Shamil Basaev is killed

So anyone who wants to fight against opression is evil? I don't agree what Basaev has done but the russians have essentially destroyed chechnya, a part of their own country, just to stop a secession.
 
WarMachine said:
So anyone who wants to fight against opression is evil? I don't agree what Basaev has done but the russians have essentially destroyed chechnya, a part of their own country, just to stop a secession.
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Nobody said that. What a rhetoric question and observation. We blamed Basaev for being a monster, regardless of what oppression he was fighting against by killing children.
Some others wished him a peaceful rest, go figure.
All he did was bringing water to the Russians' mill and helping them improve their image abroad.
 
Ok, you cleared that up as far what you meant. But he wouldn't have been so popular if it weren't for the russians who i think were much worse than he ever was in this conflict.

What can i say, Russia is in a tight situation with the reduction of freedoms and all that. But remember, this is a country that since it's formation has been under strict authoritarian rule. The way Putin is acting now is being quite friendly compared to the vast majority of russia's past leaders.

Yeltsin started the chechen war back when Russia was in a wild west market economy and nobody cared. All the sudden they export much more oil and they're under scrutiny? It's all politics and i think from a russian point of view there really isn't a big deal since they are living better lives in the past few years. The chechen conflict is their one black mark that's just bringing their whole image down, but it was handled very poorly when it first started.

Anyway, the fewer commanders that kill civilians the better. I suppose that logic would apply to Bush, but that's another subject and we shouldn't go there here.
 
WarMachine said:
Ok, you cleared that up as far what you meant. But he wouldn't have been so popular if it weren't for the russians who i think were much worse than he ever was in this conflict.

What can i say, Russia is in a tight situation with the reduction of freedoms and all that. But remember, this is a country that since it's formation has been under strict authoritarian rule. The way Putin is acting now is being quite friendly compared to the vast majority of russia's past leaders.

Yeltsin started the chechen war back when Russia was in a wild west market economy and nobody cared. All the sudden they export much more oil and they're under scrutiny? It's all politics and i think from a russian point of view there really isn't a big deal since they are living better lives in the past few years. The chechen conflict is their one black mark that's just bringing their whole image down, but it was handled very poorly when it first started.

Anyway, the fewer commanders that kill civilians the better. I suppose that logic would apply to Bush, but that's another subject and we shouldn't go there here.
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WM, you are making your assumptions on very little information available to you.
Unfortunately, the media coverage of this confilct has been very lopsided on both sides.
Both sides are guilty for atrocities, acts of genocide and oppression of each other's people.
However, I would blame the Russians alone for their reluctance to open up this conflict to the world to let people abroad know about what the Chechen criminals and bandits have done to the ethnic Russians living in Checnya for generations, about the emass kindnappings for ransom and slavery.
Instead, they still think about themselves as the Great Power and are embarassed to show to the foreogners their weaknesses.
And they insist that only the official point of view is correct(which is very lopsided, too).
That brings is very unbalanced - the Chechen side has supplied the media with a lot of data on Russian wrongs, but the Russian side didn't.
Only when the atrocities at the Moscow theater and Beslan school have become known - the world opinion has started to change.
It' time to realize that the Cheechen cause - it's fight for freedom fo some, but it's a part of the Jihad for the majotity.
The link between the islamic partisans in the Niddle East and the Chrchens has been shown last month when the Russian diplomats have been kidnapped and then killed in Bagdad. The kidnappers have demanded withdrawal of the Russian troops from Chechnya.

So, please, remember: rooting for the Chechens, you are rooting for Usama.
 
I think it's pretty stupid to create an indpendent chechnya since it would be surrounded by russia anyway. The massacres mentioned were terrorists acts, but a lot of death on the chechen side was a contributing factor to these events occuring. I don't see these things in black and white because that's usually never the case. I like to know about the russian and chechen side and i've realized overtime that both have been very lethal in their methods throughout that conflict. I think the chechens resorted to terrorism because it was easy, but it isn't paying off. Now i don't think that you can ever justify terrorism against civilians since civilians never fight an opponent, the military fights.
 
