Crisis in Georgia highlights John McCain's strengths
The London Telegraph, 15/08/2008
If the world turns anywhere in an international crisis, it is to the one remaining superpower: America. That has been the case with the Russian invasion of Georgia. George W. Bush has expressed his support for what he has called a "beacon of liberty" by sending Condoleezza Rice to Tbilisi and flying in humanitarian aid. But his presidency is drawing to a close.
Mr McCain has scored more strongly
As much interest has been shown in the reaction of the two men who would succeed him, John McCain and Barack Obama. Here the Republican candidate has scored more strongly, quickly issuing a tough statement that stole a march on both the White House and his Democratic rival.
Given the West's rejection of military engagement on Georgia's behalf, its reaction to this latest incidence of Russian revanchism has been almost entirely rhetorical. Nevertheless, the crisis has played to Mr McCain's strength as a seasoned politician with a hawkish view of Russia.
After all, it was he who looked into Vladimir Putin's eyes and found not a soul mate, as Mr Bush had initially done, but the letters KGB. By contrast, Mr Obama, who, perhaps unfortunately for him, was on holiday at the time, first issued a flaccid statement on the need for restraint, only later making it more pointed.
Georgia has not had a decisive impact on the presidential race. If there is to be any change to the current level-pegging, it will come, rather, from the two parties' conventions and their aftermaths.
But a foreign policy agenda that encompasses Iraq, Iran and the Indian sub-continent, as well as Russian designs on its neighbours, is likely to favour a war hero and long-serving senator over a relative neophyte whose main exposure to the international limelight has been his recent nine-day tour of Afghanistan, the Middle East and Europe.
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