Is Russian society prepared to counter terrorism? This question begs an answer every time Russian politicians, experts, journalists or the man in the street discuss – in diplomatic language or in unprintables, in informal conversations or in front of TV cameras – the past events in Beslan, Budyonnovsk and Moscow. There are many oppressive factors which create the fertile ground for various kinds of apocalyptic forecasts made by political scientists and consultants: confusion, xenophobia, a readiness to point an accusing finger at anyone (including professionals, who do save people’s lives), mutual mistrust of the authorities and the population, Moslems and non-Moslems, Russians and non-Russians.

The three components that can, if acted upon simultaneously, provide a positive answer to the above question are: the realization of exactly what is happening, a readiness for action, and an ability to make adequate decisions as new situations arise. The main thing here is to understand what Russia has encountered. Who are its enemies and allies? What moves should it make to withstand the trial by terrorism? What actions should it not take under any circumstances?

THE OFFENSIVE OF THE ‘GREEN INTERNATIONAL’

It must be pointed out in the first place that contemporary terrorism has come to stay – for decades rather than years. We must learn to live with this evil, treating it like, say, an epidemic or a traffic jam. Apart from special systems that make up a large part of contemporary civilization, there are sets of rules, known to everyone since childhood, which help a person to survive a car crash, for example, or avoid getting ill. If a person does fall ill, he or she needs the knowledge of how to treat the condition. Not all people observe these rules, and those who do not have only themselves to blame. The survival of a country that has encountered terrorism largely depends on how soon these rules are worked out and become part of the national culture.

Israel’s experience is very indicative in this respect. The Palestinian leadership planned the Al-Aqsa Intifada, which included the unprecedented use of suicide bombers, as an action intended to inflict a defeat on either Israeli society or the Israeli army. It was expected that, with losses estimated at one to three, Israel would simply cease to exist; the number of Israelis that would wish to leave the country would exceed the number of immigrants and the natural population growth. Moreover, the Palestinians expected a retaliatory strike from the Israeli Defense Forces, which would result in the death of tens of thousands of people. Such losses could allow Palestine to accuse Israel of an excessive use of force. This could result in the activation of a EU peacemaking force, as was the case in Yugoslavia.

However, none of these scenarios has actually taken place. Although Israelis’ losses amounted to one against two, Israeli society united; Israeli leftists, who were consistent allies of Yasser Arafat, suffered a crushing defeat at parliamentary elections; the Israeli army implemented the tactics of pinpoint elimination of terrorist leaders. Israel continued to live and develop, in spite of the terror. This provides a good example for Russia to follow.

The politically correct words that terrorism knows no nationality or religion are effective as a way to stop ethnic or religious paranoia, but they are not right in essence. Terrorists operating on Russian territory cannot be called the Basque separatist group ETA, the Irish Republican Army, the Maoist-Trotskyist guerillas from Southeast Asia or Latin America, the Red Brigades from Italy, or the Aum Shinrikyo sect from Japan. The suicide bombers killing Russian civilians have a direct relation to The Green International. This informal military-political association is redividing power in the Islamic world and seeks to influence Moslems beyond its boundaries. It is striving to extend its influence on the outer world as much as possible by conducting aggressive religious, ideological, political and territorial expansion.

Terrorist acts can be committed by people of any nationality. However, the war that has been going on in the North Caucasus for the last 10 years has made the Russian population and international observers link Russian terrorism almost entirely with the developments in Chechnya. The present level of involvement of The Green International in the war against Russia could be much greater if it had not dissipated its forces and resources among numerous “fronts” of the new jihad, in particular in Iraq. This is particularly true as the core of Islamist terrorist organizations comprises Afghan Arabs who have been in a state of war with Moscow since 1980. In the Caucasus, Islamists, who have a 25-year-long record of guerilla warfare and terrorist acts, have revived the tactics that were employed in Afghanistan in the 1980s. When committing terrorist acts, they employ the Palestinian living-bomb “technologies.” The practice of mass hostage-taking has also been borrowed from foreign experience.

