New U.S. Intelligence Chief on Georgia

Dennis C. Blair, the new director of U.S. national intelligence, said breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia “remain potential flashpoints” and that President Saakashvili faced “increasing criticism” from the opposition.

“Moscow’s expanded military presence in and political-economic ties to these regions [Abkhazia South Ossetia], along with continuing violence increase the risk of provocation, overreaction, or miscalculation leading to a resumption of fighting,” he told the U.S. Senate Committee on Intelligence on February 12.

Touching upon Georgia’s internal politics, the U.S. national intelligence chief said: “Although the political situation in Georgia has stabilized, President Saakashvili faces increasing criticism from the domestic opposition, and his reaction to that will either enhance or set back Georgia’s democratic development.”

In a prepared testimony before the committee, outlining threat assessment to the United States, Dennis C. Blair said that despite decline in the numbers and quality of recruits and a failure to keep up with the pace of weapons modernization, “the Russian military defeated the Georgian military last August.”

“Moscow for the past several years has also been strengthening its conventional military force to make it a credible foreign policy instrument, both to signal its political resurgence and to assert its dominance over neighboring states, like Georgia,” he said.

The U.S. national intelligence chief also said that although Moscow was showing some signs of change in the U.S.-Russia dynamic, issues such as NATO enlargement, the conflict over Georgia’s separatist regions, and missile defense “will continue to pose difficulties for the relationship.”

“Even as it seeks to negotiate a robust post-START agreement, Moscow consistently stresses that the accession to NATO of Georgia and Ukraine would put existing arms control regimes and negotiations at risk and could prompt Russian military countermeasures as well as increased pressure against Tbilisi and Kyiv,” Dennis C. Blair said.

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