Chaos in the North Caucasus and Russia's future
2006; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 48; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/00396330600765484
ISSN1468-2699
Autores Tópico(s)European and Russian Geopolitical Military Strategies
ResumoAbstract Chechen-style turmoil is spreading across the rest of the North Caucasus, and the Kremlin seems incapable of coping with the mounting chaos, or even understanding its causes - among them poverty, unemployment, ethnic tensions, corrupt pro-Moscow elites and high-handed policies by local authorities. Islam has become an increasingly powerful political force, and some Islamist groups are unquestionably radical and violent, and seek a sharia-based Caliphate uniting the North Caucasus. Their tactics include assassinations, kidnappings, bombings and armed attacks against towns. But there is a bigger issue at stake. Russia has many millions of Muslims, and xenophobic, anti-Muslim organisations and sentiment are increasingly prominent in the Russian political landscape. The spread of the North Caucasus crisis to other Muslim regions, such as Bashkortostan and Tatarstan, could affect Russia's entire political trajectory. Notes 1 On Maskhadov's death and its significance, see ‘Smert’ Maskhadova’ [‘Maskhadov's Death’], Lenta.ru, http://lenta.ru/articles/2005/12/30/caucasus/_Printed.htm; Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, ‘Itogi goda: ne sluzhboi edinoi [‘Summary of the Past Year: Not by Service Alone’], ej.ru, 6 January 2006. 2 Radio Interview with Social Analyst Sergei Khaikin on the Upcoming Elections in Chechnya, Mayak Radio, 25 November 2005; ‘Chechenskie issledovaniya Instituta sotsial ‘nogo marketinga’ [‘Chechen Research of the Institute for Social Marketing’], available at www.insomar.ru. 3 Der Spiegel, 20 June 2005. For the Russian translation, see ‘Zapad ne obyazan nas lyubit’’ [‘The West is Not Obliged to Love Us’], Inopressa. ru, zo June 2005. Vladislav Surkov, deputy head of the Presidential Administration, is quoted here as saying that perhaps ‘70 percent of the able-bodied population lacks jobs’ and that this is ‘catastrophe’. 4 Interview with Shamil Beno, ‘Prichina novogo “Khamasa” -50 protsentnaya bezrabotitsa’ [‘The Reason for a New HAMAS is Fifty Percent Unemployment’], Novaya gazeta, 17 October 2005. 5 On polling by the Levada Center, see ‘Natsionalizm ostaetsya udelom marginalov’ [‘Nationalism Remains the Lot of Marginal People’], izvestia.ru, 20 September 2005. 6 On this see Emil Payin, Etnopoliticheski mayatnik [Ethnopolitical Pendulum] (Moscow: Institut sotsiologii RAN, 2–2004). See also Kate Graney, ‘Tarastan's Vision of Euro-Islam: Fighting Orientalist Legacies’, paper presented at the Association for the Study of Nationalities conference, Columbia University, New York, March 2006. 7 For Malashenko's analysis, see ‘Islam v Rossii v zozo godu’ [‘Islam in Russia in zozo’], religio.ru, io July 2005. 8 There are a number of books available for those seeking background on the North Caucasus. For contemporary issues framed in brief historical context, see Anna Matveeva, The North Caucasus: Russia's Fragile Borderland (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1999); for detailed historical background on Chechnya and the rest of the North Caucasus, see Moshe Gammer, Russian Resistance to the Tsar: Shamil and the Conquest of Chechnya and Daghestan, 2nd ed. (London: Frank Cass, 2003) and John B. Dunlop, Russia Confronts Chechnya: Roots of a Separatist Conflict (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998). 9 See Yulia Latynina's regular weekly radio commentary, this one dated 8 April 2006, in http://echo.msk.ru/programs/code/42820/index.phtml. 10 For a useful compilation of economic data on Russia's regions (including those within the North Caucasus), see ‘Russian Regional Database’, http://www.cspp.strath.ac.uk/catalogu-o.html. For a general assessment of economic conditions in the North Caucasus, see Matveeva, The North Caucasus, pp. 44–59. 11 Nabi Abdullayev, ‘Putin Makes Choice for Dagestan Clear’, Moscow Times, 20 February 2006. On Aliyev, see ‘U Dagestana poyavilsya president’ [A President has appeared in Dagestari], gazeta.ru, 20 February 2006. 12 For Kozak's biography, see Aleksei Mukhin, Praveteli Rossii: Staraya ploshchad i Belyi dom [The Rulers of Russia: Old Square and the [Russian] White House] (Moscow: Algoritm, 2005), pp. 55–8. 13 Aleksandr Khinstein, ‘Prodaem kavkaz. Torg umesteri [‘We are Selling the Caucasus: Bargaining is Appropriate’], mk.ru, 15 June 2005. 14 ‘Osobie mnenie’ [‘One's Own Opinion’], Moskovskie novosti, 21 October 2005. For Gudkov's biography, see http://www.gudkov.ru.biography/. 15 ‘Putin Tightens Security Measures’, CNN.com, http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/09/13/russia.putin/. 16 ‘Kak budut vzryvat Dagestari’ [‘How They will Blow up Dagestari], mk.ru, 8 July 2005. 17 Nick Paton Walsh, ‘Rise of Islamic Militancy Casts Shadow of Chechnya Over Caucasus Villages’, Guardian, 23 September 2005. 