What Lies Behind The Terror

What We Say

What Lies Behind The Terror

THE HOSTAGE takers who seized 1,200 children, parents and teachers in
Beslan reached a new level of barbarism. Young children were denied food
and water. Many were shot by the hostage takers, even before the bloody
mayhem which ended the siege. At least 335 died, and many more are still
‘missing’. The traumatic siege and the mass funerals have had a
devastating impact on this small town.

Socialists utterly condemn the inhuman tactics used by the hostage
takers, members of an Islamist Chechen nationalist group led by the
warlord, Shamil Basayev. Such methods will not advance the cause of the
Chechen people, who have been fighting a long and bitter resistance
against military repression by the Russian state.

The angry reaction to the school killings, both in Russia and
internationally, will allow Putin to take even stronger powers to ‘combat
terrorism’. The autocratic Putin will crack down even harder on separatist
movements and further curtail democratic rights throughout Russia.

Internationally, horror at the Beslan events could, at least
temporarily, strengthen Bush and Blair in their policy of international
military aggression and pruning of democratic rights. Bush will no doubt
regard the Beslan events as a gift for his re-election campaign, in which
he is playing up his role as ‘commander in chief’ in the ‘war on
terrorism’.

Putin was quick to blame the siege on ‘international terrorism’ and
‘al-Qa’ida’. His security chiefs claim that there were at least ten Arab
fighters among the dead hostage-takers, but so far they have produced no
evidence of this. By referring to ‘international terrorism’ Putin was
attempting to divert attention from the long, brutal war in Chechnya.

While nothing can justify the hostage-takers’ savage tactics,
especially their inhuman targeting of ‘soft targets’ like young children,
their desperate tactics arise from the barbarous Russian military
repression in Chechnya.

One of the Chechen women suicide bombers, a so-called ‘black widow’,
told a hostage: "Russian soldiers are killing our children in
Chechnya, so we are here to kill yours." Another said: "My whole
family was killed. I have buried all my children. I live in the forest. I
have nowhere to go and nothing to live for."

There is some evidence that some of the young women suicide bombers
have been pressed into service. In general, however, it is Putin’s brutal
methods in Chechnya, his refusal even to concede limited autonomy, which
has swelled the ranks of the Islamist terrorist groups. They can offer no
way out, but they reflect the anger and despair of many Chechens, who are
prepared to fight to the death rather than to accept continued Russian
domination.

State repression

Just before the Beslan siege started, two Russian airliners crashed,
almost certainly brought down by Chechen suicide bombers. At the same
time, a bomb exploded on the Moscow underground. These outrages, the
latest of a whole series of attacks, have strengthened public support for
further state clampdown on terrorism. Naturally, people want protection
against terrorist attacks.

Yet it is the ‘strong state’ that Putin presides over which has
provoked national insurgencies and terrorism. Putin rules in alliance with
a new ruling class of gangster capitalists, dominated by the big oil and
gas oligarchs. He has worked to strengthen the state machine, relying
heavily on the security services.

Putin champions a new form of Russian imperialism, trying to restore
power and influence that was undermined when the former multinational
Stalinist state, the Soviet Union, collapsed after 1989. Recently, he
accused Russia’s enemies of trying to "cut a juicy piece of our
pie", by encouraging separatist movements in areas like the Caucasus.

Putin has totally opposed independence, or even limited autonomy, for
Chechnya or other national entities. Let one go, he thinks, and there will
be an avalanche of demands for autonomy or separation.

The Caucasus was colonised by the tsars in the early part of the 19th
century for their rich agricultural resources. Now it is of growing
importance for oil and gas, and especially the important gas pipelines
running to the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. After Putin’s predecessor,
Boris Yeltsin, fought the 1994-97 war in Chechnya, Putin launched a second
war in August 1999.

But Putin has played a devious game of divide and rule in the Caucasus.
While implacably imposing independence for territories like Chechnya, he
has cynically supported secessionist movements in regions like Abkhazia
and South Ossetia, mainly to foment trouble for the independent regime in
Georgia, which Putin wants to undermine.

In the early 1990s, the Russian security services themselves used
Shamil Basayef, currently their main enemy in Chechnya, to help break
Abkhazia away from the neighbouring and newly independent Georgia.

Moreover, the military forces that the Russian state deploys in the
Caucasus are notoriously corrupt. "The conflict has also offered
opportunities for personal enrichment [for the military] at every level,
from checkpoint bribes and the illegal sale of arms to control over local
oil production." (Financial Times, 6 September) There is a black
market in arms, including ground-to-air missiles, which gives many
guerrilla groups access to weapons.

Putin also faces a growing economic and social crisis within Russia
itself. He is undoubtedly using the threat of a ‘terrorist war on Russia’
to divert attention from rising discontent. The return to market
capitalism has been a disaster for the majority of Russians. Poverty and
inequality have soared. Putin’s latest move is to cut state spending on
health services, education, nurseries and pensions. No wonder he wants a
diversion.