War and Relative Peace
Wednesday, June 16, 2010 at 8:57PM This post will be a thought about the differences between guerilla insurgency and campaign of terror...
...because I feel that some commentators on the situation on North Caucasus have a problem distinguishing between what was and what is now. In their effort to magnify the severity of the situation there they speak of terror campaign as if it was a guerrilla insurgency. Take for instance the following segment from this article:
Russians are still reeling from March bombing attacks on the Moscow metro that killed 40 people and fueled fears of another campaign of attacks by North Caucasus rebels in Russia's heartland.
The Kremlin, with just under four years left before the Sochi Games, has been scrambling to bring the North Caucasus under control.
The result is a raft of hasty measures that analysts say risk fanning tensions in the region and redoubling attacks.
'This is already beginning seriously to influence the federal government's policies in the Caucasus, which now consist in rejecting all efforts toward political modernization and institutionalizing local political regimes instead,' says Petrov. 'The government is returning to an archaic model with the sole aim of creating an appearance of calm over the next two or three years.'
The problem here is in the key phrase: 'trying to bring North Caucasus under control.' The North Caucasus is already under Russian control, or at least under the control of local proxies. The terrorists are waging a war from the underground, the Russian government does not have to fake calm, it either exists or it doesn't. The Russian government is also not fighting rebels, it is fighting a bunch of nihilistic terrorists.
There is a difference between fighting an uprising and fighting a murderous campaign of terror. Uprising such as that we had seen some years ago is quelled by massive military deployment. Thousands of soldiers are used in the operation, while the guerilla controls entire villages, towns, districts and even regions. There are checkpoints, streams of civilian refugees fleeing the theatre of combat etc. It's war as it should be.
Now, fighting terrorism is not like this at all, although we might still be under the influence of the delusional concept of 'War on Terror.' Fighting terrorism is a long lasting struggle requiring the cooperation between many different segments of the society and the government. So far the Russian government and its North Caucasian allies seem to be rather successful. The only high-profile attack recently was the failed assassination attempt on Ingushetia's president Yevkurov. There were no sieges such as that in Beslan or in Moscow Theatre and certainly the militants hold no control over areas in the North Caucasus. In fact Russians recovered rather quickly from the March attacks in Moscow Metro, contrary to the impression the article quoted above is trying to make.
The Chechen's had participated in the Russian campaign in Georgia, suggesting that Chechen soldiers are not needed back home to quell any disturbances. Grozny is being rebuilt from the ruins and leaders of the militants are being continuously either killed (Buryatskiy) or captured (Magas). Many of these operations are not conducted by the Russian military or the FSB but by Chechen fighters loyal to Russia. In fact there was one positive thing about the Moscow attacks. The bombers were wives of militants killed by Russian security forces, their nihilism only speaks of how desperate they and their fellow Jihadists are.
Let me make a bit of a recourse here. As much as I can get critical of the American invasion of Iraq, I have to give the American's credit for calming the situation down over there. The American casualties are down significantly, Iraqi Security Forces also do not take as many losses as they did, and the frequency and magnitude of terrorist attacks is also not what it used to be. We do not see any battles for Fallujah anymore. I heard from the supporters of the Iraq war, especially those from the American right, proclaiming victory in Iraq. I can always hand it to them back armed with the latest news of bloody carnage, but seeing the big picture it is becoming harder to do these days. And most of all I would simply fall to same level as 'Robert in the ZOO', I mean Les Russophobes.
Reader Comments (3)
I am sure they noted the Jihadist conference held by Georgia in December of 2009 in Tblisi.
http://www.juliagorin.com/wordpress/?p=2323
I just got banned in the ZOO, I don't think they allow anything like that information that is described in the link you posted.;-) Very interesting stuff by the way. ;-)
@Leoš Tomíček
The interesting thing to note is that it referenced the fact that western intelligence used private security firms as a front to support Jihadists since the Balkans wars and the thing overlooked in the Litveneko affair in London is that traces of Plutonium where traced back to a private security firm linked to MI6 intelligence with links to oil interests in Iraq which both Litvenenko and Lugavio visited and Wayne Masden reported that I posted before on another article Berezovsky and co involved in the Litvevenko affair had links to a private security firm responsible for the World Trade Centres.
I was going to also mention Nick Berg who was killed in Iraq and strong evidence to suspect him of being an intelligence asset link to Chechnya first with connection to Zacarias Moussaoui the would be 20th 9/11 hijacker French Algerian recruiter for militants in Chechnya and Abu Zarqawi his alleged executioner who is a Jordanian-Chechen terrorist but he seemed to be operating through construction firms and communication companies rather than a private security company.
http://newsfromthewest.blogspot.com/2009/06/nick-berg-mossad-operator-with-ties-to.html