2008 South Ossetian War Over. Who Won?

The biggest victor, naturally, was myself.  I really learned a ton about propaganda, catapulting it, and how whole countries of people can come to hate each other enough to want to kill each other. I watched the television news from both Russia and America and only very rarely did their respective realities overlap.  As a side note, I learned how problematic engaging in war can be unless you have your own, slick, media operation.  Certainly no one wants thousands of people to die so they can learn about war, but if I am quite lucky, I learned enough about war to prevent this many people dying in the future.

As for the combatants, Russia can claim a marginal victory.  First, her people love her more.  Polls show only a tiny fraction of Russians disapproved of Russians moving into South Ossetia.  Their mission was portrayed as a humanitarian one to fight off US-backed Georgian aggression.  I doubt many people in Russia think America wasn't being aggressive in Iraq, so, America's standing in Russia has declined, again.

Georgia gained nothing, lost a foothold in Abkhazia, and lost the right to have further peacekeepers in South Ossetia (pretty much guaranteed).  Saakashvili's plan, instead of gaining S. Ossetia for Georgia, seems to have lost it to her forever.

Because the interests of two veto-powers were involved, the UN Security Council was never going to be that useful.  Still, I'm proud of Panama.

I'm pretty sure that the President of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, gained overall. 

Sorry, I'd write more, but I don't make a living off the truth.