U.S. deputy assistance secretary of state, Matthew Bryza, said Washington had been warning Georgia against going into direct armed conflict with Russia.

“Our message was consistent to our Georgian colleagues ... ‘Avoid a direct military confrontation with Russia at all costs. You cannot prevail. It simply is not possible,'" Reuters reported quoting Bryza as saying. “It [Russia] can almost instantaneously roll tanks in. And then even if you succeed miraculously in stopping the tanks, and the infantry, and the mechanized infantry, which move very quickly, it's the air power that's finally going to get you. And that is what happened.”