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men declared a blood feud on Lema, but the authorities intervened on the criminal’s behalf. He was appointed commander of a detachment of Kadyrovites in the village, and thereafter of an anti-terrorist center which was being formed in Kurchaloy District. His powers now virtually unlimited, he set about persecuting his sworn enemies, their immediate relatives, and anybody who might even hypothetically exact vengeance on him at some time in the future. Some of these went off to join the resistance fighters, others hid with friends. The friends were also subjected to repression for giving them refuge: they were beaten, tortured and killed. Several families were drawn into the conflict, certain episodes of which were represented in the press as being part of the struggle against terrorists. On Russian Militia Day, 2005, Lema Salmanov, who six months earlier had shot his elderly great-uncle for trying to talk sense to him, was awarded a government medal.

To the present day this individual remains one of the most powerful Kadyrovite commanders, although one might wonder what use he has been to the Russian authorities, since his activity has resulted in the killing of his personal rather than the state’s enemies, and dozens of people have taken to the hills to join the fighters.

It would appear that this is precisely the aim of Chechenisation, and that it was from the outset devised as a means of pitching Chechen against Chechen, not allowing the conflict to die down, and fanning it to the level of civil war. Clearly, if such a policy is to be implemented, it is best to seek the support of those who, having committed one crime, will not hesitate to repeat it in the future. There are no plans to combat the tradition of the blood feud in Chechnya and, given that retribution may be visited on a culprit even after many years, it binds such people to the Russian authorities more firmly than any ideological views.

This policy also serves the purely propaganda task of showing the world local inhabitants fighting on the side of the federals, and hence undermines the idea that the conflict has separatist roots.

There have always been Chechens who favored keeping the Republic within Russia. They organised movements and armed detachments and, for example, hundreds of people opposed the separatists back in the early 1990s under the command of Bislan Gantamirov. At the beginning of the Second Chechen War, even before Akhmat Kadyrov’s Security Service was created, vigilante detachments appeared in a number of districts and enabled Russian troops to take control of the mountainous part of the Republic without serious losses.

The members of these detachments and their commanders refused, however, to participate in security sweeps, hostage-taking and summary executions. Emphasising their loyalty to the Russian authorities, they nevertheless showed a determination to protect the civilian population, if necessary from the Russian Army.

From early summer 2000, the Russians began to rid themselves of these “unreliable” allies. The vigilante group of Vedeno District, for instance, was first dissolved and most of its members subsequently either abducted or killed. The Rifle Company of the Shatoy District Commandant’s Office was disbanded. It consisted mainly of men who had rallied to the Russian banner on intellectual grounds and had later refused to merge with the West Battalion, which consisted largely of criminals.

In other words, Chechenisation is not simply the transfer of power to institutions consisting of local inhabitants, but an encouragement and legitimisation of the activities of those who are prepared to participate in punitive operations against their own population. Chechenisation is a policy for expanding the scope of the war, and the result of the policy has been a replacement of the genocide practised directly by Russian agencies in the early stages of the conflict by today’s reign of terror by criminal and semi-criminal gangs supported and directed from Moscow.

A POSTSCRIPT: FRAGMENTS OF TWO ARTICLES ANNA WAS WORKING ON AT