After the Georgia War, I argued that whatever damage Russia had done to its international reputation could be recouped with a demonstration or two of reasonabless and responsibility. I expected the demonstration to come in Abkhazia and South Ossetia themselves, but I underestimated the degree to which the conflict with Georgia was “personal.” Instead, it looks like Russia has chosen the other two frozen conflicts of the region — the breakaway Moldovan province of Trans-Dniester and the breakaway Azerbaijan province of Nagorny Karabakh — to demonstrate that Abkhazia and South Ossetia were a one-off — Russia’s equivalent of the West’s […]