- Joined
- May 5, 2018
- Messages
- 10
- Points
- 33
Hello guys, I know I am a bit late into this discussion.
I do not have new images to add, but I would like to take a moment to reflect on the exchange that happened at the beginning of this thread.
Gordus & DTA had a heated exchange about the veracity of the timeline and information provided by both sides.
I personally, find this debate absurd and highly irrational. This especially when it comes to sources both sides have pitted.
I will propose the examination of 3 points, that would both be Anachronic (yes hindsight is a b°°°) but also evident given the source material I have seen.
The first point is that both sides are lying as hell when it comes to both the start of the hostilities but also to the results achieved both before the actual confrontation, during and finally after.
To discuss these points I will forego totally Russian sources. I will only use one of the references many times tossed to my face to explain Total Disaster when it comes to the August War.
This source was proposed even here and is the infamously reductive Cohen & Hamilton Russian performance analysis during the August war.
I will not delay my barrage much more, and will start.
1. Cohen & Hamilton are mainly authors of a political piece with certain military overtones. This is painfully clear in a couple of initial takes. As such the double standard is exhausting:
"U.S. intelligence-gathering and analysis of the Russian threat to and invasion of Georgia was found lacking. So was U.S. military assistance to Georgia, worth around $2 billion over the last 15 years, since a Russian invasion was not seriously considered to be a strategic threat to the U.S.-friendly country."
This is not true. To the extent that most intelligence operatives in Georgia were only trying to leave Tbilissi by late 9th August. Fact notably verified by the Exiled correspondent Mark Ames.
The invasion was either self evident, or not evident at all. It's a bit of Schrödinger's cat here.
This leads to something else. If the US was not seriously considering a fight in Georgia, so would the Georgian State. The US/NATO Pin on its chest, Georgia would have felt pretty secure to advance in South Ossetia. This take means that unlike what Cohen & Hamilton opine, the action couldn't have been spontaneous to the tune of 4/6 thousand troops committed for this operation. The planning is too large to be hastily prepared and hidden from a country like Russia, even in 2008.
Then we are afflicted by something like this:
"Bringing down President Saakashvili and installing a more pro-Russian leadership in Tbilisi."
It's mind boggling, and probably already a tell tale of the goal of this "study". I will add that this study was published in June 2011, when it became painfully obvious that Russia had no interest of deposing Saakashvili and while the US was busy deposing Khadaffi. The irony of the situation is maybe the cherry on top here. But let's continue with the rest.
So, so far the couple here have already committed a couple of elementary mistakes in the Hypothesis, because it is a Hypothesis.
They have already prepared the audience for a zero-sum game. Russians weren't expected to attack, but they actually were. That attack was premeditated and aimed at nothing less but a regime change. But they didn't do that.
I also left a little nugget for the rest of you, so you can read the obviously partisan tone of this.
"The war also demonstrated the weaknesses of NATO and the EU security system, because they provided no efficient response to Russia’s forced changing of the borders and occupation of an Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) member state. "
Earlier in 2008, a OSCE member had lost a quarter of its territory despite that territory being legally theirs and declared so by a UN resolution. Guess which State.
This projection, because that's what it is, a US projection of their own operational planning MO, is however even worse when it comes to the description of the actual combat.
2. Cohen & Hamilton are hardly credible to this point. It's about to get worse.
a. "Russian military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer". This is in page 23....The very actual beginning of the monograph.
b. We are to believe that the most dramatic front, the Axis Tskinvali-Gori-Tbilissi were only assaulted by 12 thousand troops, but the coast from Abkhazia which wasn't playing any role in the Georgian offensive was attacked by 15 thousand troops?
c. We have not a single clear source, with most of the time tossing a number and then doubling it.
d. Then our two analysts put the Georgian forces at...12/15 thousand and all three CBR's engaged.
Now My question is this, do you guys agree with this or are we back to 4/6 thousand Georgians. I Personally thing that the forces in presence were 15 vs 5 in the TGT axis. With about 5 more From the Coast.
3. Cohen & Hamilton seem to ignore every point they want to make sub-sequentially.
a. They first speak about a "Spontaneous Planning", then Complain that the Civil Administration would try to have a leash on the military matters. This is a typical constraint in representative systems. The military is subordinated to the Civil Authority.
b. They portray Russia as a clunky system that...relied on Systemic strengths to win, but Georgia was heaps better in Flexibility and tactical level. However, this vision doesn't account for its own issues. A strategically inferior side SELDOM takes the initiative in symmetrical warfare. This is the thinking of an asymmetric unit, not unlike the Finish armed forces during the Winter War.
c. Once we read this we cannot analyse this conflict the way most of you keep analyzing it. I am looking to the pro-Georgian guys. Unless the undertone is that Georgia initiated the confrontation with the thought someone was going to intervene to keep Russia in check.
With this in mind, we can imagine that some insurances were provided to the Georgian Authority. If they weren't then the Georgians were set for failure since the beginning. This is basically suicide from the Georgian side.
Now that we have had this small preparatory discussion. We can see that the Goals of the Georgian Army were at best self-destructive and at worst treasonous. Never mind the tactical quality, we have to keep in check that the Georgians committed crimes against Peace in sofar that they started the military action and they attacked a PK base.
While most of your will disregard that and will claim that the Russians were part in the conflict, this doesn't matter as much as it gave clearly the Russian a mandate in this war.
In a sense, even Cohen & Hamilton recognize this, even though they try and newspeak it:
"In examining the Russian strategy for the war, it is instructive to begin with an overview of the road to war, since the actions Russia took in the months leading up to August 2008 say much about whether and when Russia expected war and how it hoped to achieve its objectives if war came."
