Armed Negotiations: It Ain't Over 'til the Fat Russian Lady Sings

Update:  Now we know where the western half of the Georgian Army is located - Kutaisi(5)

Textbook invasion of Georgia. Tactical pause. Cease fire allegedly brokered. Russia insists on doing "recon" and defending against any attacks. Some firing continues. Reports of 30,000 refugees, mostly women and children, fleeing north to Russia (the men, apparently, are remaining behind as irregular militia fighting with the Russians). Other reports indicate at least 60,000 fled south east to Tbilisi from parts of Ossetia and the town of Gori.

Time for a map to see how the situation is shaping up (Library, University of Texas, CIA maps)




Just for comparison, therather unsettling idea that we may know as much as the US government knows about the situation:

it's "ludicrous" to assert that satellite capabilities are to blame for the administration's lack of information about the situation in Georgia. Cohen, who said he alerted the Bush administration to Russia's preparations for war in Georgia more than two years ago, said "glaring gaps" in research and analysis by the nation's national security team are to blame.

"I think this is a significant lack of policy and analysis" about events in the region, he said.

Hopefully, that is improving with the advent of military humanitarian aid, some judicious satellite manouvering and piecing together the few open source reports, we probably have a better idea today.

A quick overview of how the situation currently stands in Georgia (from open sources).   "0" represents the jumping off point for the Russians' two divisions of heavy and light armor (appx 150 vehicles and 10,000 men).  As a reminder, the numbering of these locations is simply based on an east to west accounting, not the order of battle.  The exact location of the Georgians at the time of the beginning of hostilities is not 100% clear.  Somewhere slightly southeast of Ts'khinvili(4) with other troops stationed around the west of Ossetia to control the territory that the Georgians have owned for about eight years.  I'll refrain from trying to figure out who moved first and why since the accepted wisdom already has the Georgians allegedly deciding they were going to over run the Ossetians on a whim, without bothering to cut off the Roki Tunnel or otherwise prepare the battle space with so few forces my nephew's junior varsity football team could have taken them, but I digress. 

Red squares are known Russian positions (supplemented by Abkhazian and Ossetian militia).  White and red squares are Georgian positions.  White and red circles are either Georgian light infantry or Georgian militia where reports of skirmishes have taken place and been confirmed.  Red solid line is known route of Russian troops.  Red broken line is possible route of Russian troops.

Somewhere to the north of Ts'khinvili (4), a few hours after hostilities started and the Russian army began to roll (hours later?!), the Georgians finally attempted to take out the bridge over the river at Ts'khinvili (Didi Luhkuri?).   By most reports it seems that they were either forced by circumstances (such as being ill prepared, being surprised by the invasion or by Russian superior air power) to attempt to take the bridge out with artillery and land to land missilesinstead of an air raid.  This was unsuccessful (though they appeared to shell it for upwards of three hours) and the Russians were able to cross from the west side to the east side of the river, driving down past Ts'khinvili (4).

In short order, the Georgians in South Ossetia were rolled back to Gori (3) where they joined possibly two or three brigades more of Georigan Army that were drawn up to defend Gori (3).  We should keep in mind that the entire Georgian army is just a little over 20,000 (four divisions, 18 to 20 brigades) that were spread over the entire Georgian country including holding the pass at Zugdidi (7) against the Abkhazians, an army base at Senaki (6), another at Gori(3), southeast of Tbilisi (1) and a smaller enclave somewhere east of T'elavi (not numbered).  There were possibly 2 brigades (2,000) stationed throughout parts of South Ossetia (4) to hold the territories that the Georgians controlled there for the last eight to ten years.  The numbers of Georgian troops at any of these bases or within South Ossetia is purely speculative as there is little good information about their locations and activities prior to beginning of hostilities except vague outlines of troop movements and numbers from the media. 

