Word: guerrillaism
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...into the mountains. Russian forces have reportedly surrounded the village, but haven't tried to advance on the rebel positions there. Capturing Grozny, of course, is primarily of symbolic importance, because the object of a counterinsurgency war is less to capture territory than it is to isolate and destroy guerrilla forces. The rebels have long maintained that their game plan was always to withdraw from Grozny after making the Russians pay a heavy price for the city - which they've certainly done. "This is less a retreat than a tactical maneuver," says TIME Moscow correspondent Andrew Meier. "The Chechens were...
...field commanders, who are fighting for Allah or because it is the thing they do best, Maskhadov views the struggle as a way of forcing the Russians back to the negotiating table, where he wants to win recognition of Chechnya's independence. He is waging a classic guerrilla struggle, aimed at public opinion and the political elite in Moscow. The objective is to undermine Russia's confidence that its war aims can be achieved, by embarrassing the leadership and inflicting an intolerable degree of pain...
...bloody as it may be, the battle for Grozny may be primarily symbolic. "It's this medieval symbolism of planting your flag on a city and claiming you've won," says Zharakovich. "In a war against guerrilla forces, capturing a city doesn't mean anything." The bulk of the Chechen forces are already in the mountains to the south, and constant ambushes and attacks behind Russian lines signify the limits of territorial control in this war. Still, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin desperately needs a way to declare victory in the popular military campaign that he hopes will carry...
...beatings," says Meier. "Now the Chechen population fears the Russians are planning the same thing all over again." Frustration may prompt Russia to pursue more brutal and indiscriminate measures, which makes it more likely that the Chechen population will become alienated from Russian forces rather than from the guerrillas - in other words, the waters will become hostile less to the fish than to the fishermen. And, as guerrilla wars from Vietnam to Afghanistan have shown, without winning over the civilian population it's extremely difficult for even the best-armed conventional armies to prevail against a committed guerrilla army fighting...
...paper and wrote a letter from his Turkish prison cell. In it, he urged the European Union to look kindly on his jailers' application for membership to the 15-member economic and political community - an unusual action for a man who has spent 15 years fighting a vicious guerrilla war against Turkey. But the Kurdish rebel leader reaped the benefit Wednesday, when Turkey voted to delay his execution - a punishment handed down on grounds of treason - pending a hearing by the European Court of Human Rights. Turkey's signature on the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights requires...