A summery of multiple reports in the Murdoch owned London Sunday times today.
Bush acted dumb and flitrted with the beach vollyball players.
Sarkozy got home got consesus from rest of EU and went to Moscow, after the US tried to pesuade him not to!
Murdoch's London Sunday Times and Georgia
Bush acted dumb and flitrted with the beach vollyball players.
Sarkozy got home got consesus from rest of EU and went to Moscow, after the US tried to pesuade him not to!
It was the Europeans who moved first in trying to stop the fighting. At the Olympic opening ceremony on August 8, Sarkozy bumped into Putin soon after news of Georgia’s offensive in South Ossetia started coming in. "Sarko" was with 11-year-old Louis, his youngest son, and the Russian prime minister wrapped the boy in a bear hug.
Nearby, Bush was looking through binoculars at the Olympic parade. "Listen," Sarkozy told Putin, "it’s a mistake by Saakashvili. We have to find a way out of this crisis."
An implacable Putin replied: "I can’t let it happen." After returning from China to France, Sarkozy called Angela Merkel of Germany, Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, Spain’s Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and 10 Downing Street to try to work out a European reaction to the fighting. France not only has a policy of engagement with Russia but was also enjoying taking the diplomatic front seat. Sarkozy got back on the phone to Medvedev in Moscow.
The Russian president wanted Saakashvili "fired" but Sarkozy told him that was not a helpful condition. "It’s not up to you or me to designate the Georgian leader," he told the Russian.
Washington apparently tried to persuade Sarkozy not to go to Moscow to talk to Russia’s leaders face to face.
Bush warned him: "You’ll arrive at the Kremlin when the Russians are firing missiles at Tbilisi."
Despite the rhetoric, Russia accepted an EU-sponsored accord. "For the first time in a major international crisis, it is the Americans who are on the touchline and it is the European Union that is being called upon to sort things out," crowed a French presidential aide.
Latest annoncement from Paris is Medvedev has announced Russian forces will start withdrawl noon their time tommorrow. German chancellor Merkel has just met Russian President Medvedev in Sochi 20 miles from the Georgian border.
Sky and BBC are reporting the local poulation in occupied Georgia such as Gori are asking the Russian Army NOT to leave until the Georgian authorities are able to return as the Russians imposed order after 2-3 days of irregulars looting and causing chaos.
Other clip from article showing AEI and Murdoch despairing of Bush.
America had sleepwalked into a foreign policy disaster and its response was slow and uncertain. With Bush tarrying in Beijing watching the Olympics while Putin executed a war, Americans were reminded uncomfortably of Hurricane Katrina – another occasion when Bush dithered before eventually getting around to sending humanitarian aid.
Ralph Peters, a former military intelligence analyst, said last week at a symposium on Georgia at the neoconser-vative American Enterprise Institute: "The image for me will be the president going to a basketball game and flirting with the beach volleyball team."
He added: "Vladimir Putin is the most effective leader in the world today. Nobody comes close. In contrast, President Bush is looking like Jimmy Carter when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. It’s tragic."
Bush had thought he had Georgia in his pocket. Saakashvili is surrounded by US civilian and military advisers and is so close to US politicians that John McCain, the Republican nominee, claimed last week to be in daily telephone contact with him. However, he is regarded as "mercurial" – a polite way of saying that the Americans lost control of their client. "We’d been warned about Saakashvili for some time. Our advisers knew he wasn’t ready for prime time," said Peters. "But he’s the democratically elected leader of Georgia.
Bush while Georgia burns
Would insert the picture but not sure how!