The Russians began to push south from Ts'khinvili (4) towards Gori (3) with the intention of cutting off the east-west transportation node.  They may have hoped to catch the 3 to 5 brigades of Georgian army above Gori (3) with their backs against the river or possibly hoping the Georgians were foolish enough to stand and fight there, but someone on the Georgian side had come to their senses.  After several hours of tactical pause and re-establishing order, the Georgians made a tactical retreat to Meshkheta (1), six miles northwest of Tbilisi, where the terrain created natural defenses and a greater portion of the eastern Georgian army were drawn up to defend Tbilisi.  At most, this may be less than two divisions or 10,000 men as there are reports that the Georgian Army still exists somewhere east of Gori (3).  The ranks around Tbilisi may be swelled by a few thousand volunteer militia, though, unlinked report indicated the Georgian army was first sending voluteers home.  Total numbers are speculative at best.  As noted here, the Georgians traded space to buy time.

Russians were reported leaving Gori (3) as if in relation to the cease fire agreement backed by Sakorzey from France, but they simply ended up going east and stopping about 12 miles northwest (2) of Tbilisi (1).  That leaves only six short miles between both armies.  Likely reports of continuing exchanges of SAF (small arms fire) are recon patrols or militia from either side coming into contact.

The Russians bombed Poti (8) and then blockaded the western Black Sea ports (10).  Current reports have between 6 and 10 Russian navy vessals stationed off the coast.  They destroyed the Georgian Coast Guard facilities.   A small skirmish took place between four Georgian Coast Guard ships and several Russian vessals during the landing of Russian marines in Abkhazia.  One Georgian ship was sunk, one damaged and at least one Russian ship was damaged.  Galrahn from information dissemination makes an interesting point about the speed of the Russian naval advance:

While the speed of the Russian Army's response grabbed the attention of western observers, the fast response by the Russian Navy has been quite remarkable, too. The war started on Friday August 8th; the Black Sea Fleet was reported to arrive off the coast of Georgia on Saturday August 9th. That's pretty impressive, considering it is about 400 nautical miles from Sevastopol to Ochamchire. While the Moskva, Smetlivy, Muromets, and Aleksandrovets can make good speed and make the trip quickly, those ships sailed from Sevastopol with an assortment of support vessels that could only make 12-16 knots, at best. Simple math reveals that would make it a 25 hour trip, meaning the ships would have had to put to sea almost immediately after the fighting began. For any fleet to deploy that quickly is extraordinary readiness.

Additional marines (up to 4,000; reports are still questionable) landed in Poti(8) and the port at Supsa (10) was bombed along with the oil terminal and several ships at berth.  Russian troops, either from Poti(8) or from Abkhazia (7) descended on Senaki (6) and destroyed a Georgian army base there along with large amounts of munitions and arms. 




Where the western part of the Georgian army is at this time is anyone's guess.[guessing over: .And Georgian troops in the western city of Kutaisi(5), some 50 miles from the Black Sea coast, said they were bracing as a Russian armored patrol advanced from the west. The patrol traveled inland to a town called Abasha, which is some 23 miles from the Black Sea Coast, then later returned to a temporary base at Senaki].  There are no reports of prisoners being taken, but other reports that there are still some small, open engagements particularly around Kutaisi (5).  The Georgians fear that the Russians are moving on Kutaisi(5) as reports of small engagements have been made about the area.  Possibly reconnaisance or prepatory skirmishing for taking control of the city.  That would finalize Russian control of the entire east to west transportation routes for Georgia.  As a strategy to insure their demands are met for Saakashvili to step down and Georgia to roll over, its a very strong position for the Russians.

That is only countered by some high profile "human shields" such as the Latvian, Polish and Lithuanian presidents along with Secretary Rice, two US Senators and the French representatives flying back and forth to the city for negotiations.  Still, Georgia only exists as small, free enclaves at thist time.  The Russians agreed to the cease fire, but insisted that they would perform "security operations" which, at this time, seem to include moving troops wherever they want and taking control of Georgia with little resistance.  The Russians are likely drawing out the negotiation for the ceasefire as long as possible to consolidate their positions.  They are probably even hoping to stretch it out through the weekend, expecting any western demands to be weakened by the weekened and giving them until Monday before international public opinion stops seeing them as somewhat honest brokers and turns them into occupiers with a totally different intent.

One of which is to possibly take Saakashvili, try him in a kangaroo court and have him executed for "war crimes".  As I write, somewhere in Moscow, a tribunal is preparing "evidence" of Georgian "ethnic cleansing".

Right now the Russians have upwards of 20,000 troops inside Georgia and unknown numbers staged to rotate in.  Remaining Georgian army numbers, unknown.