RUSSIA’S MAIN LINE OF RESISTANCE

According to the logic of the leaders and participants in the terrorist war against Russia (waged in the name of the neo-salafist teaching, known as Wahabism), Russian Moslems, including local leaders, religious figures and the civil population, must either obey its dogmas or be destroyed. This is why they are top-priority targets for Islamists. It is Russian Moslems, first of all representatives of ethnic elites, including Wainakhs – Chechens and the Ingush, which may become Russia’s ‘main line of resistance’ in the war against the terrorist threat. This line of resistance could eventually include a terror-warning system.

Xenophobia and the activities of anti-Caucasian and anti-Moslem groups, including skinheads, only work into the terrorists’ hands and help them consolidate their positions. The problem is that, despite the constant rhetoric about “proletarian internationalism” in Soviet times, the probability of serious ethnic conflicts persisted in Russia for decades. The Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party played the role of supreme arbiter in ethnic relations. No one could have imagined back then that this arbiter might eventually disappear; and when it ceased to exist, the system collapsed.

Russia has always been populated by hundreds of nationalities and ethnic groups practicing different religions, speaking different languages and preserving their own ways of life. Russia is therefore destined to remain a multi-ethnic state, and the issue of “the national pride of the Great Russians” is now as acute as it was in Lenin’s times. The Soviet nationalities policy was imperfect, bad in many respects and sometimes even horrible, but at least it did exist. The 1990s saw a period of general disillusionment with the past, and the emergence of numerous local nationalisms in place of the single nationalities policy; this change weakened the country. The understanding of one’s neighbors inside a common house could have been one of the foundations of a solid civil society. This, however, requires direct people-to-people contacts or a permanent information flow that would provide citizens with truthful, positive and attractive information about the country’s peoples and religions.

The main question is how to prevent the substitution of the traditional Islamic institutions in Russia with Wahabi structures, without turning any restrictions with regard to them or their activities into some sort of a struggle against Islam. Over the last decade, Russia has become an open society with a high degree of religious freedom, in which differences between the population and the state have been largely resolved. However, this freedom has brought about the emergence of foreign political-religious groups in the religious sphere, whose influence has been steadily growing. Russian society has long been discussing whether the activities of these organizations are useful, harmful or dangerous. However, it must be admitted that the only area where society and the state have encountered a direct military-terrorist threat is from the adherents of Islam. Loyalty to any state that does not live according to the Sharia law runs counter to membership in the Islamic Ummah, as interpreted by Wahabis. Their views are in contrast to those who adhere to the dogmas of Christianity or the postulate of Judaism, where the law of the country is law.
This also refers to any nation-state, even if it is populated by Moslems. A Chechen state that does not live according to the Sharia law – in its salafist interpretation – is illegitimate in the eyes of the Islamist community. Political dialog with the leaders of the Chechen separatists can be a tool for resolving tactical tasks, yet it cannot solve the problem of terrorism, since the Green International views Chechen politicians only as temporary allies. In other words, Chechnya is only a part of a future Islamist caliphate, and terrorism exists as the main means for its construction. The Wahabization of Moslems studying at Islamic universities across the Arab world and participating in Hadj, which is mandatory for every Moslem, is a serious challenge for Russia. It is fair to say, though, that no country in the West, nor Arab monarchies or secular authoritarian regimes in the Islamic world, have been able to solve this problem at this time.

NOBLE REBELS OR VAGRANT BANDITS?

