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79 Foreign Aff. 32 (2000)
Russia's Ruinous Chechen War

handle is hein.journals/fora79 and id is 236 raw text is: Russia's Ruinous
Chechen War
Rajan Menon and Graham E. Fuller
DECLINE AND FALL?
THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION may be falling apart-and its war
against Chechnya is showing why. Unfortunately, most observers of
the war in Chechnya miss the larger implications, limiting their
analysis to the struggle for independence of one small region.
Moscow blames radical Islamists for the trouble. Despite the unde-
niable role of fundamentalists in the Caucasus, however, Moscow had
a greater hand in the federation's decline than it cares to admit.
Russia's latest war with Chechnya was sparked in August 1999
when radical Islamists, many ofwhom had infiltrated from Chechnya,
staged uprisings in the neighboring southern Russian republic of
Dagestan. Russian troops were sent and, despite Moscow's reassurances
that the conflict was under control, the operations had evolved by
September into the second fill-scale war between Russia and Chechnya
in five years. The innumerable deaths, the relentless bombardment of
cities, and the torrent of refugees are eerily familiar, recalling the horrors
of the 1994-96 Russo-Chechen war.
The Russian army-even while weakened and demoralized-has
been more successful this time; Russian officials are proclaiming swift
progress. But no real solution-military or political-is in sight. Instead,
RAJAN MENON is Monroe J. Rathbone Professor of International
Relations at Lehigh University and Director of Eurasia Policy Studies at
the National Bureau of Asian Research. GRAHAM E. FULLER is former
Vice Chairman of the National Intelligence Council and is currently a
resident consultant at RAND.

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