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years after Khasukhanov’s plan was supposed to have been implemented, a single sailor managed to
take hostages and lock himself up in a Russian nuclear submarine.
Other proof of Chechnya-based radical separatists’ willingness to engage in WMD blackmail,
if not acts of catastrophic nuclear terrorism, includes:
• In 1992, Dudayev warned the Kremlin that his fighters may attack nuclear plants in Russia in
an effort to discourage Moscow from trying to counter his republic’s independence bid.
Dudayev was the first prominent Chechen separatist to publicly make such a threat. He
repeated it in 1995 during military campaign. 71
• In 2001, “suspicious persons” scouted Russian nuclear arsenals in May and July. They were
detained, according to a Russian newspaper, and confessed to military counter-intelligence
officers of the Federal Security Service that they were acting on orders of “Chechens” and
they had been paid large sums of money to scout the facilities, according to Rossiiskaya
Gazeta. 72
• In a separate 2001 case, two “reconnaissance and sabotage groups” of Chechen rebels
“displayed interest” in how nuclear arms are transported across Russia. The groups were
spotted at several key railway stations in the Moscow region, and according to the Gazeta,
“They seemed to have been very interested in the special train, which is designed for
shipping atomic bombs.” 73
• Also in 2001, General Igor Valynkin, head of the 12 th Main Directorate of the Defense
Ministry, reported that terrorist groups made two attempts to probe security at the Russian
71 “Dudayev Grozit Perenesti Voinu v Glub’ Rossii, (Dudayev Threatens to Transfer War Into the Depths of Russia,)”
Vecherny Chelyabinsk, February 1, 1995.
72 Vladimir Bogdanov, “Propusk K Boegolovkam Nashli U Terrorista, (A Pass To Warheads Found on a Terrorist,)”
Rossiiskaya Gazeta, November 1, 2002.
73 Ibid.
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