Journal of Strategic Studies

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Kadyrovtsy: Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy

and the Wars of Paramilitary Clans

Tom md & Miroslav Mare

To cite this article: Tom md & Miroslav Mare (2015) Kadyrovtsy: Russias
Counterinsurgency Strategy and the Wars of Paramilitary Clans, Journal of Strategic Studies, 38:5,
650-677, DOI: 10.1080/01402390.2014.942035

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The Journal of Strategic Studies, 2015
Vol. 38, No. 5, 650677, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01402390.2014.942035

Kadyrovtsy: Russias
Counterinsurgency Strategy and the
Wars of Paramilitary Clans

TOM MD AND MIROSLAV MARE

Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social Studies, Masaryk University, Brno,
Czech Republic

ABSTRACT This article analyses the steps taken by the Russian government,
with the aid of a powerful local clan, the so-called Kadyrovtsy, to subdue the
Chechen insurgency. It highlights the strategy used by Russia, under whose
patronage former anti-Russian guerrilla ghters were transformed into para-
military allies of the Russian government; later these former insurgents were
incorporated into the regular Russian army and other state security forces. The
article also identies problems that are connected with the activities of the
Kadyrovtsy in Chechnya and Russia, and the spillover into the diaspora; it
also contextualises the issues faced by the contemporary Chechen ruling clan
and the geopolitics of the Caucasus within the research framework of para-
militarism and counterinsurgency.

KEY WORDS: Chechnya, Russia, Counterinsurgency

Introduction
Following the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the Russian
Federation, its successor state, found itself in a difcult situation vis--
vis the Caucasus region. In particular because, in parts strong separatist
tendencies had emerged. The Chechen Republic was particularly pro-
blematic, as it declared independence, which was unacceptable to those
at the centre of the Federation. The crisis culminated in two Chechen
wars and long-term terrorist and insurgency campaigns. Russias coun-
terinsurgency strategy following the second Chechen war focused,
among other things, on seeking allies from amongst their former ene-
mies. Such an ally was found in one of the clans: the Kadyrovtsy. In this
article, we focus on how the Kadyrovtsy assisted Russia to Chechenise
the conict (i.e. to divide the enemies and therefore weaken the general
anti-Russian direction of the Chechen struggle). We also analyse the
risks associated with Russias chosen strategy and with the

2015 Taylor & Francis

 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 651

empowerment of the Kadyrovtsy. Notions of counterinsurgency and

paramilitarism provide the research framework.

Conceptualising and Framing the Issue: The Chechen Conict,

Counterinsurgency and Paramilitarism
In its overall scope, the Chechen conict can be characterised as a
separatist insurgency, which in the short time frame of the 1995 and
1999 wars temporarily transformed itself into a regular war with clear
front lines. In the years 199194 and 199699, the unrecognised
Chechen government partially controlled the Chechen territory (how-
ever, Moscow had a strong impact in some territories, especially in
Northern Chechnya), and criminal attacks (including the kidnapping
of a bus in Rostov) were committed in the territories of both Chechnya
and Russia. The conict was increasingly inuenced by the Islamisation
of Chechen demands and a certain interconnection with international
jihadist networks.1 Insurgency and terrorism also manifested after the
year 2000, when Russia changed its strategy and located its allies in
several clans spearheaded by the Kadyrovtsy. The insurgency was later
directed against the power structures connected with the clan, and not
solely against Russia. The Kadyrovtsy continue to be involved in a
struggle against their rivals within Chechnya and the Northern
Caucasus, and this strife occasionally spills over into the diaspora in
Western countries.
These contemporary clans have very limited links with the traditional
teips and the Su virds. Due to the processes of urbanisation and
modernisation ongoing in recent decades, the teips have lost the sig-
nicance they previously had. In large cities, they are more of an
ethnographic curiosity than a real expression of everyday life in
Chechnya. The teips and partially also the virds have been replaced
by other, looser forms of social organisation, of which the present
political-criminal-paramilitary clans are an instance. However, the
power of the teips and the virds continues to be noticeable in the
mountainous regions.
Generally speaking, an insurgency occurs in an environment where
the central power applies various strategies that can be conceptualised
along an axis. On one end of our imaginary axis stands the iron st
strategy, characterised by mass repression against the environment in
which the insurgency occurs and includes attacks on civilians. On the
other, there is the ideal hearts and minds strategy, which seeks to win

1
Irina Mukhina, Islamic Terrorism and the Question of National Liberation, or
Problems of Contemporary Chechen Terrorism, Studies in Conict & Terrorism 28/6
(2005), 51532.
652 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

over the inhabitants of the territory in which the insurgency appears.

The aim is to remove the resources that might be employed to support
the insurgents.2
Regular armed forces, supplemented by loyal paramilitary units, can
be deployed to engage insurgents in territories where they are active.3
Paramilitary units can be used to defend civilians (for instance against
manifestations of banditry on the part of the insurgents), but they can
also support local governments in their power ambitions. In the struggle
with insurgents, paramilitary units usually cooperate with the main
forces of the army, although they can exert a fairly wide autonomy.
They can also enjoy varying levels of support from within society. As
Julie Mazzei states, paramilitaries are neither entirely state nor
entirely civil society actors. Rather they are the product of interests
shared across factions of groups within both arenas.4
Paramilitary forces can dynamically develop and alter their character.
Original insurgents can become allies of the dominant power, or can
participate, with varying intensity, in the seizure of power. In a new
regime, they can then become an important locus of power and even
assume a dominant military role.5

From Insurgents to Pro-Russian Paramilitaries

The term Kadyrovtsy, grammatically rooted in Russian, is used in a
narrow sense to describe armed men subordinated to the head of the
Chechen Republic: Ramzan Kadyrov. In a wider sense and especially
with reference to the later period of Kadyrovs rule, the term is applied
to all representatives of Kadyrovs regime, from the local level to that of
the whole republic.
Nevertheless, originally the Kadyrovtsy were militants, formed into
units under the command of Ramzan Kadyrov, whose main task was to
protect Ramzans father Akhmat Kadyrov. The core of the militants
established itself at a time when Akhmat Kadyrov was the highest mufti
in the separatist Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, and one of the main

