Second Chechen War

The Second Chechen War began wholly in September 1999, purportedly on account of attacks by Chechen forces on neighboring Dagestan, and a series of terroristic attacks on residential buildings in Russian cities that caused nearly 300 deaths, which were attributed to Chechen militants. ^{[dubious – discuss]}(See: Russian Apartment Bombings.)

After the First Chechen War, Russia evidently didn't consider seriously to recognise the Chechen independence, because the 1999 intervention was prepared and executed according to a well-conceived plan. According to the former Minister of Internal Affairs and Yeltsin loyalist Sergei Stepashin, the plan was prepared for execution in March 1999 but was delayed.

Whether the war was planned or then delayed, the Dagestani incursion and the bombings finally gave a pretty good cover to launch the invasion and to reconquer Chechnya.

Historical basis for conflict

Following the annexation of Crimea by Imperial Russia in 1783, the Russian Empire began colonizing the Caucasus in order to secure its border against the Ottoman Empire. Russian forces first moved into the area that is now Chechnya in 1830, conflict lasted until 1859. Many troops from the annexed states of the Caucasus fought unsuccessfully against Russia in the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878).

In 1936, Chechnya and neighbouring Ingushetia became the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, a semi-autonomous part of the Soviet Union. This small measure of independence within the Soviet confederation was short-lived. Stalin believed that Chechens were aiding Nazi forces during World War II, and ordered the entire population deported to Kazakhstan. Chechens were not allowed to return until 1957—well after Stalin's death. It is estimated that at least a quarter of all Chechens died during the forced move and fewer than half ever returned to their homeland.

Coinciding with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, part of Chechnya declared independence from the Russian Federation. Simmering debate over independence ultimately led to civil war in 1993. The First Chechen War began in 1994 when Russian forces entered Chechnya to restore civil order and central rule. Following a 1997 ceasefire agreement, Russian troops were withdrawn from Chechnya.

The 1997 election of separatist President Aslan Maskhadov led to turbulence within the country and a chilly relationship with Moscow. Further tensions arose in January and February of 1999 as Maskhadov announced that Islamic Sharia law would be introduced in Chechnya over the course of three years. In March of that year, General Gennadiy Shpigun—Moscow's envoy to Chechnya—was kidnapped and ultimately killed.

Immediate causes

Conflict in Dagestan

File:Shamil basayev.jpg

Shamil Basayev

In August and September of 1999, Shamil Basayev (who served as Commander of the Chechen armed forces in 1996 and was tapped to be Prime Minister of Chechnya for six months in 1998) led a small military force—not more than two thousand troops—from Chechnya into the neighbouring Republic of Dagestan. Baseyev sought to annex the Republic in order to form an independent Islamic state, but ultimately failed to take control of the Dagestani government. Moscow responded by bombing Chechen border villages that purportedly concealed the invaders.

Bombings in Russia

At the same time as the incursion into Dagestan, a series of bombings took place in Russia (in Moscow and in Volgodonsk) and Dagestan (outside an apartment building housing Russian soliders in Buinaksk). The bombs targeted four apartment buildings and a mall, and in total killed nearly three hundred people. The Russian government (including then-President Boris Yeltsin) blamed Chechen separatists for the bombings, though there is some question about whether this assignment of responsibilty is accurate. Shamil Basayev has denied involvement in the attacks. Some high-profile individuals (including exiled Russian businessman Boris Berezovsky) have suggested that the FSB (a Russian intelligence service) staged the bombings to provide a pretext for an invasion of Chechnya.

War

In late September of 1999, the Russian military began bombing targets within Chechnya. Ground troops followed soon after. In response, martial law was declared and all eligible men were conscripted. President Maskhadov declared a ghazevat (holy war) to face the approaching Russians.

Grozny

Hoping to avoid the significant casualties which plagued the First Chechnen War, the Russians advanced slowly and in force. The Russian military made extensive use of artillery and bombs in an attempt to soften Chechen defenses. It was not until November that the Chechen capital of Grozny was surrounded, and more than two additional weeks of shelling and bombing were required before Russian troops were able to claim a foothold within any part of the heavily fortified city.

By February 2000 much of Grozny had been reduced to rubble by nearly incessant artillery fire and bombing. Surviving Chechen rebels sought to escape into the hills surrounding the city. In March, the Russian army began to allow former residents back into the city to visit the wreckage.

Guerilla war

Despite the destruction of Grozny, fighting continued, particularly in the mountainous southern portions of Chechnya. Rebels typically targeted Russian officials and pro-Russian members of government and police forces.

In September 2001, Chechen troops launched bold attacks on the Chechen cities of Gudermes and Argun. Rebels also shot down a helicopter, killing a number of senior Russian military officers. In the days following the attacks, approximately four hundred individuals suspected of involvement were arrested by Russian forces.

In March 2002, the leader of the fundamentalist Islamic rebel operations, Amir Khattab, was killed. Amir Abu al-Walid replaced him.

Russian officials have accused the bordering nation of Georgia of allowing Chechen rebels to operate out of Georgian territory, and permitting the flow of troops and materiel across the Georgian border with Chechnya. In August 2002, Russia launched air strikes on purported rebel havens in the Pankisi gorge very close to the Georgian border.

