Faced with the rebirth of the Superpower politics of Russia, visible due to the South-Ossetian and Abkhazian crisis in August 2008, the EU has two problems to solve.

Faced with the rebirth of the Superpower politics of Russia, visible due to the South-Ossetian and Abkhazian crisis in August 2008, the EU has two problems to solve. On one hand, how to re-freeze the Georgian conflicts heated imprudently by President Saakaşvili. On the other hand, how to avoid repeating the Georgian scenario in other states that used to be part of the former Soviet Union. In this context, Brussels is facing a dead-end. The situation dead-end lies in the fact that Russia, after the unilateral recognition of the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, has transferred these names from the list of frozen conflicts on the one of the solved conflicts (along with Kosovo!). Starting from this blockage, a 2nd Helsinki (i.e. a new Conference for cooperation and security in "Great Europe"), as proposed by the European Parliament and what appears to be the option of President Medvedeev, appears as a path to an effective and sustainable solution. The EU should promote it vigorously. The inspirational dead-end can be seen in the signals of agreement with the authoritarian regime in Belarus to reward it for not taking part in the Russian pro-secessionist operation in Georgia, with the hope to create a fissure between Minsk and Moscow or an omission in the case of Azerbadjan when it will come to the states whose territorial integrity is protected by the EU. An adequate strategy against the contagiousness would mean identifying the structural vulnerabilities of the states in danger. There are three vulnerabilities: the cultural-identity division, the political instability, and the economic fragility.

The identity crises that trouble independent European member states w