Over the past few weeks, Georgia and Russia have traded accusations over the downing of Georgian drones. Now, the Russian Ministry of Defense is claiming that military assistance to Georgia is destabilizing the region. The Russian-language page "On military help for Georgia from other countries" details Georgia's outside assistance; the United States, not surprisingly, is the largest contributor, providing training and equipment for several years now. Perhaps more interesting are details on Israel sales to Georgia of Hermes-450 and Skylark unmanned aerial vehicles. (Georgia's Hermes-450 drones are the ones that were shot down in recent weeks; though how many drones were taken out is in dispute.)

Russia claims all this military help is to enable Georgia to force a military settlement on the breakaway region of Abkhazia. (That's an interesting claim considering Russia's ongoing involvement with Abkhazia.) Curiously, the page is in Russian only; the English language version of the Russian Ministry of Defense site has only this recent press release about Georgia, claiming that the Russian Air Force "never shot down a Georgian surveillance drone."

There is, however, one small kernel of truth in what is otherwise a rather self-serving argument: In 2002, when the U.S. began providing military assistance and training to Georgia, both the Washington and Tblisi claimed there was evidence of Al Qaeda hiding out in Georgia's Pankisi region (similarly, there were articles, like this one in Time, titled "Inside Al-Qaeda's Georgia Refuge"). Those early claims appear to have evaporated, however. In 2006, the Dallas Morning News ran an article repeating what many have come to believe in the years since: there never really was credible evidence of Al Qaeda in Georgia. The article quote a Tbilisi-based analyst saying: "I personally would not link al-Qaeda with Pankisi in any way whatsoever."

That said, there are perfectly legitimate reasons for the United States and other countries to provide assistance to Georgia, an independent country. And Georgia has the right to seek military assistance – and alliances – with countries like the United States.

[Image: U.K. Ministry of Defence]

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