Strongman, The

Beijing. Medvedev says that he was woken by the defence minister to be told of the attack on Tskhinvali, but hoped it was just a provocation. It was only when he was told that a tent full of Russian peacekeepers had been hit, killing them all, that he gave the order to counterattack. Anyone who believed that Medvedev was a ‘softie’ compared to the strongman Putin would be mistaken. It was the president (he says) who ordered the invasion – without even consulting his Security Council. The Council did eventually meet, and supported the decision, but this was still before Putin arrived back from China. Eventually Putin returned, flew to Vladikavkaz in North Ossetia, to see the situation on the ground for himself, and then to Sochi, where he finally met Medvedev to discuss the situation. 25
    On the second day of the war, Russian bombers flew 120 sorties, aiming to destroy Georgia’s defence infrastructure – including all the shiny new hardware acquired from the USA, Israel and Ukraine.
    The next day Condoleezza Rice, who had just started a vacation with her aunt and sister at the luxury Greenbrier resort in West Virginia, called Sergei Lavrov and demanded an end to the invasion. The conversation became a major bone of contention between the two. Lavrov said the Russians had three conditions: ‘First, the Georgians have to go back to their barracks.’
    Rice said, ‘OK.’
    ‘Second, they have to sign a non-use-of-force pledge.’
    ‘OK.’
    ‘And three, just between us, Saakashvili has to go.’
    Rice could not believe her ears: ‘Sergei, the American secretary of state and the Russian foreign minister do not have a private conversation about overthrowing a democratically elected president.’ 26
    She decided to go public with what she regarded as a Russian threat of regime change in Georgia. On 10 August the US envoy to the UN, Zalmay Khalilzad, announced: ‘Foreign Minister Lavrov told Secretary Rice that the democratically elected president of Georgia – and I quote – “Saakashvili must go” – end of quote. This is completely unacceptable and crosses a line.’
    Lavrov was incensed. He said in an interview: ‘To announce to the entire world what you have discussed with your partner is not part of our diplomatic practice.’ He did not entirely deny that he had said it, though, but insisted he merely indicated ‘that we would never deal with him again’. 27
    By 11 August the Georgians, having seen Gori bombarded and emptied of its citizens, believed the Russian army was planning to move on the capital, Tbilisi. There was panic in the president’s chancellery: pictures were taken off the walls, documents stuffed into boxes in readiness for a quick evacuation. Carl Bildt and the American envoy, Matt Bryza, were there, calculating they had little more than half an hour before the Russians would enter the city.
    Saakashvili appealed to President Bush for the help he thought had been promised. ‘I told him, “Look, right now, on your watch, you might see the reversal of the demise of the Soviet Union. It might be restored right now in my country, and it would be a very sad turn of history – for us certainly, for us it would be the end – but certainly for the US and for the world.” ’ 28
    His allegation that Russia was about to enter his capital and reincorporate Georgia into some new version of the Soviet Union could have been seen as either paranoid, manipulative or simply as a disingenuous attempt to cover up his own calamitous decision to go to war. But Medvedev later indirectly confirmed that, while ‘our mission at the time was to destroy Georgia’s war machine’, more radical options were considered: ‘Saakashvili should be grateful to me for halting our troops at some point. If they had marched into Tbilisi, Georgia would most likely have a different president by now.’
    The threat was taken seriously in Washington, especially in view of Lavrov’s comment to Rice. Bush convened his national security team. Defence Secretary Robert Gates recalls: ‘There was a clear feeling on the part of virtually everybody in the situation room that the Russians had flat out committed an aggression against an independent state, and were proceeding to dismember it.’ 29
    The Americans even contemplated intervening militarily themselves. According to Secretary of State Rice: ‘There was a little bit of chest beating around the table about what we would do and about how we could signal the