Kurt Bassuener October 3rd, 2008

Soon after Eric posted the link below to the excellent Joshua Kurlantzick article, “Monster’s Ball,” the two of us discussed some of the themes therein.  The reliance on particular leaders seems a constant and repeated error throughout American statecraft, nearly always ending in tears.

One factor seems very clear to me - that the Bush administration was far more concerned with having talking points to buttress the assertion that “freedom (was) on the march,” even before his second inaugural address, than it was with the adherence to democratic principles. Furthermore, it conflates “democratic” with “pro-Western,” or “pro-American,” and these don’t always go hand in hand.  And when a regime is undemocratic and aligned with the US, it’s a safe bet the population will rightly see the US as complicit in their oppression.  The primary concern, despite all discussion of the paradigm shift away from backing “our SOBs” that came with Bush’s 2003 NED address, has been to have governments aligned with the US.

Post-Rose Revolutionary Georgia in particular came at an opportune time for the Bush administration, which was scrambling to find another rationale for the invasion of Iraq.  So the Saakashvili administration and the Bush administration were in a symbiosis, with Washington not wanting to point to Georgia’s increasing bellicosity or democratic transgressions, both of which might have been reined-in with a bit of friendly pressure early on.  The fact that they were not helped lead to the debacle of August’s “five day war” with Russia, which saw the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia leave Georgia’s orbit - even before the war legally Georgian territory but not under physical control - probably for good.  But Bush was happy to adopt and keep Georgia as a poster child - never mind the more complicated reality.  Georgia of course deserved support, but not uncritical support.

Yet the sorts of blatant hypocritical mistakes that gutted the credibility of the “freedom agenda” from the start were, as Kurlantzick notes, the relationships with such “friendly dictators” as Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, recipient of $2 billion a year in guaranteed aid.  That massive potential US leverage has never been employed to press Mubarak’s brutal and sclerotic regime to open up, and is the subject of a fascinating new book, Inside Egypt - The Land of the Pharoahs on the Brink of a Revolution, by John R. Bradley (recently banned in Egypt, natch).

Near the close of his angry book, Bradley cites the bizarre position of Egypt’s beleagured liberal democrats with a recounting of the experience of Hisham Kassem, winner of the National Endowment for Democracy’s Democracy Award a year ago:

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These conflicting goals (democracy and transparency along with stability) were captured in the rather bizarre experience of one Hisham Kassem, an Egyptian human rights activist who, in October 2007, was one of four international activists given the prestigious Democracy Award of the National Endowment for Democracy.  Kassem found the experience woefully depressing. “To see the president of the United States in person and his more or less lack of interest in what is happening politically in Egypt left me without any doubt that this whole [democracy] program was over,” he told Reuters after collecting his award.  Kassem said that although the president asked about reformers in the ruling NDP (to which he replied “Sorry, there are no reformers in the NDP”), Bush was mainly interested in the position of Islamists in Egypt.  Kassem made clear that the government had made it impossible for secular movements to operate, leaving the field open to the Islamists: “There is no alternative now for the people, given that that Islamists operate out of mosques while secular parties are not allowed to operate at all.” With the difficult economic situation, he added, “I am worried Egypt will become a theocracy by 2010.” Apparently that comment finally got Bush’s full attention, and he seemed rather perplexed that American policy was not working, noting: “We give your country $2 billion a year in order to keep it stable and prevent it from turning into a theocracy.”  He looked, Kassem said, quite dismayed.

Some would argue Kassem did himself no favors in meeting with Bush and his top advisors.  For the unfortunate reality is that the American push for democracy is now perceived as having been insincere at best, hypocritical at worst.  Which is hardly surprising, when for the president the purpose of the payoff to Mubarak’s regime is stability rather than reform.

Bradley further quotes another Egyptian human rights activist, Ahmed Said al-Islam, as saying:

The war on terror is undermining democracy advocates and strengthening Arab dictatorships…The latter are using it to put off reforms and arguing that being pro-reform means siding with the enemies of the state.

American credibility in democracy promotion is so denuded after the Bush years that respected Carnegie Endowment scholar Tom Carothers says it needs to be ”decontaminated” to regain credibility in a new administration.  Harsh words, but apropos, I believe. 

