Of course you believe this. Only Muslims do horrible things.
Perhaps I should elaborate just a little for x-ray vision before I accuse him for presenting a strawman here.
This incident was clearly a suicidal mission. I’m hard pressed to think of any other period in history where humans deliberately committed suicide for the sake of their people unless there was a religious element to it. Think back to the divine wind for example.
By the way I’ve always been careful to specify radical muslims when condemning their actions. Its getting quite tiring to have to reiterate that point to defend myself against the accusations of xenophopia.
Who? I can’t find antyhing in the English-language media, except a report on Radio Free Europe that Anna Politkovskaya flew to Moscow to be treated for acute food poisoning. A cursory search of Russian-language sites hasn’t turned anything up, either, though I am hampered by not being able to type in Russian to do searches. Who’s reporting it? (French-language sources are no problem, BTW.)
Since you raised the question perhaps you can answer it, how many? You will find that the answer is a lot less than the current massacre.
During second Chechen war, Russian army beseiged Grozny and paused for days, specifically to allow all civilians to leave the city. Only then the fighting began with militants who stayed in the city, determined to give battle. The ensuing battle was not a civilian bloodbath at all, but more like Stalingrad. You can’t compare that with sudden attack on a school.
Civilian casualties were greater during first Chechen war. But keep in minf that Chechens practically won the first war. Russians withdrew and signed truce agreement. Chechnya was left free for years until Muslim extremists invaded Russia (was that sane?), which led to second war.
All too true.
However, this school massacre can’t be even called a revenge. It was strictly political action, nothing else. Beslan school is in Ossetia, close to border with Chechnya. South Ossetia is a small ethnic region just like Chechnya, except living in relative peace with Moscow. Majority of people there are Ossetins, quite different from Russians ethnically and in language and much closer to Chechens. In addition, many children in that school might have been from families of Chechen refugees, as many of them escaped from Chechnya into Ossetia, Ingushetia and other regions and have no intention of going back. The only reason the school was attacked was a calculation that Moscow will be obligated to respond.
Most conflicts of any kind have had some religious element to them.
I read your earlier comment in the same way as x-ray vision - it seemed to suggest that without militant Islam, hostage-taking and massacres would never exist. Did you mean something different?
You think that the Chechens aren’t willing to give their lives for reasons other than religious? If you haven’t done so read Eva luna’s post. Ever heard of the Japanese kamakazis? The British Light Brigade?
From This site
That’s the second Chechen war you’re refering too, and during which, according to you, the russian units would have showed a lot of restraint by comparison with the first (I’m not sure what we’re supposed to imagine concerning the first, if it has been much worse). By, the way, I’m not sure why only the massacres commited during the second war would count. I doubt that the victims have already forgotten the first after less than 10 years. Note the words "** claimed ** and ** incursion ** by Chechen militias, which is not the same thing as an “invasion of Russia by the Chechens”. Anyway, I’m going to point out that the Chechen Maskhadov governement was trying to oppose these muslim extremists. The truth is that Putin seized the first pretext he found to start the second war and conquer again the de facto independant republic.
While searching for the figures you’re mentionning, I checked human rights watch sites, but their current infos, though interesting, doesn’t go back before 2001. This site shows pictures of what was left of Grozny after its destruction by the Russian army, and gives a an estimate of the global death toll ( 150 000, 15% or so of the population of the republic) but doesn’t give specific figures for Grozny. This global security.org page, apparently writtten during the attack against grozny, gives some interesting background about the second war, but contradictory informations about the losses , given the lack of independant sources. They mention bombings of grozny, and not an evacuation of the civilians, though.
This article of CNN, also written during the siege and describing the fights, mentions
I didn’t search for long because I must leave. Maybe I would have found an estimate of the number of children killed in Grozny during the second Chechnya war or maybe not. Still, with these elements, we know that :
-15% of the population have been killed between the two wars. That probably include a large number of children ( 40 000 according to the speech I linked above by a represenatant of "Chechen women for peace).
-Grozny has been plainly leveled during the second war.
-Assuming that the civilian population has eventually be allowed to leave (I don’t remember this evacuation, but I remember testimonies about families seeking refuges in basement while the city was destroyed), dozens of thousands of civilians were still present in city during at least part of the siege. It makes sense to assume that a part of them were children, and that part of them have been killed.
So, I strongly doubt that the number of children killed specifically in Grozny during the second Chechen war doesn’t exceed by far the number of children killed yesterday. I can’t prove it, though. It still quite clear that the number of children killed yesterday can’t even begin to be compared to the number of Chechen children killed by the Russian forces who made close to no effort to spare the civilians (when they didn’t flatly massacre them) during the whole war.
So, if people are outraged by the criminals who are responsible for the massacre in Ossetia, they could keep a lot of their outrage for this other criminal who is currently sitting in the Kremlin and who has much more blood on his hands. And has obviously no intent of stopping the killing.
Sure I can. I’ll see if I can find a cite, but I have a distinct memory of (I belive) Yeltsin (or maybe a military commander), during the siege of Grozny, giving a deadline after which any non-soldier found in the city would be assumed to be a member of the Chechen opposition and subject to being shot on sight. The remark was retracted shortly thereafter and restated as “well, Grozny is a dangerous place to be at the moment, so we advise that all civilians leave.”