The double standards applied by the present political establishment with regard to terrorists are a rule rather than an exception. Politicians support national liberation movements – as long as they exist in someone else’s country. International organizations have become a tool of the struggle waged by the third world, largely controlled by Islamists, against the ‘golden billion.’ The liberal-minded intelligentsia defends the rights of the oppressed, without noticing that the struggle of the “noble rebels” has turned into the destruction of the civilian population by armed bands, while the banner of “multiculturalism” is carried by religious fanatics. There are no exceptions here. Russia’s Foreign Ministry and the U.S. Department of State, with perseverance worthy of a better application, are developing the “peace process” in the Middle East, which in reality is yet another war in the region. Europe is becoming Islamized, while its leaders pursue anti-Russian and anti-Israeli policies that seek to appease the leaders of terrorist groups based in European capitals. The United Nations, whose ineffectiveness has prompted loud calls for its renewed role, has for many years been unable to solve a single question it has addressed. The tough statements by the Russian leadership, issued after the tragedy in Beslan, sum up the realities of international politics today: “If you’re drowning, you’re on your own.”

The support of allies and the consolidation of society play a significant role in combating terrorism. Comparing the present danger of terrorism now confronting Russia to World War II is no exaggeration. In the 1980s, the Soviet Union failed to defeat Afghan Islamists who were supported by the West. Today, the West is no longer an ally of the Islamists, yet, at the same time, it has not become Russia’s ally. Russia, which now is halfway between the past and the future, is trying to establish order on its territory. This is occurring while the formation of the system of power, together with the initial stages of the construction of a civic society, is not yet over. Russia, weakened by 15 years of reforms, is extremely vulnerable, and this vulnerability is aggravated still further by the illusions of the political elite.

Conservatives are opposed to a union with the West, mainly with the United States. They somewhat correctly point to the opportunistic nature of Western policies, while pinning hopes on a multipolar world. It is unclear, however, why Russia’s relations with, say, India, and the more so with China, should have a more solid foundation than Russia’s relations with the G-7 countries. Furthermore, why should a “new Entente” be more preferable for Russia than a union with the U.S.? The Islamists have proven themselves to be the enemies of all of the above partners of Russia. More difficult is the issue of Russia’s relations with the Islamic (above all, Arab) world. The domestic lobby, which acts in the interests of those countries, relies on its reminiscences of past relations that were established in the 1960s through the 1980s. They are inspired by myths from the Islamic community’s ideological arsenal, such as blaming Mossad and the CIA for the September 11 events, as well as the suggestion that the occupation of Iraq by the Western coalition was carried out on Israel’s demand.

The former Soviet satellites in the Arab world have reoriented themselves to the West; they only cooperate with Russia because they cannot make a bargain with the West. They use Russia as a bargaining chip in this relationship. The wars in Afghanistan and the developments in Chechnya have made Moscow into a bugbear for the Islamic world. This world despises Russia less than it despises the U.S., yet it does not consider Russia as a force to fear or to be reckoned with. The events in Qatar have proved that. Secular regimes and moderate monarchies in the Islamic world are ready for a union with Russia to combat their own Islamists, but they do not want to generate tensions inside their countries. Thus, they avoid taking any actions against anti-Russian forces on their territory. Russia’s dialog with the Organization of the Islamic Conference and similar structures does nothing to solve the problem. In the eyes of the Islamists, it only confirms the illegitimacy of these organizations, encouraging terror rather than stopping it. From the point of view of the Islamists, a country courting the Islamic world only because it is weak and unable to put up efficient resistance, demonstrates its weakness.

Repeating the clichОs of the international community, which describes terrorism as a “weapon of the poor,” liberals have come to believe that the war in Chechnya was caused only by its economic state. Thus, they advocate the termination of all military actions against the militants as a necessary condition for the protection of the local population’s rights. This pacifism is praiseworthy, but theories have no relation to the reality: terror is a tool for redistributing power, and it is being used by educated, former middleclass men. They use the redistribution of economic aid in favor of “vagrant bandits” (common not only in Sudan, Algeria or Palestine, but also in Chechnya), just as any cease-fire (hudna) is used for a rest and the regrouping of forces before hostilities resume.

