at Opinio Juris. Though I was born in the Russian Empire (in what's now the Ukraine, but Kiev was a heavily Russified city at the time), I haven't kept up on the situation there; I therefore can't speak from any real experience. But while my instinctive sense in the Russian-Georgian conflict is that the Russians are in the wrong, I think it's important not to assume that therefore the Georgians are in the right, or ought to get what they want. And my sense is that the talk of letting Georgia into NATO is likely quite misguided: It's not clear to me that it's in our national interest to get into this fight, and I suspect that our participation will on balance not be good for anyone (and certainly not for us). Prof. Anderson, who seems to have a good deal of knowledge on the subject, likewise thinks that the Georgians ought not be allowed to actually govern Abkhazia and South Ossetia. And while for the reasons I mentioned I can't speak with any confidence about whether he's right, his arguments seem to me much worth considering. I'll of course be happy to link to thoughtful and detailed responses to Anderson's arguments.

Thanks to InstaPundit for the pointer.