Russia’s government-owned media is full of pictures of frightened weeping South Ossetians pleading for God and Russia to come save them from the marauding Georgians. Putin is less than a week away from tying the bowknot on this entire incursion into Georgia, and will become even more popular domestically than he already is. And with great clarity, he will have shown that the bear still has its claws and is quite willing to use them. No one is now going to accuse Russia of being a ‘paper tiger,’ and all of the countries of Russia’s ‘near abroad’ are going to reassess Russia’s willingness to enforce its regional domination.

Much credit to Georgia for accomplishing whatever they wanted to accomplish by provoking the bear.