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

1.2 million tons. 125 This was in stark contrast to the situation in Tatarstan, another major oilproducing
region, where a relationship with Moscow was carved out and oil production was
maintained. In this respect, Tatarstan benefited from the considerable experience and political
acumen of the former Soviet party boss and new political leader, President Mintimer Shaimiev, who
was able to chart a moderate political course between the opposing demands of the radical Tatar
nationalists on the one hand and of Moscow on the other.
In Chechnya, poor leadership after 1991 exacerbated the difficulties of the 1980s. President
Dudayev’s background and training in the Soviet military academy prepared him admirably for the
job of creating the Chechen armed forces, as attested by the Chechen success in keeping the Russian
army at bay for several months in 1994-1995, but it did not provide him with the fundamental
knowledge for building a new state.
During the Dudayev period, the social structure of Chechnya was severely distorted with
practically the entire male population under arms and the republic’s income generated by the
comparatively small number of Chechens engaged in commerce in Russia and the former Soviet
Union and the Chechen diaspora. Industrial and agricultural production, the education system and
health care all collapsed. Unemployment rose precipitously. 126 Chechen groups began to engage in
bandit attacks on trains on the Baku-Rostov main line, steal cattle from neighboring Dagestan,
highjack airtransport in Krasnodar and Stavropol’, and engage in a range of other illegal activities.
These groups were all lumped together under the general rubric of the ‘Chechen Mafia’ by the local
population, increasing the unpopularity of the Chechens as a group and feeding into a broader and
extremely negative Russian stereotype of “People of Caucasian Nationality” and their relationship to
organized crime. One prominent Chechen Historian, Professor Yavus Akhmadov, described life
under Dudayev in an article in a regional newspaper in 1995 in the following manner: “The people
were left with only three options to sustain themselves: war, robbery and petty trading.” 127
General Dudayev’s political naiveté and bad judgement compounded the economic
difficulties. In swearing his oath of office on the Koran, as acknowledgement of the support of the
Muslim clergy and Islamic nationalist parties in his bid for power, Dudayev fed into Russian fears of
the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the North Caucasus. These fears grew in step with the
increasing political influence of the Chechen clans or teips, and the Chechen Muslim clergy.
125 See Elaine Holoboff, “Oil and the Burning of Grozny,” Jane’s Intelligence Review, Volume 7, Number 6, 1995
(pp.253-257).
126 There are no reliable figures for unemployment in this period. As far as industrial and agricultural production
are concerned, however, they fell by 30% and 46% respectively in 1992 alone. This information on the collapse
of the Chechen economy and society is based on Dr. Magomedkhanov’s interviews in the North Caucasus and
his own travels to Chechnya in the period leading up to December 1994. For another view of the problems faced
by Chechnya in this period see Stephen Handelman, “The Guns of Grozny,” in his book Comrade Criminal:
The Theft of the Second Russian Revolution, Michael Joseph (London, 1994), pp.192-208. Handelman suggests
that by 1993, for example, there were an estimated 150,000 firearms in Grozny, for a population of 400,000.
127 Yavus Akhmadov, “Vinovaty okazalis’ vse ...,” Novoe Delo (Makhachkala) March 3, 1995.
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