Maybe invading Georgia was not such a good idea after all.

The onesided, short war with the former Soviet satellite country was hailed in Russia. It supposedly marked Russia's return as a world power.

But military victories are not everything. The economy counts, too, and Russia has been one of the hardest-hit countries in the global financial turmoil.

Credit is stagnant. Investors have transferred billions of dollars out of the country. Russian stocks have declined 60 percent this year, USA Today reports.

Part of the problem has to do with falling oil prices. Russia is the world's no. 2 exporter of crude. But the Aug. 8 invasion turned the tide. Foreign investors were spooked by Moscow's abrupt military aggression and what has been described as hostility toward certain Western companies.

Since this summer, foreign companies have moved $57 billion out of Russia. Russians have removed capital from the country too — $16.7 billion in the third quarter.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has placed the blame squarely on America, as have other politicians.

But Russia will not go bankrupt. It has a budget surplus of $188 billion and the world's third-largest gold and foreign exchange reserves — $556 billion.

Yet Russians are used to 7 percent annual growth and have seen substantial rises in their incomes, notes Cliff Kupchan, analyst with the Eurasia Group. "They've come to expect a 'yes' answer to the question of, 'Are you better off today than you were yesterday?"

Russian leaders may want to tone down their anti-Western rhetoric and try to win investors back. There are signs that is happening. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said earlier this week that the country sought to smooth relations with the West that were roiled by the war.

Russia looked like a bully in Georgia. That was bad for business.