I do not have new images to add, but I would like to take a moment to reflect on the exchange that happened at the beginning of this thread.
Gordus & DTA had a heated exchange about the veracity of the timeline and information provided by both sides.
I personally, find this debate absurd and highly irrational. This especially when it comes to sources both sides have pitted.
I will propose the examination of 3 points, that would both be Anachronic (yes hindsight is a b°°°) but also evident given the source material I have seen.
The first point is that both sides are lying as hell when it comes to both the start of the hostilities but also to the results achieved both before the actual confrontation, during and finally after.
To discuss these points I will forego totally Russian sources. I will only use one of the references many times tossed to my face to explain Total Disaster when it comes to the August War.
This source was proposed even here and is the infamously reductive Cohen & Hamilton Russian performance analysis during the August war.
I will not delay my barrage much more, and will start.
1. Cohen & Hamilton are mainly authors of a political piece with certain military overtones. This is painfully clear in a couple of initial takes. As such the double standard is exhausting:
"U.S. intelligence-gathering and analysis of the Russian threat to and invasion of Georgia was found lacking. So was U.S. military assistance to Georgia, worth around $2 billion over the last 15 years, since a Russian invasion was not seriously considered to be a strategic threat to the U.S.-friendly country."
This is not true. To the extent that most intelligence operatives in Georgia were only trying to leave Tbilissi by late 9th August. Fact notably verified by the Exiled correspondent Mark Ames.
The invasion was either self evident, or not evident at all. It's a bit of Schrödinger's cat here.
This leads to something else. If the US was not seriously considering a fight in Georgia, so would the Georgian State. The US/NATO Pin on its chest, Georgia would have felt pretty secure to advance in South Ossetia. This take means that unlike what Cohen & Hamilton opine, the action couldn't have been spontaneous to the tune of 4/6 thousand troops committed for this operation. The planning is too large to be hastily prepared and hidden from a country like Russia, even in 2008.
Then we are afflicted by something like this:
"Bringing down President Saakashvili and installing a more pro-Russian leadership in Tbilisi."
It's mind boggling, and probably already a tell tale of the goal of this "study". I will add that this study was published in June 2011, when it became painfully obvious that Russia had no interest of deposing Saakashvili and while the US was busy deposing Khadaffi. The irony of the situation is maybe the cherry on top here. But let's continue with the rest.
So, so far the couple here have already committed a couple of elementary mistakes in the Hypothesis, because it is a Hypothesis.
They have already prepared the audience for a zero-sum game. Russians weren't expected to attack, but they actually were. That attack was premeditated and aimed at nothing less but a regime change. But they didn't do that.
I also left a little nugget for the rest of you, so you can read the obviously partisan tone of this.
"The war also demonstrated the weaknesses of NATO and the EU security system, because they provided no efficient response to Russia’s forced changing of the borders and occupation of an Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) member state. "
Earlier in 2008, a OSCE member had lost a quarter of its territory despite that territory being legally theirs and declared so by a UN resolution. Guess which State.
This projection, because that's what it is, a US projection of their own operational planning MO, is however even worse when it comes to the description of the actual combat.
2. Cohen & Hamilton are hardly credible to this point. It's about to get worse.
a. "Russian military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer". This is in page 23....The very actual beginning of the monograph.
b. We are to believe that the most dramatic front, the Axis Tskinvali-Gori-Tbilissi were only assaulted by 12 thousand troops, but the coast from Abkhazia which wasn't playing any role in the Georgian offensive was attacked by 15 thousand troops?
c. We have not a single clear source, with most of the time tossing a number and then doubling it.
d. Then our two analysts put the Georgian forces at...12/15 thousand and all three CBR's engaged.
Now My question is this, do you guys agree with this or are we back to 4/6 thousand Georgians. I Personally thing that the forces in presence were 15 vs 5 in the TGT axis. With about 5 more From the Coast.
3. Cohen & Hamilton seem to ignore every point they want to make sub-sequentially.
a. They first speak about a "Spontaneous Planning", then Complain that the Civil Administration would try to have a leash on the military matters. This is a typical constraint in representative systems. The military is subordinated to the Civil Authority.
b. They portray Russia as a clunky system that...relied on Systemic strengths to win, but Georgia was heaps better in Flexibility and tactical level. However, this vision doesn't account for its own issues. A strategically inferior side SELDOM takes the initiative in symmetrical warfare. This is the thinking of an asymmetric unit, not unlike the Finish armed forces during the Winter War.
c. Once we read this we cannot analyse this conflict the way most of you keep analyzing it. I am looking to the pro-Georgian guys. Unless the undertone is that Georgia initiated the confrontation with the thought someone was going to intervene to keep Russia in check.
With this in mind, we can imagine that some insurances were provided to the Georgian Authority. If they weren't then the Georgians were set for failure since the beginning. This is basically suicide from the Georgian side.
Now that we have had this small preparatory discussion. We can see that the Goals of the Georgian Army were at best self-destructive and at worst treasonous. Never mind the tactical quality, we have to keep in check that the Georgians committed crimes against Peace in sofar that they started the military action and they attacked a PK base.
While most of your will disregard that and will claim that the Russians were part in the conflict, this doesn't matter as much as it gave clearly the Russian a mandate in this war.
In a sense, even Cohen & Hamilton recognize this, even though they try and newspeak it:
"In examining the Russian strategy for the war, it is instructive to begin with an overview of the road to war, since the actions Russia took in the months leading up to August 2008 say much about whether and when Russia expected war and how it hoped to achieve its objectives if war came."
Last edited: