One minute we were driving past a column of Russian armour that, according to Moscow, wasn't supposed to be there, the next we were being held up at gunpoint and plunged into that sudden moment when it flashes in your mind that your life is in real danger.

A Lada car had suddenly cut us off and three militia brandishing Kalashnikov rifles were dragging us out of our car. Actually our Georgian driver was dragged from the car; I was in the passenger seat and was shoved out by the butt of a rifle in the arms of a wild-eyed bandit who'd jumped in his place.

The three men were shouting all the time. They were shouting in Georgian which means they were almost certainly Ossetians, possibly Cossacks, who are non-ethnic Russians.

A short stroll down the road the Russian soldiers, lying on the decks of their personnel carriers awaiting orders, could see this mini-drama unfolding but it clearly wasn't their problem.

Vladimir Putin's mastery checkmates the West

Michael Binyon says Russia has been biding its time - but its victory in Georgia has been brutal and brilliant

Multimedia

• Video: stories from the front line

• Pictures: Georgia conflict

BACKGROUND

• Hellraising for the rich: how Osborne met Rothschild

• Oleg Deripaska - oligarch at centre of storm

Related Links

• Georgia warning as sides exchange atrocity claims

• 'Civilians targeted' around Gori, as Russians on move

• Full text of the Russia-Georgia peace plan

Multimedia

• Pictures: Russia-Georgia war

At first these men thought we were Georgians and we thought they were going to kill the three of us, but we grappled for passports and waved them shouting that we were English, "Angliski! Anglia! Korrespondent!"

My cameraman Jolyon Mackew was now out from the back seat and all six of us were shouting at each other - but our nationality took the edge off it and, quite possibly, saved the life of our driver, Georgi, who was now held fast by the other two.

There are hangers-on trailing this Russian advance; Ossetians with scores to settle, volunteers with their own weapons, or mercenaries scenting a quick buck. And this is an ethnic conflict so, just like the Balkans and Chechnya there's blood letting in the air.

These men were killers, that was clear in their demeanour, they just didn't kill us. A Georgian family may have met a very different conclusion.

Under the wind of such a swift invasion, command and control is lax at best and people are dying in a ceasefire.

As the first militia man sped off with our car, camera, satellite kit and personal bags, then came that inevitable same thought. Should we have pressed them, argued further, faced them down? The answer is simple, absolutely not. When you're covering situations like this one, whether it's Chechnya, Baghdad or Haiti, draw your own line and never cross it.

We were left alone, the three of us, on the roadside, next to a column of Russian armour a mile out of Gori. We walked until we were out of sight, and then we ran.

*Andrew Wilson is a presenter for Sky News

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