All-too-plausible explanation from Asia Times (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JH13Ag02.html) of Georgia's attack on South Ossetia (2,000 civilians killed and refugees made of another 30,000; a helping hand from US airlifts of 2,000 'essential' Georgian troops back from Iraq) in terms of the push to extend NATO into the Caucasus, which, as it says in the title, would 'end the post-Cold War era', permanently activating the military faultline along Russia's southwestern border and the course of the major Central Asian gas and oil pipelines.