joelgibson.co.uk - South Ossetia

South Ossetia: How a Desire for Independence Turned into a Case of Kremlin Dominance

POSTED: 13:00 (GMT) 31/10/2023

In April 2022, the population of the largely unrecognised Republic of South Ossetia (widely recognised as a de jure territory of Georgia) voted to change their president. To the outside world and non-observers of the geopolitics of the Caucasus’, such a change will likely echo insignificance. After all, South Ossetia is a territory geographically smaller than Jamaica, with a population numbering fewer than that of Andorra.

However, despite its seeming insignificance, this change in South Ossetian leadership has marked a dynamic shift in the breakaway republic’s international relations.

In March 2022 (one month prior to the election), the then president of the territory, Anatoly Bibilov, formally announced that South Ossetia was going to start the legal process for integration into the Russian Federation in the near future. What this essentially meant was that there would be a referendum on the matter of unification with Russia following the next presidential election.

However, as aforementioned he ended up losing the April election. The new president, Alan Gagloev was quick to redact Bibilov’s statement on unification with Russia and cancel any potential plans put in place for a referendum on the matter. This move by Gagloev led to widespread confusion amongst the ethnic Ossetian population of the territory who see a potential unification with Russia as an opportunity to unite the entire ethnic Ossetian people, as the Republic of North Ossetia is part of the Russian Federation. Additionally, it also ruffled some feathers in Moscow. Not because Russia is desperate to absorb South Ossetia into its Federation, but because referendums such as these amongst pro-Russian breakaway republics signal continued allegiance to the Kremlin.

This is not the only move by Gagloev in the first 18 months of his premiership to have brought the attention of Russia to the goings on of South Ossetia. In an incident back in August 2022, Gagloev came into direct confrontation with the Kremlin, as he dismissed the ethnically Russian South Ossetian defence minister Vladimir Pukhaev, who had initially been placed in this position via an agreement between Bibilov and Moscow. Gagloev has also seemingly been attempting to normalise relations between South Ossetia and Georgia. This has resulted in the temporary opening of border checkpoints between South Ossetia and Georgia every month. A huge development from the previous status quo, which saw the border between the two stay permanently closed for 15 years.

Gagloev clearly has a vision of running South Ossetia as a truly independent state that can dictate its own geopolitical and even economic ties. A dramatic change to the previous regimes which have governed South Ossetia, practically all of which came with pre-attached puppet strings, the origins of which could be traced to Red Square.

But is Gagloev’s apparent vision really attainable? Can he really take South Ossetia in whichever direction he desires and act out against Moscow?

In simple form, the answer is no. Gagloev can push the boundaries, but ultimately it is still at present Russia who holds the final say over all issues South Ossetia. To understand just why this is we must examine the history of the territory and its sheer dependence on the Kremlin to maintain its de facto independence.

The collapse of the USSR in the period between 1989 and 1991, ultimately resulted in global society accumulating 15 new states. None of these states held entirely new state identities, as these had been curated for the most part prior to their relative periods of Soviet rule. However, what was new to these states were their borders. The reason for this is that the pre-existing borders of the 15 Soviet Republics (which had all been originally manufactured by Moscow), became the borders of the states which came into existence following the Soviet leviathan’s collapse. For example, the borders which marked the previously named Soviet Republic of Russia became the recognised borders of what we now know as the Russian Federation.

This was the case across the board, in some scenarios states lost territory which they saw as being rightfully theirs (Armenia’s claim to Nagorno-Karabakh is a prime example), whilst in others states now held control of territory which they had little to no historical ties to (Ukraine was given significant swathes of territory in their eastern regions which were predominantly inhabited by Russians).

These various pockets of (as these groups would see it) misplaced ethnicity are what led to the post-Soviet conflicts breaking out across the FSU. Between 1991 and 1994 war raged in Moldova, Azerbaijan and in two separate conflicts in Georgia between the recognised governing militaries and separatist militias formed from small pockets of ethnic minorities. It is within analysis of the two conflicts in Georgia that we find the root of the Kremlin’s lasting influence in South Ossetia.

When Georgia declared its independence in April 1991, it took with it territories belonging to two distinctive ethnic groups, who for a long time had held tensions with Tbilisi. These were the ethnic Abkhaz population who lived primarily in the region of Abkhazia, in Georgia’s north-western corner and the ethnic Ossetian population who populated the region of South Ossetia on Georgia’s new northern border with Russia. However, foreseeing that Georgia’s independence movement was growing stronger and stronger, the populations of both Abkhazia and South Ossetia had prepared for conflict.

Between Georgia’s declaration of independence in April 1991 and June 1992, fighting raged in South Ossetia between the National Guard of Georgia and the separatists. It is also widely believed that Russia had a hand in the conflict on the side of the South Oseetians (a belief that now appears highly likely). The conflict only ended when the highly nationalist President Gamsakhurdia was replaced by the former Soviet leader of Georgia, Eduard Shevardnadze (an ally of the Kremlin). Shevardnadze brokered peace over South Ossetia, which saw it gain de facto independence for the first time. It did not have control of the entirety of the South Ossetian region, but what it did have control of it was allowed to administer itself. This was the territory which grew to become the Republic of South Ossetia.

