RUSSIA'S TINDERBOX - Belfer Center for Science and International ...

“RUSSIA’S TINDERBOX”
Conflict in the North Caucasus
And its Implications for
The Future of the Russian Federation
INTRODUCTION
Chechnya. Prior to the December 1994 Russian military intervention, few people in the West
other than Russian specialists had even heard of Chechnya or were familiar with its people. Today, it
is infamous as the site of one of the most violent ethno-political conflicts of the 1990s and of the
largest military campaign on Russian soil since World War II. Chechnya’s capital, Grozny, is in
ruins, in the wake of a massive and ferocious bombing campaign by the Russian airforce. Hundreds
of thousands of Chechens have been killed, maimed or left homeless.
Russian military intervention has, however, ended in stalemate. The initial conflict that
sparked the war between the Russian political leadership in Moscow and Chechnya over the
republic’s status in the Russian Federation has not been resolved by the overwhelming show of
force.
The factors that both led to war and now hinder a peace settlement are not exclusive to
Chechnya. They are present to a greater or lesser degree throughout the Russian Federation, but are
most acute in the broader region of which Chechnya is a part––the North Caucasus. In contrast to the
rest of the Russian Federation, which has largely managed to avoid violence since 1991, the North
Caucasus region has now been the scene of two wars and an array of armed clashes, and has also
become embroiled in conflicts beyond its borders.
The North Caucasus region consists of seven mountainous republics designated as the
territory of a number of non-Russian ethnic groups—Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia, North
Ossetia, Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachaevo-Cherkessia, and Adygeia—and two Russian regions,
Krasnodar and Stavropol’, which are stituated on the steppe north of the mountain ridge. Russian
geographers and economists also frequently consider the Rostov Oblast’ of the Russian Federation,
which lies to the north of Krasnodar on the border with Ukraine, as part of the North Caucasus
Economic Region. 1
The North Caucasus is Russia’s land bridge between the Caspian and the Black Seas and
thus the crossroads for trade between North and South, East and West. As such, it is of critical
strategic and economic importance to Russia. It is Russia’s southern flank, the front-line military
1 The territory of the North Caucasus region is 355,100 square kilometers, which is equivalent in size to Germany,
and accounts for approximately 2% of the total territory of the Russian Federation. According to the 1989 Soviet
Census, the total population of the North Caucasus is 16,751,000, which is approximately 6% of Russia’s total
population. The seven mountain republics have a combined population of 5,628,000, accounting for 33% of the
population of the region.