The North Caucasus: Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia

[Jedburgh]

A two-part piece from the Jamestown Foundation's Chechnya Weekly:

The Dagestani Jamaat (Part 1)

The Dagestani Jamaat "Shariat" is the direct successor of the Dagestani Jamaat supposedly destroyed on the orders of Vladimir Putin in August and September of 1999. As such, it is one more example of how inefficient a military response is for suppressing an ideological opponent. It is possible to destroy bases, to destroy active participants, but it is quite impossible to destroy an underlying ideology using tanks and planes. Since the large-scale military operation carried out in Dagestan in August-September 1999, Salafi teachings have spread throughout the whole of Dagestan, especially enjoying popularity among the youth of the republic. Thus, Salafi ideology has become a form of protest against Russian policies in Dagestan. It is worth noting that while not all the members of the Dagestani Jamaat are dedicated Salafi adherents, all of them stand united in the anti-Russian struggle, making this ideology a unifying force. There are also small groups in the armed resistance movement in Dagestan that are not controlled by the Jamaat, but they still identify themselves with the resistance movement forces.....

The Dagestani Jamaat (Part 2)

....Jamaat structures are uniform across the North Caucasus and do not vary due to ethnic or regional differences, perhaps in rare exceptions. For nearly eight years, one of the best-known leaders of the Dagestani Jamaat was Rappani Khalilov, a native of the city of Buinaksk and an ethnic Laks. He was replaced as commander of the Dagestani sector of the Caucasus Front by Amir Abdul-Madzhid, who also began as a member of the “Shariat” Jamaat at the start of the second military campaign in Chechnya in 1999 and was one of Khalilov’s closest associates. The “Shariat” Jamaat has units across the entire republic. The republic is divided into zones, such as the Buinaksk, Gubden, Makhachkala, Kizliar, Khasavyurt, Botlikh and others. Amir Abdul-Madzhid himself and others in the sector’s command are members of the Military Council of the Shura under Dokka Umarov and, since Umarov’s recent proclamation of a “Caucasian Emirate,” Amir Abdul Madzhid has been made “Vali of the Vilyat of Dagestan”–that is, the resistance’s de facto ruler in Dagestan. All of the vilayets are united under the leadership of Dokka Umarov, who is considered the personal ruler of this “virtual” emirate, but in fact, each vali is autonomous not by virtue of the formation of an emirate, but strictly due to the absence of authority of Dokka Umarov among those fighting under the flag of the resistance movement......

[Penta]

Insofar as there's a "native" form of Islam in the Caucasus, what is it? Sunni? Shiite? Salafi? Sufi? Some other variety?

[bourbon]

Channel One "Uncovers" a Turkish-U.S. Plot in the Caucasus, The Jamestown Foundation: Chechnya Weekly, April 24, 2008.

Russian state television’s Channel One on the evening of April 22 broadcast a putative documentary film made by Kremlin correspondent Anton Vernitsky called “Plan 'Kavkaz'” (The Caucasus Plan). The film purports to show how Turkey, the United States and Great Britain attempted at the start of the 1990s to divide Russia into small parts not controlled by the federal center. The film featured Berkan Merrikh Yashar, born Abubakar—a Turkish-born ethnic Chechen who claims to be a journalist who once worked for Radio Liberty in Munich and a politician with close connections to the Turkish leadership.

Yashar states in the film that at the start of the 1990s he prepared a political platform for separating Chechnya from Russia and that there were several sources financing this project. He claims, among other things, that passports for the unrecognized Chechen Republic of Ichkeria were printed in France while "many tons" of Ichkerian banknotes, which resembled U.S. currency, were printed in Germany. Yashar says that Western special services did not really care about the independence of the peoples of Caucasus but were acting only in the interest of their "personal profit." He also claims that Western special services tried to convince Muslim muftis in Russia—not only in Chechnya, but also in Tatarstan and Bashkortostan—to break away from Russia because of religious differences. He also refers to the self-exiled Russian tycoon and his former partner, the late Badri Patarkastishvili, stating that they were involved in questionable deals in the Caucasus.

[Sarajevo071]

Insofar as there's a "native" form of Islam in the Caucasus, what is it? Sunni? Shiite? Salafi? Sufi? Some other variety?

The Sufism of the Naqshbandi tariqa (or brotherhood).

[Ray]

Caucasus embraces Islam

http://www.kafkas.org.tr/english/kultur/din.html

[Jedburgh]

Russia Profile, 22 Jul 08: Similar, But Different: Radical Islam is the universal challenge in Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan

The Northern Caucasus today has diverse problems that are impossible to solve “using the same measure.” However, as this region “awakens” and bears witness to an increase of protesting attitudes, the Caucasus, more than ever before, needs a comprehensive Russian strategy of development.

Despite multiple reports about the stabilization of the situation in the Russian Caucasus, the number of problems in this region does not decrease on a daily basis......

[bourbon]

The Jihadi Insurgency and the Russian Counterinsurgency in the North Caucasus, by Gordon M. Hahn. Post-Soviet Affairs, Volume 24, Number 1 / January-March 2008.

