Moscow's civilians: the latest victims of Russia's unfinished war

Today’s tragic bombings in Moscow not only offer a stark lesson in the dangers of declaring victory in a “war against terror,” but also illustrate the profound problems associated with nation-building after a conflict.

Last April the Kremlin declared the war with Chechnya over. In May that year Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, the Russian-sponsored former rebel leader who has been given the task of bringing order to a battle-scarred and brutalised Chechnya, stood side-by-side with a Russian general as they watched a Chechen army parade. Seeing them decked out with new Russian uniforms and assault rifles, it would have been tempting to reach the conclusion that, after nearly two decades of war, the region might finally be settling. As with the many victories declared before, however, the peace would prove temporary.



In the 1990s Grozny, the Chechen capital, was reduced to a wasteland thanks to Russian campaigns which saw the city dubbed “most destroyed city on earth” by the UN. In recent years, however, the Russians have poured money into the region and rebuilding has happened at a startling pace. Nowhere is the rebirth of the city more striking than in the centre, where an exact replica of the Blue Mosque in Istanbul has sprung up from the ruins. But despite all this, the scars of conflict still fester. While Kadyrov is a partial solution for the Kremlin, his iron-fisted diplomacy has meant he has a colourful history and is often involved in violent power struggles with other Chechen warlords. Indeed, he has appeared among a list of names associated with the investigation into the murder of the journalist Anna Politkovskaya in 2006.

For many in Russia, describing Chechnya as unstable would be a tautology. The six-year respite from bombing campaigns in Moscow itself may have led many to relax their guard, but there will be few doubts today in the minds of most Muscovites over the motivations of the bombers. Already the Russian security services have pointed to groups linked to the North Caucasus region as the likely perpetrators of today’s atrocity.

These latest bombings should be condemned in the strongest terms by the international community for the senseless killing of innocent commuters. Coming 19 years after Chechnya declared independence from the Russian Federation, however, it should also be taken as an insight into how not to go about the task of rebuilding a nation. Propping up one local warlord with massive injections of cash and arms may seem preferable to slow, painful and often unproductive negotiations, but the history of countries such as Uganda, Somalia and Afghanistan shows the folly of such actions. In each of those cases the puppet regime has eventually turned on and humiliated its most prominent supporters through brutal repressions of their own people and public insults.

Worse, they showed how political expediency had taken precedence over the needs of local people, as authoritarian simplicity was deemed more manageable than becoming involved in complex web of relationships between different ethnic, religious or political groups. Help was extended only insofar as the recipient remained amenable to the demands of the donor. In Chechnya, much of the psychological damage has become so ingrained that a mediated solution can at times seem impossible. Open debates between all parties over the future of the country remain, however, the only realistic way in which the conflict has any hope of ending—and for the Kremlin to truly claim the victory it has been searching for.

If there is a significant lesson to be taken from today’s tragedy, it is that the slow and painful process of rebuilding is the price a nation must pay for indulging in conflicts. Otherwise, the cost is felt by innocent people who have had no agency in the decisions taken on their behalf. It is a lesson that the west should take heed of.