Russia's priority in S.Ossetia war was to defend citizens

After the Georgian army launched a full-scale attack on the capital of South Ossetia in August 2008, then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ordered Russian troops to intervene, the hardest decision of both his political career and life.

In the night of 7 to 8 August, 2008, Tskhinval came under attack by the Georgian army, which violated a truce and killed dozens of Russian citizens and peacekeepers stationed in the city.

The Russian military intervened, and within five days the conflict was over. Dmitry Medvedev, who at that time had spent less than three months in office as president, spoke with RT’s Oksana Boyko about how it started and the behind the scenes political gambles that led to the conflict.