Russia's second
Afghanistan By Dr Michael A Weinstein
Russia's predicament in its rebellious republic
of Chechnya is fast spinning out of control and is
threatening to become Russia's second Afghanistan. After
10 years of trying to control Chechnya primarily by
military force, punctuated by a period of withdrawal
from 1996 to 1999, Russia still has not been able to
realize its aim of ruling the republic through a
compliant local political leadership. At present, the
situation in Chechnya is deteriorating so badly that
Moscow is increasingly faced with a series of options,
all of which are unfavorable to its strategic and
security interests.
Located in the strategically
significant Caucasus mountains, Chechnya's predominantly
Sunni Muslim population has never been reconciled to its
incorporation into the Russian empire in 1859. Chechens
declared an autonomous republic in 1920 in the wake of
the Russian Revolution, but were later absorbed into the
Soviet Union. In 1944, the Josef Stalin regime accused
the Chechens of cooperating with Nazi forces and sent
hundreds of thousands of them into forced exile in
Kazakhstan, from where they were allowed to return in
1957. After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the
Chechens again made a bid for independence under the
leadership of air force general Dzhokar Dudayev. The
Russian regime of Boris Yeltsin refused to acquiesce in
Chechnya's separation and invaded the republic in 1994,
setting off a two-year war that ended in Russian retreat
and de facto independence for Chechnya without
international recognition.
During its brief
period of independence, Chechnya became a failed state.
The elected government of Aslan Maskhadov was unable to
contain rampant crime, corruption, warlordism and
Islamic revolutionist tendencies, which spilled over
into neighboring Russian republics and into the heart of
Russia itself. After a series of apartment house
bombings in Russia in 1999 that were blamed on Chechen
radicals, the Putin regime chose to invade Chechnya once
again, driving Maskhadov underground and triggering a
second Chechen war that continues to fester and recently
has erupted with suicide bombings of Russian airliners
and the seizure and bombing of a school in the republic
of North Ossetia, resulting in hundreds of deaths and
casualties.
The recent upsurge of violence in
the Chechnya conflict stems directly from the
assassination of Chechnya's Russian-backed president
Akhmad Kadyrov on May 9 this year. Elected in October
2003, Kadyrov had been Moscow's hope for achieving
legitimacy for its control of Chechnya. The chief
religious leader of Chechnya's Sunni Muslims, Kadyrov
had backed the separatist forces in the first Chechen
war, but became disenchanted with the failed experiment
in independence and collaborated with the Russian
occupiers after 1999, becoming head of a Russian-imposed
governing authority. With the death of Kadyrov, Moscow
lost the only local leader with sufficient support and
prestige in the Chechen population to possibly secure
legitimacy for Russian rule. Politically, Russia's
situation in Chechnya has reverted to what it was in the
first Chechen war, in which it was defeated.
Russia's position in Chechnya In
Chechnya, Russia faces a situation that is strikingly
similar to the one that it encountered in Afghanistan in
the 1980s when it tried unsuccessfully to preserve that
country as a client state against nationalist and
Islamic opposition aided by the United States. Both
Chechnya and Afghanistan are clan-based societies whose
members share strong senses of national identity and
independence, but do not have traditions of strong,
centralized, political rule. When such societies
function as effective polities, their governance is
based on a fine balance of power among networks of clan
alliances, which is easily disturbed and vulnerable to
degenerating into fragmentation, localism and
warlordism. Under the stress of war, Chechnya has fallen
apart into an array of competing groups, some of which
war against Russia and others which cooperate with it to
varying degrees out of expediency.
The one
constant among Chechens is a fundamental opposition to
Russian rule, which is sometimes superseded by
calculations of group and individual expediency.
Russia's only significant advantage in Chechnya is that
a large proportion of the Chechen population is war
weary and has become disabused of the separatists as
well as of the Russians. After 10 years of turmoil, many
Chechens are willing to acquiesce reluctantly in Russian
rule, so long as it brings them a modicum of security.
The problem for Moscow is that it has not been able to
suppress the militant Chechen resistance through force
and political manipulation. The result has been chronic
instability, the devastation of Chechnya's economy and
infrastructure, an exodus of refugees to other Caucasian
republics, waves of resistance strikes in Russia and a
weakening of Moscow's power in the Caucasus.
During the 10 years of struggle, Moscow has
pursued a policy of imposing its rule by force and
attempting to install compliant leaders, rejecting the
option of negotiating with the opposition. Most public
discourse about that policy concerns whether or not
Moscow should shift gears and try to enter negotiations.
Critics of the military option tend to blame Russian
President Vladimir Putin's stubbornness for continued
failures in Chechnya, but there are plausible reasons
why Russia has not turned to negotiation.
Most
importantly, Chechen society has become so politically
fragmented that it is not clear if any deal that Russia
might make, for example, with Maskhadov's exile
government of Ichkeria, would be effective on the
ground. The resistance is split between Chechen
nationalists and far more uncompromising Islamists and
warlords, particularly Shamil Basayev, who is deemed
responsible and has claimed responsibility for most of
the terrorist acts committed outside Chechnya. Even if
Moscow could bring some of the nationalists on board,
that would not guarantee peace and security, at least in
the short term, and would probably lead to more autonomy
for Chechnya than the Russians are willing to permit on
a lasting basis.
In addition, Russia has a vital
security interest in maintaining its territorial
integrity and discouraging bids for autonomy in
republics where ethnic Russians are a minority,
particularly in the Caucasus. Rebel movements have
sprung up in neighboring Ingushetia, which has ethnic
and religious ties to Chechnya. Inter-clan conflict has
arisen in the republic of Dagestan and there have been
recent reported incidents of armed confrontations with
security forces in the republic of Kabardino-Balkaria. A
generous grant of autonomy by Moscow to Chechnya might
not result in effective separatist movements elsewhere,
but it would be highly likely to create instability in
the region.
