AP Photo Washington And The World When America Toes Moscow’s Line I saw what happens when a U.S. president lets Vladimir Putin get away with murder. His name was Barack Obama.

Mikheil Saakashvili is the former president of Georgia and a leader of the Movement of New Forces, a Ukrainian opposition party.

For someone with personal experience of Russian harassment and full-blown military attack, it is hard to observe the recent debate in the United States about Russian meddling with merely an academic interest. As the president of Georgia from 2004 to 2013, I saw firsthand how Russia treats its neighbors—and now Americans are getting a small taste of what former Soviet states have experienced for decades.

It’s quite a turn of events, because since the end of World War II, every step taken by United States has had direct implications for the well-being and even the existence of countries around Russia. In August 2008, Russian troops headed toward Tbilisi, the Georgian capital, were stopped by the somehow belated but still powerful intervention of the George W. Bush administration, which made very clear to the Russians that Washington would not tolerate the full occupation of Georgia and the overthrow of its democratically elected government.


Back then, President Bush sent several ships from the U.S. Sixth Fleet to Georgia to provide humanitarian relief—and to send an unmistakable signal to Moscow: Don’t push it. And when Turkish authorities created certain bureaucratic obstacles to passing through the Bosphorus, the commander of the Sixth Fleet told them that he would go through with or without documents since it was an order of the U.S. president. I believe Bush’s bold actions spared the full annihilation of the Georgian state and restored U.S. credibility after Russia dared to invade its pro-American neighbor. Kremlin strongman Vladimir Putin got the message loud and clear.

From the very beginning, Barack Obama’s administration behaved rather differently. U.S. officials made it very clear that nobody should expect the United States to act the way Bush acted in 2008. Many in the new administration were convinced that Russia’s invasion was in fact the result of a Georgian provocation designed to help John McCain to win the U.S. presidential election, some in the White House told us. From day one, the Obama administration saw relations with Russia’s neighbors through the eyes of Moscow, introducing, for instance, a de facto arms embargo in Georgia. And in March 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov pushed the reset button in the misguided hope that the Kremlin would become more cooperative. Watching this, the leader of one of Russia’s neighbors told me he had a feeling the two were trying to kill us off like some annoying flies.

The demoralizing effect of the reset reverberated all over the region, and I would argue it was largely responsible for the demise of the pro-Western governments all around the Russian periphery, bringing to power Viktor Yanukovich in Kiev and my successor Bidzina Ivanishvili, the largest Gazprom shareholder, in Georgia.At times, the Obama administration’s fear of angering Putin reached absurd heights. For example, when the U.S. announced a surge of new troops in Afghanistan—at a time when other American allies were leery of making fresh commitments to a war that had become more dangerous and less popular—my government offered to send a full Georgian brigade without any caveats. The administration was extremely reluctant to take our offer, privately explaining to us that they didn’t want to annoy Moscow even further, and it took almost two years and energetic efforts by Gen. David Petraeus to convince the White House to agree to such badly needed help.

In Ukraine, the Obama administration was totally taken by surprise when Russia began its meddling in yet another once-hopeful U.S. ally. At the time, Ukrainian leaders told me that the only action that Secretary of State Kerry and other American interlocutors took was to insist that the government in Kiev should do nothing to provoke Russia, in particular strongly urging Ukrainians not to use force. As a result, the annexation of Crimea went very smoothly, despite the fact Ukraine had enough forces on the ground to put up strong resistance.

As a result, Russia grew emboldened and did what I, and many other observers, was expecting them to do: Start another military adventure in Donbass, Ukraine’s eastern region. And here again, the Obama administration was stubborn and skittish: They refused to provide defensive antitank weapons to Ukraine. Their hesitancy was a catalyst for further adventures by Russia, which had little fear of a serious U.S. reprisal.

Some of President Obama’s statements were not helpful, either—as when he continuously said, when asked about Ukraine, that the U.S. would defend its allies in NATO. The Russians rightly perceived that comment as signaling America’s unwillingness to defend Ukraine, which hadn’t been lucky enough to make it into NATO in time. And later, President Obama articulated this perverse red line even more directly when, in his interview with The Atlantic Monthly, he basically said the U.S. would never go to war with Russia over Ukraine: “But this is an example of where we have to be very clear about what our core interests are and what we are willing to go to war for. And at the end of the day, there’s always going to be some ambiguity.”

Had that been said by a former president, it would hardly have made an impact, but hearing that from the sitting U.S. president had a disastrous effect. It sent a very clear message to Russia that Obama’s willingness to support Ukraine had clear limits, while Russia had none. Some of the actions Obama took to contain Russia, especially the sanctions, were steps in the right direction, but they were too small and came too late. Overall, Obama had mostly withdrawn from the former Soviet Union, and he finished his term with American prestige largely reduced in my part of the world.

What of President Donald Trump? It’s true that some of his seemingly pro-Russian statements have also been met with alarm in our countries, as we are all too used to the reality that big countries can always deal with one another at the expense of smaller ones.

But I also have my own personal experience with Trump. After the 2008 invasion, many politicians in the West would avoid me in order not to alienate Putin—and many businessmen did, too. Anyone who invested in Georgia risked becoming persona non grata with Putin, precluding them from making money in Russia. In 2009, Trump faced the same dilemma. He had a choice to make between investment projects in Georgia or Russia, with Russia promising greater returns, but Georgia being attractive as an uncorrupt, safe place, and one of easiest countries to do business in the world. And Trump, who clearly had presidential ambitions even back then, opted for Georgia, and this very fact speaks volumes for me. I never detected any weakness in Trump for the Russian system—in fact he was very skeptical of corruption and red tape in Russia in his conversations with me.

Of course, legitimate questions need to be answered about whether anyone in his camp colluded with Moscow, but based on my personal experience, I believe the conspiracy theories that are swirling around Trump are just that: theories. What is unquestionable fact is that his predecessor’s weakness and misreading of Putin has led to dire consequences in this part of the world. When will you Americans investigate that?