John Rapley
John Rapley
UNITED STATES Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was quick to draw parallels between the Beslan tragedy and terror attacks on Americans. So too was Russian President Vladimir Putin. That may not be surprising: with the American death toll in Iraq passing 1,000 on the day Mr. Rumsfeld made his declaration, and with 1,000 Russians having died in terror attacks in the last two years, both men may be trying to turn the spotlight away from their own policies' shortcomings.
It is still not clear exactly who carried out the Beslan school siege, but they are almost certainly connected to Chechnya's rebel movement. The Chechen rebels, for their part, certainly have links to al Qaeda. In particular, the militant leader Shamil Basayev, whom some suspect of involvement in the Beslan attack, is closely connected to the international terrorist network.
Yet while the Russian government likes to portray the Chechen conflict as a front in an international Islamic war so too, incidentally, does al Qaeda that would be simplifying matters a bit too much. The Chechen conflict has deep roots. Essentially a fight for national autonomy, only in recent years has it become 'Islamicised'. Even then, religion may be secondary to the conflict.
RESTIVE PEOPLE
Under Russian rule for centuries, the Chechens have seldom accepted Moscow's rule passively. Always a restive people, they caused their overlords endless headaches. Only the iron fist of Joseph Stalin appeared
to subdue them. He simply deported the entire population deep into the interior of Russia. Since then they have returned, taking advantage of the power vacuum after communism's collapse to reassert themselves.
Moscow will not give much ground on Chechen demands for autonomy. It does not feel it can. Russia's imperial history led it to colonise dozens of different ethnic minorities. Were the Kremlin to grant autonomy to one, it fears the dominoes could begin tumbling. And given that Russians have intermingled with all these groups over the centuries, such a break-up could be bloodier than what we saw in Yugoslavia.
So, Moscow has decided to take a military line. It has also tried to manage the Chechen political process in such a way as to ensure that the region's governments are loyal to Moscow. Neither prong of the Kremlin's strategy has worked well. The Chechen government lacks legitimacy in the eyes of many Chechens. The recent elections, which elevated a pro-Moscow candidate to office, have met with considerable scepticism.
As for the military campaign, the hard line has failed. President Putin all but admitted as much after the tragedy. Rebels are operating pretty much with impunity all over Russia. In the last three weeks alone, rebels launched a raid in Chechnya, are believed to have blown up two airplanes, detonated a bomb outside a Moscow subway station and captured the school in Beslan. In all these incidents, and particularly in the school siege, they demonstrated a high degree of planning, co-ordination and brutal sophistication. The response of the Russian military has appeared ham-fisted by comparison.
ACCIDENTAL EXPLOSION
In Beslan, what appears to have happened is that an accidental explosion inside the school triggered a panic among desperate hostages, who began fleeing the building. Hostage-takers started shooting. The soldiers responded in kind. But what really seems to have provoked chaos is that armed vigilantes in the crowd joined the fray, turning the gunfight into a bloodbath. The army can therefore legitimately say it did not botch a rescue, but was forced to act. However, that leaves the question of why an angry, armed crowd was allowed so close to the school.
The collapse of Soviet-era institutions left Russia's army and police demoralised and poorly-paid. Distribution networks that once operated through the communist party, and which enabled state employees to supplement meagre incomes with privileged access to scarce goods decent housing, good schools, and the like - spun out of official control. Organised crime emerged. But the links remained. Police and soldiers who once depended on communist patronage often now turn to criminal patronage.
This has made it possible for criminal organisations, including Chechen rebels, to infiltrate the state and undermine its operations. Blaming al Qaeda for Beslan may buy Mr. Putin a little breathing-space. But it won't lessen the gravity of the challenge he faces.
John Rapley is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Government, UWI, Mona.