Born in Gori, Georgia, Chankotadze was trained at the Soviet Tbilisi Artillery School (1978–1982) and the Chinese PLA National Defense University (2001). Chankotadze served in the Soviet military since 1982 before joining the National Guard of Georgia in 1990. During the 1990s, he commanded various artillery units in the military of a newly independent Georgia and also fought in the civil wars of the early 1990s. In 1999, he was promoted to the rank of Major General. He then served as a deputy Chief of General Staff of the Georgian Armed Forces from 2000 to 2004 and then as a military envoy at the CIS military cooperation staff and a defense attaché until being dismissed from the Georgian military in October 2005. He resumed service in October 2007 in the capacity of the commander of an artillery brigade, a position he held during the August 2008 war with Russia. After the war, in November 2008, Chankotadze was appointed a Deputy Chief of Joint Staff of the Georgian Armed Forces in a major army reshuffle initiated to address the shortcomings during the August conflict. The Russian daily "Kommersant" quoted the Ministry of Defense of Georgia (MoD), describing Chankotadze as "the one to have best distinguished himself during the hostilities."