Sorry for being off topic, but does anybody here know whether the President has the Constitutional authority to order the elimination of our nuclear arsenal? That possibility scares the crap out of me.

I don't speak of it because what I have to say is forbidden. But our family has our emergency food and supplies, and the means for self-protection. Any of us can suddenly be in the front lines.

Delta, But, purely for argument's sake, if Russia was on the level, could we live with what it says it wants?

Let me ask the Fool's question. Assuming (a big assumption I admit) those "basic points" are on the level, are they so intolerable to the USA's interests that we cannot live with such an arrangement of the world? And if we can't, are we really willing to pay the price? Really, really willing? True, there's the matter of our national honor, but sad to say we've often tossed aside when it was too costly to uphold. Taiwan...Vietnam...the Hungarian uprising...the Iraq uprising of '91....and now Georgia? Ukraine?

She reminds me of another dumb hick, Harry Truman. A good day.

If forced Russification is the Rx for the Russian demographic problem, then why not go for the whole hog? Those 400 million Euro weenies. They're already half-way acclimated to obedience, thanks to their managers in Brussels.

From their point of view, the U.S. has failed to honor a number of pledges to them, including treating them as equals and as a true partner. Before things get totally out of hand, can I ask whether there isn't some truth to Russia's beef? The question isn't moot....yet.

NATO relies on Pakistan's supply routes into Afghanistan, which this week became more insecure than ever. The other way in, the various -stans to the north, requires Russian cooperation. Checkmate.

Russia WILL become emboldened and WILL devour the rest of the former republics and then the EE... The EU? Or at least Finlandize it, which would be less work than actually having to occupy and run it. Sometimes I wonder if the average citizen of the EU would even notice or care. On the other hand, outright seizure would be a much needed demographic injection. Perhaps Putin would kick their post modern Euro arses to church, where they'd learn about being fruitful and multiplying, not that the moslems inhabiting Europe need encouragement. Seriously, I do think that we need to think about the unthinkable: Would the re-establishment of a Russian Empire necessarily and inevitably be bad for the USA?

Ogla, The $64,000 (this was a lot of money when you were still in Russia!) Question. What do you think Russia wants?

Conventional Wisdom: Russia's has no gameplan beyond slapping the USA down into the dust because they're thug bastards who hate us. OK. It' d be a fool who didn't take that very seriously. We can't live with such a Russia. Wake up Gipper, there's work to do. But just for yuks, what if...?: Russia wants its turf back, but its ultimate vision is to be a big neutral nuclear- armed Switzerland, but making buckets of money off oil and gas instead of banks. I think the US could live with that. But could and would the up and coming places with an attitude? China? Islam? Would better relations with Washington be a wise precaution to safeguard your Russian Switzerland? No. I'm not asserting this is the case-how the hell would I know? --but we owe it to our future to think this through very, very carefully. And meanwhile drill, go nuke, put pinwheels on every roof top, recycle dogpoop, whatever it takes.

Today we're Turds R Us. Not that we had a choice but....

Jordan: Geostrategically impossible Why is that? A Moscow-Washington axis would create a zone of mutual security, trade, and prosperity around the northern hemisphere. Its basis would be mutual respect, mutual interests and mutual dangers. So, not a love affair but a marriage of realisms. We need their energy; they need our Pentagon, unless they'd rather be a suburb of Bejing someday. NJ Soldier: Owing to their dependency on Russian energy, practically speaking they already are conquered, or at least Finlandized. Besides, they've long since handed over their national soverignity to Brussels. It'll be best to regard Europe as a kind of a nice themepark belonging to America and Russia. Gotta do some work now. Hope this conversation continues. igout