Between the end of the South Ossetia War and 2004, there was very little confrontation between Tbilisi and Tskhinvali (the de facto capital of South Ossetia. Relations were at the least cordial and often friendly between Georgians and the separatist Ossetians and Abkhazians (who had themselves declared independence in 1992). It seemed that as long as Shevardnadze ruled Georgia, its two separatist republics would be able to maintain their de facto independence. This was good news not only for the two republics, but also critically for the Kremlin, who had worked hard to assist the maintenance of their independence. Moscow supplied peacekeeping troops to South Ossetia, as well as heavily subsidising the annual ‘state budget'.

You might wonder why a country the size of Russia needs to funnel billions of rubles a year to prop up (relatively) geographically insignificant separatist states? The answer is that it doesn’t need to do this, but that it does it because it can. Moscow sees it as a way of flexing its remaining power over the post-Soviet space. A sort of ever lingering reminder to not poke the proverbial Russian bear too hard, as often in these cases it is sat on your doorstep.

2004 marked a significant change to the aforementioned cordial relations between Tbilisi and its breakaway republics, as the ‘Rose Revolution’, as it is now known marked the end of Shevardnadze’s time in power. The replacement was a man called Mikheil Saakashvili, who was to ‘The West’ what Shevardnadze had been to Russia. A great ally. Saakashvili took office on the promise that he would rid Georgia of Russian influence and set them on a course which would result in them joining both the EU and NATO. To all intents and purposes, Saakashvili was an ardent Georgian nationalist. This spelled problems for both Abkhazia and South Ossetia, as Saakashvili’s vision for Georgia was one which saw these territories reabsorbed into Tbilisi’s orbit.

To briefly summarise all the events which fell between Saakashvili’s election in 2004 and tensions finally boiling over in 2008, it should be said that neither side was particularly compromising with the other. Saakashvili decided that he would allow South Ossetia and Abkhazia autonomous status within the Republic of Georgia if they chose to reintegrate. Naturally, this offer was entirely rejected, as it was unthinkable to either of the separatists states that they should have to cede their de facto independence. Over the period both Georgia and Russia made significant military posturing manoeuvres regarding the territories. Georgian helicopters would regularly stray into air space seen by Abkhazia and South Ossetia as theirs, whilst Russian troops would continuously enter and leave the separatist regions as they pleased, naturally aggravating Tbilisi.

In 2008, tensions came to head, as Georgia looked to formally join NATO and Russia started to toy with the idea of recognising Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In June that year, war broke out between the Armed Forces of Georgia and the South Ossetian separatist militia. To this day, both sides accuse each other of firing the first shot. The ensuing days were rife with 20th century style conflict. The Georgian forces had set their eyes on capturing Tskhinvali, whilst the South Ossetian militia were determined to rid the region of ethnic Georgians. On August 7 2008, Saakashvili called a ceasefire, fearing that the longer the conflict raged the more likely it would be that Russian tanks would roll towards Tbilisi.

Unfortunately for Saakashvili his fears were to soon become reality, as on August 8, Russian troops entered South Ossetia en masse under the guise of a ‘peacekeeping mission’. Within 24 hours, Russia’s forces had overpowered those of Georgia and had not only retaken Tskhinvali and removed all Georgian peacekeeping forces from the South Ossetia region, but had also taken control of numerous Georgian towns and cities. Within the space of a month a new peace settlement had been agreed, in which Russia agreed to withdraw from Georgia and Georgia agreed that it would no longer have any presence within South Ossetia.

Alongside the peace agreement, Russia formally gave recognition to both Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Whilst many South Ossetians took this moment as an opportunity to celebrate their independence, cementing in the minds of many Russia as its great liberator. This move by the Kremlin was actually just cementing what had now become a case of faux independence for South Ossetia. To all intents and purposes this territory was now in all but name entirely under the control of Moscow.

The economy of South Ossetia was fully integrated into that of the Russian Federation in 2015, whilst the South Ossetian Armed Forces have been largely under the command of Moscow since 2008. If Russia was removed from the equation, South Ossetia could never exist independently.

South Ossetia holds de facto independence because Russia allows it to. The parameters of this independence are determined by Moscow. Naturally, they are hardly ever pushed, as many South Ossetians remain enamoured with Russia and likely even vote for unification should the opportunity arise. However, there are South Ossetians like President Gagloev who are seemingly more sceptical and generally more aware of Russia’s agenda towards South Ossetia. South Ossetians who want independence to be fulfilling its dictionary definition, rather than geopolitical limitation. However, the options for Gagloev are limited. He pushes too hard against the Kremlin’s desires and he will likely be replaced.

This status quo is the reality for South Ossetia now. They have for a long time now been prisoners of Russia’s geopolitical game, but only now are some of its population noticing the shackles.

It remains to be seen what the exact future of South Ossetia is. It’s currently unlikely that Russia will move to formally annex the territory, as there is little requirement for it to do so. It already obtains everything that it needs from South Ossetia via the present status quo. The only foreseeable scenario in which Russia might move to annex South Ossetia is if somehow its ethnic Ossetian population unanimously come to the realisation that they want to be the masters of their own affairs. But such a scenario is again highly unlikely, as intervention would probably be made before such a situation could even gain any momentum.