WarMachine said:
I think it's pretty stupid to create an indpendent chechnya since it would be surrounded by russia anyway. The massacres mentioned were terrorists acts, but a lot of death on the chechen side was a contributing factor to these events occuring. I don't see these things in black and white because that's usually never the case. I like to know about the russian and chechen side and i've realized overtime that both have been very lethal in their methods throughout that conflict. I think the chechens resorted to terrorism because it was easy, but it isn't paying off. Now i don't think that you can ever justify terrorism against civilians since civilians never fight an opponent, the military fights.
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Unfortunately, I can't point you to the good sources on this matter in English.
You are wrong in regards on geography( a common American ignorance, I believe:). Checnya is not surrounded by Russia. On the South, it borders Georgia which had supported Chechnya and has some Chechen minority along the border.

Let me give you some short history(my own version:)

The Chechen nation has survived a very tough life in the Caucasus mountain region. It has been surrounded by hostile tribes, mostly Christian(Georgians and Ossetians) as well as Ingushes. Economy was pretty much concentrated on cattle, so stealing of cattle (and women) was always a huge business for the Chechens and for their neighbours.
This tough life has produced very tough, resourceful, brave and cruel people. Their ethics could be very strange for the outsider.
1. They are fiercely loyal to their teip(clan). The loyalty to their nation comes after that.
2. All outsiders are fair game, except when they are guests. Guests are sacred. A mortal enemy can show up at the Chechen's door and he will be getting all the courtesies - food, shelter, etc.
However, as soon as he gets out of sight - he will be pursued and killed, if found.

The first Russian troops and the irregulars(Cossacks) have come to the area 400 years ago. The weaker tribes have come(mostly voluntarily) under the Russian rule. The stronger ones have resisted until the end of the 19th sentury. Some people and even whole tribes have moved out to Turkish Empire's lands - that's why there are a lot of Chechens in Saudi Arabia and Jordan, as well as Circassians in Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.
Those who stayed, were, pretty much, left alone. The Csarist Government has been relying on the local chiefs and nobles to rule the land.
The situation has changed when oil has been found in the plaines of Chechnya. A number of Russian techicians have moved in and cities have been built there. But again, the Csar didn't want to change the locals' lifes, religions, etc.
When the Bolshevicks have taken power, they wanted to change all that and the resistance grew. There were several uprisings in Chechnya between 1920 and 1941. They were crashed mercilessly.
However, when the WWII has started and the German Army has come to the borders of Chechnya, many of the Chechens have been seeing their chance. They have cooperated with the Nazis, provided them with the intelligence, stored weapons and explosives in their villages.
In the same time, other Chechens have been fighting the Germans along with the Russians. So, I wouldn't say that entire Chechen nation was pro-German and anti-Soviet.

However, Stalin has not discriminate - he has ordered the entire nation to be exiled. And not just the Chechens. He had sent to exile all ethnic Germans, Koreans, Greeks, Balkars, Ingushes, Turkes, Crimean Tartars...
Now, try to understand how they felt being thrown into the cattle railroad cars and sent on the thousand miles journey to the steppes of Kazakhstan....
No shelter, no infrastructure - they had to build everything by themselves.
The locals, who are Moslems, were not hostile at the beginning. But it has changed.
The Kazakhs were poor and not as enterprenerial, but they have controlled the police and the courts.
No wonder, many Chechens, fierce and independent men, have found themselves in the Soviet Gulag prison camps very soon!

And they throve there! They have been very well prepared for harsh reality of the camps- they spoke the unknown language, they didn't snitch, they protected each other...
The Chechen criminals are the most respected in the Russian underworld since...

After removing the Chechens and the Ingushes from their land, Stalin has ordered to remove all signs of their existense there.
I have seen the map of Chechnya made in the 1950-s, where the word "Chechnya" has disappeared from! The area has been renamed to "Groznensky District". Many cities and villages have changed their names and inhabitants.
So, when the Chechens have been allowed to returned after the Stalin's death, they had to squeeze between the new settlers.
Yes, the Chechens have a lot of grievances against the Soviets!
In the same time, they have paid back in different way.
The shadow economy of Chechnya was notorious, the Chechen criminal gangs were very powerful in Moscow. At some point, I have heard, the number of luxury cars in the Chechen capital, Grozny, have been the highest in the country, except of Moscow(50 times larger city).

