Source: From the Wikipedia article linked above.
The French (via my Jane's email updates) decided to sell the Russians their Mistral amphibious warfare ship--but without weapons:
Russia will buy Mistral-class amphibious assault ships from France without weapon systems, according to a 5 July report by Russian state-owned news service RIA Novosti. Under the sale, the ships will come with navigational equipment and technical documentation, but Russia will equip them with its own weapons and helicopters[.]
The French may try to use the lack of shooting weapons as an excuse for the sale not being an actual weapons sale, but it ignores the fact that the big deck of the Mistral is the weapon. That ship--without weapons--is the weapon that will allow the Russians to hit the Georgian coast in force in a short amount of time.
I suppose this means the Georgians could really use some Harpoon anti-ship missiles, now.
