Russia and Georgia were on a war footing Wednesday after Moscow hinted it could resort to military action in response to a Tbilisi threat to open fire on vessels that "illegally" entered the waters of its breakaway region of Abkhazia.
The Russian defence minister said Georgia's leaders were turning into "pirates" while the country's most popular Internet news site Gazeta.ru screamed in a headline that "Russian tourists will be shot" in Georgia.
Russian ships frequently take tourists to the separatist region on the Black Sea coast in north-western Georgia that was a top spot for summer vacations in the Soviet era.
Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili has vowed to reunify his fractured republic since toppling the old administration in a peaceful "rose revolution" last year.
And he has since taken a stern view of Russia's involvement in his tiny and impoverished former Soviet republic that will soon be home to a key pipeline from the Caspian Sea backed by the United States.
"I gave such an order a few months ago and I am repeating it today: all the ships will be sunk, we will fire on them... as happened in the waters of Abkhazia a few days ago," Saakashvili said Tuesday before leaving for a private visit to the United States.
Georgian coast guards last Friday opened fire on a Turkish ship that entered the Black Sea waters of Abkhazia.