Russians and Chechens

Submitted by Ianus (Poland), Dec 12, 2006 at 14:34

Dear Susan,

Thank you very much indeed for your post and many encouraging words ! I feel really flattered.

I happen to know a little Russian and I have great respect for Russia's high culture and its positive role in Eurasia as the power that stopped and disaramed Islam and civilized the barbarians of the Eurasian steppes. Perhaps you also know that the Russians could have liberated Constantinople -as they liberated the Balkans - from the Turkish yoke had it not been for Britain's duplicity and blackmail. I respect the Russians for that effort greatly.

> I sometimes talk to russian people and they all think chechnia is a lost cause and they despise all the moslems there, they don't even care about the (few?) natural resources in caucasus, the pain is more than the gain.

In the first place, why should they admire and respect Moslem Chechens or Moslems as such? What good things have they ever received from Moslems or Islam ? From Byzantium they got their Orthodox faith , their civilization , their alphabet and many Greek words in Russian . All this great Byzantine civilization was humiliated and crushed by the Moslems who didn't stop at the gates of Tsarigrad (Constantinople) but pushed northwards in coalition with the Tatars to impose Islam by force also among the Slavs. Historically these predatory Moslem hordes were the Russians' implacable and deadly enemies. Until Ivan the Terrible's time their recurrent incursions were a scourge for Russia . Can you rationally like Moslems as a Russian ? Give me some reasons , if you can !

As to Chechen Moslems do you know who Ushurma (sheikh Mansur) or Shamil was ? The latter instituted imamat in Chechnia , both declared gazawat (=jihad) on the kaffiri Russians and conducted it with due cruelty. In one of his "Caucasian stories" Leo Tolstoy describes that the Moslems actually didn't have any pangs of conscience cutting Russian throats. For them the Russians simply weren't humans. They were less than impure dogs in their eyes.

Some later history of the Chechens is also instructive as to the reasons why they were deported by Stalin in 1944 to Kasakhstan. As the Nazis were approaching Grozny in the autumn of 1942 the Chechens organized a mass armed revolt to support the Germans and oust the Soviets. They collaborated everywhere with the occupiers and defected Russia. Was it only because of Stalin's tyranny or simply out of an inherited tribal instinct ? The Chechens are thought to be the most savage and most backward tribe in the Caucasus. Have you ever seen a ritual dagger dance perforemed by Chechens ? It inspired fear in me. The Russians came to the Caucasus not just as "imperialists" and "colonialists". They came to protect the weaker Christian nationalities ( Armenians, Osetians, Georgians) against these and other primitive bloodthirsty Moslem tribes who lived off mass banditry the Russians put an end to .

As to natural resources the region is a major production centre of oil. Around 1990 the Grozny region alone produced 4,2 mln tons of raw oil and its refineries' output amounted up to 18 mln tons . A strategic pipe-line goes over Grozny to Novorossyisk, although now it has been circumvented by the pipeline going from Baku over Georgia to Turkey. Grozny and Chechnia is the key to the Caucasus and Transcaucasus. Who rules here , controls much more than just Chechnia.

> Actually if one good thing can be said is that they are not afraid to speak loud about how low they think of the moslems. Is it because slavic people are more racists? If being racists is telling like it is, more people should be racists.

Come on ! When did Islam become a race ? You seem to be mixing up notions a little .

Chechens are jingoists who think they are much superior to other Moslems thanks to their notorious brutality and "courage". As Moslems they despise all kaffirs and who are Christians if not the "falsifiers of the Holy Scripture" ? And they are identical with the hated Russians at that ! Why should any Christian or atheistic Russian admire or respect them ?

The Russians are - as also we other Slavs - prone to anarchism and due to negative historical experiences extremely distrustful of their politicians' parlance and of mass media newspeak. If a politician or an opinion leader in the West calls a spade a "non-spade" , he may expect next day a learned analysis hailing his 'innovative' approach" , "brilliance" or "revolutionary change of perspective" etc. In Russia they would call him a fool and his scholarly flatterers would indubitably be honoured with worse epithets . In general "politician" in Russia - it holds also for other Slav coutries - means something like "criminal in the majestety of law" (In Russian they call them 'vor v zakone"). So you can can well imagine how the notorious phrase "politically correct" is understood in Russia ...

> I am not aware of how many moslems there are in chechnia

According to the 1989 population census out of 1 234 452 persons living in Chechnia/Ingushetia 326 500 were Russian-speaking non-Chechens ( Russians, Belorussians, Ukrainians, Armenians, Jews). The census of 2002 showed only out of the number of 1 084 922 inhabitants (around 400 000 only in Chechnia) 48 000 non-Chechens (including probably also all Russian soldiers stationed in Chechnia! ). At least 278 500 non-Moslems had to flee or simply disappeared in this gangster state run by Dudayev and other 150 local Moslem chieftains.

The number of Chechen atheists or non-Moslems is not known to me. The bulk of the population is Moslem.

> but you would agree that there are only 2 options. Bulldozing the whole place or give them their land (and that land only) and deport all the russian muslims there. Then LOCK the borders and close all kinds of relationships with it.

Neither option will work. Scorched land policy in a region in which oil flows and ploughland is fertile and landscapes are so fabulously beautiful seems irrational and wasteful. Leaving the land to the Chechens was an impardonable mistake of Yeltzin whose irresponsibility and erratic character will be hopefully a long remebered warning to Russia. Due to his indolence or malice or both a terrorist state was created by Dudayev in 1992 which specialized in mass kidnapping (not sparing even pro-Chechen journalists , doctors and activists from different corners of the planet) with a slave market in Grozny , drug and arms smuggling , money laundring and all other imaginable crimes.

Weekly in this small republic 8-10 people were killed and c. 60-70 crimes were perpetrated most of which were not investigated as the state didn't have any control over c. 150 armed gangs at large . It was a breeding place of international terrorism with mercenaries coming from or to Afghanistan and Saudi millions financing an aggressive Wahhabi movement in the Caucasus. After 1992 the Chechen authorities received money for Soviet pensioners from Moscow but never paid it to them. They stole the money and used it to buy weapons and organize traditional Caucasian banditism instead!

If you leave Chechnia and make it a no man's land it will swiftly become terrorists' land. And remember that the ultimate aim of all Moslems in the Caucaus and their Arab sponsors is to create an independent Moslem state stretching from the Black to the Caspian Sea. It was what Basayev and Khattab were trying to initiate in August 1999 unleashing the second Chechen war. Would you welcome such a Moslem state ? And what do you think could Christian groups and states around the Caucasus, e.g. Armenia, feel when confronted with such a prospect ?

> It's a comparable situation with mindanao (philippines), pattani (thailand) and other relatively small areas where local non muslims are constantly suffering....

What would you suggest? "

Not a single concession to the Muslims! Not an acre of non-Moslem territory should be given to them! Instead they should give back all they have illegaly seized so far ! If they want to live with Russia as they have to it is on Russian , never on Moslem terms! If they want to create their own enclave to revitalize their religious gangsterism again , they should be treated like gangsters .

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