Word: chechens
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Take, to begin with, the debacle the Russian army suffered when it tried last week to storm the Chechen capital of Grozny, only to be driven back from the city center by greatly outnumbered and outgunned Chechen fighters. Yes, everyone knew the Russian military was no longer the tightly disciplined, overpowering army that a few years ago haunted the dreams of potential victims from Beijing to Bonn. It still came as a shock that the machine had deteriorated so badly -- and a greater shock that so much of it was riven by dissension and insubordination from teenage draftees who deserted...
Most disturbing of all was the sense that in this war there was no clearly defined right and wrong. Most outsiders felt instinctive sympathy for the Chechens as the victims of assault, of indiscriminate bombing of civilians -- but sympathy too for the hapless Russian recruits dying because of the ineptitude of their leaders and generals. But could anyone really cheer for Chechen secession? A few voices call for letting regions historically forced into the Russian Federation go free, like the other pieces of the Soviet Empire. But the U.S. and West European governments acknowledged without question Russia's right...
...house-to-house fighting against a determined enemy is the most harrowing task in all warfare. And even after the Russian flag finally waved over a pile of smoking rubble, the killing might not stop. A Russian army of occupation would be subject to hit-and-run raids by Chechen guerrillas holed up in the Caucasus Mountains south of the city, as czarist armies were held off for no less than 47 years in the mid-19th century...
...moment the invasion began on Dec. 11, it violated just about every rule of modern warfare. The slow-motion operation gave the rebels plenty of time to organize and arm. A barrage of air strikes failed to do anything but stiffen resistance. Once the fight was joined, the Chechens made hash of the raw Russian troops, ill-trained and unprepared, who fought poorly and used tactics any military academy cadet would be expected to avoid. Grachev had remarked recently that only an "incompetent commander" would order tanks into the streets of central Grozny, where they would be vulnerable to rocket...
Russian troops, pressing further into Grozny with their latest wave of artillery and rocket attacks, today came within yards of seizing the symbolic presidential palace in the Chechen capital. Chechen rebels have pressed the defense of the city even though their president on Wednesday publicly admitted they were outmatched militarily. Moscow news reports said Russian forces now occupy the Chechen government headquarters, a "key target" across the street from the palace. TIME correspondent Ann Simmons, reporting from Moscow, says many Russian officials believe the inevitable fall of Grozny will merely spark a more fragmented guerrilla war as rebels...