The first thought is it was sort of “War of the Worlds.” But whereas aliens have never invaded the U.S., despite what summer blockbusters predict, the scare in Georgia hit a little bit closer to reality. After all, it was just a year and a half ago that Russia really did invade. From The Moscow Times:

“Thousands of Georgians — including President Mikheil Saakashvili’s grandmother — panicked Saturday night when a pro-government television station aired a hoax that Saakashvili had been killed and Russians tanks had invaded their country at the request of opposition parties.

Cell phone networks crashed, and long lines of worried people formed at gas stations and bank machines.

But by Sunday afternoon, the fear had given way to anger, and opposition supporters rallied in central Tbilisi to accuse Saakashvili of pulling off the hoax in an attempt to discredit the opposition.

Saakashvili described the fake report as ‘unpleasant’ but ‘close to the real thing.’

‘It was really an unpleasant film, but more unpleasant is the fact that report was maximally close to what could happen or what the enemy of Georgia has in mind,’ Saakashvili said at a meeting with locals in one of the country’s provinces, RIA-Novosti reported.

He did not say whether he had known about the report in advance. But if he had, he hid the information from his closest relatives.

Saakashvili said the report had scared his grandmother. ‘My grandmother, though she had seen me shortly before the report, got worried and nervous and, of course, a lot of people got nervous,’ he said.”

BBC has the video from pro-government Imedi TV, showing archive footage of the war and theorizing how opposition figures might seize power after an assassination of Saakashvili.