It looks like another 0-for-3 weekend for the watchdog, even with an opportunity to ask two questions of Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice.
There was one tantalizing moment on NBC’s Meet the Press, when host David Gregory pressed Sec. Rice on the U.S. role in advising Georgia. (Something we’d hoped Fox News Sunday would tackle, but more on that in a second.)
MR. GREGORY: But you–this is a close U.S. ally and you warned them don’t provoke the Russians, don’t do this.
SEC’Y RICE: David, I…
MR. GREGORY: We have a lot of influence over them.
SEC’Y RICE: David, as I’ve said, this–you can’t just start with, “we told the Georgian’s this.” We also told the Russians not to engage in certain activities that they were engaging in. This was a zone of conflict, we were trying to do it peacefully. But whatever happened before this, once this broke out in South Ossetia, it could have been confined to South Ossetia. Rather than confine it to that and deal with the facts on the ground there, the Russians decided to go deeper into Georgia, to bomb Georgian ports, to bomb Georgian military installations, to go into the city of Gori. And so it was that escalation that got us to the point that where we’re at now. And that…
MR. GREGORY: And give–but given…
SEC’Y RICE: …fully has been…
MR. GREGORY: …that escalation, Secretary Rice, do you understand why there are some within the Georgian leadership who feel betrayed by the U.S.? Do they have an unreasonable expectation that the U.S. would come in guns blazing, as it were, to protect them?
SEC’Y RICE: I don’t think anybody had an expectation that the United States was going to use military force in this conflict. But we need to keep the focus on the culprit here, and the culprit here is that Russia over-reached, used disproportionate force against a small neighbor and is now paying the price for that, because Russia’s reputation as a potential partner in international institutions, diplomatic, political, security, economic, is frankly in tatters.
When President Medvedev gave that very forward-leaning speech just a few weeks ago, saying that Russia was going to be a modern state, it was going to look to Western institutions, it was going to be integrated into the international system, well, if this is what he had in mind, that’s a real problem. And I think now that vision that Medvedev put on the table is really in serious doubt, and serious trouble.
Notice how that next-to-last paragraph was uttered with out a hint of irony? That lack of irony carried over to Sec. Rice’s interview on Fox New Sunday.
WALLACE: Secretary Rice, if Russia complies with the cease-fire, do relations go back to normal or, as Secretary Gates says, do there have to be consequences for the action that Russia has already taken in the last 10 days?
RICE: Well, I think there’s no doubt there will be further consequences. I would note that there have already been significant consequences for Russia.
You know, any notion that Russia was the kind of responsible state, ready to integrate into international institutions of the political, diplomatic, security, economic kind, that this was a different Russia — a Russia, by the way, that President Medvedev himself described about a month ago — this forward-leaning, modern Russia, well, you know, that reputation’s, frankly, in tatters, and so that in itself is a significant consequence.
And also, by the way, if the Russians intended this as intimidation, they have done nothing but harden the attitudes of the small states around them, as witnessed by Ukraine’s defiance in going to Georgia, Poland, the fact that we are moving forward on missile defense.
I think the Russians have made a significant mistake here.
Meanwhile, the move to bring Georgia into NATO has slowed a little — with the U.S. now advocating that Georgia and the Ukraine become part of a “Membership Action Plan” that’s not membership, but a kind of anteroom for “resolving conflicts” first.
So, Secretary Rice went down to Georgia, looking to broker a cease-fire and turn back an invasion that reminded her more of 1968 than 2003, but Russia has only kinda sorta withdrawn.
Tune in on Friday, when the watchdog will once again ask…