Excellent point about the population of Ossetia, though. A significant proportion of Ossetians are Muslims, and while I doubt I will be able to find any statistics on the ethnic/religious makeup of a specific town, many other primarily Muslim ethnic minorities (including Chechen refugees) live in Ossetia. The location for this act was not chosen because of the religion of its inhabitants.
That was reported on Radio-France International. Maybe it’s indeed Anna Politkovskaya (I’ve a hard time remembering names, let alone russian names), and I misunderstood and made up the part about her dying. I don’t have time to search right now, unfortunately.
Just in case someone would argue that Putin became president only in 2000 while the second war began in 1999, I’m going to point out that he was appointed prime minister in august 1999, one month before the beginning of the war, while Eltsine was in such a shape that he was unable to politically lead the country anymore (actually barely able to express himself).
Yes. My point is simply that any group action by an individual that is understood by that individual to be guaranteed to result in the loss of life for that individual will indicate a high probability of religious influence. The Chechen connection here would indicate that that religion is Islam, and once again I will reiterate it still takes a fanatic or a radical to perpetrate violence.
Read my previous post. I have already referred to the Japanese kamakazis earlier. That was religious based as well.
The charge of the Light Brigade was not deliberate suicide. It was an absolute disaster in terms of the outcome of the battle that day.
Or it was, with the 3 escaped terrorists taking refuge among the (Chechnyan refugeee) population. Who knows?
As you say yourself, there was a deadline set for all civilians to leave Grozny; when some Russian general or minister said that stupid thing you cite, there was an uproar in Russian and Western media, making him to retract his words; the deadline was even extended after that. When Russians tried to enter Grozny after the deadline, they were met with fierce resistance by militants determined to give battle. Grozny was levelled in ensuing battle, just like Stalingrad. How can these events be compared with sudden ambush on school?
Not trying to exonerate Moscow, just trying to present facts.
The crucial fact remains that Chechnya did win its independence in the first war. Russians were forced to sign truce and withdraw. They never recognized Chechen independence officially, but they stayed completely out for few years. What was happening in Chechnya during this time? There were elections, Maskhadov was elected President of Ichkeria. However, “field commanders” never disbanded troops loyal only to them, foreign Muslim radicals (much hated by Chechens, btw) never left, there were no civil reforms, no stability, nothing but a breeding ground for terrorists, like Afghanistan. Eventually, Muslim radicals went to further “liberate” their Dagestani “brethren”, provoking a new war with Russia. Was Moscow waiting to use this chance to take over Chechnya again? You bet it was. Will Moscow use the aftermath of present school massacre to crack down even harder? Yes, it will.
The point is that Chechens had their independence and lost it, and Russia is not the main culprit why it happened that way. Bands of Islamic radicals prevented establishment of civil order in Chechnya and plunged Chechnya into second war with Russia. Islamic radicals killed Chechen freedom for the sake of their own crazy doctrines. Now the same bands of Islamic radicals attack schools and kill Ossetian, Ingush, Chechen and Russian children, demanding withdrawal of Russian troops from Chechnya.
There may have been an element of (non-religious) Bushido (or simply the cultural tradition of following orders) behind the Kamikaze, but there was no religious impetus for the Kamikaze attacks.
Not that this advances the thread at all, but I think you’d find that Shinto has a heavy influence on Bushido…and that IS a religion. There certainly was a religious element to what the kamikazi were doing…thus the Shinto rituals prior to getting in the cockpit.
-XT
And the prayers in the lockerroom are the religious element to a football game.
Why you are fixated on this is beyond me, but you sound like a fool to compare prayers before a football game with Shinto rights observed before Kamikazi went into battle…it shows a lack of understanding of the Japanese people and of Bushido.
I fail to see what any of this really has to do with the OP though, as the situation in Chechnya has few parallels to WWII era Japan. Is it your hope that if you can prove that the Japanese were not motivated by religion that this will prove that the Chechnen’s are not? One does not follow from the other.
-XT
I don’t think its a foolish comparison at all. My point is that rituals before battle, whether on the football field or in planes, do not show that the motivation for the battle is religious in nature.
Well, leaving aside for a sec the point that a football game isn’t exactly ‘battle’, you are correct as a general rule. However, I wasn’t really talking about a general rule, but a very specific one…i.e. when the Japanese preformed Shinto rituals before battle it WAS religiously motivated. Japanese kamikazi attacks, and the kamikazi strategy itself stems from religious roots…kami being spirits, kazi being wind…divine wind. Like much else in Japanese society its roots are in the Shinto religion…as the roots of bushido are.
So, the statement “There may have been an element of (non-religious) Bushido (or simply the cultural tradition of following orders) behind the Kamikaze, but there was no religious impetus for the Kamikaze attacks” I was responding too is not correct…Bushido HAS its roots in the Shinto religion (i.e. its NOT non-religious), nor was this some kind of secular ‘cultural tradition of following orders’…again, it had its roots in Shinto and therefore was religious at its roots.
Again, it shows a basic mis-understanding of Japanese culture and traditions to try and paint it this way. And again, I fail to see why this is important in any case, nor how it advances the thread. If you would like to debate this further I’d be happy to…in another thread. I’ve studied Japanese martial arts for many years, and have visited Japan on a numbe of occations…so its a subject I really enjoy.
-XT