The US, having beat the democracy drum so loudly, is front and center in being cited for hypocrisy, but sadly not alone. In the case of Egypt, French President Sarkozy asked Mubarak to co-chair the Mediterranean Union summit last summer - though it’s fair to note that none of the potential members from the southern littoral of the Mediterranean really fits the bill as a democracy.  The larger point to be made is that the democratic world has no clear strategy to employ the leverage it has to promote its values.  The US and EU remain divided on democracy support largely because the Bush administration has shot its credibility on the subject.

No matter what the result of the US presidential election, the bottom line is that the EU and the US have to collaborate in that endeavor if it is to bear fruit and help reverse authoriarian capitalism’s increasing appeal.

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Eric Witte October 2nd, 2008

Writing for The New Republic, Joshua Kurlantzick has a thoughtful article on a series of setbacks for democratization over the past few years, as has been documented by Freedom House.  In part Kurlantzick attributes backsliding and lack of progress in Central Asia, Africa, Latin America and East Asia to the Bush administration’s selling of the Iraq war under the banner of “democratization” (which gained prominence once weapons of mass destruction failed to materialize) and to the administration’s naked hypocrisy in dealing with countries from Azerbaijan to Equatorial Guinea:

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As members of the Bush administration eye their legacies, they can be sure that their embrace of democratization has tarnished the very idea. In a 2006 report on the backlash against democracy, the U.S. National Endowment for Democracy, which funds democracy promotion around the world, admitted that some of its grantees overseas did not want to meet with NED program officers for fear of being tainted by association. The Iraq war, which was rationalized as an exercise in democratization, has also inspired new faith in authoritarian rule by linking the idea of democracy with the chaos in Baghdad. “What happened in Iraq makes the entire region afraid,” Haitham Maleh, a former president of the Committee for Human Rights in Syria, told Salon.com. “People don’t want to risk foreign occupation, chaos, and sectarian bloodshed.”

Worse, the administration has not even stuck by its guns. After having earlier emboldened some Middle Eastern democrats with promises of a “freedom agenda,” Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, on her most recent trip to the region, barely mentioned the word “democracy.” At times, the Bush administration has gone out of its way to assist autocrats, aiding the Ethiopian regime over the past three years in exchange for promises to help fight terrorism in Somalia and welcoming the leader of Azerbaijan at the White House after he rigged a national poll. The administration has even embraced leaders like Equatorial Guinea’s Teodoro Obiang Nguema, who has been accused of abhorrent crimes, overseeing a regime under which political opponents are tortured, starved, and raped (Obiang himself has even been accused of eating the body parts of rivals). Still, in April 2006, Rice met Obiang at Foggy Bottom and–no doubt aware that Equatorial Guinea is becoming one of the largest oil exporters in West Africa–told him, “You are a good friend, and we welcome you.”

Beyond American policy failures, Kurlantzick also attributes democratic backsliding to the weakness of new democratic governments and the increasing savvy of authoritarian leaders.  China and Russia, alarmed by the color revolutions, are now offering training to authoritarians around the world in how to resist and co-opt democratic opposition.  The whole sobering article is must reading.

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Eric Witte September 21st, 2008

Douglas Muir makes a good point regarding the war in Georgia over at A Fistful of Euros:

What’s interesting - and sort of depressing - is that the war seems to have damaged the prospects for liberal democracy for all four parties. Not that those prospects were bright in Russia or South Ossetia anyhow, but still: all the participants are seeing a tightening of press controls, a strengthening of the nationalist line, and a general boost to the authoritarian pretensions of the current ruling class. And this is likely to get worse before it gets better… if it ever does get better.

Indeed, the prospects for democracy in Russia, South Ossestia and Abkhazia have long looked bleak.  And Muir is right that Georgia has undergone democratic setbacks as well, dating to before the Russian invasion. 

With the West hoping to stave-off Russian control of Georgia, President Mikheil Saakashvili is probably much less likely to come under western pressure with regard to his own democratic shortcomings.  That seems to be a natural reaction to increased polarization and tension between the West and Russia.  But does it make sense?  With Saakashvili’s dependence on the EU and US greater than ever, Washington, Brussels, and European capitals have greater theoretical leverage to insist that he consistently adhere to democratic ideals.  In the end, ensuring that the moral divide between Tbilisi and Moscow is not muddied by Saakashvili’s authoritarian streak would help Georgia to sustain greater sympathy in the West.

