US to target Iran via Georgia? – Russian paper

Georgian and US Presidents Mikheil Saakashvili and Barack Obama will meet in Washington on Monday to discuss the situation in Iran, and Georgia’s possible assistance to the United States in case of a military conflict with the country.

According to the Russian newspaper Komersant, Washington eyes Georgia as a bridgehead, considering its airbases in Vaziani and Marneuli towns proper places to hit the Iranian airliners.

“Georgia will be the most loyal among the countries in the region, and more loyal than Turkey in case of a US-Iranian war,” a Georgian analyst, Paata Zakareashvili, told the paper.

But Georgia’s ex president, Edward Shevardnadze, has expressed doubts that Saakashvili would join an anti-Iranian campaign that could produce a disastrous impact on his country.

The paper further reports experts as saying that Georgia would not be able to provide a real assistance to the US in case a war breaks out.

“It is more convenient for the US to bomb Iran from the South Caucasus, but Georgia does not share a common border with the country. Armenia and Azerbaijan, which have that border, are unlikely to permit the flight of the US military aircraft.

Besides, the air space over the South Caucasus is controlled by Russian anti-air defense systems, a factor that reduces the possibility of sudden attacks. The minimum the Russians will do is such situation is to inform the Iranians of the nearing US airliners,” Irakli Aladashvili, the editor-in-chief of the military analytical journal Arsenali, told the paper.