"Russia has invaded a sovereign neighboring state and threatens a democratic government elected by its people. Such an action is unacceptable in the 21st century" ¹

Says who. Says the man who began the 21st century with unprovoked invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, and who threatens to engineer a third invasion before the first decade of the century is over. Says the man at whose hands over a million have died and as many at least have been forced from their homes. Says the unelected President and Commander-in-Chief of the strongest military force the planet has ever known. Says the self-appointed ruler of the world.

"There is no justification for continued Russian military action in Georgia, which threatens the stability of the entire region and risks a humanitarian catastrophe" ²

Says the corpse of Gordon Brown; who spat on stability and international law when he voted for the illegal invasion of Iraq, and spits on humanitarian needs as he continues the destruction of that country and Afghanistan.

"The British policy is founded on very clear foundations, that the rule of force does not replace the rule of law, and the territorial integrity of sovereign nations is to be respected" ³

Says who? Says the corpse of Gordon Brown's jet-setting pipsqueak foreign minister, who sat back idly while the Labour Government spat and shat on international law.

"Britain's weight is being felt in establishing very, very clear lines that force is not the basis for redrawing international maps" ⁴

Says he whose pipsqueak weight as Blair's Head of Policy Unit was keenly felt by Serbs at the receiving end of forceful British bombs; the man who as a loyal member of the British cabinet ensured that nothing was done about the 150,000 Serbs who were chased from Kosovan land⁵ while it was a NATO protectorate; and the man who, as Foreign Secretary, drew clear new international lines dividing Kosovo from Serbia without UN approval. Not to mention, of course, his help in colouring in the new maps of Afghanistan and Iraq with stars and stripes.

But the Russians too are learning. They knew that force was not the basis for redrawing international maps. So they forced the independence-seeking Chechens to live according to their international map by smashing the country and the people, destroying and poisoning the land, reducing the infrastructure to rubble and appointing a local mafia boss to keep the order. Then having used force in order not to redraw any maps, they raised the architect of this destruction first to President of Russia for two terms, and then to Prime Minister. And now they can proclaim that:

"The Russian Federation is an example of largely harmonious coexistence by many dozens of nations and nationalities. ... Some nations find it impossible to live under the tutelage of another. Relations between nations living 'under one roof' need to be handled with the utmost sensitivity" ⁶

If they ask for independence: smash them and destroy the unharmonious ones - but do so with the utmost sensitivity. Preserve that sensitivity when neighbouring nations try to smash their inharmonious regions:

"The most important thing [in invading Georgia] was to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe" ⁷

So says the current 'President' of Russia. He who received a personal anointment from the murderer of Chechnya; he who appointed that same murderer as his own Prime Minister; he who has ordered the Russian peacekeeping forces in South Ossetia to abandon the land of South Ossetia and march on into Georgia to destroy the peace there, leaving some of the people of South Ossetia to burn the houses and chase from the land the other peoples of South Ossetia.

And finally, and not surprisingly, the media-savvy, crazed tie-chomping president of Georgia also took some lessons... My friends in NATO do it, my neighbours in harmonious Russia do it - the birds and bees and educated fleas do it. But of course he says it in his own tie-chomping, media-savvy, half-crazed style.

"When people say the Georgian army invaded that is a technically unclear term, what does it mean invaded, it was such a small place there was nothing to invade there"⁸

!?*@!!??#*!?

It's very easy really. You can invade as long as something is small, and as long as it's not a neighbouring country. You can redraw (or colour in maps) by means of force, as long as you clearly establish clear lines that no-one else can do so. You can protect minorities by bombing them, or by bombing others, as long as... well - as long as you have more bombs than they do; and you can preserve human rights and keep the peace by leaving the locals to chase out other locals they don't like the look of, as long as the Kosovars do the chasing and you're NATO, or the South Ossetians do the chasing and you're Russian.

And the general rule about independence is that it is fine by those who seek to make you dependent on them.

Notes:

1. George Bush

2. Gordon Brown calls on Russia to end military action against Georgia

3. Miliband holds Georgia crisis talks

4. Interview with World at One

5. The New York Times on the Kosovo Crisis

6. Why I had to recognise South Ossetia

7. UK urges tough response to Russia

8. Interview with Saakashvili