#14 - JRL 8021
From: "Robert Bruce Ware" <rware@siue.edu>
Subject: Ten Questions for John Dunlop (JRL 8017)
Date: Sat, 17 Jan 2004
John Dunlop has performed a considerable service by compiling a large quantity of information about the Nord Ost hostage crisis in an article titled "The October 2002 Hostage-Taking Incident" (JRL 8017). Dunlop presents this material in order to argue that the hostage incident was the result of a conspiracy between the Russian FSB and Shamil Basayev that was designed to discredit Aslan Maskhadov and thereby disrupt, what Dunlop regards as, tendencies toward a negotiated settlement of the conflict in Chechnya. Dunlop also asserts that, in 1999, similar alliances between Basayev and the FSB were responsible for the invasions of Dagestan and the apartment block blasts in Buinaksk, Moscow, and Volgodansk. He offers little evidence or argument for the latter claims, though some evidence has been presented elsewhere.
It is possible that Dunlop is correct, and no possibility can be disregarded. However, even the incomplete scenario that Dunlop paints is Ptolmaic in its complexity. For all of its merits, it remains an unwieldy and precarious stack of sub-hypotheses loosely connected by innuendo. In the absence of conclusive evidence, Dunlop does not explain why his account should be preferred to alternative explanations that offer greater simplicity and coherence. It would seem that Dunlop’s account would be further complicated if he were to attempt to address the following questions, which his account appears to beg:
1. If Basayev concocted the Moscow hostage incident in order to discredit Maskhadov then why, immediately after the incident, did Basayev claim full responsibility? Why did Basayev attempt to distance Maskhadov from the incident, and why did he acknowledge and accept the demotion with which Maskhadov punished him?
2. If Maskhadov had no responsibility for the Moscow hostage incident then why didn’t he condemn it while it was in progress? A similar question might be asked about the 1999 invasion of Dagestan?
3. Dunlop’s argument that Basayev conspired to discredit Maskhadov presupposes that Maskhadov was unable to control Basayev. But if Dunlop assumes that Maskhadov was unable to control Basayev then why does Dunlop think that negotiations between federal officials and Maskhadov (which, Dunlop believes, the hostage incident was intended to prevent) could have brought an end to the conflict in Chechnya? If Maskhadov were unable to control Basayev, as Dunlop assumes, then negotiations with Maskhadov would more likely have proven to be a meaningless exercise.
4. Dunlop argues that the Chechen terrorists who were responsible for the hostage incident intentionally "sabotaged" their own explosives that they brought to Moscow (in order to prevent them from detonating) because they did not wish to kill large numbers of Russian civilians. If that were true then why did they bring the explosives to Moscow in the first place? Certainly, Basayev does not hesitate to kill large numbers of Russian civilians, for he has claimed responsibility for several blasts that have done exactly that. Nor, on Dunlop’s account, does the FSB hesitate to kill large numbers of Russian civilians, since he holds the FSB responsible for the apartment block blasts in September 1999. Hence, if the explosives were brought to Moscow as a result of a conspiracy between Basayev and the FSB then it would seem difficult to explain why those explosives were intentionally "sabotaged" by the terrorists. Conversely, if the Chechen's intentionally sabotaged their explosive devices in order to prevent them from actually detonating, then why did one of them explode at a Moscow McDonalds?
5. According to Dunlop’s information, some of these explosive devices were prepared by Arman Menkeev. Menkeev, who has a Chechen mother and a Kazakh father, went on to become "a Russian officer, a major, and a former deputy commander of a [GRU] special-forces detachment." After the hostage incident Menkeev was arrested, imprisoned, interrogated, and released. If Menkeev prepared the explosives on assignment from the FSB then why was he arrested? If he prepared the explosives and was subsequently arrested, then why was he released? It would seem that the conspirators would not wish to draw attention to themselves by arresting one of their own. If they did so, perhaps due to a failure in communication, then why would they release him? If one of the government conspirators were arrested then it would seem more likely either that he would die mysteriously during his captivity, or that he would be convicted in a closed trial, sentenced to a remote detention center, and then quietly disappear. If Menkeev were part of a government conspiracy, then it seems unlikely that he would be arrested and then released after his arrest had attracted media attention. However, that is exactly what occurred, and Dunlop offers no explanation.
6. Since his invasion of Dagestan, the fortunes of Shamil Basayev have suffered a dramatic reversal. He has lost power, prestige, the admiration of the Chechen people, and one of his feet. Yet this is nothing compared with the on-going social catastrophe suffered by his fellow Chechens as a consequence of his actions. If, as Dunlop suggests, the invasion of Dagestan were the result of a conspiracy between Basayev and the FSB, then why would Basayev wish to repeat what was clearly the greatest mistake of his life by conspiring with them again? Moreover, Basayev would surely know that if he conspired with the FSB, and if his fellow Chechens were to learn of his betrayal, then they would likely take mortal revenge upon Basayev as well as many members of his family. Given the liklihood that a conspiracy would eventually come to light, can anyone be sure that Basayev would wish to place himself and his relatives in that position?
7. Why would federal officials have encouraged Basayev and Khattab to invade Dagestan at a time when many federal officials seemed to believe, as Basayev seemed to believe, that most Dagestanis would side with Basayev against Russia? Had the Dagestanis welcomed Basayev then it is unlikely that Moscow could have prevailed against the unified forces of Chechnya and Dagestan. If that had been the case, then Russia would have lost 70 percent of its Caspian seashore and access to considerable resources, including a pipeline. Moreover, Russia would then have confronted a viable and militant Islamist state on its southern periphery. In the summer of 1999, it was clear that many Russian officials, including Vladimir Putin, did not expect the Dagestanis overwhelmingly to resist the invaders from Chechnya. It therefore seems unlikely that they would have encouraged Basayev to invade Dagestan.
8. If the FSB is responsible for the apartment block explosions in September 1999, then why did Basayev make the following statement on September 9, 1999 (in an article by Petra Prokhazkova published in the Prague periodical, Lidove Noviny): "The latest blast in Moscow is not our work, but the work of the Dagestanis. Russia has been openly terrorizing Dagestan… For the whole week, united in a single fist, the army and the Interior Ministry units have been pounding three small [Dagestani] villages [Karamakhi, Chabanmakhi, Kadar- RBW]…And blasts and bombs -- all this will go on, of course, because those whose loved ones, whose women and children are being killed for nothing will also try to use force to eliminate their adversaries. This is a natural process and it is yet more evidence of Newton's third law, that each action generates a reaction… What is the difference between someone letting a bomb go off in the center of Moscow and injuring 10-20 children and the Russians dropping bombs from their aircraft over Karamakhi and killing 10-20 children? Where is the difference?"
Among those whose women and children were in Karamakhi during the federal assault was Ibn ul Khattab, Basayev's Arab partner in the invasion of Dagestan. Khattab was married to a Karamakhi woman. On 15 September 1999, an Associated Press reporter (Greg Myre) quoted Khattab as saying: "From now on, we will not only fight against Russian fighter jets (and) tanks. From now on, they will get our bombs everywhere. Let Russia await our explosions blasting through their cities. I swear we will do it."
The last of the apartment block blasts occurred on 16 September 1999, the same day that Basayev’s insurgents were driven from Dagestan. Dunlop does not consider that the blasts might have been retribution for the federal attack upon the Wahhabi enclave centered in the villages of Karamakhi, Chabanmakhi, and Kadar, which was in progress at the time.
Nor does Dunlop mention the credible convictions that resulted in the case of the first of the four apartment block blasts. That explosion occurred on 4 September 1999, in the Dagestani town of Buinaksk, near Karamakhi, Chabanmakhi, and Kadar. In the winter of 2001, a Dagestani court convicted five so-called Wahhabis from those same three villages for the Buinaksk apartment explosion. One of them, who had worked as a cook for Basayev and Khattab, admitted that he had brought the explosives from Chechnya beneath a truckload of watermelons. Later he retracted his confession.
9. Why would Khattab and Basayev have conspired with the FSB to stage an invasion of Dagestan, when it was clear that a likely outcome of that invasion would be the destruction of Karamakhi, the village of Khattab’s wife and the place where Khattab was spending much of his time? Wouldn't Khattab have recognized that he was thereby creating an opportunity for federal authorities to attack his family, friends, and neighbors?
10. Why does Dunlop think that Moscow leaders would have been influenced by the peripheral efforts of various individuals and NGOs to inspire a negotiated peace in 2002? Why does he think that Russian leaders would be likely accept advice from Zbigniew Brezinski? Why does he think that Western leaders were increasing the pressure on Moscow to negotiate a settlement in 2002? Hasn’t it been widely agreed that Western leaders decreased their pressure on Moscow after 11 September 2001?
Dunlop’s analysis answers none of these questions. Moreover, he neither addresses nor refutes the evidence for Maskhadov’s complicity in the Moscow hostage incident that was compiled by Ralph Davis and myself and published in The Journal of Slavic Military Studies, 16, 3, September 2003.
The simplest explanation for the invasion of Dagestan is that Basayev’s judgement was clouded by his own grandiosity. Perhaps he miscalculated the mood of the Dagestanis because he was unduly influenced by the Dagestani Wahhabis with whom he associated. In those years, Dagestani Wahhabis chronically overestimated their influence in Dagestani society, and would have had a clear interest in exaggerating their support during discussions with Basayev. On the other hand, the principal weakness of this explanation is that Basayev’s second entrance and exit from Dagestan (in September 1999) appeared to be too easy.
The simplest explanation for the 1999 apartment block explosions is that they were retribution by Wahhabis (drawn perhaps from throughout the North Caucasus) for the federal assault upon the Wahhabi enclave of Karamakhi, Chabanmakhi, and Kadar. The first apartment block blast occurred in Buinaksk, the town nearest to those villages, on 4 September 1999, just a couple of days after the federal assault began. The last apartment block blast occurred in Volgodansk on 16 September 1999, the same day that Basayev was finally driven from Dagestan. On the other hand, the principal weakness in this explanation is the incident at Ryazan, which it does not explain. Legitimate concerns are also raised by the closed, and consequently unsatisfactory, nature of the trial that recently convicted two men for the Moscow blasts.
The simplest explanation for the hostage incident of October 2002 is that Basayev conspired with Maskhadov to bring the Chechen conflict to Moscow. To his credit, Dunlop essentially has catalogued the weaknesses in this explanation. While that is a significant contribution, it is not a credible alternative explanation. However, Dunlop's analysis does succeed in raising a number of important questions, and these deserve as much attention as the ten that I have noted above.