Bombs and other explosive ammo may have began turning Georgia’s separatist region of South Ossetia into hell on earth about five days ago, but the attacks aimed at the country’s cyberspace began as early as July 20, according to internet experts who observed the event closely.

Just like almost a year ago, when Russian hackers attacked Estonia’s cyberspace, the Georgian Web sites collapsed under devastating waves of fake traffic, sent from great numbers of compromised computers.

Georgian banking and government sites were the first that went down just as the war began on Friday. The Web sites were paralyzed through a so-called Distributed Denial of Service (D.D.o.S.) attack.

A torrent of data was aimed at Georgia’s government Web sites containing the message: “win+love+in+Rusia,” according to researcher Jose Nazario of Arbor Networks in Lexington, The New York Times reported. The attack started as early as July 20 with coordinated barrages of D.D.o.S. that shut down several Georgian Web sites.

The Web site of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili was left inoperable for a whole day by the numerous D.D.o.S. attacks, said the experts at Shadowserver, a group that tracks malicious network activity. They said that the server which controlled the attack was based in the U.S.

This first attack may have been a rehearsal for what was about to come. The cyber attack on Georgia was the first known attack of this kind which coincided with a war in its standard meaning. However, in modern warfare, it’s no surprise to see one of the belligerent sides take over enemy TV stations, radios, newspapers and, more recent, Internet sites. The strategy is pretty much the same. Only the means differ.

The Web sites of the government of South Ossetia were first hit with D.D.o.S. just a few hours after the Russian troops opened fire on August 8. During the following day, the Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Web site was shut down as well. Its visitors could see photos of Georgian President Mikheil Saaskashvili and Adolf Hitler side by side. The attack was claimed by the South Ossetia Hack Crew.

Another Web site of paramount importance that was hacked was the National Bank of Georgia’s. If the banks seize operations, no one can get cash, a situation that can degenerate into chaos very quickly. On Monday, the Web site of Russian news agency RIA Novosti was attacked with the same kind of D.D.o.S. attack.

It’s still unknown who was behind the cyber attack. Georgian officials blamed Russia, while Russia denied any involvement. The main suspect is a cyber-criminal organization known as the Russian Business Network, The Wall Street Journal reported.

However, Georgia is relatively a late arrival to the Internet. With a population of only 4.6 million, it ranks 74th out of 234 nations in terms of Internet addresses. If such an attack would be carried out on a more Internet-reliant country, the impact would be stronger and could prove to be an important supplement to the military attack.

Nevertheless, the cyber attack hampered President Mikheil Saakashvili’s efforts to mount an aggressive media attack against Russia’s foreign policy to a certain extent.