Some thoughts on Ronald D. Asmus 'A Little War that Shook the World. Georgia, Russia and the Future of the West', conference-paper St. Andrew's 16-17 April 2010. European Security, Vol. 21, No. 1, March 2012, 129-138.
It is now 21 years since my first intervention in the then-developing Georgian-Abkhazian crisis. Followers of news-releases on the Net for Abkhazia were reminded of this in late 2009 by a group calling themselves The Experts' Club, which, by their own admission, consists of former KGB officers from Georgia. I circulate their piece (with necessary correctives inserted) both to shew the low opinion in which I am held by many (?most) Georgians and to demonstrate the kind of responses one can expect, when daring to present arguments not wholly in accord with the perceived Georgian national project. Basically, then, I have been presenting variations on the same theme now for 21 years, and, since one often hears/reads that my motive stems from having an Abkhazian wife, let me put on public record at the outset that my wife actually advised me notto get involved back in the spring of 1989 before I popped my 'Open Letter to the Georgians' (as mentioned by the 'Experts') in the post to Tbilisi.
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