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Kurt Bassuener September 16th, 2008

Just as addendum to the earlier post, this BBC article spells out in some greater detail the positions of various democratic governments regarding their sanctions.  The EU will review its sanctions next month, for example.

The article also contains an organigram of the power sharing deal. 

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Kurt Bassuener September 15th, 2008

Zimbabwe’s bitter political rivals Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai today signed a deal that will divide power between the two of them, with Mugabe retaining his role as President, and Tsvangirai taking on a new Prime Ministership. The ministerial positions will be split with Mugabe’s ZANU-PF holding 15 and the MDC’s two combined wings (the main led by Tsvangirai, and a smaller led by now-Vice President Arthur Mutambara) holding 16.  Al Jazeera English reports the ministerial portfolio split thus:

Zanu-PF, the MDC and the smaller opposition grouping of Mutambara met in Harare on Saturday, agreeing to share out the 31 cabinet seats.

The powerful state security ministry was abolished while the justice portfolio was split into two and a new prisons department was formed.

The parties met again on Monday to allocate ministries, with the MDC reportedly pushing to take control of home affairs, local government, one of the justice ministries, information and finance.

The name of the individual heads of the ministries are expected to be announced later in the week, according to a government minister.

 The whole agreement, courtesy of the Financial Times, can be seen here.

South African President Thabo Mbeki was at the Harare ceremony where the deal was signed, and introduced the main signatories.   The ceremony was attended by the leaders of Swaziland, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and other regional leaders.  Interestingly, Mutambara, who preceded Tsvangiarai, repeatedly called Tsvangirai “president.”  The differences between the speeches of the main antagonists could hardly be more stark.  Tsvangirai’s speech was mostly forward looking, dwelling predominantly on the dire situation of Zimbabwe’s citizens, and the need to work together to resolve their plight:

I, the prime minister of Zimbabwe, call Zanu-PF and MDC to unite Zimbabwe. Divisions belong to the past.

If you were my enemy yesterday, today we are bound by the same patriotic duty and destiny…

I have signed this agreement because I believe it represents the best opportunity for us to build a peaceful, prosperous, democratic Zimbabwe.

I have signed this agreement because my belief in Zimbabwe and its peoples runs deeper than the scars I bear from the struggle.

I have signed this agreement because my hope for the future is greater than the grief I have for the needless suffering of the past years.

Today, every one of us has a decision to make.

Should we be driven by feelings towards those we blame for the suffering we have endured, or shall we be driven by the hope of a new, better, brighter country - the hope of a new beginning?…

The international aid organisations came to help our country and found our doors locked.

We need to unlock our doors to aid… we need medicine, food, and doctors back in our country.

We need electricity, water, petrol for our vehicles, we need to access our cash from banks…

This unity government will let businesses flourish so our people can work and provide for their families with pride.”

Mugabe’s speech rewound all the way back to the liberation struggle, and tried to place his repression in anti-colonialist terms, implying that the opposition were agents of Britain and the US:

“Are we beginning today? No. We have been walking the same route without knowing it, or not recognizing each other. After all, we are all Zimbabweans and is there any other road, any other route to follow? History makes us walk the same route…

[Looking at Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara] I don’t see any British amongst them. There is no American amongst them.

Let us be allies.

African problems must be solved by Africans.

The problem we have had is a problem that has been created by former colonial powers, who wanted to continue to interfere in our domestic affairs and continue to have a share of our natural resources.

This is what we have resisted.

We have said the land - Zimbabwe’s land - belongs to Zimbabweans…

Democracy, democracy. Democracy in Africa is a difficult proposition.

Because always the opposition will want much more than what it deserves.

The opposition will want to be the ruling party and will devise ways and means of getting there, including violence [jeers].

I am not just referring to you, but I am referring to the system as we see it in Africa. That’s what it is. [Jeers]

I can give examples. What is happening in Mozambique? In Ivory Coast? It will take us some time to get to a position where opposition parties will confine themselves to peaceful ways.

People will want to see if what we promise is indeed what we strive to do… We are committed, I am committed, let us all be committed.”

It is, of course, a risky move on the part of Tsvangirai, but he must have signed when he saw no other way out.  Mugabe, before he strode the podium, looked dejected - not having had to share the stage with a domestic rival since Joshua Nkomo, who he ultimately broke.

The international community is maintaining a wait-and-see stance on the deal, which asks for international sanctions to be lifted.  The US State Department’s reaction in its daily press briefing is below:

QUESTION: My question is about Zimbabwe.

