Obama: U.S. and Russia “disagree” on facts of August War

Despite overall thawing relations between Washington and Moscow, U.S. President Barack Obama announced in a statement that the U.S. will hold firm to the Bush administration’s interpretation of the of the brief war between Russia and Georgia in August 2008 –  that Russia invaded Georgia unprovoked.

The joint statement with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev covered a wide range of issues and was overall constructive in tone. However, it did highlight disagreement in a few key areas — Georgia being key among them. Obama reiterated that the United States will not recognize Abkhazia or South Ossetia as independent states and maintains that disagreements persist between Washington and Moscow on the “causes and sequence of military actions” leading to the all out five-day military conflict between Russia and American ally, Georgia.

One person overjoyed by this news is Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili. In his country he has been accused by the growing opposition of starting an unwinnable war with Russia through reckless military action against the separatist province of South Ossetia.

Saakashvili and the U.S. State Department have held firm to the narrative that Georgia moved its forces into the province in order to counter artillery bombardments on Georgian villiages by rebel forces and to halt a Russian incursion that was already underway. This version has many critics. Numerous journalists on the ground in at the time of the conflict as well as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which had military monitors in place in South Ossetia, have said that they saw the opposite and that the Georgian claims lack evidence.

No one should be surprised at this move. Despite his desire to “hit the reset button” on relations with Russia, Obama would be putting the United States in an awkward position to admit Georgian wrong-doing in the August War despite how rational and factually sound that might be. In the end this is likely no more than a symbolic gesture keeping the United States from totally losing its relationship with the Caucasus nation, without necessarily strengthening it — the administration has not given any clear indication it wants Georgia in NATO.

Obama appears to be prepared to allow this issue to be a stalemate while the U.S. and Russia can press ahead on other collaborative issues. In the end, no one totally lost face, and the situation is no more resolved today that it was yesterday.