When the USSR has collapsed, the Chechens were well prepared for the new "Wild East" situation. They have siphoned billions from the Russian economy using th illegal schemes. The Chechen criminals had the safe heaven in th Chechen republic - as soon as he crossed the border, he was safe from justice.. The Republic itself was a little Somalia or Afghanistan at that time.
From that point, I think, the matter of Russian/Soviet oppression had become the issue of the Russian survival as the state.
The best solution, ideally, was to dissociate Chechya from Russia completely, build a fence, remove all ethnic Russians from there...
But it was not possible - the Russians can't even think about the loss of territory(even with th largest territory in the world!)

So, they have tried to crash it and have been beaten badly. The peace agreement has made Checnya almost independent... But!
She was unable to become sustainable - the warlords have been fighting each other, the lawlesness grew... and more Muslim fanatics were coming to fight and proselite for the extreme Islam...
The Saudis and other were paying for that. So, the Chechen warlords, especially late Khattab the Arab and Basaev, have tried to spread their influence over other Russian areas. .The have launched raids into Russia
That had given Russsia the pretext to beat them back and then re-conquer th country.

Remember, I have been talking about their clans(teips)?
The Russians have learned to use one teip against another. Thus they were able to create pro-Moscow government there and make Chechens to fight Chechens.

Is everything over?
This round, apparently, yes.
However, the entire region of Northern Caucasus is a powder keg. While Russia is a demographic disaster now - it is dying off, this region is steaming with overpopulation with thousands of unemployed young people having nothing to do. The Wahhabi ideas are getting more and more popular there.

Hope, it will help you understand a little bit more...
 
It was an interesting history of it, but it really boils down to what the russians will do in order to stop the conflict. It's spilled over into dagestan in some parts and that sounds more like a widening area of conflict.

I wouldn't too much about the chechen underworld, i heard the russians have an even larger mafia working on a scale that would do Al Capone proud. If it wasn't for the russian goverment's initial problems with calming down checnya, then the chechen captial wouldn't have been destroyed. See, this conflict just reciprocates until the chechen found a new source of fervor in radical islam to justify their continuation of the conflict.

If russia is going to keep doing this whack-a-mole strategy against the region, then they have to wake up and realize that it hasn't been working. I don't know what is necessary since i'm not an expert in regional warfare, but diplomacy with some promise of an official autnomous republic doesn't sound so bad. You just have to make sure that the chechens are run by government officials who aren't gangsters or are under the control of gangsters.
 
WarMachine said:
It was an interesting history of it, but it really boils down to what the russians will do in order to stop the conflict. It's spilled over into dagestan in some parts and that sounds more like a widening area of conflict.

I wouldn't too much about the chechen underworld, i heard the russians have an even larger mafia working on a scale that would do Al Capone proud. If it wasn't for the russian goverment's initial problems with calming down checnya, then the chechen captial wouldn't have been destroyed. See, this conflict just reciprocates until the chechen found a new source of fervor in radical islam to justify their continuation of the conflict.

If russia is going to keep doing this whack-a-mole strategy against the region, then they have to wake up and realize that it hasn't been working. I don't know what is necessary since i'm not an expert in regional warfare, but diplomacy with some promise of an official autnomous republic doesn't sound so bad. You just have to make sure that the chechens are run by government officials who aren't gangsters or are under the control of gangsters.
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I don't think this problem has a solution acceptable to everybody.
Even now, there is so many viepoints on what is going on there.
On one hand, the "independence movement" or the "bandits" (whatever term is used) are, basically, defeated by the Russians.
On the other, the power in the republic belongs to the guy who is not better than those "fredom fighters"/"bandits" that he is fighting against.
They just belong to a different clan than him.
Russia sends him money and looks away when he and his thugs("special forces" that loyal to him, not to Moscow) kill or kidnap someone.
He is not 30 yet, so he can be legally elected as President of the Chechen republic, so he is just a prime-minister. This fall he is going to be 30 an it is expected that the current figurehead-president will step down to clear the office for him.

here is info on him at wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramzan_Kadyrov
 
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