By Saipti Gelayev

The recent sharp increase in activity of the Chechen armed underground raises questions about 
the ability of Chechnya's pro-Moscow leadership to control the situation

July 4, 2008
GROZNY, CHECHNYA

With the beginning of spring and summer, Chechen militants, who over the past two to three years have not undertaken serious activity on the territory of the republic, once again loudly announced their presence.  Today, reports about the situation in Chechnya are reminiscent of the events of four or five years ago when there was a high level of militant activity.

Chechen militants traditionally are most active during the warmer parts of the year when mountainous regions are concealed by vegetation.  Despite being part of a kind of yearly tradition of escalation, the current situation has some significant differences.  This time, militants operate in relatively large groups and conduct themselves more openly and boldly.  In June of this year alone, they allegedly attacked village as a large force, carried out several attacks on soldiers and members of local authorities, killed and wounded approximately 30 soldiers and members of law enforcement, fired on a military helicopter and in the center of a village, burned an armored vehicle.

In previous years, militants in Chechnya were more inert and rarely engaged in clashes with the soldiers and police – particularly after the death a chief field commander, Shamil Basayev, who was killed in the summer of 2006 in neighboring republic Ingushetia.

No one knows the exact number of militants operating in Chechnya.  Just a few months ago, the Kremlin-backed leader of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, asserted that no more than a few dozen “bandits” were hiding in the mountains.  The Russian military command believed that [in the North Caucasus] overall, members of militant bands numbered approximately 700 people.

Recent Incidents

On June 29th, three law enforcement officers were killed as the result of an attack by militants.  In the first case, according to official reports, militants ambushed and fired upon two policemen who, with local residents (a woman and a man), were on their way to talks with the goal of negotiating the surrender of a participant in militant units.  This incident occurred in the foothill region of the Urus-Martanovsky district in a wooded area near the settlement of Roshi-Chu.

The very same night, in the mountainous Vedensky district (which, along with many other mountainous districts in Chechnya, such as Nozhai-Urtovsky, Shatoisky, Itum-Kalinsky, is considered militant stronghold), unidentified individuals fired upon the territorial police department in the village of Elistanzhi.  As a result, a deputy to the commander of the spetsnaz battalion “South”, which is comprised of local recruits, was killed.  Another serviceman was wounded.  During the firefight, a local resident was killed.  Just two days earlier, in the very same Vedensky district, there was an armed skirmish between police and militants.

On the evening of June 27th in the vicinity of the alpine village Dargo, members of law enforcement were ambushed by militants.  In the course of the fierce gunbattle, four policemen and two militants were killed.  At least four more members of law enforcement were seriously wounded.  The militants were able to escape by hiding in the inaccessible forests of the mountainous regions where they can take up positions from camps and bases.  Units of the pro-Moscow Chechen authorities, along with the Russian military, are already in their second week of conducting so-called “special operations” against members of the armed underground.

In the words of a member of the republic’s police, these two mountainous districts have seen the activation of special branches of the Chechen MVD federal police, OMON ^[1], the spetsnaz battalions “South” and “North” (which are comprised of local residents), as well as other special branches of the federal authorities.  According to him, the overall number of involved forces consists of several thousand men.

Background to the new activity

The pretense for conducting large-scale operations was the June 13th militant attack on the village of Benoi-Vedeno in the Nozhai-Yurtovsky district, where the relatives of the current head of Chechnya (Ramzan Kadyrov – a member of the Beno clan) live.  A large group of militants, up to 60 people, entered the village and held it under control over the course of several hours.

The raid resulted in the killings of three local residents (a father and two sons, the latter killed for their service in one of the units loyal to Kadyrov), as well as the burning of five homes and two cars belonging to families of Chechen policemen.  Detachments of the local police and Russian army arrived in the area only the next morning, after the captured village had been abandoned by the militants.

A few months before this incident, militants conducted an analogous operation in the foothill district of Achkhoi-Martanovsky.  The night of the March 19th, a detachment of approximately 50 militants entered the village of Alkhazurovo.  Several members of law enforcement were killed.

In June, after the events in Benoi-Vedeno, the pro-Moscow president of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, who had previously declared that “this winter will be the last for militants in Chechnya” and that “in the mountains of the republic there are only 50-60 ‘shaitans’ (as the militants are called by local ‘siloviki’),” urgently gathered the heads of local and federal authorities in Grozny and sharply criticized them, accusing them of being unable to adequately react to the militant raids and unable to inflict preemptive strikes on the armed underground.

Moreover, Kadyrov demanded a large-scale special operation against units of militants in southern Chechnya.  “We must conduct a joint military operation…so that, together with units of the Russian Ministry of Defense, the battalions “North” and “South” are activated, as well as the 2nd patrol-post regiment of the police [regiment of spetsnaz of the Chechen MVD in the name of Akhmat Kadyrov].”

New kind of resistance?

As a result, a relatively large contingent of police and military units were sent into the mountainous Vedensky and Nozhai-Yurtovsky districts in order to carry out this large-scale operation.  However, as the events of the past few days have shown, the measures taken have not put serious pressure on the activities of the armed underground.

