Strategypage.com has some good things to say about the performance of the Georgian army. Obviously the Georgians were overwhelmed, but they killed a Russian commander and took some planes out. I wonder what they would have done if they had more surface-to-air missiles?
Russian troops beat the Georgians on the ground, not so much because of superior numbers, but because the Russians had more troops with combat experience, and very recent experience in fighting this kind of war. The Russians got this way by fighting a successful campaign just across the border, in Chechnya.
A more pessimisic report from the DEBKAfile is that Putin is threatening to place missiles in Syria and Iran in retaliation for American missiles in Eastern Europe and ex-Soviet republics.
DEBKAfile's military sources report Moscow's planned retaliation for America's missile interceptors in Poland and US-Israeli military aid to Georgia may come in the form of installing Iskandar surface missiles in Syria and its Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad.
Russian Baltic and Middle East warships, submarines and long-range bombers may be armed with nuclear warheads, according to Sunday newspapers in Europe.
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