Donald Rumsfeld Returns To Georgia:
War-tested And Ready For Fresh Conflicts
29 June 2012
By Rick Rozoff
Only reported in English on the website of the
Georgian Ministry of Defense, former Secretary of
Defense Donald Rumsfeld visited Georgia for a week in
late June.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, NATO's Deputy
Secretary General Alexander Vershbow, also an
American, and NATO's Deputy Supreme Allied Commander
Transformation General Mieczyslaw Bieniek were also in
the country last month. During Vershbow's visit
Georgian Deputy Prime Minister Giorgi Baramidze
announced that Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen
will visit his nation in September.
Something is drawing top U.S. and NATO officials to
the South Caucasus nation, as a six-member U.S.
Congressional delegation also arrived there on July 2
to meet with President Mikheil Saakashvili and Deputy
Defense Minister Nodar Kharshiladze and observe
U.S.-trained Georgian troops prepare for deployment
for NATO's war in Afghanistan.
Vershbow, former ambassador to NATO and to Russia and
Assistant Secretary of Defense for International
Security Affairs, was in the nation to attend the
Georgia Defence and Security Conference on June 29 and
was accompanied by Assistant Secretary of Defense (and
principal adviser to the Secretary of Defense and
Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology
and Logistics for matters concerning nuclear,
chemical, and biological defense programs) Andrew C.
Weber; Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for
Russia/Ukraine/Eurasia Celeste Wallander; and Rear
Admiral Mark Montgomery, U.S. European Command's
deputy director of plans, policy and strategy.
In May Admiral Montgomery was the first to announce, a
week before the NATO summit, that the U.S.-NATO
European interceptor missile system had reached
initial capability with the deployment of American
warships equipped with Standard Missile-3
interceptors, a forward-based radar in Turkey and a
command and control center at the U.S. air base in
Ramstein, Germany.
Before the conference in Georgia, NATO's Vershbow met
with Georgian Defense Minister Bachana (Bacho)
Akhalaia to discuss the host country's NATO
integration and its enhanced troop strength in
Afghanistan, where Georgia will soon be the largest
contributor of any non-NATO member.
Poland's General Bieniek, second-in-command of NATO's
U.S.-based Allied Command Transformation, was also in
Georgia for two days in June during which time he
delivered a lecture at the National Defence Academy
and met with NATO member states` defence attachés
accredited to Georgia.
The American congressional delegation will "observe
U.S. and Georgian service members training together in
preparation for deployment to Afghanistan as part of
the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF),"
according to a U.S. embassy press release.
The day before delegation's arrival, President
Saakashvili addressed graduates at the Cadets Military
Lyceum in Kutaisi and his comments included:
"There is nothing more authoritative in Georgia than
the Georgian army."
The Georgian armed forces need to remain ever-vigilant
and perpetually mobilized because "the one who wants
to invade entire Georgia is not sleeping."
"We will never have a huge army, but at the same time
we will have up to 100,000 reserve troops, which will
be ready to defend their villages, streets and
neighborhood if we need it."
On June 21 Rumsfeld returned to Georgia. His first
trip to the country was in December 2001, eleven
months after becoming U.S. defense secretary,
following which visit the Defense Department launched
the Georgia Train and Equip Program, at first led by
U.S. Green Beret special forces, then by the U.S.
Marine Corps and personnel of the British Army. The
program lasted until 2004, when it was succeeded by
the Georgia Sustainment and Stability Operations
Program. Altogether, the U.S. and its NATO allies have
refashioned the Georgian armed forces for deployments
to Iraq and Afghanistan and for the invasion of South
Ossetia and war with Russia in 2008.
On December 5, 2003 Rumsfeld was the first senior
American official to visit the nation after the
extralegal putsch, known as the Rose Revolution, that
later brought Saakashvili to power with a 96 percent
vote the following month.
Two weeks after standing president Eduard Shevardnadze
was manhandled and forced from office, Rumsfeld was in
Tbilisi to, in his words, "underscore America's very
strong support for stability and security and the
territorial integrity here in Georgia." The comment
was a hardly veiled threat to Adjara, Abkhazia and
South Ossetia, whose leadership wanted no part of a
"Rose" Georgia and whose presidents went to Moscow for
emergency consultations immediately after the coup in
Tbilisi of November 23.
