Potomac Institute for Policy Studies Senior Fellow Amb. David Smith, (Ret.), directs the Georigian Security Analysis Center in Tbilisi, Georgia, and is a keen observer of Russian foreign policy. In his latest column for the Georgian publication Tabula, he writes about Moscow's newly aggressive posture toward a group of islands that Japan considers to be part of its Northern Territories, but Russia calls the Kuril Islands and claims as Russian soil.  He writes that a recent diplomatic confrontation with Tokyo was planned in Moscow "for some time, following an altogether familiar pattern—expansionism, paranoia, pretext, military action and righteous indignation," and adds, "anyone familiar with Russia’s 2008 attack on Georgia will recognize Moscow’s Kuril caper for what it is."  Click below to read the article in full.