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It's now midnight Friday in Georgia, and Michael has moved to the capital city of Tbilisi. In this clip, he describes how the Russian army has moved further into Georgia.
SUZANNE
MALVEAUX, CNN ANCHOR: CNN's Michael Ware is on the
ground in Georgia.
Michael, we are hearing that a convoy, up to about
100 vehicles, are heading into the second largest
city. What do you know? What are you seeing on the
ground?
MICHAEL WARE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, what we've
heard in the last hour and a half or so, Suzanne, is
that approximately 100 Russian armored vehicles are
indeed moving deeper into Georgian territory. Now,
what we need to understand here is that in the
country of Georgia, there's key disputed enclaves of
pro-Russian communities. So what Russia has done has
launched a key front attack into Georgia: first, to
secure both of those enclaves, one in the east, one
in the west; however, what Russia has since done is
advance into Georgia proper, deep into sovereign
Georgian territory. And indeed, we now know that the
Russians are comfortably in control of at least one
Georgian city, and it now appears that they're in
control of a second key port city as well.
We visited one of those front lines this afternoon
around the city of Gori. Now, that's a Georgian city.
But we saw that the Russian troops were firmly in
control. So they are very much taking the upper hand
here.
At the same time, on the road leading from Gori to
the capital of Georgia, Tbilisi, we saw ragtag
columns of the Georgian military, rallying as best
they can. But to be honest, from what I witnessed,
they pose very little threat to any Russian advance,
if in fact that's what the Russians intend. Now, on
the second front to the west, we see this armored
column moving, and perhaps the Russians are
consolidating further into Georgian territory.
And right now I have to say there's absolutely no
incentive for the Russians to back off, and I'm
afraid to say that having seen this on the ground
today, I have to tell you that America is much more
involved in this war. This war was much more about
U.S. interests than I think folks back home realize
-- Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: And Michael, what do you think is actually
happening there? Do you think that this is a
threatening posture from Russia when you see the
vehicles there? Or do you think they're just kind of
showing off, if you will, kind of the manpower, the
fact that they can be there on the ground and move
without impunity?
WARE: I think it's very much the latter, Suzanne. The
Russians militarily, I believe, have achieved their
primary goals.
Now, from what I saw today, they were sitting, as I
said, comfortably, relaxed. They didn't seem to
perceive any kind of direct threat from the Georgian
military. And from my personal assessment, there is
no direct threat from the Georgia military.
But more importantly, Suzanne, what's the bigger
picture here is that the Russians know, as Washington
knows, is that there's no direct threat from the U.S.
either. With its combat divisions already
overstretched in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Russians
know there's nothing America can do to help its ally
here on the ground -- Suzanne.
MALVEAUX: Michael Ware, on the ground in Georgia.
Thank you so much for those observations.