Georgia On My Mine(layer)

Well, nothing good can come from this.

Georgia's president said Friday that his country is under attack by Russian tanks and warplanes, and he accused Russia of targeting civilians as tensions over the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia appeared to boil over into full-blown conflict.

"All day today, they've been bombing Georgia from numerous warplanes and specifically targeting (the) civilian population, and we have scores of wounded and dead among (the) civilian population all around the country," President Mikhail Saakashvili told CNN in an exclusive interview.

"This is the worst nightmare one can encounter," he said.

Asked whether Georgia and Russia were now at war, he said, "My country is in self-defense against Russian aggression. Russian troops invaded Georgia."

For those of you keeping score, the South Ossetia republic of Georgia (not Russia, this is important) decided it wanted to be independent. First, some background on Ossetia, Georgia, and Russia.

South Ossetia and Georgia's Black Sea region of Abkhazia broke away from Georgia after fighting wars against Tbilisi in the 1990s. Both have financial and political support from Moscow and the vast majority of locals have Russian citizenship.

But the frozen conflicts are fast beginning to thaw, particularly since pro-Western President Mikheil Saakashvili took power in 2003 and angered Russia by pledging to steer ex-Soviet Georgia towards membership of NATO.

However, the Georgians have decided to retake the region by force. This has caused Russia to step in and say "No." The offical reason is that Russian peacekeepers are in the area. The unofficial reason is because Russia doesn't want another Chechnya on its hands.

About 150 Russian armored vehicles have entered South Ossetia, Saakashvili said, and Georgian forces had shot down two Russian aircraft.

Russia's Defense Ministry said it sent "reinforcements" to South Ossetia to help the Russian peacekeepers already stationed there.

The events followed an emergency session of the U.N. Security Council to discuss a dramatic escalation of violence in Georgia and South Ossetia.

The session ended Friday morning without a statement about the fighting.The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said it was sending an envoy to the region immediately.

NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer issued a statement Friday saying he was seriously concerned about the recent events in the region, and he called on all sides to end armed clashes and begin direct talks.

But right now there's a three-way war among Ossetian rebels, Georgian troops, and the Russian Army. Imagine France invading Quebec after it seceded to stop Canadian troops from retaking Montreal, on the premise that most of Quebec and Montreal are French, and you have some idea of what's going on. This is ugly all the way around. More as this develops.