EUCOM Battle Knowledge Centers

In the summer of 2008, a conflict that appeared to have begun in the breakaway Georgian territory of South Ossetia rapidly escalated to become the most significant crisis in European security in a decade. The implications of the Russian-Georgian war will be understood differently depending on one's narrative of what transpired and perspective on the broader context. This book is designed to present the facts about the events of August 2008 along with comprehensive coverage of the background to those events. It brings together a wealth of expertise on the South Caucasus and Russian foreign policy, with contributions by Russian, Georgian, European, and American experts on the region.

The brief war between Russia and Georgia in August 2008 seemed to many like an unexpected shot out of the blue that was gone as quickly as it came. Former Assistant Deputy Secretary of State Ronald Asmus contends that it was a conflict that was prepared and planned for some time by Moscow, part of a broader strategy to send a message to the United States: that Russia is going to flex its muscle in the twenty-first century.

Putin's Master Plan makes the case that it is essential to wake up to Putin's strategy to divide Europe, destroy NATO, and build a new empire in the former Soviet Union. Russia has demonstrated an extraordinary level of aggression, most boldly by its outright invasions of Georgia and Ukraine. Russia's terrified neighbors have been left without an alternative to Russian domination by American weakness and a divided Europe, and even once-stalwart American allies such as Georgia are on the brink of becoming part of Putin's new empire in Europe. Putin has made it clear that he sees NATO expansion as a fundamental threat to Russian nationhood, and he is systematically challenging the NATO Alliance as well as the United States.

This fully updated book offers the first systematic analysis of Putin s three wars, placing the Second Chechen War, the war with Georgia of 2008, and the war with Ukraine of 2014 2015 in their broader historical context. Drawing on extensive original Russian sources, Marcel H. Van Herpen analyzes in detail how Putin's wars were prepared and conducted, and why they led to allegations of war crimes and genocide.

In August 2008, the armed conflict between Russia and Georgia broke out on the territory of Georgia’s breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The Russian-planned military campaign lasted 5 days until the parties reached a preliminary ceasefire agreement on August 12. The European Union (EU), led by the French presidency, mediated the ceasefire. After signing the agreement, Russia pulled most of its troops out of uncontested Georgian territories, but established buffer zones around Abkhazia and South Ossetia. On August 26, 2008, Russia recognized the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, making them a part of what President Dmitry Medvedev called Moscow’s “zone of privileged interests,” and since then deploying five military bases on occupied Georgian territory.