Georgia, NATO Network Radars in Electronic Alliance

Georgia isn't a member of NATO yet, despite Dick Cheney's desires. But the Georgians and the Alliance are becoming more intertwined, militarily. NATO's "early-warning surveillance system has been plugged into Georgia's air-defense network," according to the Times of London. Bill Sweetman calls it a new kind of military partnership -- a "network-based alliance."
Alliance officials said that the arrangement enabled NATO radar specialists to be linked up to the Georgian radar systems. “It means NATO can now see what the Georgians are seeing through their radars, effectively allowing the alliance to monitor what is going on over Georgian airspace without having military assets in place,” one official said...

A NATO official said that the combined air surveillance arrangement had been negotiated before the crisis in Georgia. The technical switch-on, linking radars in Georgia to NATO, happened this week however...

Or did it? Check out this Reuters story: "Georgia has plugged into NATO's integrated air defense radar system, Deputy Defense Minister Batu Kutelia said on Thursday, months after his country accused Russia of violating its airspace." It's dated December 6, 2007. Hmmm....

Anyway, the Georgian air-defense systems -- which were able to shoot down Russian jets during the two countries' conflict last month -- are actually Russian-made, the Times notes. But "officials said that technical experts for NATO had found ways of linking them to the air surveillance system of the 26-member alliance."

Before its August war with Russia, Georgia received training and gear from both American and Israel. Now, U.S. ships and planes are delivering aid to help Georgia recovery from the Russian attack. Tbilisi may not be in NATO, formally. But the ties appear to be growing closer by the day.
Wired

Hey maybe those rumors weren't so crazy after all.