2
John Collins, Military Strategy. Principles, Practices and Historical Perspectives
(Dulles: Brassey 2002).
3
Andrew Scobell and Brad Hammitt, Goons, Gunmen, and Gendarmerie: Toward a
Reconceptualization of Paramilitary Formations, Journal of Political and Military
Sociology 26/2 (1998), 21327.
4
Julie Mazzei, Death Squads or Self-Defense Forces? How Paramilitary Groups Emerge
and Challenge Democracy in Latin America (Chapel Hill: The University of North
Carolina Press 2009), 217.
5
Miroslav Mare, Paramilitarism in the Czech Republic (Paramilitarismus v esk
Republice) (Brno: Centrum Pro Studium Demokracie a Kultury 2012).
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 653

gures of the secessionist movement. However, Kadyrovtsy only

became truly inuential and powerful after Akhmat Kadyrov and his
clan defected to the side of the Russian federal centre i.e. after the
beginning of the so-called second Chechen war in the autumn of 1999.
Consequently, the top circles of the Kadyrovtsy include a number of
former rebels who fought against the federal centre in the rst Chechen
war. Thanks to a policy of targeted amnesties, which, in exchange for
ending their separatist revolt, offered the boeviki immunity from pro-
secution and the possibility of joining Kadyrovs forces; many rebels
who fought the Federation in the second Chechen war also found their
way into the Kadyrovtsy. In fact, some of these rebels fought Russias
forces even after the ofcial end of the second Chechen war, becoming
members of networks of rebels, inspired by Salast Islam, into which
the original guerrilla ethnic separatism transformed itself over time.6
The term Kadyrovtsy was commonly used in Chechnya, and subse-
quently in Russian discourse as a whole, at the turn of the twenty-rst
century. After their defection to the side of the Federation, the
Kadyrovtsy have become Akhmat Kadyrovs security service; Kadyrov
became the head of the pro-Russian administration, and later, in 2003,
the pro-Russian president. The Kadyrovtsy had no legal status, and in
the logic of the federal discourse, they were an illegal armed grouping;
nevertheless, they have gradually grown into a powerful pro-govern-
ment militia, led by Akhmats son Ramzan. The organisation has been,
and continues to be, very hierarchical, with strongly personalised lea-
dership. Clan and family bonds are very important: the Kadyrovtsy, or
more precisely, the inner circle, consists of members of the teip or rather
neke, around Ramzan Kadyrov and related teips and nekes. The
Kadyrovtsy describe themselves as a security service, and, at one time,
as the Presidential Regiment. When Akhmat Kadyrov was the president,
the Kadyrovtsy allegedly numbered an estimated 2000 armed men; yet
this is hard to establish, and unsurprisingly, ofcial information has not
been not available.7
Not only the Kadyrovtsy, but also other secessionist militias, or
rather private armies of Chechen warlords, who had built the cores of
their formations on a clan basis, switched sides, aligning themselves
with federal forces. The National Guard of the Chechen Republic of

6
Aleksey Makarin, Creation of Ramzan (C ), Politcom.ru, 26 Apr.
2008, <http://www.politcom.ru/6086.html>; also Sergey Markedonov, Russian Expert
on the Issues of the Caucasus Region Interviewed by Author, Moscow, Nov. 2009 and
Washington, DC, Apr. 2013; and Abdulla Istamulov, Chechen Political Analyst,
interviewed by Author, Grozny, July 2012Aug. 2013.
7
Novaya Gazeta, Country Special Forces (-), 24 July 2011, <http://
www.novayagazeta.ru/society/47063.html>.
654 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

Ichkeria, or more specically its second battalion, proved important for

the ensuing story of Chechen paramilitarism. This was a secessionist
armed group commanded by brothers Dzhabrail and Sulim
Yamadayev. Sulim Yamadayev and his brothers were well-known
eld commanders of the separatist Ichkeria. Despite being Muslims
themselves, they did not like the fact that Arab Salast groups had
increased their inuence in the country, and they did not support
Basayevs raid into Dagestan either. For an extended period, they
were at war with Basayev, and when the Russian army entered the
country a second time, they, like Akhmat Kadyrov, sided with federal
forces. These were warlords who controlled parts of the Gudermes
district; in addition to mastering communications, they also managed
illegal oil extraction.8 When they defected to the federal side, one of the
brothers, Ruslan, penetrated the structures of the pro-presidential party
Yedinstvo; he was its chairman in Chechnya, and in 200307, he was a
federal deputy elected on the partys ticket. These gunmen were called
Yamadayevtsy, and became a force in their own right; they operated
independently of the Kadyrovtsy and lacked a formal legal standing.
Originally, the Yamadayev and Kadyrov clans were allies, and accord-
ing to unveried information, they may be related. Together they
formed a militia, but gradually became competitors vying for de facto
power in Chechnya; their conict culminated in a fatal clash, which will
be analysed below.9

Identifying Clan Roles in the Chechen Republic

In 2002, the activities of both pro-Russian groups were distinct. The
Kadyrovtsy were responsible for providing security to the Head of the
Republic. They were later formally in charge of Alu Alkhanovs secur-
ity, although in terms of actual distribution of power, Alkhanov was
their competitor. The Kadyrovtsy developed their relations with
Russias Ministry of the Interior (MVD). In March 2002, the
Yamadayevtsy became a special company under the military command
of the Mountain Group of the Ministry of Defence, growing by autumn
2003 into a special Vostok battalion under the operational command of