The financial and organizational support of Islamist terrorism, and the recruitment of new members, is carried out not only by the Islamic countries, but also from the territory of those states being attacked by the Islamist community. Organizations operating under the brand name al Qaeda and their allies have taken root in the U.S. and Great Britain, and successfully use the Western banking system for replenishing their resources. It has been proved that funds of the European Union and other sponsors of the Palestine National Authority are being spent for organizing terror. Experts argue that a large part of the money being used by the terrorists in Chechnya is of Russian origin and derives from the funds allocated for Chechnya’s reconstruction. Corruption is an ally of the terrorists: whether it is a border guard letting in cars and trucks without the appropriate checking procedure (for a bribe, of course), or officials milking the national budget.

The coordination of the federal and local authorities’ efforts is a must for building an antiterror system. It is no accident that the Beslan tragedy is viewed as an attempt to extend the Chechen conflict into the entire Great Caucasus and turn the region into a civil war zone, uncontrolled by the federal center.

REACTING AS NEW SITUATION ARISES

Counterterrorist experience gained by the West and Russian special services over the last few decades, in particular with regard to hostage-taking, negotiations on their release, etc., has proven to be not very useful when dealing with terrorists of the new type: fanatic suicide bombers. Many experts say that the chances for surviving a terrorist act committed by suicide bombers are higher for those who are ready for an immediate reaction and action, be it an attack or escape. A high number of potential terrorist acts have been prevented in Israel in recent years by such people: waiters, bus and taxi drivers with a military service record, who immediately reacted to some imminent danger. Many of the children who escaped from the school in Beslan when it was seized by terrorists saved their own lives, unlike some of their schoolmates who followed classical recommendations and did not resist the terrorists.

Another factor that helps counter terror is the coordination of actions of professionals and authorities, and the support of these actions by the population. Even professionals cannot work miracles. This is why the Israeli special forces, when planning an anti-terrorist operation, assume in advance that the death rate among the hostages will be 100 percent. This approach helps them to avoid mistakes that are caused by the wish to save everybody. Unfortunately, nothing can ever guarantee the rescue of all hostages. Exceptions to this rule are very rare, and in those cases involving “mega-terror,” which Russia has now encountered – and Israel encountered much earlier – it is virtually ruled out.

Unlike geographically small Israel, the antiterrorism system in Russia cannot be made uniform throughout the country. Large and small towns, major industrial centers, villages and special-purpose facilities need their own plans to counter suicide bombers or groups of terrorists, many of whom are armed and trained every bit as well as national special forces. These plans must take into account local conditions, the state of the infrastructure, seasonal weather changes, the specificity of the local nationality, and proximity to combat zones.

At the same time, the main indicator that Russian society has realized the problem it faces can be witnessed by its degree of consolidation, which is similar to the degree of consolidation the Israelis or Americans have displayed during their national tragedies. Countering terrorism cannot be an affair of the state, special agencies and organizations alone. Without the participation of broad sections of the population, all antiterrorism efforts would be doomed – if not to defeat then to infinite repetition of terrorist acts. How the citizens of Russia can be united into a community that is capable of withstanding an outside threat, while keeping its foundation intact, is a special subject. I would only like to point out here that at least in two countries of the contemporary world, Britain and Israel, the years-long struggle against terrorism has affected civil freedoms and society’s self-perception to a minimal degree.

The most important factor, perhaps, that can help Russia discover the mechanisms for efficiently combating Islamist terror is the realization of its nature. Islamists do not wait for concessions from the Russian Federation, nor any other country they are fighting against. They simply want to destroy the country and its citizens: atheists and believers, Moslems and non-Moslems. Islamists do not consider these individuals to be people and are ready to sacrifice their own lives and the lives of their relatives for a victory in the new jihad which, in its senseless cruelty, has exceeded by far the jihad of the Prophet’s times. In the struggle against such an enemy compromises are senseless, and the only efficient strategy is to destroy the terrorists before they strike. The creation of a mechanism that will make this possible will bring victory.