Down But Not Out

The leaders of the lush, beautiful Black Sea enclave of Abkhazia, without official recognition by any country and still in ruins after a bloody war of independence with Georgia 10 years ago, have a modest though eccentric dream: to become the Russian equivalent of the U.S. Marshall Islands, an associated state, living independently but under Moscow's protective wing. Russia shows no sign of sharing this dream, Abkhaz Prime Minister Anri Dzhergenia concedes. But right now Abkhazia has a more pressing problem: the threat of another war with Georgia. If that happens, Abkhaz officials say, blame the U.S. military advisers who will soon start training the Georgian army. An advance unit of U.S. Green Berets arrived in Georgia last week.

The Georgians will mount a "full-scale attempt to solve the Abkhaz problem by force before the onset of autumn," says General Vladimir Arshba, Abkhazia's chief of general staff. They are engaged in "semi-covert mobilization" and menacing exercises, he says, and by the summer the first batch of Georgian troops should have finished U.S. training. If there is an attack, Arshba adds, "I do not exclude the participation of U.S. advisers." Washington says its advisers will prepare Georgian counter-terrorist troops to root out a group of al-Qaeda operatives supposedly sheltering in the remote Pankisi valley, but many diplomats in Georgia wonder if the terrorists actually exist. The U.S. insists that its advisers will not be involved in any military actions. Arshba, a veteran of Afghanistan who trained at a military academy alongside some of the Georgian commanders he is preparing to fight, shrugged off the diplomatic niceties. "We're grown-ups. We understand that people can say one thing and do another."

Diplomats and other observers in the region caution that the war talk is exaggerated, though not entirely. "The Abkhaz do have cause for concern," says a senior U.N. military expert. The risks of a new conflict are high, and top Georgian generals are "exuberant," speaking of a lightning strike that will have them in Sukhumi, the capital, within 24 hours, according to one observer. Any war would certainly be tougher than that, and there is no guarantee Georgia would win. The Abkhaz are determined fighters who would be defending their own homes. Help from Russian volunteers cannot be ruled out, says Abkhaz Foreign Minister Sergei Shamba. Neither, international military officials add, can covert Russian military assistance, possibly air strikes.

There is, however, good reason to wonder if Abkhazia could survive the victory. A wander though Sukhumi leaves the impression that the last war took place only yesterday, not in 1993. Burned-out buildings stand unrepaired even in the center of town. The U.N. helicopter that brings visitors in flies over whole abandoned villages. Streets are largely free of cars. The Abkhaz say 3,000 of their number were killed during the war — ethnic Abkhaz number about 90,000 in a total population estimated at 250,000. Some 200,000 ethnic Georgians fled, allegedly as a result of ethnic cleansing by the Abkhaz.

Since 1993 the economy has made only the slightest of progress. Dzhergenia listed the achievements: "We used not to be able to pay our workers anything, now they get a miserable salary, but regularly." Salaries run about $15 a month, pensions $1 a month. He then ran down the list of Abkhazia's assets — tobacco, citrus fruit, grapes, wine — then raised his eyebrows as if shocked at the shortness of the list. There is also tourism. "In Soviet times we had 2 million tourists a year," he said. "Now we are delighted because we had 100,000 last season."

Abkhazia's subtropical beauty drew both the élite and the masses to its Black Sea coast in Soviet times. Joseph Stalin and his secret police chief Lavrenti Beria had dachas here, as did Mikhail Gorbachev. Cows now graze around Stalin's dacha, while Beria's is occupied by a senior U.N. official trying to negotiate a peaceful settlement to the dispute with Georgia.

The luxuriant richness of nature here — trees and plants forever threatening to displace human habitation — is obviously what has kept people alive these last 10 years. Given peace, they could once again make Abkhazia a tourist paradise. But that chance, like the hopes of becoming a protectorate, is a dream that may never flower.