8
Novaya Gazeta, War for Chechen Oil ( ), 29 Jan. 2009,
<http://www.novayagazeta.ru/inquests/46335.html>; also SJ, MP of the Chechen
Parliament Who Wished to Remain Anonymous for Security Reasons, interviewed by
Author, Grozny, Feb. 2010.
9
SJ, MP of the Chechen Parliament Who Wished to Remain Anonymous for Security
Reasons; also Josef Pazderka, Czech Journalist and Former Czech TV Correspondent,
interviewed by Author, Moscow, Oct. 2009.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 655

the 42nd Motor Rie Division of the Russian Army, comprising about
1500 men.10
Another pro-Russian Chechen formation was the so-called Kakiyevtsy,
who transformed themselves into a special battalion Zapad, under the
operational command of the 42nd Motor Rie Division. The battalion
was commanded by Said-Magomed Kakiyev and was a somewhat differ-
ent affair to those of the Yamadayevtsy and the Kadyrovtsy. Kakiyev and
the substantial number of men under his command fought on the side of
the Federation from the outset of the ChechenRussian conict origin-
ally, in 1992, under the political leadership of Umar Avtorkhanov, later in
close coordination with the Russian Army. Kakiyev was even involved in
an unsuccessful attempt on Dzhokhar Dudaevs life in 1993, losing an eye
and an arm (below the elbow) in the process.11
Later, after 1996, the majority of the Kakiyevtsy left Chechnya and
only returned to their homeland in 1999 in the ranks of the special
company of the 42nd Motor Rie Division from which the Zapad
battalion was created. They mostly originated from northern
Chechnya, mainly from the Nadterechny district, which was always
more Russied and pro-Russian than the mountainous southern region
of Chechnya. They never accepted the former boeviki among their
ranks as a matter of principle, distinguishing themselves sharply in
this regard from the Kadyrovtsy.12
The last signicant pro-Russian paramilitary group were the
Baysarovtsy gunmen under the command of Movladi Baysarov.
During the Maskhadov administration, Baysarov was a eld comman-
der, and not a particularly inuential one; he later became closer to
Akhmat Kadyrov; his people were Kadyrov Snrs bodyguards at the
time and the latter was the mufti. Thus, they were in charge of his safety
before the armed group around Kadyrov Jnr was formed. Later, they
merged with the Kadyrovtsy to a certain degree, or rather both groups
were entrusted with the same task: protecting Kadyrov Snr. After the
latter died in a bomb attack in May 2004, his bodyguards ceased to
exist de facto (formally they continued to serve Alkhanov, however).
The Baysarovtsy metamorphosed into the special unit Gorets, formally

10
Novaya Gazeta, Country.
11
Sergey Markedonov, Kadyrov has Completed a Campaign Against Vostok
( ), Politcom.ru, 14 May 2008, <http://politcom.
ru/6169.html>; cf. Vladimir Svartsevich, Chechenets S.-M. Kakiyev: Allah, I am Ready
to Die for Russia!! ( .-. : ,
!), Argumenti i fakti, 17 Nov. 2004, <http://gazeta.aif.ru/online/aif/1255/
14_01>.
12
Kavkazsky Uzel, Kakiyev Said-Magomed Shamayevich ( -
), 25 Apr. 2008, <https://www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/articles/137582>.
656 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

incorporated into the Federal Security Service (FSB, Federalnaya

Sluzhba Bezopasnosti) or more precisely, under its Operational
Coordination Centre for the North Caucasus.13
In May 2003, the Kadyrovs assumed fairly effective control over the
Chechen Special Purpose Mobile Unit (OMON, Otryad Mobilniy
Osobogo Naznacheniya), which comprised about 300 men. The
Chechen OMON was previously considered one of the strongholds of
the anti-Kadyrov opposition within the structures of power. It was initially
led by Musa Gazimagomadov, who later perished in a suspicious car
accident.14 Ruslan Alkhanov, a rebel eld commander who had been
granted amnesty only a year before, brought it into the Kadyrovtsy.
When in October 2003 Akhmat Kadyrov became the president of
Chechnya, his security service became the strongest body in the country;
according to his own words it comprised 3000 men. The backbone of
these forces was the former separatist boeviki, who made up 70 per cent of
them (according to the Russian military sources). Most of them had joined
Ramzan after pressure had been exerted on their relatives, who were often
taken captive. Others signed up after being granted amnesty.15
Thus, by 200405, four basic paramilitary groups loyal to the federal
centre had established themselves. All of these had originally been
entirely unlawful armed formations, and three of them had fought
against the federal forces until 1999. In formal terms, they had been
gradually incorporated into the federal structures, but this barely
affected their actual practices, as numerous testimonies state. It must
be added that the federal units themselves often acted unlawfully in
Chechnya, disrespecting international treaties, human rights conven-
tions and other norms. The formal status of the armed groups simply
had no fundamental bearing on their actual behaviour.

The Rise of the Kadyrovtsy

The Kadyrovtsy were connected with the Ministry of the Interior, as
were the Kakiyevtsy, while the Yamadayevtsy had links with the
Ministry of Defence and the Baysarovtsy with the FSB, or more

