Russia Makes Itself at Home

Photographs by Alex Majoli / Magnum for Newsweek

In late summer of 2008, for Georgians, the attacks seemed to come from all sides. Residents of South Ossetia first came under siege from the Georgian military as it tried to clamp down on the breakaway movements there and in Abhkazia. Then, in a classic blitz by land, sea and air, the Russians descended from the north, quickly took control of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and continued the attacks on greater Georgia. Photographer Alex Majoli, on assignment for NEWSWEEK, caught the former Soviet republic in a flash of chaos. Majoli's images communicate a sense of recalled despair, as the Russian invasion brings forth brutal and suppressed memories of the old iron fist.