Russia's `War' With Georgia Dashes NATO Entry Plans

By Bradley Cook and Janine Zacharia

Aug. 9 (Bloomberg) -- The armed conflict between Russia and Georgia deals a blow to U.S. aspirations of bringing the former Soviet republic into NATO's orbit and securing an emerging energy corridor linking Central Asia to Europe.

Russian tanks pushed into the separatist South Ossetia region, and Georgia said Russian warplanes bombed sites including the port of Poti and the western military base at Senaki. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili evacuated the presidential residence to a ``safe location'' and will reemerge to chair an emergency session of government officials, Kakha Lomaia, head of Georgia's Security Council, said by telephone after midnight in Tbilisi.

Georgia said 30 Georgians were killed in the violence and 70 were injured, while the Russian government said 1,300 people had died in South Ossetia due to Georgian military actions.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the fighting was a response to Georgia's assault on Russian citizens and the peacekeepers Russia has had in the disputed region since the early 1990s. Saakashvili called it a ``well-planned invasion'' and appealed for international help. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said, ``War has started.''

The conflict ``absolutely'' dooms Georgia's chances for North Atlantic Treaty Organization membership, said Robert Hunter, U.S. ambassador to the Brussels-based alliance under President Bill Clinton and now a senior adviser at the policy- research group RAND Corp. in Washington. ``You don't bring in a country that has this sort of trouble.''

Rice Works Phone

As those hopes evaporated, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice worked the phones with her Russian counterpart, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, and planned to send an envoy to broker a cease-fire between the sides. President George W. Bush, attending the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympic Games yesterday, said the U.S. backed the ``territorial integrity'' of Georgia. The U.S. asked Russia to withdraw its combat forces.

The European Union joined efforts to stop the conflict, though help may not be as forthcoming as Saakashvili wants in part because of European dependence on Russian energy supplies.

``Countries like Germany and France were already resistant to the idea of giving a NATO security guarantee to a country with an open dispute with Russia,'' said Dominic Fean, a researcher at the French Institute of International Affairs in Paris. ``I can't see how they can get the consensus of 26 states anytime soon.''

Georgia's Ambassador to the U.S. Vasiil Sikharulidze told Bloomberg Television the conflict would make NATO entry for the country harder, ``but we are strongly convinced we have to continue this way and that we will be a NATO member.''

`Rose Revolution'

Saakashvili, a U.S.-educated lawyer, came to power in the 2003 ``Rose Revolution'' backed by the U.S. He vowed to bring South Ossetia and two other separatist regions under central control in a challenge to Russia.

South Ossetia has a population of about 70,000 and is connected to Russia's North Ossetia region by a tunnel through the Caucasus Mountains. Most South Ossetian residents hold Russian passports.

Georgia is a key link in a U.S.-backed ``southern energy corridor'' that connects the Caspian Sea region with world markets, bypassing Russia. The BP Plc-led Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline to Turkey runs about 100 kilometers (60 miles) south of the South Ossetian capital, Tskhinvali.

Gas Strategy

The U.S. seeks to connect Central Asia natural gas supplies with European markets, skirting Russia in an attempt to weaken the grip of Russia's state-run OAO Gazprom energy company. One planned pipeline route runs from the Georgia-Turkey border.

NATO in April committed itself to bringing Georgia into the alliance without providing a timeframe or a clear path toward membership -- as Bush had pushed for -- out of concern it would antagonize Russia. Putin has called the expansion of NATO toward Russian frontiers a ``direct threat'' and likened South Ossetia's drive for independence to Kosovo's from Serbia.

Sergei Mironov, a Putin ally who heads Russia's upper house of parliament, said the fighting is ``grounds'' to consider South Ossetia's appeal for international recognition, which cited Kosovo as a precedent, Interfax reported.

Russia hasn't recognized Kosovo since its declaration of independence.

Diplomatic efforts in the South Ossetia crisis were inconclusive late yesterday, raising the possibility that violence might spread, potentially rattling energy markets.

The ruble dropped the most against the dollar in 8 1/2 years and Russian stocks tumbled yesterday on concern the fighting would worsen.

``This could be a prolonged and bloody conflict with an unpredictable end,'' said Pavel Felgenhauer, an independent military analyst in Moscow.

NATO Role

While NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer called on all sides to end fighting and hold direct talks, the alliance is staying out of the discussions.

``NATO hasn't got a direct role in the conflict in the Caucasus,'' spokeswoman Carmen Romero said in an interview. ``We don't have a mandate to negotiate or mediate.''

Republican presidential candidate John McCain and Democratic rival Barack Obama called on Russia and Georgia to halt hostilities and hold negotiations.

Hunter said flawed diplomacy was in part responsible for the clash. ``This is an issue that was allowed to get out of hand by people who haven't thought through what NATO membership really means, and on the Russian side doing too much muscle flexing over a country that is a pretty small place,'' he said.

To contact the reporters on this story: Bradley Cook in Moscow at bcook7@bloomberg.net; Janine Zacharia in Washington at jzacharia@bloomberg.net.