13
Aleksandr Zheglov and Sergei Mashkin, Enemy to the Grave ( ),
Kommersant, 20 Nov. 2006, <http://www.kommersant.ru/doc/723010>.
14
Vadim Rechkalov Musa Gazimagomadov: I Ended a Life ( :
), Izvestiya, 6 Apr. 2003, <http://izvestia.ru/news/275166>.
15
Alu Alkhanov, In the Ministry of Interior Affairs in Chechnya a Special Regiment was
Established ( ), Memorial, 20 July 2004,
<http://www.memo.ru/hr/hotpoints/caucas1/msg/2004/07/m28568.htm>; cf. Ksenia
Solyanskaya, By Umarova His Brat Started Talking ( ),
Gazeta.ru, 26 Jan. 2010, <http://www.gazeta.ru/politics/2010/01/25_a_3316345.shtml>.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 657

precisely, with one of its sections. In no small measure, the subsequent

growing rivalry between these groups reected the institutional rivalry
between the bodies of the Federation and also the preferences of the
Federations political leadership, which tended to support the bodies of
the Ministry of the Interior as opposed to those of the Army. One must
also consider the factionalist struggles within the individual federal
departments and services; as will be explained below, Baysarov had to
suffer the consequences of this.
The emergence of pro-Federation paramilitary units allowed Moscow
to Chechenise the conict, a strategy preferred by Vladimir Putin after
the end of the second ChechenRussian war.16 A substantial compo-
nent of Russian Federal forces were withdrawn and their activities
taken over by precisely these formations. Ofcially, there were no
Kadyrovtsy, Yamadayevtsy, Baysarovtsy or Kakiyevtsy. Gradually, all
became afliated with some Republic- or Federation-wide body, yet in
fact they continued their activities on a clannish-family basis, and
privatised the bodies of the Republic or the Federation. In any consti-
tuent entity of the Russian Federation, the President of the Russian
Federation controls the power structure through the relevant minister.
The Chechen pro-federal armed formations were soon accused of large-
scale human rights violations, extrajudicial executions, kidnappings,
torture and other crimes. Many eyewitnesses from the local population
agreed that no fundamental distinction could be made between the
individual groups in terms of their reputations or practices. Having
said this, one can nevertheless recognise from recollections and inter-
views that initially the Baysarovtsy were the most feared and had a
particular reputation for cruelty; they were nicknamed death
squadrons.17
The Yamadayevtsy, meanwhile, were responsible for the most dan-
gerous areas: the mountains and forests around Vedeno, Kurchaloy,
Nozhay-Yurt and the border with Dagestan. There they chased the
boeviki and suffered some signicant losses. On the other hand, they
were able to replenish their units readily from among locally vetted
youths. All of the formations allegedly had their own prisons, in which
they held, extrajudicially, numerous locals, many of whom had done no
wrong, but were described by the leaders of the paramilitaries as rebels,
Islamists or extremists. Many prisoners were only relatives of actual

16
Emil Souleimanov, The Endless War. The RussianChechen Conict in Perspective
(Berlin: Peter Lang 2007).
17
SJ, MP of the Chechen Parliament Who Wished to Remain Anonymous for Security
Reasons; Istamulov, Chechen Political Analyst; Inhabitants of the Chechen Republic
interviewed by Author, Nov. 2009, Feb. 2010, July 2010, JulyAug. 2012, Aug. 2013.
658 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

rebels, and unsurprisingly, a good deal of those were members of rebel

anti-Federation armed groups.
A situation often arose in which former boeviki pursued the present
ones while serving alongside the federal soldiers and agents whom they
had previously ercely fought. Putins policy of Chechenising the con-
ict was not favoured by some of the army commanders, especially in
later phases when the Chechen pro-Moscow formations gained in self-
condence and often attacked federal soldiers at checkpoints, the video
evidence of which can be found on YouTube.18
Most of the rank and le, but also the commanders of the paramilitary
formations were former boeviki except for the majority of the
Kakiyevtsy. Many of these considered anti-Russian resistance to be fruit-
less and rejected the growing power and ideological inuence of Salasm
among the insurgents. Hence, they defected to the side of the Federation, in
most cases in response to a promise of immunity from prosecution. The
new Chechen additions to the Russian armed services were connected with
the creation of the Chechen MVD in 2002. At that time, Kadyrov Snr
convinced Moscow that he could woo the boeviki of the forests and the
mountains to his side. Consequently, many repentant separatists joined
the Chechen militia and their companies under the military headquarters.
Quite a few surrendered to the Kadyrovs personally: rst, to Kadyrov Snr;
then when he died, to his son. The Kadyrovs granted them amnesty with-
out coordinating with the bodies of the Federation and the Republic
(especially the public prosecutors ofce), and in 2004 alone there were
thousands of such amnesties, according to local testimonies. Various
sources indicate that in 200205, Kadyrov had won over between 7000
and 14,000 boeviki, but far from all joined the pro-Federation armed units.
Many emigrated, while others returned to civilian life in Chechnya.19
Istamulov nevertheless considers these gures to be exaggerated, putting
the number at 3000 to 4000 at most, and decisively rejecting the idea that
insurgent formations in Chechnya involved as many as 4000 armed men at
any given time.20 Vyacheslav Ismailovs estimates are even lower,21 as are
Pavel Felgengauers.22 The real number of military personnel of the pro-
Federation formations was never specied or conrmed by ofcial

18
See Kadyrovtsy Mock Russia Fighters (
), 12 Oct. 2009, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puKV1h9a0M4>.
19
Vyacheslav Ismaylov, Russian Journalist and Military Expert of Novaya Gazeta,
interviewed by Author, Moscow, Dec. 2009; B.M. Chechen, Police Ofcer Who
Wished to Remain Anonymous, interviewed by Author, Khasavyurt, July 2012.
20
Istamulov, Chechen Political Analyst.
21
Ismaylov, Russian Journalist and Military Expert of Novaya Gazeta.
22
Pavel Felgengauer, Russian Military Journalist, interviewed by Author, Moscow,
Jan. 2012.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 659

authorities in Chechnya or Russia, and upper estimates suggest in the

region of 4000 men were equipped with rearms, grenade launchers
and armored personnel carriers.23 Clearly, many boeviki had other
reasons to switch sides, as numerous testimonies by locals inhabitants
and observers show.

