Asymmetric Conflict: Case Study Of Russian-Georgian War

The problem of small (local) wars and so called “frozen conflicts” is very important inour international society. There are always a lot of reasons for this conflicts to happen andmost of them still stay unsolved. In this thesis I try to understand a little more about whythose conflicts happen so often nowadays. And as a case study I’m analyzing the conflictbetween Russian and Georgia which were once two parts of one big state USSR. Me as aRussian citizen is highly concerned about wars on the borders and so called “frozen conflicts”of the former USSR. There are few of them but the one with Georgia was the most recent onebefore this paper was started. The problem of small wars on the Russian border worries notonly Russian citizens but also people of neighbor states and the whole international society.The new conflict has started this year. It is the one between Russian and Ukraine. I hope thisthesis will contribute its share in studying asymmetric conflicts and especially will help tofind a way to prevent those conflicts in future.The topic of the research is “Asymmetric Conflict. Case study of Russian-GeorgianWar.” The main research question is “Have Russian-Georgian conflict emerged from theasymmetric nature of relations between the two states?” And according to the researchquestion, the main argument is that “The main reasons for the conflict to start came from thenature of asymmetric relations between Russia and Georgia”.Different approaches to understanding the problem of asymmetric conflicts have beenconsidered. Having reviewed different typologies of the conflicts I chose the theory ofasymmetric conflict suggested by Brantly Womack as the theoretical basis of the presentstudy. Womack explained his theory firstly from the bilateral form of relations and then heapplied the theory to regional and universal multilateral relations. Womack tried to explainhow states that are in asymmetric relations can maintain stable relations between them and atthe same time he explained the reasons which can lead to disagreements, conflicts and wars.According to Womack, an asymmetric relationship can be an absolutely normalrelationship, so they are not in need of correction. However, there are alwayssystemic differences in interests and perspectives of the stronger and weaker sides inasymmetric relationships. The weaker part is more attentive to the relationship because it is more at risk. At the same time the stronger side is inattentive to the bilateral relationship withthe weaker power. It makes the weaker side a sort of paranoid, and so the difference in viewsof relationship can lead to misunderstanding and cause a conflict. There are many otherreasons for the asymmetric conflict to start and they all are described in detail in Chapter2and Chapter4. The theory of asymmetric conflict by Womack provides the perfect frameworkfor studying conflicts between a large powerful state and much smaller ones.The case study to analyze is recent war between Russia and Georgia in2008. After thebreak-down of the Soviet Union asymmetric relations emerged between Russia and Georgia.Two states had and have significant differences in capacities. Russia is great powerpossessing large economic and military resources (including nuclear weapons), having largestterritory in the world (more than17million square kilometers) and big population (about150million people). Georgia is a small state (about70thousand square kilometers) withpopulation about4.5million people. Even though Georgia and Russia were new politicalcommunities their relations were kind of stable for nearly15years because they maintainedgood relationship and so called “equilibrium of defefence and autonomy”.But there emerged few reasons for this equilibrium to be shaken. First of the reasons wasthe novelty of power in relationships. In2004after Mikheil Saakashvili came to power inGeorgia, he started the new politics and the relationships between Russia and Georgia hasspoiled.The other reason for the conflict were misperceptions between the two states. Georgiawas afraid for its autonomy and Russia did not have enough deference. As long as Russiawas greater in capacities it paid little attention to Georgia, while Georgian attention in its turnwas fully paid to Russia. This happened because Georgia was more at risk because Russianthreat to Georgia was bigger than vice versa. For Russia it was important to push Georgiaback not only to stop the disagreement but also to free its attention for other problems. Russiaand Georgia could not maintain that equilibrium of needs for deference and autonomy. Eachof two states made a mistake of trying to predict the other state by using own experience.This led to the misperceptions between two states.When the war began, both Russia and Georgia gave their reasons for starting it. Georgiaclaimed that it was responding to attacks on its peacekeepers and villages in South Ossetiaand that Russia was moving non-peacekeeping units into the country and provoking Georgiantroops. Russia, in its turn, claimed that Georgia became aggressive towards South Ossetia andthe consequence of this aggression was a humanitarian disaster,30thousand refugees, deathof Russian peacekeepers and inhabitants. Georgian attack was qualified as genocide andRussian actions were a necessary humanitarian intervention and peace enforcement.There were also other reasons which none of two states claimed about. Russia surely didnot want Georgia to enter NATO. As we know according to NATO charter states who haveterritorial disputes cannot become members of the organization. By provoking Georgia to warRussia also prevented other countries like Ukraine and Azerbaijan against trials to join NATO.The other reason for war was Russia’s government wish to show leadership in the region.From the other hand, Georgian reasons to start this war were attempt to stop South Ossetiafrom self-determination and separation; chance to raise authority of the President andpatriotism in the state.Once the USA and NATO took place in the event we can no longer call it bilateral and itcomes to the multilateral stage. For understanding of the multilateral part of the theory Iapplied the triangular model which is called “romantic relations”. The USA as a state withgreater capacities played a role of X in triangle, Russia was Y and Georgia Z as a smalleststate in the triangle. Although we cannot definitely determine this triangle as “romantic”,because we cannot call relations between Russia and the USA totally friendly. But this modelis the closest to the reality. The USA and NATO could not fully control actions of two states.After relations between Georgia and the USA became better than normal, and on the otherside relations between Russia and the USA became worse than normal, according to thescheme, it influenced the tensions between Russia and Georgia to grow. This was the otherbig reason for the conflict to start. These relations of Russia and the USA and NATO aredescribed in detail in Chapter4.The asymmetric theory of Brantly Womack was applied for the case study of Russian-Georgian war on the bilateral and multilateral levels and the reasons to start the conflict havebeen analyzed. The asymmetry conflict theory works perfectly for the case study. Althoughthere exist some extra reasons for the escalation. They lay mainly in both states’ domestic andgeopolitical interests, including relationships with NATO. However, these reasons can beincluded in the basic scheme of the Womack’s asymmetry theory.