Bush Administration Attempting To Provoke Conflict With Russia

The U.S. is reportedly sending a Coast Guard ship to the Georgian Port city of Poti, which is under the control of the Russian armed forces. This appears to be a clear attempt on the part of the Bush Administration to provoke a military confrontation with Russia. The U. S. knows full well that Russia has numerous ships in the Black Sea, in and around Georgia as part of their ongoing military operations there. This effort by the Bush Administration appears to be designed to create the environment for a “Gulf of Tonkin” or German U-Boat style incident. The Bush administration is using the guise of a “humanitarian mission” to send the ships into the Black Sea. There are also other NATO ships in the Black Sea conducting operations.

The Russians are already responding militarily and they have indicated that they will attempt to confront and search any Western ships entering the conflict zone. (This is the scenario that I was referring to last week).

Two other ships, including a Navy Destroyer, were earlier assigned to a different Georgian port- The port of Batumi- where no Russian troops are stationed. But one Destroyer, the McFaul, and possibly others may now head for Poti, a port that was not believed to be under consideration prior to today. The McFaul has been assigned to the Black Sea to conduct military operations after its “humanitarian mission”.

So why is the Coast Guard ship (and possibly more to follow) being sent to Poti, when other ports are available? Why use ships at all, when humanitarian aid can be moved into Georgia through a variety of other means, including by land and air? The U.S. has the greatest airlift capacity of any nation in the World. Why use a U.S. Navy Destroyer (the most powerful combat ship in the U.S. Navy’s arsenal) to ship humanitarian aid, when the U.S. military has access (contracts) to private merchant ships and its own Navy cargo vessels? This is the most bizarre fact of this whole thing. Why even use the military at all for this? The EU, UN, and NGO’s had been handling the real humanitarian effort and they have the know-how and expertise to best distribute any such aid.

This is an effort by the U.S. to flex its military might in what has become the biggest flashpoint on earth. U.S. & NATO warships in the Black Sea is provocation enough. But the use of a port that is part of ongoing military operations of another nation is a clear attempt by the White House to try to insert the U.S. directly into the conflict. There is no logical reason to use the Poti port or any other zone under Russian control, especially when other options are available. And it reveals the entire “humanitarian mission” as the fraud that it really is.

Contact peace advocates, diplomats, UN representatives, NGO’s/Peace Groups, and government representatives to put a halt to this reckless irresponsible schoolyard brinksmanship, before a new conflict and a new much larger crisis erupts.

I predicted this problem in my posting from last week, and suggested that the U.S. was using "humanitarian aid" as a way to get involved in the conflict.