Chechenisation of the Conict and the Kadyrovtsy

The blood feud is an important historical and cultural feature of Chechen
society. The custom has not yet disappeared from the country, and for a
long time it played an indisputably stabilising role.24 Blood feuds were a
much more powerful deterrent to the potential offender than the European
notion of law could ever provide, because the responsibility for an offence
could be ascribed to the offenders relatives as well as to himself. The
offender would be accountable with his own life, and to commit a murder
in such a culture brought much greater risks than within the other cultural
systems of the Soviet Union. If someone wanted to escape punishment, he
would have to leave Chechnya. Nevertheless, at a time when the Chechen
statehood and traditional social structures were fundamentally weakened
and violence was rife in the country, such offenders who would normally
be subject to a blood feud often banded together into armed groups and
acted from a position of strength, even against their pursuers. Some of the
armed groups, during the Maskhadov era (199699), who assisted in
turning Chechnya into a country of violence and lawlessness, were com-
prised of individuals on whom a blood feud has been declared. The
common Chechens dubbed them Indians.25 Thus, it was precisely these
people that the Russian leadership targeted with their policy of
Chechenisation; it was highly unlikely that they would betray the federal
centre, as it was effectively impossible for them to integrate into traditional
Chechen society. Yet it must be said that their involvement in the armed
forces lacks any political motive. Their enemies are certainly not ethnic
Chechens as was the case with the federal death squads made up of the
so-called kontraktniki or even real separatists or Islamic radicals. These
militants came under the wings of the Federation in order to defend
themselves from specic hostile families and clans, and potentially to

23
Novaya Gazeta, Country.
24
Even ofcial Soviet statistics admitted that the ChechenIngush ASSR had the lowest
rate of violent crime in the Soviet Union, and this was explained with reference to the
practice of blood feuds, which was more effective in terms of preventing violent crime
than a legal system based on the European traditions of statehood and the Roman law.
However, this legal system was deformed by the Bolshevik ideology and political
practice of the Soviet regime (cf. Souleimanov, The Endless War).
25
Inhabitants of the Chechen Republic.
660 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

deal with them. Hence, their violence was selective and not as blanket as
that committed by the federal units.
This, then, is how Chechenisation policy can be dened; the violence
in the country had changed gradually into a low-intensity civil war, or
insurgency. Chechenisation, therefore, means not only the handover of
authority to local structures, made up of local inhabitants, but also a
legalisation of those who were ready to participate in punitive acts
against their fellow citizens. Such a policy naturally relies on people
of this type. No one can eradicate the practice of blood feud in
Chechnya indeed, few efforts have been undertaken in this respect
and according to adat, offenders can be pursued for many years. This
binds such people to federal power much more strongly than any
ideological or political alignment could.
A signicant proportion of the personnel in present-day Chechen
security forces have a history of murder and kidnapping, of which the
Baysarovtsy and their leader are a good example. Baysarov was pre-
viously a member of a band under the known criminal, Ruslan
Labazonov, who, as Abdulla Istamulov has argued, symbolised the
decline of Chechen society in the 1990s, and whose band the Chechen
leadership crushed in 1994.26 Between the wars, Baysarov and his
people kidnapped others to acquire ransoms, thus providing one of
the symbols of the criminalisation of the Chechen (Ichkeria) de facto
state, and of Chechen society as a whole. Many pro-federation para-
militaries were dubbed Indians in the interwar period, because they
acted however they wished; kidnappings, assaults, theft of oil, construc-
tion of illegal checkpoints, etc. were common practices. According to
the data from the public prosecutors ofce, the Yamadayevtsy com-
mitted kidnappings. Said-Magomed Kakiyev, a former Labazonovite,
was accused of committing a number of crimes and terrorist acts.27
However, it should also be mentioned that there were always people
in Chechya who rejected separatism and favoured staying within the
Russian Federation. They created organised movements and armed
units. Bislan Gantamirov, for instance, commanded hundreds who
stood against the separatists back in the early 1990s. At the beginning
of the second Chechen war, and before the Kadyrovtsy organised
themselves on the side of the Federation, militia units were created in
some districts, which assisted the Russian army in its control of the
mountain area of the country without substantial losses. However, the
members of such units refused to participate in cleansing operations,
kidnappings and arrests. In contrast, having shown their loyalty to the

26
Istamulov, Chechen Political Analyst.
27
Novaya Gazeta Punitive Conspiracy ( ), 28 Sep. 2006, <http://
www.novayagazeta.ru/politics/29635.html>.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 661

Russian power, they sought to protect locals from the soldiers.

Especially from the summer of the year 2000 onwards, those in
power were quick to rid themselves of those allies whose motivation
was to protect the population in their municipalities. The militia of the
Vedensky district were disbanded, and many of its members killed or
disappeared without trace. Similarly, the militia in the Shatoysky dis-
trict were dispersed, after refusing to become part of the Zapad
battalion.28

Kadyrovtsy in the Struggle to Stay in Power

After the death of Kadyrov Snr, the Kadyrovtsy fundamentally reorga-
nised themselves. In 2005, the Anti-Terrorist Centre (ATC) was created;
the appointment of personnel to the centre was fully in their hands. In
2006, the ATC was abolished, and two battalions Sever and Yug (the
248th and 249th Special Independent Battalions) were formed, com-
prising about 1200 men in total, drawn partially from the ATC and
partially from among the militiamen of the 46th division of Russias
Internal Troops, at that time dislocated in Chechnya.29
The Yug battalion, under the command of Alimbek Delimkhanov,
had about 700 men and the Sever battalion, under Muslim Ilyasov,
about 500 men. The Neftyanoy polk (or Neftepolk), initially com-
manded by Adam Delimkhanov, Alimbeks older brother, should also
be counted among the Kadyrovtsy. Formally, this Oil Regiment was
established to defend the oil infrastructure in Chechnya. According to
many Chechens, the Delimkhanov brothers were the Ramzan
Kadyrovs rst cousins.30 The co-author of this article has also encoun-
tered claims that they were second cousins. In any case, in Chechen
notions of kinship, they are close relatives. Another formalised section
of the Kadyrovtsy was the PPSM-2 (Postovo-patrolnaya sluzhba mili-
tsii). When the PPSM-2 and Neftepolk were formed, they had about
2000 men in total; however, higher estimates have also appeared,
extending to 4500 men for Neftepolk alone.31 According to European
notions of statehood, the Kadyrovtsy are an informal clan; yet they
have formally legalised themselves within the framework of the

