Word: meiers
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...Latest reports suggest the Chechens have used the same strategy as in the last war," says TIME Moscow correspondent Andrew Meier. "They recognized the superior firepower of the federal forces and retreated all the way to Grozny. But some of their men simply went underground, waiting for the right moment, and that moment came last weekend when they struck in a coordinated attack that has embarrassed Russia." For weeks the Chechens had been harassing the Russians forces behind their own lines at night. Then, realizing the disarray at the top of the Russian chain of command signaled by last Friday...
...generals and alarmed the Russian public. The tenor of media reports, which had for the most part been bullish on the war, suddenly began to shift, and Russians began invoking memories of the last war. "There's a palpable shift in attitude from the beginning of the campaign," says Meier. "They swept across the northern plain with the wind at their backs and were boasting of a quick and easy victory. But three months later, the bravado is gone, the high morale of the early weeks has proved to be rather shallow and, of course, the body count is rising...
...Chechen resistance. That allowed Moscow to project the idea of a "clean" war in which Russian casualties are kept to a minimum and the militants are routed by cannon and air power. "But in the end, Putin faces the same problems as his predecessors in the last war," says Meier. "You can pursue the strategy of bombing and shelling from a distance only so far. It hasn't worked in Grozny." It's now clear that the capital can't be seized without Russia accepting heavy casualties, and that forced a pause last week as the Russian commanders and politicians...
...deadline that Putin set for himself on Grozny has already passed, and now it's threatening to turn into a familiar quagmire," says TIME Moscow correspondent Andrew Meier. "While the Russian public is still overwhelmingly in favor of the war, the challenge for Putin is how to maintain the appearance that things are going well in the absence of a real victory on the ground." And the events of the weekend highlighted the limits of Russian control despite its territorial gains in the first months of the war. The Chechens for the most part retreated in the face of Russian...
...halt" the assault on Grozny, and that Moscow's two leading commanders in Chechnya would be returning to their former posts. "This is as close as we're going to get to an official admission that Russian forces have hit a wall in Grozny," says TIME Moscow correspondent Andrew Meier. "It's a major turning point...