Continuing tension

War Crimes

Russian and Chechen officials both regularly accuse the opposing side of committing various war crimes, up to and including murder, rape, and assorted other breaches of the laws of war. International and humanitarian organizations (including the Council of Europe and Amnesty International) have criticized both sides of the conflict for blatant and sustained violations of humanitarian law.

One of the earliest war crimes trials to be held was that of Salman Raduyev, a field commander for the rebel Chechen forces. He was convicted in December 2001 on terrorism and murder charges.

In 2002 Russian Colonel Yuri Budanov was tried for war crimes. Budanov was ultimately convicted of raping and murdering a Chechen girl he believed to be a separatist sniper.

The European Court of Human Rights agreed to hear civilian cases brought by Chechens against Russia in October 2004.

Assassinations

Former Chechen President Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev was killed by a car bomb in Qater on February 13 2004. A Qatari court convicted two Russian government agents in the bombing. The Russian government denied involvement in the attack, blaming infighting among rebel factions or dispute over money. Moscow had at the time been involved in a bit to extradite Yandarbiyev to Russia to face terrorism-related charges.

President Akhmat Kadyrov was killed in a substantial bomb blast in a Grozny stadium on May 9 2004. President Kadyrov had survived two preceding bomb attacks, one on his Grozny headquarters in 2002, and one by a suicide bomber at a 2003 religious festival. His successor, acting President Sergei Abramov, was targeted by yet another bombing in July of 2004; Abramov survived the attack.

Hostage takings

The Moscow theater hostage crisis

On October 23 2002, gunmen took more than seven hundred hostages prisoner at a Moscow theater. The hostage-takers demanded an end to the Russian presence in Chechnya, and threatened to execute the hostages if their conditions were not met. The seige ended violently on October 26, when Russian troops stormed the building. More than one hundred of the hostages perished in the fighting that followed and from the incapacitating effects of knockout gas used by the Russian forces. Russian officials blamed Maskhadov and Baseyev for the attack; both initially denied responsibility and insist that the attack was the work of independent rebels and terrorists. On November 2 Baseyev recanted his statements, assuming responsiblity in a statement on his web site and apologizing to Maskhadov for not informing him of the plan.

The Beslan school siege

On September 1 2004, approximately thirty individuals seized control of Beslan's Middle School Number One and more than one thousand hostages. Most of the hostages were students under the age of eighteen. Following a tense two-day standoff punctuated by occasional gunfire and explosions, Russian special forces raided the building. Fighting lasted more than two hours; ultimately 331 civilians, 11 soldiers, and 31 hostage-takers died.

Once again, Russian officials publically linked Baseyev and Maskadov to the attack, and Baseyev again claimed responsibility in a November 17 website publication. Maskhadov denounced the attacks and denied involvement.

Ceasefire?

In February of 2005 Aslan Maskhadov and Shamil Baseyev issued a call for a ceasefire lasting until at least February 22: the day preceding the anniversary of Stalin's deportation of the Chechen population. The call was issued through a separatist website and addressed to President Putin. Fighting between Chechen and Russian military units has apparently ceased in the region.

On 8 March 2005, Maskhadov was killed in the Chechen community of Tolstoy-Yurt, northeast of Grozny. His death took place during a raid by Russian security forces.

How the existent war turned publicly non-existent

^{[dubious – discuss]}

Reportedly, in the Russian political vocabulary the period 1999-2002 of the second Chechen war was called consistently an antiterrorist operation that understandably caused some military losses, too. Then, in an already classic way, those numbers were downplayed but in a pretty clumsy way.

Since then, in the same vocabulary, the partisan-styled phase of the second Chechen war has been called not a true war at all but sporadic attempts instead. While effectively blocking out news of war inspired by no news, no war logics while the war goes on undercover producing other traces of war beeing seen on the streets; neonazis and skinheads, abuses on foreigners and the dark due to the war traumas of the endless war, a political shift to totalitarianism justified publically only by this militarily non-existent but politically very existent 5 year's war.

Prospects of warfare in the cricis

The usually reliable ^{[dubious – discuss]} Chechen resistance news agency, the Chechenpess, has told for years in its weekly reviews of war that Russia has kept on losing approximately 50-150 troops and various military equipments weekly in Chechnya. Factually, no repurable impartial source - exept Russian military spokespeople - has truely denied that. ^{[dubious – discuss]}

The fact is that either the military or civilian losses haven't made any effect on the Russian politics regarding Chechnya and therefore, most likely, they won't make either in the future until the losses amount over the news blockage by numbers or just somehow unpredictibly mediawise or societywise. Nevertheless, Russia is purposely made to stand enormous losses by the information warfare, that is the extensive blockage and filtration of the military news, while the reported wide-scale human rights abuses continue without interruption in order to break-up the resistance on the spot. ^{[dubious – discuss]}

The citizens' common access to the onfield facts of war is prohibited, but anyway the rumours are spreading, so reportedly the majority of conscipts try their best to avoid military service, and finally only some 10% of the young men of the age annually end in the army.

External links