28
Taus Dzhabrailov, Former Chechen Politician, interviewed by Author, Moscow,
Nov. 2009.
29
Kavkazsky Uzel, In Chechnya Clashes Between Anti-Terrorist Center Staff and
Ministry of Internal Affairs (
), 19 Aug. 2005, <http://www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/
articles/82570/>.
30
Inhabitants of the Chechen Republic.
31
Novaya Gazeta, Country.
662 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

Ministry of the Interior, assuming control over its structures in

Chechnya. In fact, the Kadyrovtsy constitute a single armed structure
that is loyal to Ramzan Kadyrov.
In 2005, the Kremlin combined forces with Ramzan Kadyrov, who,
according to the Moscow ideologues, had matured into the role of the
Chechen leader. He obtained control over the Republics MVD, within
whose framework a special-purpose regiment was created. One of its
tasks was ghting terrorists beyond the borders of Chechnya itself. In
formal terms, Ramzan Kadyrov was Chechnyas deputy prime minister, a
position he obtained soon after his fathers death; later, when Sergey
Abramov resigned in 2006, he became the prime minister.32 In the
meantime, however, he had to deal with his rst signicant adversary
Movladi Baysarov, who refused to obey him after the death of Kadyrov
Snr. Indeed, at the time anti-Kadyrov tendencies were not limited to
Baysarov, and the rst frictions were recorded between the Kadyrovtsy
and the Yamadayevtsy. Kadyrovs relations with the president Alkhanov
were cool; the latter preferred his own bodyguards, drawn from the
members of his own clan, who had been engaged in skirmishes with
Kadyrovs men on several occasions, some of them after Alkhanov had
left his post and gone to work in Moscow. In 2011 at the Grozny airport,
the co-author of this article witnessed a brawl between Kadyrovs militia-
men and Alkhans bodyguards, after the Kadyrovtsy attempted to check
the identity of Alkhanov, who was ying to Moscow.33 Although for-
mally a subordinate to Alkhanov until 2007, Kadyrov in fact held power;
he controlled decisive sections of the security apparatus and was
Vladimir Putins protg. It was Baysarov, however, who was the rst
to stand against Ramzan Kadyrov publicly.
Ofcially named Gorets, and subordinates of the FSB, the
Baysarovtsy had a base in Baysarovs native village of Pobedinskoe.
As indicated above, they had a very bad, even macabre reputation
among the Chechens; a reputation that persisted after they switched
to the Federation side. They were known to practice kidnapping for
ransom and were involved in a number of murders and killings. (In the
1990s however, Baysarov was on no xed side and uctuated oppor-
tunistically.) The Baysarovtsy also controlled the extraction of oil
around Pobedinskoe. Baysarov was therefore not only a political, but
also an economic competitor to Kadyrov.34

32
Aleksey Malashenko, Ramzan Kadyrov. Russian Politician of Caucasian Nationality
(Ramzan Kadyrov: rossiysky politik kavkazskoy natsionalnosti) (Moscow: Rosspen
2009).
33
Authors uninterested observation in Grozny on 17 Nov. 2011.
34
Tatyana Gritsenko, Gortsa Came On ( ), Vremya Novostey, 20 Nov.
2006, <http://vremya.ru/2006/213/46/165933.html>.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 663

Towards the end of 2005, and under the pressure of the Chechen
representatives (the Kadyrovtsy), the FSBs Operational Coordination
Centre for the North Caucasus was disbanded. Ramzan also decided to
dissolve the Gorets itself and divide its ghters into various units that
would be under his and the Kadyrovtsys control. Without physically
eliminating the ghters, the informal structure of the Baysarovtsy would
be abolished. Baysarov relied on the support of former leading bodies
within the FSB. He hoped that he would be allowed to metamorphose
his unit into the MVD structure, where the Gorets would become a
company, under his leadership, entrusted with protection tasks in some
department. According to the federal minister, Rashid Nurgaliyev,
Gorets was to become a self-contained company tasked with protecting
the Argunsk thermal power station.35
Kadyrov rejected this, however, and the federal centre yielded to him.
Baysarov, who had already repeatedly refused subordination to
Kadyrov Jnr, had commanded his men to barricade themselves in
Pobedinskoe. Soon an old hearing against Baysarov was resumed: it
concerned an event from 2004, when the Baysarovtsy kidnapped and
killed ten members of the Musayev family. Allegedly Baysarov himself
shot the captives in revenge for the killing of his brother Sharini, who
served in Akhmat Kadyrovs security service.36
Baysarov probably lost FSB protection on orders from above, and his
extermination was unprecedented. A special group of the Chechen
MVD, i.e. the Kadyrovtsy, came to arrest him in Moscow. The event
thus became symbolic of Ramzan Kadyrovs growing power, as the
arrest could have been done (and indeed, according to Russian law,
should have been done) by Muscovite militiamen. During the arrest,
Baysarov was riddled with bullets on the Leninsky Prospekt, one of
Moscows busiest boulevards. According to the militiamen who inter-
vened, Baysarov had a grenade on his person, which was why they
opened re. Resistance to arrest was given as the ofcial cause of his
death. Many observers opined that Kadyrovs revenge, and his endea-
vours to consolidate and strengthen his power, were behind the event.37
This interpretation is reinforced by the fact that, although Baysarov was

