Last week, I had the opportunity to meet with a high-level delegation of parliamentarians and government officials from Georgia.

Our conversation drove home for me how difficult the situation is now in that country-- both for its people and its government.

Georgia’s future, and the future of the entire region of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, depends, to a great degree, on how the United States and the leading states of the European Union react in the coming weeks and months to the Russian invasion of Georgia.

A couple of important facts must be highlighted:

• The recent invasion by Russian military forces had been planned for some time by the regime in Moscow.

• The Russian government has aggressively and provocatively involved itself in the affairs of Georgia-- not just in recent years, but for the entire period since that small country gained its independence in 1991.

Russia has provided military support of all types to the separatist regions of Georgia for almost two decades.
 
The Russian government has orchestrated the grant of Russian citizenship to the residents of those separatist regions, providing an excuse with which to later intervene “on their behalf” in the military operation the world witnessed last month.

The so-called Russian “peacekeepers” in the separatist regions of Georgia have never been impartial.

They have served as simply another means by which Moscow has interfered in Georgia’s internal affairs.
 
Instead, the Putin regime in Moscow would like nothing better than to see the disintegration of the current Georgian government.

Mr. Putin’s style of government in Moscow is in stark contrast to the increasingly democratic governments in countries along Russia’s borders and, more importantly, the Georgian government has closed Russia’s military bases and has opened a pipeline route for regional gas and oil supplies that is not under Russia’s control.

Yet the Putin government wants to ensure that Russia sits astride the routes that will move the huge reserves of gas and oil that lie in Central Asia and the Caucasus to markets in Europe and the rest of the world.

Some commentators have recently warned that Russia’s invasion of Georgia is reminiscent of Nazi Germany’s invasion and later destruction of the independent state of Czechoslovakia in the late 1930s.

There is much for us to consider in that analogy – primarily the failure by the leading European states of the late 1930s to understand the nature of that aggression.

That failure ultimately emboldened Germany to turn its eyes to yet more countries in its campaign to expand its sphere of power in Eastern Europe.

We must ask ourselves what further steps the Putin regime may take to wrap itself in the cloak of Russian nationalism in order to maintain its hold on power, to justify its aggression; to divert attention from its corruption and criminality.
 
Will there be claims that parts of Ukraine rightfully belong in Russia?

Will there be pressure on the Baltic states, where so many ethnic Russians live?

Will northern Kazakhstan and its large population of ethnic Russians become an issue?

Will Russian troops ever leave the independent country of Moldova, which has sought their withdrawal for years?

I want to express my support for the Administration’s proposal to provide aid expeditiously to the Georgian people by reallocating some of our existing foreign aid funds.

Such a reallocation allows us to be supportive of Georgia in this time of need, while acknowledging that we have fiscal demands in other areas.

We also support current efforts involving our European allies and the multilateral development banks toward a truly international aid effort to support Georgia.