MR. MCCORMACK: Zimbabwe.

QUESTION: Now that the agreement has been signed –

MR. MCCORMACK: Right.

QUESTION: — and maybe you know a little bit better about it and whether –

MR. MCCORMACK: A bit more. We don’t have a full picture of it. We have not yet seen the agreement and all of its details. We have had some briefings on it, and from what we have learned from the MDC briefing us on the detail – what – the details of it, then we would welcome this agreement, again, with the caveat that we haven’t yet seen the full agreement. And it is our hope for Zimbabwe and the Zimbabwean people that they could – they can now move forward, that this – the agreement, as we understand it, can be fully implemented, and that the agreement be implemented in such a way that it reflect the will of the people, as expressed in the recent election.

QUESTION: And are you optimistic it will be able to implement?

MR. MCCORMACK: Well, we’ll see. You know, you can get agreements and it’s important to execute those agreements, implement those agreements. We’ll see how it’s implemented.

Yeah.

QUESTION: On that subject, the new power-sharing leadership there in Zimbabwe has called on Britain to accept responsibility for compensating farmers who lost their land during the land reform process there. I wondered what you thought of that idea. Should Britain be compensating farmers there?

MR. MCCORMACK: I think that’s for the parties involved to comment on, and not for us. We don’t seem to be an issue in that particular question.

That latter point is apparently a sticking point in Mugabe’s mind, who seems convinced Britain should have financed the buyout of white farmers.

The foreign ministers of the EU, meeting in Brussels, also adopted an implementation first approach (full conclusions here):

The Council will study the details of the agreement and will be attentive to its implementation, which will mean immediate cessation of all forms of intimidation and violence. It stresses that that agreement must provide the Zimbabwean people with the reforms awaited: democracy and the rule of law, including respect for human rights, and the restoration of the country’s economic and social situation.

What is clear is that Mugabe is weakened.  What is less clear is whether he is weakened enough so that Zimbabwe can now begin to dig itself out of the hole he and his cronies dug it into.

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Eric Witte August 25th, 2008

Radovan Karadzic has his second court appearance this week at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, when he will have another opportunity to enter a plea.  (He refused to do so at his first appearance.) Karadzic is charged with crimes across Bosnia and Hercegovina, including the July 1995 massacre by Serb forces of some 8,000 Bosniak men and boys in and around the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica. 

On Sunday, Kurt had an article in the St. Petersburg Times, which offers a bleak but fascinating look at the tremendous effort by the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) to account for Srebrenica’s victims:

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In ICMP’s mortuary in Tuzla the air hangs thick and musty - the dank odor of mortal remains excavated from mass graves, placed in numbered plastic burlap sacks, stacked seven high and 15 wide. Brown paper bags of clothing found on or with the remains, also carefully labeled, top the shelving. A neighboring room contains personal effects, such as walking canes, ID cards and canteens.

In many cases, the whole male line of a family was wiped out. Just last month, on the 13th anniversary of the fall of Srebrenica, 308 bodies found in mass graves and identified by the ICMP were reburied.

…

The center painstakingly links the remains of individuals killed at the same execution sites but spread among many secondary mass graves. The bones of some 140 individuals were laid out on long tables and shelves in the large room, each bone and fragment individually marked with a numbered foil tag. The skeletons of three brothers are laid out side by side. DNA from parents can only ensure identification as a child, but not which one absent other data. Two of four missing brothers could be positively identified by other distinguishing features, relative age, or because they themselves had children with matching DNA. But one partial skeleton could only be narrowed down to brother number three or four. More evidence is needed to positively identify him.

Every year on July 11, the remains of those identified are buried at Potocari, near Srebrenica. Families have sole discretion as to whether to bury a loved one who has been only partially found. Great is the trauma suffered by some who have buried a loved one only to find more remains later, and face the choice of disinterring the previously identified remains. ICMP refrains from contacting families until a significant amount of remains have been identified.

The man who was in operational command at Srebrenica, Ratko Mladic, remains at large in Serbia.  European Union foreign ministers meet next month, with Serbia again on the agenda.  Karadzic’s arrest would likely not have been possible without Dutch and Belgian insistence on Serbia’s full cooperation with the ICTY prior to implementation of its Stabilization and Association Agreement and other EU benefits.  As Kurt argues, the pressure should be maintained:

Will the man accused of being operationally responsible for creating the tangle of human remains that is still being sifted ever see justice? That largely depends on the continued lonely leadership of the Dutch and Belgian governments, and the readiness of those, including the U.S. government, who bankroll the international tribunal to continue financing its work until justice is done.

