Honestly, if Bush thinks that the Russians are going to respond to any plea that the American government makes, he is very mistaken. The Russians seem to feel that their influence is being further infringed on by the west. The U.S. recently made an agreement to set up a radar system in the Czech Republic, and the Russian government was not very happy about it.

A couple of points not mentioned in the story:

The US has a mutual defense pact with Georgia

There are 130 US military and civilian "advisors" in Georgia.

The president should indeed be "deeply concerned". Unlike the third world nations he has been bullying, Russia has a nuclear aresenal that is on a par with the US. This situation is an actual threat to American security rather than the concocted threats from Iraq and Iran.

Let us hope cooler heads prevail and overcome the predisposition of the Bush administration toward war over diplomacy. The Russian nuclear arsenal may well encourage that.

You have to be kidding me Bush and PEACE please that war criminal doesnt know what the word peace means I cant wait for that man to get out of the white house he is an embaressement to this country!!!!!!!!!!

Let's see - McCain and Bush have spoken on the subject. Wonder why Obama hasn't.

Oh yeah - he's waiting for the results of the conflict so he can take the most politically expedient position.

What a loser!

Thermal
Obama did speak on it nice try!!!

How does Bush think anyone is going to listen to his please for peace, when he ordered the invasion of Iraq that has killed a minimum of 250,000 civilians? One evil war monger telling the other to cool it? I don't think so.

supporting breakaway republics is big on the white houses' list of favorite things...as long as the breakaway republics are allied with the usa or are democratic ( our particular flavor of democracy that is...).

we need to butt out completely in eastern europe and let russia do whatever it feel like OR step up and let russia and china know that they cant do whatever they feel like with no consequent international ramifications.

we supposedly have allies in europe and they need to step up big time as well because bullying militaristic nations like russia and china will only recognize a unified front of similarly powerful nations unafraid to use force ,anything else they will ignore , as they have since eisenhower and jfk .

What does it say about us as a society that there are over 1100 comments on the John Edwards affair story yet there are only 10 on the Russian Invasion of Georgia? One story is important only to the families involved, the other affects our national security. Truly Sad.

It is so hilarious to me that president Bush is calling for peace.
First you stage a terriost attack on your own country to wage war in the middle east to control oil and you turn around and try to tell other countries who they can and cannot invade.
And I agree with the comment above -the media has our nation more concerned with John Edwards affair than an actually hostile situation

Just ONCE... Can't the United States BUTT-OUT of another country's civil war?!?!

But what is this about "staging a terrorist attack" in America? Have you also been abducted into a flying saucer? Have you seen Sasquatch?

ENOUGH with the conspiracy garbage.

canary papers , i dont think its that simple. the us involvment in georgia ,eastern europe ,africa ,etc is just an ongoing democratization of the post cold war world.

the problem is that countries like russia and china look to expand politically and economically etc etc ,using military power ,not political means and to think otherwise is to ignore their very history.

these are not saber rattling nations ,they are saber wielding nations ,ready to use force to get what they need or just want. to ignore that pre fact starts any discussion out on the wrong foot.

also ,to assume there are wars fought for oil is pretty mainsteam/kneejerk thinking . if that is the case ,why is oil at all time highs in the usa ,going higher when we are dominating and basically ruling by proxy one of the largest oil producing nations ? i read the other day that iraq had a gov . surplus of 50 billion dollars because of the oil price skyrocketing recently.

so ,that begs the question...why is oil so expensive in the usa? apparently oil prices here are NOT tied to the usa winning (or losing ) some particular conflict.

the real reason we (the usa) is backing georgia and other nations around the world is that we (western civilization) need to keep russia ,india and china contained and afraid to try to expand using military force, and without our assistance ,military and economic , these smaller ,militarily weak but still SOVEREIGN nations would eventually be assimilated into the russian or chinese culture, by creeping expansionism , pogroms targeting political parties deemed problematic,etc etc, and from there it is a tiny step to political and economic domination.

now when the usa or whoever steps in to stop that kind of expansionism ,russia doesnt get what it wants ,ergo the current situation.

georgia was once (not that long agon) part of the ussr ,albeit a satellite (puppet regime) state . russia had control over its rich resources ,but the people of georgia decided they did not want to be part of russia, and using POLITICAL MEANS NOT MILITARY they started a new democratic government that is allied with their historical adversary.

now russia is using any means possible to regain the territory .thats all thats happening here ,dont sugar coat russia .

Know I see why people hate America sometimes or so much

Bush seek calm? Yeah right. His hyper-response to Iraq was anything but calm and I doubt he learned anything from the experience to apply to this situation. Just keep Bush out of international affairs for the next 5 months to minimize any further damage he has done to this country and to the world.

McCain wants Russia to move out of Georgia. Why not the same analysis for Iraq? Russia is a Constitutional Republic so they have a right to protect their new borders. We should not take sides. It is an independent region that wants to be free from Georgia and a pivot point for the meddling of the west. Look at the US we stole most of our territories. This is a not the fall of free Russia as some fear. The west has it wrong by painting Russia as the bad guys, it is mutual and Russia is drawing a line in the sand over its new borders. They do not want to descend into the chaotic colored revolutions of the region. US imperialism is the real threat to global stabilization not Russia.

yeah if there was a radar it shows who fired first maybe unless the other was provoked no one will know unless they were a witness, was CNN there to see what happened fist of all?

Exactly what does this dork think he can do about this??? He is in China with his knee pads on sucking up to the Chinese for more war money..He is the laughing stock of the world. The Russians are going to tell him to go pound sand where the sun don't shine and he will get that stupid grin on his face and say "OK". January 20 cant get here soon enough.And we will be rid of this half baked lying fool.

This conflict is about a province (South Ossetia) trying to break-away from the Republic of Georgia which had previously broken away from the former Soviet Union. Somebody, probably the Georgian's, had broken a truce that was established in '92 and the Russian's responded with force. The Russian's had been acting as "peacekeepers" enforcing the truce between the Ossetian's and Georgian's. The US has no roll in this other than to try and broker a peace between the two sides along with the EU, NATO, and UN. The US is an ally of Georgia and helps arm and train their troops as they have forces in Iraq with us. I would love to know who started shooting first and why?

I find it interesting that the Russians state that the rational for South Ossetian independence from Georgia be the same used for Kosovo. I find it hard to dispute their position.

Todd!!
Georgia started first shooting
Osetian forces had to defend
they were too small
so th capital was almost immidiately in georgian hands
russian peacekeepers were bombed too so they started defending themseleves and russian people that are there
they are constitutionaly tere to keep peace in the region and stoop the shooting from georgia side,which they are trying to do

Russia is a bully and what the USA thinks matters not to them. They want to control more people and territories.