Trust, But Verify

Well, Russia has agreed to ceace hostilities--for now. They've (at least oficially) stopped bombing the soverign state of Georgia, but refuse to withdraw troops both from Southern Ossetia and from the areas of Georgia they pushed into. The (probable) puppet president of Russia has ordered Russian troops to hold the ground they've taken, defend themselves, and quell any rebellion in the areas they've taken.

In essence, Russia has cut Georgia nearly in half. They say they've completed what they've set out to do. I say that we need to take them at their word exactly as Regan did: trust, but verify.

Why?

Well, this entire situation stinks of a set-up. I spoke of some of what I mean now yesterday, regarding the parallels between this invasion of a neighboring, smaller country, and Hitler's invasion of Chechoslovakia in '38. The further I've read, the more convinced I am that this has been in the works for a long, long time, at least on Russia's part.

According to the New York Times (not the most credible source of all, but still), Russia has been giving out passports and citizenship papers to anyone who wanted them since before Georgia's current president was elected. The International Herald Tribune (admittedly a sattelite of the New York Times) says:

Under the presidency of Vladimir Putin, Russia had been granting citizenship and distributing passports to virtually all of the adult residents of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the much larger separatist region on the Black Sea where Russia also massed troops over the weekend.

The West was skeptical about the validity of Russia's handing out passports by the thousands to citizens of another nation. But whatever the legal merits, the Kremlin had laid the foundation for one of its public relations arguments for invading Georgia: Its army was coming to the aid of Russian citizens under foreign attack.

Many sources have been skeptical of this move. Many sources agree that has allowed for the position that Russia took in invading a soverign nation. What allowed them to claim, like Hitler, that they were only following the wishes of Russian citizens. Many sources also agree that Russia's response has been "disproportional.

Russia, and Vladimir Putin in specific, has made no secret of personally and politically disliking Georgia's president, Mikhail Saakashvili, from the start. Indeed, "Russia's foreign minister called for Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili to resign and Medvedev said Georgia must pull its troops from South Ossetia and Abkhazia — the two breakaway provinces at the heart of the dispute."

Update: As I said first, Russia claims that they've ceased hostilities. Georgia says otherwise. Russia says that the attacks are from another separatist segment of Georgia, Abkhazian. However, there is no proof that Russia is telling the truth. Before we believe them, we need to make sure that they are.

Update: I thought so, too.