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Eric Witte August 23rd, 2008

The Economist provides a nice overview of Liberia’s gradual recovery under President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf*, who took office in January 2006.   While she has tackled corruption and sought to spur economic growth to the advantage of average Liberians, Liberia has received substantial aid from the United States and Europe, as well as benefitted from mounting international investment.  As The Economist notes, China is among the countries putting cash into Liberia:

The Chinese are getting involved too. They have resurfaced the decrepit William Tubman Boulevard, Monrovia’s main artery, named after the country’s longest-serving president, and will take on similar projects throughout Liberia.

China’s influence across Africa is growing, which has rightly sparked concern.  In such places as Sudan, Chinese investment serves as a crutch for dictatorial (and in Sudan’s case, genocidal) regimes.  By contrast, Chinese investment in democratic Liberia seems unproblematic at first blush.  Yet it still poses a potential risk.

If Liberia’s fragile new democracy were to falter, there is a decent chance that western aid would be used as leverage to keep democratic governance on track.  The response of the United States and European Union to the August 6 coup in Mauritania, for example, could eventually create real pressure for the restoration of democratic order in that West African nation.  It is evident that Western defense of democracy in the region (and beyond) is far from guaranteed.  Witness, for example, the West’s appalling, passive acceptance of outright dictatorship in Liberia’s bauxite-laden neighbor, Guinea, or its cozy diplomatic relationships with the despots of oil-rich Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.  

While use of the established democracies’ leverage cannot be taken for granted in pressing for democratic change or seeking to prevent democratic backsliding, it is clear that China doesn’t care about democracy or good governance at all.  As long as natural resources from African countries continue to fuel China’s rapid economic development, Beijing will maintain support for the most odious of regimes.  To the extent that China becomes a major player in Africa, potential leverage from established democratic governments for maintance of human rights and democracy declines.

Liberia remains one of the poorest countries in the world and obviously cannot afford to turn up its nose at any aid or investment.  But China’s no-strings-attached approach to investing in Africa raises the stakes for Liberia by cutting away part of the safety net under President Johnson Sirleaf’s impressive high-wire act.

*Most media organizations - including The Economist - hyphenate her last name, but in interviews President Johnson Sirleaf has said that it isn’t hyphenated.

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Kurt Bassuener August 15th, 2008

In an ominous development, the Washington Post reports a Russian reaction to yesterday’s missile defense deal:

In Moscow today, Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, deputy chief of the Russian general staff, said that a newly-signed missile defense deal between the U.S. and Poland “cannot go unpunished,” the Associated Press reported. He did not elaborate.

I’ve always thought the Bush administration’s fixation on missile defense was a bad idea, and that hasn’t changed.  But one has to wonder what sort of punishment Moscow might have in mind, seeing as the last time that word was used, it was employed by President Medvedev to describe the military operations against Georgia.

Given Moscow’s reaction, it is understandable why Poland would want bilateral assurances, on top of NATO commitments, and direct assistance from Washington as the cost for deploying the missile defense interceptors.  The New York Times reports today:

The deal reflected growing alarm in a range of countries that had been part of the Soviet sphere, about a newly rich and powerful Russia’s intentions in its former cold war sphere of power. In fact, negotiations dragged on for 18 months — but were completed only as old memories and new fears surfaced in recent days.

Those fears were codified to some degree in what Polish and American officials characterized as unusual aspects of the final deal: that at least temporarily American soldiers would staff air defense sites in Poland oriented toward Russia, and that the United States would be obliged to defend Poland in case of an attack with greater speed than required under NATO, of which Poland is a member….

The missile defense deal was announced by Polish officials and confirmed by the White House. Under it, Poland would host an American base with 10 interceptors designed to shoot down a limited number of ballistic missiles, in theory launched by a future adversary such as Iran. A tracking radar system would be based in the Czech Republic. The system is expected to be in place by 2012.

In exchange for providing the base, Poland would get what the two sides called “enhanced security cooperation,” notably a top-of-the-line Patriot air defense system that can shoot down shorter-range missiles or attacking fighters or bombers.

