For the past year, Georgia has been desperately trying to attract the attention of U.S. President Barack Obama’s White House. It may finally have succeeded.

Georgian officials announced last week that they will contribute two light companies and a heavy battalion — nearly 1,000 troops — to the NATO mission in Afghanistan next spring. Those troops will join 170 Georgian soldiers already on the ground, making the tiny South Caucasus nation the Afghan mission’s largest per capita contributor.

The deployments are part of a surge expected to bring foreign troop levels in Afghanistan to 140,000-150,000. Obama announced last week that the United States was sending an additional 30,000 troops, and turned to NATO allies in search of another 7,000. Georgia, whose own NATO ambitions have been repeatedly frustrated, stepped forward nonetheless.

“Our main message is that Georgia, which is a country under threat, is not just a consumer of security but a frequent contributor as well. I believe our partners understand this,” Eka Tkeshelashvili, who heads Georgia’s National Security Council, tells RFE/RL’s Georgian Service.

“The contingent we’re sending to Afghanistan might shame Western European countries in its size and content. But we’re not doing this to shame others, only to demonstrate that we’re ready to stand with our partners.”

Georgia announced its troop commitments in Brussels during a NATO meeting in which the alliance once again declined to offer Tbilisi a Membership Action Plan (MAP), a key step toward NATO membership.

Mikheil Saakashvili has made his country’s Western integration a cornerstone of his presidency since coming to office in 2004, and received strong support from the previous U.S. administration of George W. Bush.

But the Obama administration, distracted by priorities elsewhere and wary of antagonizing Russia, has not given Saakashvili the level of attention he enjoyed from the Bush White House. Georgia has also seen its prospects dwindle under mounting critique of its democratic record and the country’s disastrous war with Moscow in August 2008.

So now, Tbilisi’s dramatic gesture of support for the Obama administration’s goals raises a natural question: What, if anything, are they getting in return? Not much, analysts say, other than goodwill from Washington.

“The Georgians know they are in a difficult neighborhood and that American interest creates a kind of tacit security guarantee against further Russian aggression,” says Edward Lucas, Central and Eastern European correspondent for the British weekly “The Economist” and author of the book “The New Cold War.”

“And anything that keeps America feeling engaged and grateful is good.”

‘Punching Above Your Weight’

U.S. officials were quick to express gratitude for Georgia’s troop commitment.

During a visit to Tbilisi on December 7, General Roger Brady, the U.S. Air Force commander in Europe, called Tbilisi’s decision “an example to others” and praised Georgia as “a nation that clearly is punching well above your weight.”

Likewise, speaking at a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council in Brussels this week, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Washington was “very grateful for Georgia’s contributions to this important mission.”

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