Does Chechnya pose a security threat to Russia?

Chechnya is a region in southern Russia that borders Georgia and has been over the last twenty years, a region with a history of resisting rule from Moscow. It has been the location for two major wars, the first from 1994-1996 and the second from 1999-2009, as well as becoming a breeding ground for Islamic extremism and separatism. Its volatile history with Moscow has resulted in Vladimir Putin allowing Chechnya’s current president Ramzan Kadyrov to lead Chechnya and leaving him to rule Chechnya as he wishes as long as it maintains stability in the region. This has allowed Chechnya to become a thriving hotbed of radical Islamic extremism and fundamentalism, being one of the predominantly Muslim regions in Russia. This essay will argue that in fact, Chechnya poses a huge risk to Russia due to a number of reasons. The reasons this essay will cover are the fact Chechnya has a large amount of autonomy from Moscow, the fact its Muslim extremist problem makes it a fertile breeding ground for Al Qaeda and so-called ‘Islamic State’ (IS) and finally, the fact that Chechnya’s president Kadyrov’s rhetoric towards Moscow is dangerous and aggressive and may eventually spark a response. The essay will also briefly touch on why the risk towards Moscow is less severe than it may seem due to the nature of the relationship between Kadyrov and Putin and how if Putin is able to find a strong candidate to replace him in 2024, the stability between Moscow and the region may remain.

 

The first reason Chechnya poses a threat to Russia is the fact that the current president, Ramzan Kadyrov has implemented a ‘brutal machine of persecution’ on the people of Chechnya combined with extreme Muslim religious laws which allow Polygamy, persecuting homosexuals and extreme punishments for minor crimes such as petty theft. This extreme method of law-making has allowed Chechnya to become a breeding ground for radical Islamic extremism, highlighted by the fact that it is estimated that more than 800 Chechens have left to fight for IS. This has been encouraged through the words of the Kadyrov who is seeking to make himself a more prominent Muslim political leader in the world stage, offering support for various Muslim groups around the world, such as the Rohingya people in Myanmar. This projection of himself and Chechnya as a strongly Muslim region that offers support to Muslims all over the world will be viewed as dangerous rhetoric by Moscow due to the Orthodox nature of the Kremlin. By showing support to Muslims being persecuted by allies of non-Muslim countries, Kadyrov and Chechnya are allowing the seed of radicalization to be planted in the region. This can and has translated to terror attacks in Russia, such as the 2011 suicide attack on Domodedovo airport in Moscow and the 2010 Moscow metro bombings, both caused by the Caucuses Emirate, a Chechen Islamic group. This consistent Islamic threat will only get worse with the defeat of IS as many of the foreign fighters not caught or killed will return home, but maintain their radical beliefs. Due to Russia’s size, the ability for Moscow to be able to prevent all pre-meditated attacks on Russian soil is nigh on impossible simply due to the size of the country. There are not enough resources to be able to maintain a level of control over the country for the threat to be eliminated, especially given that the threat is predominantly in Chechnya, a place where Moscow has very little say in.  

As Alan Phillips, a veteran of the Chechen Conflict reports in the Telegraph, ‘They have sought help in the only place they had (Islamic fighters from the Russo-Afghan conflict), it was a poisoned source’. Because of Russia’s excellent portrayal of Chechens as ‘bandits and terrorists’, Russia had majority support from Western nations, leaving the Chechens to fend for themselves. This meant turning to veterans of the Mujahidin in Afghanistan, who in turn brought their fundamentalist Islamic views to the region, hence the region leaders lost their secularism, becoming religious hardliners. This link between Chechen rebels and Islamic terrorist organizations was made clear to the world during the Beslan school shooting, where 335 Russian school children and parents were murdered by Chechen rebels, with links to Al Qaeda. 