Finally, Russia has a vital
strategic interest in maintaining control over the
northern Caucasus region and expanding its influence
into the southern Caucasus to break American
encirclement through Georgia and Azerbaijan, and prevent
the US from monopolizing Caspian Sea oil. De jure or de
facto separation of Chechnya from Russia would be a
major setback to core Russian strategic aims.
The election of Alu Alkhanov Russia's
severe predicament in Chechnya is illustrated by the
election to Chechnya's presidency on August 29 of Alu
Alkhanov to replace Kadyrov. Widely seen internationally
and within Chechnya as a rigged vote, the election
detracted from Russia's legitimacy in Chechnya. A former
Chechen interior minister and security operative,
Alkhanov has no ties to the opposition and has been
ordered by Moscow not to negotiate with it. Unlike
Kadyrov, he has no prestige or base of support in the
population, although he is linked to the powerful clan
led by Ramzan Kadyrov, the son of the late president,
who controls a formidable independent militia, and is
too young to constitutionally assume the presidency.
Moscow has attempted to increase acceptance of
Alkhanov by permitting him to pursue a policy of
diverting all of Chechnya's oil revenues to
reconstruction efforts in the republic. Yet with most of
the fields depleted and most of the refining capacity
impaired, this plan seems to be an effort by Moscow to
avoid having to give direct reconstruction aid, which in
the past has been frittered away by corruption.
By putting up as weak a figure as Alkhanov,
Russia has shown the weakness of the hand it has to play
in Chechnya. The resistance forces understand this,
which is why they have launched their spectacular
strikes. After the airliner and school bombings, Moscow
is faced with a choice between trying to apply massive
coercive power to crush the rebellion, letting
conditions go on as they are, or attempting to make some
kind of bargain with segments of the opposition. Each of
those options has more downside risk than upside
potential, and each of them has benefits for the
resistance. Massive force will further alienate the
Chechens from Russia; continuation of chronic
instability will do the same; negotiation will spell a
diminution of Russian power if a bargain is made, and
will be a sign of weakness that will likely embolden the
hardline opposition. There is also the option of another
Russian withdrawal from Chechnya, but that would mean a
severe weakening of Russian influence in the Caucasus.
International complications Just as
was the case in its intervention in Afghanistan, Russia
faces the additional problem that the opposition to its
policies is aided by the US. Chechen businessman Malik
Saydullayev, who would have been the only credible
candidate contesting Alkhanov in the presidential
election had he not been barred from running because of
a technical problem with his passport, has said that
"Russia has geopolitical and geostrategic interests in
the Caucasus, the heart of which is Chechnya, and
developed NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization]
countries also have interests in the Caucasus. This war
is over these interests."
The interest of the US
in the Caucasus is control over oil supplies from the
Caspian Sea, which involves securing compliant regimes
in the southern Caucasus, including Azerbaijan, where
the oil is extracted, and Georgia, through which the
Baku-Ceyhan pipeline will pass. As a consequence of this
dominant interest, the US is also committed to thwarting
any attempt by Russia to expand its influence in the
Caucasus. From the American viewpoint, Russian failure
in Chechnya is welcome, as long as it does not get to
the point that Chechnya becomes a base for Islamic
revolution worldwide.
In the current strategic
environment, the US is constrained to give public
support to Russian efforts to curb terrorism, but that
does not mean that it takes Russia's side in practice.
Not only did the US criticize the August 29 election as
being "neither free nor fair", but it has granted asylum
to Ilyas Akhmadov, the foreign minister of Maskhadov's
opposition government, leaving him free to pursue
diplomacy aimed at winning international support for
Maskhadov's Republic of Ichkeria. The Putin regime has
complained of an American "double standard" in the "war
on terror", but has been powerless to stop the American
support of the opposition.
Maskhadov is pursuing
a novel strategy of sending his government ministers
into exile in different countries so that they can gain
maximum diplomatic leverage. Culture minister Akhmed
Zakayev has been granted asylum in Great Britain; health
minister Umar Khanbiyev is in France; social defense
minister Apti Bisultanov is based in Germany.
Maskhadov's dispersion strategy has led to publicity for
his proposal to internationalize the Chechen conflict
through guarantees of the country's autonomy and to
contacts with non-government organizations. Whether NATO
powers are formally involved with the Ichkerian exile
government is unclear, but at the very least they are
granting it a measure of legitimacy and sending a signal
to Moscow that they are not supportive of its success in
Chechnya.
The US and the European Union have
called for Russia to negotiate with the separatists.
France and Germany have played both sides of the table,
distancing themselves from the US by endorsing the
August 29 election, but also urging negotiation. Their
ambivalence is based on their desire for stronger
relations with Russia to counter American influence in
Eastern Europe and to build economic relations,
particularly in the oil sector. At the same time, they
also want Caspian Sea oil free from Russian control.
Conclusion With no apparent favorable
options, it is likely that the conflict in Chechnya will
result in a setback for Russia's geostrategic interests
in the Caucasus. Faced with a population that remains
ill disposed to Russian rule and is not organized
coherently enough to make a bargain, and confronted by
external powers that have an interest in diminishing
Moscow's influence in the region, Putin's regime is in a
bind from which it will be difficult, if not impossible,
to extricate itself. Over time, Moscow will be tempted
either to withdraw or to apply massive force. In the
short term, it will probably continue its failed
policies, possibly with additional shows of force that
will not change the basic situation.
The most
likely scenario of prolonged instability will weaken
Putin's credibility and give him less leeway elsewhere
in the Caucasus, providing an advantage to the NATO
powers.
Published with permission of thePower
and Interest News Report, an
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