In Grozny itself, thousands of buildings have only a wall or two standing. For nearly 10 weeks after the Russians invaded on Dec. 11 to reverse a 1991 declaration of independence, fighters in Grozny resisted block by block. Now, fewer than a hundred thousand people pick for food in what was once a city of 400,000. Moving on, Russian forces level the countryside of a tiny country that Russia originally conquered by force only 135 years ago.
Russian announcements follow a well-thumbed script.
Western governments are supporting Yeltsin, with mild criticisms. He is referring to Boris Yeltsin. The struggle for self-determination is one of the strongest real forces for change a step toward democratization today, and toward the goal of a voluntary federation of free peoples, still far away. Russian policy was both imperialist and anti-Muslim. The Chechens and other tribal peoples, such as Daghestanis, resisted Russian control until the nineteenth century.