KEY POINTS:
The art of military statecraft is to quit while you are ahead. John F. Kennedy displayed that art in the Cuban missile crisis, standing down United States forces as soon as Russian ships turned back from his blockade. George Bush snr displayed it when he drove Iraqi invaders from Kuwait but did not destabilise the Middle East. We will soon see whether post-communist Russia has the required touch.
Russia's invasion of Georgia nearly two weeks ago quickly achieved all its reasonable goals. The small Georgian Army was quickly driven from South Ossetia where it had unwisely broken a ceasefire with secessionists who are Russian. By going further into Georgia, bombing and occupying strategic places, capturing military equipment and destroying bases, Russian made a much larger statement.
It was plainly stating with force what it had previously said verbally, that it will not tolerate border states such as Georgia and Ukraine entering the Nato Alliance. This too is a reasonable position.
Georgia and Ukraine both have ethnic Russian components in their populations who look across the border for protection in times of tension. Moscow will not ignore their interests and conflicts such as that in South Ossetia are likely to occur.
It is obviously untenable for Nato to extend its security commitments to states that have on-going sources of tension with a neighbour such as Russia. Some Nato members, notably France, Germany and Spain, recognised the risk when they refused to agree to a date for Georgia and Ukraine's entry at the alliance's summit meeting in April this year.
But the United States did not recognise the risk then, and perhaps still does not. Reportedly there was some hairy-chested talk in the White House this week of hastening the admission of the two former Soviet republics to show Russia its aggression in Georgia would not succeed. Wiser counsel to President Bush surely will prevail.
An alliance is not something to be awarded to a country simply because it is a Western style democracy, as Georgia has become. Or because it has been a good friend, as Georgia has been, supporting the US in Iraq and providing the West with a non-Russian pipeline for oil and gas from Central Asia. An alliance is a serious commitment for the more powerful partner, potentially drawing it into the partner's disputes.
Before an alliance like Nato extends its defence umbrella to any aspirant member it needs to be sure that country is stable, well-governed and unlikely to needlessly antagonise powerful neighbours, particularly a nuclear-armed one. Recent events have shown Georgia to be unreliable on that score.
Events have also shown that the US is not about to intervene. To offer Nato membership as punishment of Russia would be reckless in the extreme if the most powerful partner is not prepared to come to the potential ally's defence. Signing a paper does not change the chemistry of interests, kinship and geography that causes a country to risk its citizens' lives for another.
Under French mediation Russia has agreed to withdraw its forces and discuss the future of the South Ossetia and Abkhazia regions. No timetable has been agreed and its actual withdraw is still awaited. It has achieved all it needs though it probably has little to lose in delay.
But there would come a point when continued occupation of Georgia made reasonable people wonder whether Russia's return to global power calculations is more ominous than it yet seems. It is not in Russia's better interests to raise the stakes. It has made its interests clear. It should leave now.
