Chechnya: Tombstone of Russian Power

Cover
......Page 1
Title Page
......Page 2
Copyright......Page 3
Contents......Page 4
Acknowledgements......Page 10
Introduction......Page 12
Part I: The War......Page 24
Journey to Grozny......Page 28
From Russian Fortress to Soviet Oil Town......Page 33
Elders, Bandits and Heroes......Page 37
Grozny under Dudayev: Ordered Anarchy......Page 50
The Bombardment of Grozny......Page 54
The Russian Population......Page 56
The Russian Army in Grozny......Page 57
The Chechen Revolt of the 1990s......Page 67
General Dzhokhar Dudayev......Page 76
Chechens, Ingush and Ossetes......Page 81
Chechnya under Dudayev, 1991-1994......Page 85
Dudayev's Regime......Page 91
The Russian Decision to Intervene and the
Geopolitics of Oil
......Page 95
Catalyst for Intervention......Page 97
The Anarchy of Russian Decision-Making......Page 105
Why Chechnya Fought Alone......Page 107
Bad Planning and Moral Cowardice: The First Three Weeks......Page 113
Spring 1995......Page 132
Maltreatment of Prisoners and the Civilian Population......Page 141
Victory and Defeat, January 1996 to January 1997......Page 148
Part II: The Russian Defeat......Page 158
4 
The Masque of Democracy: Russia's Liberal Capitalist Revolution and the Collapse of State Power......Page 161
Privatisation as Enclosure of the Common Land......Page 163
The Privatisation of the Russian State......Page 167
Ruinous But Probably Stable......Page 192
Liberal Capitalist Hegemony in Russia......Page 194
5 'Who Would Be a Soldier If You Could Work in a Bank?': Social and Cultural Roots of the Russian Defeat......Page 197
Demographic Change: The Engine of Expansion Goes Into Reverse......Page 198
An Aged and Weary Population......Page 204
Social Change, Culture and Demilitarisation......Page 211
Urbanisation, Economic Development and the Attempts to 'Catch Up'......Page 217
Patriotism and the Private Soldier......Page 223
The Serbian Option......Page 230
The Cossack Tradition and its Destruction......Page 240
The Cossacks and the 'Invention of Tradition'......Page 244
The Transdniestrian Path......Page 254
The 'Manipulation' of National Conflict......Page 263
The Crimean Path......Page 266
The Nature of the 'Russian Diasporas'......Page 270
8 'A Fish Rots from the Head': Military
Roots of the Russian Defeat
......Page 280
An Unparalleled Defeat......Page 281
Shortage of Training and Equipment......Page 285
Shortage of Men......Page 290
Shortage of Money......Page 292
Shortage of Unity......Page 297
Dyedovshchina, the Abuse of Servicemen and the
Lack of NCOs
......Page 301
The Struggle Over Military Reform, 1996-1997......Page 305
Part III: The Chechen Victory......Page 312
9 The Two Hundred Years' War: The History and Context of the Russian-Chechen Conflict......Page 314
The Russian Wars Against the Mountaineers......Page 315
A Tragic Geopolitical Location......Page 321
Four Hundred Years of Deportation and Ethnic Cleansing......Page 325
The North Caucasus Under Soviet Rule......Page 326
Active and Passive Resistance, 1859-1944......Page 327
10 'We are Free and Equal like Wolves': Social and Cultural Roots of the Chechen Victory......Page 335
Aeneas with the RPG......Page 338
The Chechens: A Primordial Ethnic Nation?......Page 341
The Russian Intervention: An Error of Colonial Ethnography......Page 346
Tribal Warrior Egalitarianism: Teip, Vird and Adat......Page 350
Chechen'......Page 356
Anarchy and Autocracy......Page 359
The 'Bandit' Tradition and the 'Chechen Mafia'......Page 360
Religion and Nationalism......Page 366
Islam in the War of Shamil and the War of Dudayev......Page 367
A Sufi Evening......Page 378
The Hegemony of the New Order......Page 380
Future Revolutions......Page 383
The Nature of Russian Nationalism......Page 387
The Future of Russian Nationalism......Page 392
Notes......Page 396
Index......Page 438