I wonder whether at the end of the day the kinder and wiser course back in '91 would have been to declare a sort of Monroe Doctrine on behalf of Russia. Acknowledging her rightful and natural sphere of interest and pledging to protect it until such time as she was able to do so herself. Today we might have had a bold and enterprising friend in Mr Putin instead of a bold and enterprising enemy. But hindsight is cheap wisdom. It's most likely that Russia will recover its lost lands with the possible exception of the Baltics. Nobody can or will stop her; that's as certain as the Titanic is going to sink. No point in bickering over whether the iceberg or the ship is in the wrong. We're beyond that. A great and powerful and, let's say it, brave Russia is now a fact. I say Brave because that's what our useless European "friends" aren't. So Bear:1. Us: 0. But the game doesn't end there; it never ends. The Bear has real problems too, and their names are China and Islam who live next door. Small world. We got concerns there too. Can the Bear be converted into an ally? If we pulled that off, we'd sure have fewer headaches from that part of the world. This sounds cynical and heartless about Georgia. Personally, I feel like a piece of sh1t about it, which right now amounts to a big So What?

Durka-Durka, We will sleep badly at night so that the American people can. Sorry but I didn't design this dirty old world.

I think about Georgia and I feel like a total sh@t that the USA going to stiff them, as we have so often before those who trusted in us. That said, I gotta side with Tom...sort of. SuperMan may be able to deflect an asteroid and save a cat in a tree at the same time, but we're not SuperMan. We're an overstretched and uncertain country. It looks like Russia is out to recover its lost territories and that it will likely succeed. The question we must ask and answer very carefully is whether this would be necessarily and inevitably a bad thing for the USA. Would Russia, like a wise gambler, retire with its winnings and as it were invest them prudently in a partnership with the US? There would be advantages for both. We need their oil and gas. They need our Pentagon because they live in a very rough neighborhood--having China and Islam next door can't make for a good night's sleep in the Kremlin. We make not like the Russians much or they us, but let's be adults about this, at the moment we're both somewhat brittle and a strategic partnership would be a good thing for both.

Hungary '56. Last chopper out '75. '91: telling the Iraquis to overthrow Saddam and leaving them hanging. Now Georgia. Now there are very solid reasons for doing nothing again; I've mentioned some myself. But as American I have trouble looking in the mirror just now.

But practically speaking what can NATO do? Let's not bluster or huff and puff. Practically speaking what we do?

I'd definitely vote for Obama if I 100% knew that, at their first summit, Putin would rip the little chap into fish chum and send him home in a plastic bucket adorned with that hokey made in Chicago Presidential seal.

Russia can paralyize NATO/EU by energy blackmail. But hasn't it this lever on us? If Pakistan's supply routes are lost to the forces in Afghanistan, we will have to beg the Russians to let us use their territory. And I mean beg. Just imagine their price...

I read somewhere that Russia would permit the resupplying of the NATO forces in Afghanistan if the routes through Pakistan were lost to us. If true, game's over for Georgia. The Russians got us where they want. And if I was a Russian, I'd be so very tempted to repay the USA for ending the USSR. And I'd do it by means of oil. Absorb the Caspian Sea region, form an Axis of Oil with Greater Iran, put the dependent EU on a short leash, and then watch the USA gasping for oil. The only countermove my poor little brain can come up with is to try to convince the Russians that vengeance would give a very short term satisfaction, in the long run the only beneficiary will be China. It's like the old chain gang movies. Russia and the USA may hate one another but they need to cooperate.

Rev Wright is preaching sedition and treason in time of war. It is a sign of how unworthy this country is of its armed forces that the debate over Rev Wright has never mentioned this. Sad and ashamed and disgusted tonight.

If you'd rather side with a totalitarian crony capitalist state that has one of the worst human rights histories in the age of mankind, rather than a global 'United States' yep. I was never into utopian science fiction.

Heard Condi & Gates are in Moscow to try to sell the Russians on those missiles in Poland. I hope they don't waste time carping about democracy and instead talk about supply routes into Afghanistan and beyond that a Moscow-Washington alliance. We have common dangers in Islam and China. We need a safe source of gas and oil; the Russians need a powerful friend to help them keep ownership of Siberia. Given their demographic situation, which will take decades to improve, they need us, and we need them. I'd swap NATO for some Russians any day.

I admit it. I'm just a civilian noodlehead, but aren't you talking about keeping hundreds of miles of roads in our hands? Even the Russians couldn't do that. And they were right next door.