Abstract
A political scientist reviews the vicissitudes of the Caucasus jihadi insurgency and Russia's counterinsurgency efforts since 2005, drawing on the press, jihadist websites, and scholarship on insurgencies and counterinsurgencies. The development of jihadi-oriented fighting units, the rise and decline of Maskhadov's supremacy, the rise of Islamist elements, the Chechen separatist movement and the expansion of the jihad, Moscow's counter-jihadi successes, the jihadi network after the death of Basayev, and the rise and career of Ramzan Kadyrov are examined. These events are analyzed in terms of the dynamics of insurgency and counterinsurgency conflict.

39 Page pdf at the link.

I've been looking for examinations of Russian counterinsurgency in the Kadyrov era. Came across this and thought I would share it.

[Jedburgh]

CSIS, 18 Nov 08: Violence in the North Caucasus: Trends Since 2004

Since January 2004, CSIS staff have been compiling, almost daily, a database that tracks violent incidents occurring in the North Caucasus. The following figures draw on this database, through August 31, 2008.

Due to the nature of these incidents and the difficulty in finding trusted reporting, we are not in a position to verify all of them. We will, however, continue to update our database as information is made available to us......

[Jedburgh]

The Jamestown Foundation's Chechnya Weekly, 21 Feb 08:

Dagestan's Expanding Insurgency

....Now that Putin’s presidency is ending it is important for him to remind the public of his political achievements. During his February 4 trip to Botlikh, Putin talked a lot about the events of August 1999, especially about the Dagestani local militia's support for the Russian troops that fought the Basaev/Khattab-led insurgents. “There were many wounded and killed among the local population,” Putin said at the meeting in Botlikh. “Please do not forget about these people and their families”.

Apart from other aims, Putin’s visit to Botlikh was meant to highlight the success of his Caucasus policy and show that the residents of Dagestan support the federal government, just as they did in August 1999. Nevertheless, current events in Dagestan demonstrate the opposite: the area of hostilities in the republic is expanding. War reports from the region mention more and more districts of Dagestan that have never before appeared in the news as scenes of battles between the rebels and police forces.....

[zenpundit]

I generally like Jamestown stuff but this struck me as really weird.

Isn't a "Vilyat" a corruption of an Ottoman Turk administrative division? When did the Ottomans rule Daghestan ? Golden Horde, sure. Persians, definitely. Why would Wahabbist neo-salafi loons use antique Turkish terminology when a good Wahabbist would see Ottoman sanjaks as corrupt former oppressors of "true Islam" ?

Maybe I have missed something somewhere ?

[Jedburgh]

I generally like Jamestown stuff but this struck me as really weird.

Isn't a "Vilyat" a corruption of an Ottoman Turk administrative division? When did the Ottomans rule Daghestan ? Golden Horde, sure. Persians, definitely. Why would Wahabbist neo-salafi loons use antique Turkish terminology when a good Wahabbist would see Ottoman sanjaks as corrupt former oppressors of "true Islam" ?

Maybe I have missed something somewhere ?

It is a term that is used in many Central Asian states: Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan - none of which were ever under Ottoman rule. In Dagestan, they can also be referred to as rayons, but wilayat is a common usage.

[zenpundit]

It is a term that is used in many Central Asian states: Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan - none of which were ever under Ottoman rule. In Dagestan, they can also be referred to as rayons, but wilayat is a common usage.

Thank you Jed, that clarifies -and makes linguistic sense for some of the CA examples.

[Jedburgh]

ICG, 3 Jun 08: Russia’s Dagestan: Conflict Causes

....Large-scale war is unlikely to develop in Dagestan, but violence can be expected to continue to be caused by competition over lands and jobs, spillover from Chechnya and the rise of local jihadi groups. The origins of the present jihadi-inspired violence are in the “hunt for the Wahhabis” carried out by the Dagestani authorities after the 1999 Chechen incursion and the arbitrary persecution of pious youth by local law enforcement officers. The violence in Dagestan’s streets is also fed by the movement of rebels and Islamist militants across the porous border with Chechnya, as well as by the republic’s omnipresent corruption and criminality. Rival clans, led by President Aliyev and Makhachkala’s mayor, Said Amirov, duelled for control of economic and political assets in 2007, as the street troubles intensified.

Reprisals by local and federal security forces have failed to curb the violence; instead they seem to be escalating it. The troubled March 2007 electoral campaign and the growing number of attacks on local officials and assassinations carried out by Islamic militants suggest Dagestan faces a violent future.

[kaur]

President Dmitry Medvedev’s statement in Daghestan last week that foreign forces are behind anti-Russian movements there is leading some Russian commentators to overstate the role of such forces there and thus to misunderstand the nature of the conflicts in that region, according to a leading Russian expert.

In his July 9 comments, Medvedev attempted not only to “sum up the threats to Russian statehood” in the region but also “to explain their causes,” the Moscow analyst says. The Russian president pointed to unemployment and poverty as among the most important, but he listed others as well.
Among these, the Russian leader said, are massive and widespread corruption, “systemic deformations of government administration,” and the “extremely low” quality of regional officials, charges that while true raise questions such as “who formed these power structures” if not the current tandem at the head of the much ballyhooed power vertical.

http://windowoneurasia.blogspot.com/...-in-north.html

If anyone is interested about more general situation in Northern Caucasus, then you can dowload paper "Kreml and Northern Caucasus" here. This paper is in Russian

http://www.politcom.ru/tables/docl.doc