What is Miliband trying prove ?

David Miliband, our foreign secretary, wants a war. He's making no bones about it. The denials are half hearted while the sabre-rattling is strong. He wants a conflict with Russia and he wants it now.

I wonder if this is all part of his bid for the Labour leadership ? Miliband wants to distance himself from Gordon Brown and the only way he can think to do this is become more Blairite than Blair. And the one thing Blair loved was a war. He got us into Afghanistan and Iraq but before these there was a conflict a year all through his premiership. In fact there wasn't a year he was PM and our troops weren't getting shot at to satisfy his lust for conflict.

The media aren't helping either. Listening to the radio last night the presenter was busy interviewing someone from NATO and his line of questioning was "If the Russians ignore all the diplomatic moves, what happens then ?!?! Ehh ? Answer ME !!!". What he wanted was the interviewee to say WAR.

Sadly this is all an example of life following art. Those who remember "The Day Today" will recall this sketch:



Well, this is the BBC today.

Now I understand that what Russia has done is probably wrong and almost certainly against international law. In the same way the recognition of Kosovo by the West after we'd come in on the side of the KLA was in the 90's. Realists would suggest that no matter how happy we are or not, there is very little we can do, short of all out war.

Thanks to years of short sighted planning the Russians have the UK over a barrel with energy supplies so the first thing they will do is turn the gas off. Assuming Miliband doesn't get his wish, I wouldn't be surprised to see some supply problems this winter just to remind us who is boss.

At present the Russians don't care what the West thinks, or at least think they do. The more posturing we do the more they will want to show this, possibly by going for another land grab. Of course next time will be harder as it's unlikely they will find a President as stupid as Saakashvili who thinks the world is going back them when they poke the bear with a big stick, but it might happen.

The only way out of this is for all our leaders to stop waving thier willies around and sit down to some complicated and fiddly deplomacy. The Russians want to prove to thier people that they are strong. The people in Georgia who have been "anexed" seem reasonably happy and those who aren't need to be protected. NATO has to look at the options for growth and ask if it is really happy to gain members who might take a pot shot at the enemy during the 2012 Olympics.