September 1, 2008 8:40 AM- Russia’s Putin says today that if Europe imposes any sanctions they will re-route all gas and oil from Europe over to the Far`East in a blatant violation of many previous promises that they would never use energy as a weapon.
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Meanwhile, there are reports that Russian forces are leaving most of Georgia excluding Poti, Abkazia, and Ossetia.

William R Collier Jr. [3] The American Freedomist

The BIG headline of the day should not be about Obama or the normal droll that passes as “news” these days, the blaring headline should be that Russia, Syria, and Iran are all headed towards a military confrontation with Israel and the Urkraine and that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has said Russia will have to respond militarily to the deployment of elements of a U.S. missile shield in Central Europe, according to RIA Novosti.

“These missiles are close to our borders and constitute a threat to us,” Medvedev said in an interview with Al-Jazeera television on Tuesday. “This will create additional tension and we will have to respond to it in some way, naturally using military means.”

The assumption has been that Russia would attack Poland itself, but this assumption ignores where Russian forces, especially naval and air, are concentrated: in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean although Russia has considerable resources in Kaliningrad.

The Russians have been steadily increasing their military capabilities in Kallinigrad, an enclave of land claimed by Germany (Konigsbirg), Poland, and Lithuania which Russia had promised would be weapons free in the early 90’s but which has been beefed up as a dagger pointing at Polan and Lithuania.

Kaliningrad Oblast is the site of tens of thousands of Russian ground and air forces equipped with 1100 main battle tanks, 1300 armored combat vehicles, dozens of Scud and SS-21 surface-to-surface missiles, and 35 advanced Su-27 fighter aircraft, among other modern weapons. Some of these weapons still carry nuclear payloads. There are well over 100,000 troops crammed into this tiny enclave which is 200 miles or so from Russia, separated by Lithuanian and Polish territory.

Kaliningrad Oblast is the headquarters of the Russian Navy’s Baltic Fleet and the site of one of its two main naval bases in the region, Baltiisk. The Baltic Fleet does not include any strategic missile submarines, but it does include 32 major surface combatants (3 cruisers, 3 destroyers, and 26 frigates), more than 230 other surface vessels, roughly 200 naval aircraft, 9 tactical submarines, and a brigade of naval infantry.

Moscow is beefing up its military presence in the Mediteranean, particularly the Eastern Med., by sending their only aircraft carrier “Admiral Kuznetsov” from its home base in Murmansk, to the Mediterranean and the Syrian port of Tartus and into Georgia’s territorial waters, including the port of Poti. President Bashar Assad of Syria recently agreed to a deal to place Russian surface to surface missiles in Syria while Russia has also announced their intentions to place these same missiles in Kalliningrad, a potential Hot Spot with ties to Germany and neighbors, Poland and Lithuania, which is divided from Russia but which has a vital port that is utilized by the Russian Navy.

The United States has responded somewhat timidly, sending in its own flotilla of three warships, one being the Coast Guard cutter Dallas, to provide humanitarian aide to Georgia. America’s decision to redirect its Georgia aid warship from Russian-controlled Poti port to Georgian-controlled Batumi Wednesday, August 27 – on direct orders from the Pentagon - did not cool the escalating tension between the two powers. As soon as the US Coast Guard cutter Dallas docked with 34 tons of humanitarian aid, three Russian missile boats, led by the Moskva missile cruiser, anchored at the Black Sea port of Sukhumi, capital of breakaway Abkhazia, to the north for what the Russians called “peacekeeping operations.”

In Moscow, Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn said NATO had exhausted the number of forces it can deploy in the Black Sea under international agreements. He warned Western nations against sending more ships. “NATO – which is not a state located in the Black Sea” cannot continuously increase its forces and systems there, he said. Russia has also announced that any vessels that enter the Georgian Port of Poti will be searched.

Russian Navy chief, Adm. Vladimir Vysotsky announced Sunday, Aug. 24, that its warships in the Mediterranean region have been placed under the command of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

By linking up the warships in the Black sea, now we know why the Russians sent the flotilla (the Moskva was part of that flotilla), the Russians have essentially placed their entire naval operations in the region on a war footing. Israeli and American military commanders in the region are concerned that this may lead to hostilities, even unintentional, with all these warships jostling about in a relatively small space.

Another major concern is the Crimea which some fear will soon be targeted, despite a recent, and dramatic, announcement by the Brutish Foreign Office and other by both NATO and the G7 that they would not tolerate any violation of Ukrainian territorial sovereignty. The general message was that Russia would be making a mistake if they learned “the wrong lesson” from Georgia: a clear sign that in the minds of some Russia fait accompli in Georgia is becoming an irreversible fact.

Russia’s ally, Iran, has also been busy, integrating its missile command with that of Syria and placing an Iranian early warning system in Lebanon. What is wore, Western military and intelligence were shocked to learn that Iran has plans and the right technology for making a nuclear warhead that could fit onto its Shehab-3 missiles. The discovery was released by the former UN weapons inspector, David Albright.

While US news adores Barack Obama or focuses on news about abduction, missing children, or Hollywood starlets the world outside seems to be moving steadily towards some form of confrontation.

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