35
Ibid.
36
Baysarov left for Moscow, and despite the accusations raised against him, he
appeared publicly and complained that Kadyrov had started to hound him for political
reasons. Baysarov nonetheless continued to take, euphemistically speaking, controver-
sial steps, for which he was not prosecuted only thanks to FSB interventions. For
instance, he blackmailed a casino on Novyy Arbat and other businesses. Rechkalov,
Musa Gazimagomadov; cf. Chechen, Police Ofcer Who Wished to Remain
Anonymous.
37
Ibid.
664 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

accused of the murders in 2004, the prosecution had been very lax until
he had started to challenge Kadyrov directly. Moreover, Apti
Alaudinov, a Chechen police ofcer, and according to some Chechen
sources a former car thief, claimed that Baysarov could not be arrested
because he was protected in Moscow by people in high places.
Interestingly, the operating group of the Chechen MVD in Moscow
was commanded by the Chechen deputy prime minister Adam
Delimkhanov. Beslan Gantamirov, another veteran of Chechen politics
and a pro-Federation ofcial, had accused Delimkhanov of personally
eliminating Baysarov, stating that Baysarov was shot with
Delimkhanovs personal decorated memorial handgun. The operating
group was allegedly mainly comprised of the members of the Neftyanoy
polk, which had been under Delimkhanovs command before he was
designated the deputy prime minister.38
The Kadyrovtsy doubtless did not care for the case to get to the court.
They had known about the murder of the Musayevs for years and had
kept silent. Moreover, under Chechen customary law, Baysarov had
acted fairly logically, even though, according to the traditional notion
of a blood feud he should have killed only the culprit and not the whole
family. The case was brought up expediently at the point when
Baysarov began to challenge Kadyrov politically.
It remains unclear today who called Baysarov to the place where he
was eliminated. As he arrived without his bodyguards, it must have
been someone he trusted. This means that he was probably betrayed by
one of his people, many of whom were arrested in the campaign against
the Baysarovtsy. The operation in Moscow aroused outrage among
many Russian ofcials, who considered it a proof that the Kremlin
was not fully in control of the situation in Chechnya, suggesting that
the mutually competing, yet formally pro-Russian factions there were
getting out of control, and that they even dared to carry their disputes
over to the streets of Moscow, which was no longer accustomed to such
overspill although it was once common in the underground of the
1990s.39 In 2006 and beyond, Kadyrovtsy were also suspected of being
involved in the murder of a journalist, but this was never proven and
other versions of the event exist.40
According to the organisation Memorial, in 2006, when Baysarov
was killed, the Kadyrovtsy numbered 5000 gunmen in various forma-
tions such as Neftepolk or PPSM-2. Gradually, their roles were formally

38
Ibid.
39
Tatyana Stanovaya, Death of the Enemy ( ), Politcom.ru, 25 Sep. 2008,
<http://www.politcom.ru/6920.html>.
40
Ismaylov, Russian Journalist and Military Expert of Novaya Gazeta.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 665

legalised. A key moment in their legalisation was the election of

Ramzan Kadyrov to the ofce of Chechen president.
Kadyrov Jnr lacked the natural popular support, which his father
partially commanded, and unlike the rst president Dzhokhar Dudaev,
he was not a charismatic leader. Thus, his reputation had to be made.
To this end, he was entertained in Kremlin palaces, received personally
by Putin, and received many accolades, including the decoration Hero
of the Russian Federation. Alu Alkhanov was formally president,
partly because Ramzan had not yet reached the age prescribed by the
constitution: 30 years. Within three years of Akhmat Kadyrovs death,
Moscow decided that Ramzan was ready for the role of president, and a
targeted propaganda campaign succeeded in building a fairly solid
reputation for him, especially among the younger generation.41
Kadyrov became the acting president on 15 February 2007, when
Vladimir Putin appointed him. In formal legal terms, he consolidated
his power in Chechnya on 2 March 2007, when 55 of the 58 deputies of
the National Assembly voted in favour of Putins proposal, according to
which Ramzan Kadyrov should discharge the duties of the President of
the Republic.42 The fact that the Kremlin placed virtually all power into
Kadyrovs hands and renounced the system of checks and balances has
had profound implications, which have been, and continue to be,
widely discussed in Russia. What matters with respect to the theme of
this article is that the strong vertical integration of power, which is
totally foreign to Chechen traditions, will not be to the liking of certain
other pro-Moscow authorities, especially those who stood on the side of
the federal centre from the beginning of the ChechenRussian conict in
the post-Soviet era. Another important factor, which is again a wider
Russian problem, is that, in such a regime the only opposition is the
separatist insurgency, in fact the Islamist insurgency, because many
ethnic separatists are swayed to Kadyrovs side. In the words of
Sergey Markedonov, open separatism thus becomes a systemic,
although hidden, separatism.43

Power and Security Structures under the Rule of the Kadyrovtsy

Soon enough, Ramzan initiated a large-scale change of personnel, ran-
ging from government posts to police ofcers at the district level, and
installed into ofces members of his clan and his close relatives (this
remains true even if we consider a European notion of close relatives).

41
Inhabitants of the Chechen Republic.
42
Malashenko, Ramzan Kadyrov.
43
Sergey Markedenov Chechnya: Between Two Separatisms (:
), Politcom.ru, 30 July 2007, <http://www.politcom.ru/4893.html>.
666 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

