That's not what the reports showed last check.

Last I saw they invaded because those regions started firing artilliery into their land.

I find it less the coincidental that a lot of minor russian officals are also now ossetian ministers.

Well, yeah, that was what prompted Georgia to invade at the end of it all (or so they claim), but that was merely the tail end of violence dating back to June 2008, the root cause of which is murky in the whole "who shot first?" deal, and the casue of that violence goes back still further to Georgian efforts to undermine the autonomous government by establishing a counter-government in Tbilisi

As far as I know those autonomous territories were legally Goergian territory. Goergia had a civil war going on where the Ossetian's were fighting to create their own country. They however were not recognized by the rest of the world as an independant country. Infact Nato and the UN mostly considered that soil to be Goergian. Goergia attacked the rebels to unify the country and win the civil war, however Russia moved in tons of troops and faught Goergia out of its territory then single handadly recognized the Ossetian territory as independant.

Its like Chechnya for example. Their are thousands of rebels fighting for an independant state. At times these rebels have formed their own Governments. These rebels right daily, now how would Russia like it if Nato invaded and declaired Chechnya an independant country?

A civil war is a civil war. Russia just decided to go in and divide Goergia up. Goergia could have won the war a nd unified the country which infact is what they were doing before Russia interfered. Only the UN has the right to draw up borders and consider new countries independant.

Russia can't just draw borders where ever they feel like, theirs do process to be followed.

If you want to speak seriously about this - it can be done if you are interested...

And regarding drawing borders and invading countries without UN approval - look into Yugoslavia and Iraq.

I of course disagree with the US invasion of Iraq. However the US is pulling out and Iraq remains a soveirgn state. The US is set to fully withdraw and the country itself remains united. Its not like the US came into Iraq and decided well this part of the country should be seperated from the rest, lets draw up a new border put some American Government officials into the Iraq Government. How about making Kurdistan its own country?

Russia annexed a huge hunk of the country and put their own Government leaders into powerful positions and essentially now occupy a huge part of a country which the UN deems a soveirgn state. Also the country was looking to join Nato and Nato was highly considering them. It was provacative and unlawful occupation.

Yes I love speaking seriously about politics.

It's very different. Chechnya's autonomy was never recognized (except de facto from 1996 to 1999), whereas Georgia agreed to treat Abkhazia and South Ossetia as autonomous territories after wars in 1992 and 1994. Georgia knew the consequences of trying to revoke their autonomy by force, and went in anyway, and Georgia was trying to use its status as a NATO candidate and NATO's general frostiness with Russia at the time as a potential shield (in a sort of "hey Russia you can't stop us from doing this because i'll get my big bro America to kick your ass!"), which clearly wasn't the case

At the start of the war, the South Ossetian war was entirely Georgia's fault, and most international observers agree to this (except people with a vested anti-Russian interest, like the Baltic states and Poland). Russia was condemned for a disproportionate response, but they did abandon their control of *uncontested* Georgia, and didn't take out Saakashvili even if they totally could have

Really?  All the observers i've seen have blamed Russia for convincing Ossetia to attack.  That is the observers that were there when the whole thing started.

Afterall, that's what most of the world's countries believe as well.

I can't see there being such a divid between the observers and the countries.

afaik, all russias bomber flights take place in international airspace.  even if they are close to our own, shooting down one of them would make us the bad guy...regardless of russia being a corrupt mafia state.

1. What makes you think UK and France would back us up? Sure they'll urge Russia to calm down, but there's no way they'd get their hands dirty against someone so powerful. This isn't Iraq we're talking about. This is the country with the largest arsenal of nuclear weapons and the means by which to single handedly destroy every living thing on this planet. Yes, that includes humans.

2. I'd appreciate if you stopped making "facts" up. Brazil has the most freshwater in the world, followed by Russia. Canada is third. As for lumber: Russia has almost thrice the forest area of Canada. Brazil, as well, has 50% more forest area than Canada.

3. Europe could not "simply start importing gas from Canada." For them to be able to do that a pipeline must exist connecting us to them. In case you're not aware, a vast ocean divides us; building and maintaining a pipeline across an ocean would be extremely expensive. Plus it would take a few decades before it would be ready for use. And even then Canadian gas would be much much more expensive for the Europeans compared to Russian gas.

4. I never said Russia is stupid. Granted my scenario of Russia invading us was exagerated, but do you still want get on the black list of the second most powerful military nation in the world (arguably first if you consider nukes)? Plus, this is exactly the kind of behaviour we're internationally not known for. That is in fact one of the reasons pretty much every nation in the world respects us.

I tell you what I would do.

I would go get all my friends guns and mine.  Load them, Clean them and test them. GO buy some more guns, The same MM so I can have same ammo and stock up big time. Stock up on some food and if nothing happens well atleast I was ready.

SHoot the f out of anything that move! J/k but not if sh-t was hidding the fan.