And why does the clock start on Kosovo? Why not a nice round 1940, when Nazi ally Russia grabbed eastern Poland and the Baltic triplets?

Uh, buddy, we had these things called WW2 and the Cold War! After the Cold War all the borders of former Soviet and Yugoslav Republics (not regions within Republics) were accepted by the international community as valid borders for breakaway states.

By rejecting the Helsinki agreement on borders the US tore up the post-CW consensus. For 16 years Russia has not annexed or recognised Abkhazia or SO. In fact it actually had sanctions against the former right up until March of this year after the US recognised Kosovo’s independence. Throughout the Kosovo talks for the last year and a bit Russia has repeatedly warned the US, publicly and privately, that independence for Kosovo would change everything.

(Hey, buddy, just because CNN and Fox News doesn’t cover a story until trouble breaks out doesn’t mean the rest of the world is unaware of events unfolding. The conflict most certainly did not begin with Russian troops marching into Georgia as the US MSM would have us believe).