A senior Pentagon official described an unusual part of this quid pro quo: an American Patriot battery would be moved from Germany to Poland, where it would be operated by a crew of about 100 American military personnel members. The expenses would be shared by both nations. American troops would join the Polish military, at least temporarily, at the front lines — facing east toward Russia.

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Eric Witte August 15th, 2008

Following last week’s coup in Mauritania, the United States quickly suspended non-humanitarian aid and the African Union suspended Mauritania’s membership, signaling a promising coordinated defense of Mauritania’s young democracy.  On Monday, France followed suit in suspending non-humanitarian aid.  The  European Commission appeared to be working in the same direction, but leaving itself wiggle room.  European Voice reported on Tuesday [subscription req’d]:

“A spokesperson for Louis Michel, European commissioner in charge of development, told European Voice that the EU executive is preparing to launch formal consultations with Mauritania, under the Cotonou agreement which governs the relationship between the EU and African, Caribbean, and Pacific countries. The agreement foresees the launch of such consultations when countries breach principles of democracy and respect for human rights. The spokesperson said that ‘the potential of suspension [of development aid] is there’, if the discussions do not produce satisfactory results.”

With international pressure mounting, things might seem bleak for the coup plotters who overthrew President Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi. 

Or do they? 

Reuters reports that international companies involved in extracting natural resources in Mauritania remain unperturbed by the coup.  Their activities continue unhindered, and now provide remittances to an illegitimate government.  Extraction in the areas of oil, gas and uranium are relatively young, meaning that the coup has occured as exploration is giving way to more lucrative production.  The same Reuters report notes that Chinese demand is driving up prices for iron ore, so this staple of the Mauritanian economy is producing record profits.

In an additional bit of good news for General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz and other members of the junta, just five days before seizing power, a four-year fishing agreement between the European Union and Mauritania came into effect.  In exchange for access to Mauritanian waters for fishing vessels from Spain, Portugal, France, Italy and Greece, the EU will pay Mauritania EUR 76.25 million per year.  The $23 million (about EUR 15 million) in suspended American assistance to Mauritania suddenly seems less impressive.

Yesterday, the junta named a former Mauritanian ambassador to the European Union, Moulaye Ould Mohamed Laghdaf, as prime minister.  Reuters quotes an anonymous diplomat saying, “Internationally speaking it’s a strategic nomination because he is pro-European and he knows how Brussels works.”  But it gets worse.  Digging deeper into Laghdaf’s background, Agence de Presse Africaine reports that he has specific experience in coordinating European support for natural resource extraction in Mauritania:

“He worked as an international consultant between 1997 and 2000 and before that as an expert at the Centre for Industrial Development (TDCI) of the ACP (Africa, Caribbean and Pacific) states and the European Union (1991-1997).

He was in charge of selecting adapted technologies for the development of ores at the TDCI, searching for European partners and institutions to finance identified projects.

He was in charge of developing the mining resources of the ACP states, particularly the implementation of the mining and industrial part of the Lome Convention.

He wrote and published practical guides on increasing the value of mining resources of the ACP states and developing the phosphates of Mauritania, Senegal, Mali and Togo.”

It appears that to really pressure the putchists, the European Union and its member states will have to prioritize the defense of democracy over mercantilism and parochial interests. 

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Eric Witte August 11th, 2008

Proposals for stronger western action to defend Georgia from Russia’s invasion have tended to be short on specifics.  For example, Bill Kristol asks in yesterday’s New York Times:

Shouldn’t we therefore now insist that normal relations with Russia are impossible as long as the aggression continues, strongly reiterate our commitment to the territorial integrity of Georgia and Ukraine, and offer emergency military aid to Georgia?

The first proposal is a given - as long as the attack continues, western relations with Russia will be anything but normal.  That seems like weak motivation for Putin to call an end to the war while such tantalizing goals remain within his grasp. 

The second action is only a verbal commitment absent other actions.  As I wrote earlier, at least with regard to Ukraine, it could actually be helpful in defining its sovereignty as a red line for the West.  But I’m not sure it does anything for Georgia at this point. 

The third proposal - emergency military aid - is more concrete when it comes to doing something to defend Georgia now, but Russia has moved swiftly and controls Georgia’s airspace.  How would emergency military aid even be delivered?  Would Georgia still have a functioning military by the time it got there?  Then, of course, there’s the question of how Russia would respond.

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