 

Secondly, Chechnya has been allowed more and more autonomy to act as its own state, helped by the fact Kadyrov and Putin are close friends. However, Kadyrov’s relationship with Moscow seems to be a shaky one. Whilst his father swapped sides during the first conflict to fight for the Russians, solidifying himself as the president of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov has taken every opportunity to place distance between Chechnya and Moscow whilst maintaining a friendship with Putin. This is only allowed as Putin seems to be content with Kadyrov ruling Chechnya as his own ‘Fiefdom’, as this maintains a level of security in Russia, however when Putin’s term as president ends in 2024 it appears that the thousands of Chechens who are against Kadyrov and his rule will once again start causing violence, ‘unthawing’ the conflict that ended a decade ago. This will be aimed at Kadyrov’s’ secret police, the Kadyrovtsy, and also towards Russian troops, officials, and even civilians, leading to a significant threat to Russia. Further combined with the fact that Kadyrov’s strongmen in the Kadyrovtsy are in an increasingly tense stand-off with members of Russia’s security services, the Siloviki, means the inevitable break down of the relationship between Kadyrov and Putin/Moscow will almost certainly overflow into violence, which in turn will allow penetration of Russian soil and therefore a larger growing threat against Russia from Chechnya and those who live in the region. 

 

By ignoring what is occurring in Chechnya, Putin and Moscow are in essence placing a ticking time bomb on a Chechen civil war, once Putin leaves his position as president. This has been foreseen through a number of cases in the last few years such as the blatant ignoring of Russian law when Kadyrov allowed an underage teenage girl to marry one of his close allies who already had a wife. A small act such as this has shown that the autonomy that Putin has left Kadyrov and Chechnya is now being abused by Kadyrov and his men in the Kadyrovtsy. This blatant disregard of Russian federal law is one step in a long walk that leads to Chechnya trying to take full independence and initiating a conflict once again with Russia.

However, there is a chance that if President Putin is able to find a candidate to replace him in 2024 when he inevitably steps down from the presidency, the relationship he had with Kadyrov will be transferred over to the new president. This in turn may allow the same understanding the two men had to continue and as a result of this, relative peace may be able to continue. This however is not a transition of power that could easily happen and that likelihood of Chechen attacks towards both Russia and Kadyrov’s government will increase exponentially.  As Ekaterina Sokirianskaia says in her article on possible peace in Chechnya, ‘if he [Putin] feels that democratization and normalization of Chechnya will benefit him, he can make that change and achieve significant progress’. This shows that the relationship between Putin and Kadyrov is very much dictated by what will give Putin a good name and what will maintain the level of security Russia has against Chechnya. What will happen after Putin leaves his post can only be speculated over but there is a high probability that violence will once again erupt on the streets, putting Russia back at risk of attack. 

 

 

In conclusion, there is a significant amount of data that indicates that Chechnya remains a considerable security threat to Russia. The predominantly large threat that Russia is facing at the moment from Chechnya is the threat from radical Islamic extremism, with the Russian Orthodox church only having 600 churches in the region compared to the 6000 mosques. This explains why in the radicalized, hostile region, so many young Muslim Chechens traveled to Syria to fight for IS. This threat has not disappeared and will remain a significant issue to orthodox Moscow, with many fighters turning their attention back to Russia. Secondly, the essay argued that Chechnya remains a security threat to Russia due to the allowance by Moscow to act essentially autonomously, with Kadyrov breaking Russian law and flaunting his power through hit squads and persecution of minority groups. This has created considerable tension with citizens as opposed to Kadyrov and Putin becoming more and more aggressive, which in turn may lead to outbursts of aggression towards Russia. The essay also highlighted how there is a small window of opportunity to prevent and reduce the threat that Chechnya shows towards Russia when Putin leaves office and is replaced with possibly a similar figure who can build and maintain a rapport with Kadyrov.

The essay explained that the end of Putin’s second term as president and his age (74 years old in 2024), means he most likely will stand aside and let someone new in. This will lead to an inevitable collapse of Kadyrov’s rule over the region given his close relationship with only Putin and his hatred of Russian security services. The essay argues that this will lead to violence on the streets that could descend into a civil war, which would become a huge security threat towards Russia. 

Finally, it is clear through the findings in the essay that the answer is that Russia faces a large number of significant threats from Chechnya, and there is little chance that at some point in the next 10 years that there will not be a substantive rise in violence as powers shift and relationships between individuals as well as the region and the country change.  Overall it is clear that Chechnya still remains a large threat to Russia’s security and should not be taken any less seriously than the threat from the West or external states as the reality is that an attack from Chechnya is far more likely. 

 

 

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