WASHINGTON — Russia appears to be rolling back its military incursion into neighboring Georgia. But that’s probably because what Russia wanted wasn’t territory at all.
Instead, what Russia seized by sending in its troops was the strategic upper hand in dealing with countries around its periphery.
And that, experts say, is what it wanted after all.
“They don’t want to rebuild the Soviet Union, but they do want a sphere of influence,” said Steven Pifer, a former deputy assistant secretary of state and ambassador to Ukraine.
Russia has long itched to strike at its southern neighbor’s Western-oriented leader, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili. And Saakashvili gave them an opportunity when he sent troops into the separatist region of South Ossetia last week in an effort to reassert Georgia’s sovereignty.
U.S. officials have called Russia’s response disproportionate because its forces did not just expel Georgian troops from South Ossetia but drove deep into Georgian territory and bombed Georgian targets.
Russian leaders probably were responding not only to Georgia’s military operation but to actions by neighbors and Soviet-era allies over a number of years.
“I think this was aimed much more to the West, more to Ukraine, Central Asia and the other Caucasus states,” said Sarah Mendelson, a Russia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank in Washington. “I worry that any country in the region, such as Ukraine, that has been tilting towards the U.S., may now think twice. They may lean back a bit toward Russia.”
Russian leaders had seethed as Georgia brought in Americans to arm and train its troops. One of the first spots hit by Russian aircraft was a military base outside the capital where more than 1,000 U.S. Marines and soldiers led exercises last month.
For years, Russia could do little but fume as NATO courted and enrolled Russia’s former Soviet allies as members. But now, with its economy resurgent thanks to high oil and gas prices, and NATO and the United States preoccupied with Iraq and Afghanistan, Russia’s relative power in the region has grown.
“For 3 1/2 centuries, Russia has dominated its neighborhood,” said Angela Stent, director of the Center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies at Georgetown University. Russia is “throwing a gauntlet down, saying that there isn’t going to be any more NATO enlargement.”
NATO has granted membership to three former Soviet republics in the Baltic region — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Former Warsaw Pact countries from Poland in the north to Bulgaria in the south also have become members.
Georgia and Ukraine, each with long borders with Russia, had been hoping to gain candidate status at NATO’s meeting in December. But recent events in Georgia might make NATO members and even the countries think twice.
“The Russian argument is: ‘We are a great power. . . . Just because the Soviet Union collapsed does not mean that NATO can expand on our border,’ ” Stent said.