He met with the "Rose" triumvirate of then-Georgian
Interim President Nino Burjanadze, State Minister
Zurab Zhvania (whose family accuses Saakashvili over
his death in 2005) and presidential candidate Mikheil
Saakashvili as well as inspecting the Krtsanisi
National Training Centre near the capital where the
U.S. had been training Georgian troops since the
preceding year (and have been doing so since).
Even at that early date Rumsfeld advocated, although
acknowledging that Georgia was a member of NATO's
Partnership for Peace program, it needed to advance
further toward NATO integration, including full
membership. With characteristic bluntness, he demanded
Moscow "withdraw Russian forces from Georgia," meaning
small contingents of peacekeepers in Adjara and South
Ossetia.
Nino Burjanadze, now in the anti-Saakashvili
opposition, said of the meeting with the Pentagon
chief: "We stressed that relations with the U.S. are
of main importance for us. We also stressed that our
foreign policy remains unchanged and accession to the
NATO remains a priority. We thanked Mr. Rumsfeld for
providing assistance to Georgia…"
Rumsfeld in turn said: "Georgia made a decision to
work closely with NATO. This was a good decision. The
decision was reaffirmed by the new leadership. We look
towards the political, economic as well as military
reforms that move Georgia's approach closer to the
democracies of the West."
Making the most of his time in Tbilisi and not
unrelated to the above, Rumsfeld also inspected a
pipeline that was later incorporated into the
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey) oil
transport project, described as the world's most
politicized pipeline.
Six days after his arrival in Tbilisi, Georgian
special forces entered into breakaway South Ossetia,
in the word's of Britain's Daily Telegraph, "inflaming
tensions in a country already facing the threat of
civil war."
A week after his departure the first of four Georgian
battalions trained by U.S. military personnel under
the Georgia Train and Equip Program graduated.
In May 2004 Adjara fell into by then President
Saakashvili's clutches following large-scale Georgian
military exercises conducted on its borders, with
Saakashvili immediately threatening that Abkhazia
would be next. Four years later Saakashvili attempted
just that against South Ossetia and Abkhazia, but was
thwarted by Russian military intervention.
In May 2005 Rumsfeld's commander-in-chief, George W.
Bush, became the first and to date only American head
of state to visit the Caucasus when he arrived in the
Georgia capital with a 700-person delegation and spoke
at a rally with Saakashvili.
His comments at the time, a clear attempt to replicate
President John F. Kennedy's Berlin Wall speech of
1963, included the following, well worth recalling in
regard to what has transpired in the interim:
"Your courage is inspiring democratic reformers and
sending a message that echoes across the world. Now,
across the Caucasus, in Central Asia and the broader
Middle East, we see the same desire for liberty
burning in the hearts of young people.
"In recent months, the world has marveled at the
hopeful changes taking place from Baghdad to Beirut to
Bishkek. But before there was a Purple Revolution in
Iraq, or an Orange Revolution in Ukraine, or a Cedar
Revolution in Lebanon, there was the Rose Revolution
in Georgia."
The reference to Bishkek is an allusion to the
so-called Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan in March
2005.
When Rumsfeld returned to Georgia late last month he
was greeted by Defense Minister Bacho Akhalaia, who
briefed him on the transformation and upgrading of his
nation's military under the auspices of the U.S. and
NATO.
According to the Georgian Defense Ministry's website,
during the meeting between Rumsfeld and Akhalaia
"focus was placed on the enhancement of Georgia`s
defence capabilities and military education."
The two sides "also referred to Georgia`s involvement
in the ISAF mission and NATO integration
perspectives." Georgia's defense chief "extended his
gratitude to the former Secretary of Defence for his
contribution to deeper US-Georgia relations in the
defence and security spheres."
Akhalaia further stressed that "the basis for
intensive cooperation between the two countries was
laid exactly throughout [Rumsfeld's] service in the
Pentagon, under George Bush`s presidency of the United
States."
A decade later, Rumsfeld was given accolades for
starting the process of building a Pentagon-NATO
surrogate army in Georgia, one which is now war-tested
and ready for fresh conflicts.
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