18 On the assault on Nazran, see Yuliya Kalinina, ‘Lyubimyi gorod mozhno sdat’ spokoino’ [‘One can Peacefully Surrender a Favorite City’], mk.ru, 22 June 2005. 19 See John B. Dunlop, The 2002 Dubrovka and Beslan Hostage Crises: A Critique of Russian Counter-Terrorism (Stuttgart:Ibidem Verlag, 2006), pp. 17–102. 20 On the attack on Nazran and for details on Jamaat Yarmuk, see ‘Nalchik: The Official Stats Don't Add Up’, ‘Basaev Claims Responsibility’, and ‘Nalchik: Another Sign that the Center Cannot Hold?’, all in Jamestown Foundation, Chechnya Weekly, vol. 6, no. 39, 20 October 2005. Also see ‘Russian City Recovers after Siege’, CNN.com, www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/Europe/10/15/Russia.attack.ap/index.html. 21 Emil Payin, ‘Moscow's North Caucasus Policy Backfires’, Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst, 29 June 2005, http://www.cacianalyst.org/viewarticle.php?articleid=3413&SMSESSION=NO. Also see Payin's ‘The Chechen War as the Prelude and Model for Federal Reforms in Russia’, in Peter Reddaway and Robert W. Orrtung (eds), Dynamics of Russian Politics, Vol. z (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2005), pp. 341–70. 22 ‘Pod elochku Ivanovu polozhili Chechnyu’ [‘They Placed Chechnya under the Christmas Tree for Ivanov’], Nezavisimaya gazeta, 23 December 2005. On the snubbing of Kozak by North Caucasus leaders, see ‘Odinochestvo Kozaka’ [‘The Loneliness of Kozak’] in the same issue. 23 On military and civilian death in Chechnya, see Vyacheslav Izmailov, ‘Bez vesti pogibshie’ [‘Perished with out Trace’], Novaya gazeta, 8 September 2003 and ‘Bez vesti propavshie tsifry’ [‘Statistics that have Disappeared without Trace’], Novaya gazeta, 15 August 2005. In her book, Putin's Russia (Washington DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2003), Russian political scientist Lilia Shevtsova writes: ‘Former minister of the interior Anatoly Kulikov … announced that in the course of the two wars in Chechnya Russia had [as of 2002] lost as many men as in the war in Afghanistan in 1979–1989, that is, about 15,000’ (p. 252). Also see Boris Sapozhnikov, ‘Second Chechen Campaign Takes Its Toll’, gazeta. ru, reprinted in Johnson's Russia List, No. 8-JRL 7067 18 February 2003, http://www.cdi.org/russia/johnson/7067–8.cfm. The financial costs of the war are an extremely difficult subject and can only be estimated. For calculations by various experts, see Sam Vaknin, ‘The Chechen Theater Ticket’, http://samvak.tripod.com/brief-chechnyaoi.html. 24 ‘Interior Troops to Fill Caucasus with Ranks from Chechens’, themoscowtimes.com, 23 December 2005. 25 Kozak's comment noted in Aleksandr Khinstein, ‘Prodaem Kavkaz’, mk.ru, 16 June 2005. 26 For the polling data from the Levada Center, see ‘Sotsialri no-politicheskaya situatsiya v Rossii v dekabre 2005 g’ [‘The Socio-political Situation in Russia in December 20051, levada.ru, 29 December 2005. 27 Tat'yana Stanovaya, ‘“Kadyrovizatsiya” vmesto “chechenizatsii” [‘“Kadyrovisation”’ instead of “Chechenisation”], politcom.ru, 3 March 2006; ‘Groznyi opyat’ trebuet deneg i neft. Zakonoproekt o razgranichenii polnomochii mezhdu Chechnei i RF mozhet stat’ nepriyatnym syurprizom dlya tsentral'noi vlasti' [‘Groznyi is again Demanding Money and Oil. The Draft Law on the Delimitation of Powers between Chechnya and the Russian Federation could become an Unpleasant Surprise for the Central Authorities’], Nezavisimaya gazeta, y March 2006; Yulia Latynina, ‘Ramzan I’, ej.ru, 1 March 2006; Georgii Kovalev, ‘Kadyrov nachal s ultimatuma’ [‘Kadyrov Began with an Ultimatum’], politcom.ru, 17 March 2006. 28 ‘Shamil Basaev sobiraetsya forsirovat’ Volgu’ [‘Shamil Basaev Plans to Force the Volga’], Kommesrant, lo January 2006. 29 Sergei Markedonov, ‘Sevemyi Kavkaz: ot etnonatsionalizm k islamskomu terroristicheskumu intematsionalu’ ‘The North Caucasus: From Ethnonationalism to an Islamic Terrorist International’], politcom.ru, 2 February 2006; Sergei Markedonov, ‘Rossiiskii Kavkaz: smena karaula’ [‘The Russian Caucasus: A Changing of the Guard’], apn.ru, 9 March 2006; ‘Komandivanie vnutrennikh voisk na Kavkaze ozhidaet proryva boevikov na pyati napraveniyakh’ [‘The Command of the Internal Troops in the Caucasus Awaits a Breakthrough by the Rebels in Five Directions’], news.ru.com, 8 January 2006; ‘Federal'nye sily v Chechne stali lishnimi. Teper’ Groznyi nastaivaet na polnoi demilitarizatsii respubliki, [‘The Federal Forces in Chechnya have become Extraneous. Now Groznyi is Insisting on a Full Demilitarization of the Republic’], Nezavisimaya gazeta, 3 April 2006. Additional informationNotes on contributorsJohn B. Dunlop John B. Dunlop is Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author of The 2002 Dubrovka and Beslan Hostage Crises: A Critique of Russian Counter-Terrorism (2006). Rajan Menon Rajan Menon is Monroe J. Rathbone Professor of International Relations at Lehigh University, Fellow at the New America Foundation, and a 2002–03 Carnegie Scholar.
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