“In my view, the leaders of militants in the Caucasus… have been able to consolidate their power and reestablish a system which had been seriously derailed by the death of one of its chief commanders, Shamil Basayev, in Ingushetia in the summer of 2006.  The armed underground today is clearly a well-organized and established system, operating as though it were a single organization in Chechnya, Dagestan, Ingushetia, and in other regions of the Caucasus. “It is even better organized than in the first years of ‘counterterrorist operations’, during the second military campaign in the republic [of Chechnya],” said a local political scientist.

“Umarov’s announcement about the creation of the ‘Emirate’ led to a serious conflict in the leadership of Chechen separatists, but it didn’t seriously change the situation in the republic.  People, secretly or openly sympathizing with the armed underground, justify Umarov’s decision by saying that he simply didn’t have any other choice.  For many years the CRI^[2] , beginning with Djokhar Dudaev, counted on the fact that the West and the International community would force Russia to end the war.  However, this never happened; instead the Chechens were practically given as a sacrificial lamb to the Kremlin in exchange for cheap oil and gas.  Sooner or later, this should be reflected in a movement of resistance and that’s exactly what happened.  In exchange for moderate and secular leaders – like Dudaev and Maskhadov – came the radicals.” 

“The armed underground is deeply conspiratorial and groups of militants have become more autonomous and operate where and when they consider it necessary, in situations that are beneficial to them – this is the basis of guerrilla warfare.  It [the underground] rather successfully recruits the youth into its ranks.  It has established new channels of financing and arming itself which is also critically important for the successful operations of guerrilla units.  And, finally, it still employs the support of a large percentage of the population. If the opposite case were true, militants without rear bases and systems of supplies would not be able to stand a chance against a nuclear state over the course of almost ten years of continuous military conflict.”

A local resident claimed that, “Just in the last few weeks, a few dozen young men have left three villages for the mountains.  Among them is even a member of the Chechen police, taking with him not only his standard-issue weapon but also his younger brother.”

There are no reliable sources about how many young men leave for the mountains.  People are afraid to openly speak about it because the families of such men instantly become objects of investigation by local authorities.  Two weeks ago, information surfaced that in the village of Avtura in the Shakinsky district a few dozen young men “submitted applications” to the militants.  The departure of young people to the mountains, in the opinion of many observers, is related first and foremost to the youthful aspiration for justice. The absolute power bestowed upon Kadyrov and his inner circle by the Kremlin is far from pleasing to everyone in Chechyna.   

Trends connected to the Yamadayev–Kadyrov Conflict

Certain local observers do not rule out that the growing activities of militants are directly connected to the conflict between the head of the republic and the fairly influential group of the Yamadaev brothers, one of which is the commander of the spetsnaz battalion “East”.

The open conflict between former brothers-in-arms, Ramzan Kadyrov and the Yamadayev brothers, stretches at least from mid-April.  Kadyrov and the Yamadayevs belong to the same clan, a fact which plays a fairly serious role in Chechnya.

“I cannot claim this with full certainty, but there are indirect signs that “siloviki”, in particular the command of the battalion “East”, took part in the attack on Benoi-Vedeno,”  said an expert from a Moscow human rights organization.  “There are many questions in this case.  For example, why was it necessary for the militants to destroy the home of the former head of the village administration?  Local residents say that the attackers were dressed in practically new uniforms, conducted themselves very crudely when they logically should have done whatever possible to win over the local population.  Otherwise the continuation of the guerrilla war could not even be considered.  According to numerous eyewitness accounts, militants in such a situation try not to enter into conflict with the local population.  They work in a targeted way, exclusively against those who they consider traitors and enemies, i.e. policemen, bureaucrats, or individuals who they consider informants.” 

“The southeast part of the republic (the Nozhai-Yurtovsky, Vedensky, Kurchaloisky, and Shalinsky districts) was ‘East’s zone of responsibility’.  After the conflict with Kadyrov, subdivisions of the battalion, which were stationed here earlier, were removed.  Now it turns out that with the departure of “East”, the militants have started attacking entire villages!  In this way they are dealing blows to Ramzan Kadyrov, who constantly assures everyone that there are about 20-30 local ‘shaitans’ and a few more mercenaries from Arab countries running around in the mountains and that he fully controls the situation in Chechnya.  The strikes seem to be a response from the Yamadaevs, who are now being accused of an entire array of terrible crimes in Chechnya including murder, kidnapping, and torture.” Said a human rights defender.

This new escalation of the violence in the republic, in connection with the stirring of the armed underground and possible beginning of large-scale military conflict, seriously worries a large portion of residents in Chechnya, who still clearly remember the horrible consequences of war.  “I won’t say that I’m a supporter of Ramzan (Kadyrov) and his methods of ruling – I’ll go further.  I hate the greedy bureaucratic leash and the law enforcement, drunk on its own indulgence, but, as it goes, ‘a bad peace is better than a good war’.”  Said a 55-year-old resident of Chechnya.  “The war can’t last forever, people got tired of it long ago.  Chechens, like any other people, want to live in peace and quiet.  People want to work, raise their children, build homes, in general, live a normal, full life.  We don’t need war and shock anymore.”

Saipti Gelayev, independent journalist in Grozny, Chechnya