Watch out, the Russian bear is back

Last October 6th I opened my column with this warning. “Keep your eye on Russia-Again.” Last week someone lit the “it’s my territory fuse” in the Caucasus and that Russian bear, which ran for cover in 1991 when Boris Yeltsin cracked the whip of Democracy, came out from hiding with a vengeance by shooting fish in a barrel in the former USSR satellite of Georgia.
 Here’s another animal reference - a leopard doesn’t change its spots, once a KGB member always a member of the Soviet Secret Police. Look up KGB in any Russian dictionary and you’ll find a picture of Vladimir Putin beneath it. His secret spy roots run deep. He prominently made his letters as a major in the KGB in East Germany in the 80s. In 1998 when the KGB was renamed as the Federal Security Service, guess who was named director? Yep, the communist trained leopard that can’t change his spots.
Succeeding Boris Yeltsin as president Putin followed in Yeltsin’s democratic footsteps until he could no longer stand the Western bright lights of openness and truth so he meticulously began morphing the country back to its gory glory days of Stalin and Socialistic Republics.
He took control of the media, government appointments, distained a free economy and snubbed his nose at the West. Constitutionally, the popular president was unable to run for another term so with subterfuge he handpicked the current mendicant, Dmitry Medvedev, to succeed him while he assumed the powerful position of prime minister.
When Georgia made advances on South Ossetia the Russian bear slammed down its paw and roared with soldiers, tanks, guns, bullets and jets. Putin has battled, literally and figuratively, to ward off NATO and the West from enticing Abkhazia and South Ossetia out of Russia’s sphere of influence.
While a trembling population wanders what comes next, words of acrimonious accusations are flying in all directions from the United Nations to the capitols of Moscow and Washington. President Bush criticized the Russian intrusion to which Putin fired back and threw invading Iraq and Saddam Hussein in our face. Since the short-lived demise of the Union of Socialistic Soviet Republics in 1991 American taxpayers poured some $20 billion down the drain to shore up the new democratic Russia. A new Cold War has officially begun so keep your eye on Russia - again.
I give you President John Adams’ toast: Independence Forever.