The message below comes from a former student of a Romanian guy in Budapest, and arrived to me via a mutual friend. Mikheil is yet another one of the Georgians desperately hoping/waiting for Western support in the face of the Russian aggression.

Dear all,

Russia is now officially waging war on Georgia. Russian warplanes, 10 of which have been shot down, bomb villages and towns outside the conflict zone of South Ossetia, having devastated Poti Port, a stronghold of Georgian economy, and a military base very near Tbilisi, airfields, marketplaces, and apartment buildings, leaving dozens of civilian casualties behind. Russian channels are now reporting Russia has to start bombing Tbilisi.

Georgian troops are now fighting regular Russian army in Tskhinvali. If the west does not condemn Russian massive aggression unequivocally and help us stop it, it will give Russia a much freer hand to wage on the war and invade much of Eastern Georgia.

We very much hope for the western support. Georgia has made enormous progress
since the Rose Revolution in 2003. The European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development recognized Georgia as the “least corrupt transition
economy” in the world. It is clear to us that if the war with Russia
continues, Georgia will be devastated.

It is appalling to find how many ordinary Russians have a deep-seated hatred of
Georgia. If you tune in to Russian channels you will see people in the street in
Russian cities saying that Georgia should be obliterated from the face of the
earth, which, while not representative of what all Russians think, is indicative
of the Russian media’s sentiment, which is very alarming as they are
reporting and thus spreading the hate speech. The Russian media are reporting
1600 casualties among civilians in Tskhinvali, which is a downright lie.

People in the west ask how it all came about.

The hatred of recalcitrant Georgia that Russia has not been able to subdue and
Russianize has been building up for two centuries now, being at its peak at the
moment.

Russia accommodated itself to the Baltic states’ western orientation. It,
however, has failed to put up with Georgia’s aspiration for European and
Euro-Atlantic integration.

Georgia was very anticommunist throughout the communist regime. Moscow
perceived the attacks on communism, of which a few examples I gave below, as
essentially anti-Russian. Russia perceives collapse of the Soviet Union as a
loss of its power and fame.

It was before Perestroika that Tengiz Abuladze shot his Repentance (1983),
which was a verdict of communism. It was not merely a film about communist
repressions of the thirties, which was a taboo in eighties as it was, the film
said that bolshevism was a heinous crime. The film was not released in 1983
(after all, formally, Georgia was communist), but people lent and borrowed VCR-s
to see the film. It was released in 1987 when the Soviet empire was still quite
strong. The film was shocking.

Communist Party bosses in Moscow knew that Georgians cherished remembrance of
the three-year period of Georgia’s independence before it had been reinvaded
in 1921 by Soviet Russia. I remember that I as a little child knew who the head
of the government of Georgian Democratic Republic was. They could not help it
though and this was how the hatred and rancour has been building up.

In 1984 a Georgian director shot a feature film (Kirile’s Journey) of which
finale is a ripsnorter: rain wipes down a Map of the Soviet Union, imprinted on
a window. The film was shown on TV in 1984, before Perestroika. It had the
effect of explosion.

There are scores of soviet Georgian documentaries that tell stories of frescos,
churches, in which Georgian psalms are recited to the accompaniment of Georgian
hymns, showing praying people, people lighting candles, and attending masses.
Georgian soviet government published a newspaper (Samshoblo) for Georgian
emigrants in tens of thousands of copies from 1956 to late eighties, where the
Georgian emigration, children of members of the government of Georgian
Democratic Republic living in France, the US, Chile, Poland, Germany, people
that in their respective countries of residence were officially denouncing
communism and Georgia’s communist takeover, published their reminiscences.
So the communist Georgian government funded clearly anti-soviet activities.
Moscow could not help it because even Georgian communists were unanimous when it
came to Georgian identity. This was how the hatred and rancour has been building
up.

Georgian was the state language and therefore the language of official
correspondence, judiciary, soviet government, which was not the case with
national language in the majority of the Soviet republics. When Moscow decided
to change the status of Georgian as a state language in 1978, about 50,000
people took to streets. It was shocking for communists to see so many people
protesting, which ended in Shevardnadze pleading Brezhnev to let Georgian
supreme council leave the status of Georgian unchanged or face bloodshed.
Finally, Shevardnadze persuaded him to let the Georgian Language alone.
Moscow’s attempt failed again and added to its bitterness towards Georgia.

Then in 1983 a group of Georgian youngsters denouncing soviet citizenship and
communism, hijacked a plane which was a real nightmare.

While ordinary Russians may not remember some of the facts, many of them
developed a strong distaste for Georgia’s anticommunist sentiment, which
they perceive as essentially anti-Russian, which is certainly a fallacy.

Please, help us by spreading the word of this massive Russian military
aggression!

Thanking you in advance,

Mikheil Kukava