Odes Baysultanov, who became the prime minister, was Ramzans

cousin. When Ramzan was the prime minister, Baisultanov was his
rst deputy. In 200406, Ramzan had the role of deputy prime minister
which he held until he became the acting prime minister; he also de
facto controlled the not entirely loyal Alkhanov.44 The heads of
Kadyrovs militias, for instance Adam Delimkhanov, his cousin, also
took on a number of important posts.
Fundamental to the legalisation of the Kadyrov militias were the
Sever and Yug battalions, created in 2006 and formally incorporated
into the 46th Independent Operational Brigade of the Internal Troops,
managed by the Russian Federations Ministry of Internal Affairs. Each
battalion consisted of three patrol companies, a reconnaissance com-
pany and service units: medical, communications and a materials-tech-
nical unit. Unlike the brigade as a whole, the two battalions were
strictly mono-ethnic, comprised only of Chechens (about 1200 in
total). Only contracted professional soldiers worked in the battalions.
In 2010, the Sever battalion was reorganised into the 248th Special
Independent Motor Rie Regiment, and from autumn 2010 new sol-
diers received their call-up papers and joined. The Sever battalion is
based in Grozny and has 700 men; the Yug battalion has 500 men and
since 2011 has had its base in Vedeno. Until that time, the battalion was
in the Sharoysky, Shatoysky, Kurchaloysky, Itumkalsky and Shalinsky
districts. Major general Anzor Magomadov is the present commander
of the Yug, and Alimbek Delimkhanov, colonel and Hero of Russian
Federation, commands the Sever. Other independent (and non-
Chechen) sections of the brigade are also stationed elsewhere, for
instance in Gudermes, Urus-Martan, Grozny and the Cossack stations
in the Nadterechny district in northern Chechnya.
In 2007, Putin reduced the size of the army group in Chechnya from
50,000 to 25,000 men, and at that time, Kadyrov obtained control over
the Operational Investigation Bureau No. 2 (OBR 2) as well as the
whole of the Republics MVD, within which a special-purpose regiment
was created. Its task was to ght terrorists, beyond the borders of
Chechnya. Over these ve or six years, the headcount of the Chechen
militia tripled. Whereas, in 2003 they had about 5000 men, in later
years the gure rose to 16,000.45
Nevertheless, armed pro-Federation militias continued to exist in
Chechnya; these were not fully controlled by Kadyrov. These were the
Kakiyevtsy and the Yamadayevtsy. A conict with the Kakiyevtsy
occurred rst, in the summer of 2007. Formally, the unit in question
was the Zapad battalion, commanded by Said-Magomed Kakiyev. In
44
Makarin, Creation of Ramzan.
45
Novaya Gazeta, Country.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 667

June 2007, in Grozny, the Kakiyevtsy shot dead several Kadyrovtsy

militiamen in a gunght. Sources indicate that four to seven were killed.
On the side of the Kakiyevtsy, one or two men reportedly perished. The
organisation Memorial reported on the incident and mentions ve dead
in the Staropromyslovsky district of Grozny. Members of the Zapad
battalion were allegedly stopped by the trafc militia; various reasons
have been given to explain why, but that is not especially important
here. In fact, the Kakiyevtsy refused to obey orders, which created a
conict and the trafc militia called the Chechen OMON, that is, more
Kadyrovtsy.46
As already indicated above, Kakiyev and his men were largely taken
from the pro-Federation old guard and were among those who did not
take a liking to the growing power of Ramzan, a former boevik and son
of a separatist mufti. The political ambitions of the Kakiyevtsy tended
to rely on Alu Alkhanov, although they were unable to create a suf-
ciently strong anti-Kadyrov alternative with the necessary backing from
the Kremlin. It must be added, however, that it is commonly argued in
Chechnya that Kakiyevs political ambitions were not so strong when
compared to those of the Yamadayevtsy for instance. Moreover, the
Kakiyevtsy were less attractive to those separatists who formally
intended to surrender to federal powers, a fact that further weakened
the position of the Kakiyevtsy. Chechen society was not particularly
welcoming to the Kakiyevtsy, as they were close to the hated federal
soldiers; however, the reputation of the Chekist Baysarovtsy was
generally even worse. The Kakiyevtsy fought on the Russian
Federations side in the separatist conict in Georgia; their presence in
Abkhazia was common knowledge; and in 2008 under a new comman-
der, they participated in the RussianGeorgian war in South Ossetia.47
Kakiyev eventually grasped the situation and yielded to Kadyrov.
Unlike Baysarov whose fate was a warning to him Kakiyev was
unwilling to go to extremes; thus he paid tribute to Kadyrov. He left the
position of the commander of the Zapad battalion and became the
deputy to Chechnyas military commissioner for military and patriotic
education, which resolved the conict to a certain degree. Nevertheless,
in 2008, acts of violence occurred which have been linked by some to

46
Memorial, Contradictory Information abou Incident between People of Kadryov and
Yamadayev in Chechnya (
), 15 Apr. 2008, <http://www.memo.ru/hr/hotpoints/
caucas1/msg/2008/04/m131470.htm>.
47
Sergey Markedonov, Chechen Factor and Georgia: New Realities and Old Problems
( : ), Politcom.ru, 21
Dec. 2007, <http://www.politcom.ru/5521.html>; Inhabitants of the Chechen
Republic.
668 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

this conict. Rank-and-le Kakiyevtsy supposedly had a vendetta

against the Kadyrovtsy of the Chechen OMON, and according to
certain interpretations, they were behind the explosion in the Dallas
caf near the headquarters of the Chechen OMON in Bogdan
Khmelnitsky street.48
Kakiyevs successor as head of the Zapad, Bislan Elimkhanov, was
himself an old Kakiyevets, and a participant in the shoot-out in the
Staropromyslovsky district. Lieutenant colonel Elimkhanov was later
replaced, leading him to command the special company of the 42th
Motor Rie division. He also fought in South Ossetia on the Russian-
Ossetian side. In September 2008, an attempt was made on his life,
again in the Staropromyslovsky district in Grozny. Another attempt
was made in January 2011 near the Khankala military base close to
Grozny. Despite being shot seven times, Elimkhanov survived. The
attempt was allegedly committed by boeviki, and it was reputedly a
planned attack on Elimkhanov himself and not just a randomly tar-
geted person in uniform, a practice common with the boeviki.49
According to another version, this was a continuation of the dispute
with the Kadyrovtsy, and since 2007, Elimkhanov himself was to be
accompanied by bodyguards everywhere, as a matter of principle.
During the January 2011 attack, Lechi Bogatyrev was also injured;
he has been suspected by the Austrian police of murdering Chechen
refugee and former Kadyrovets Umar Israilov in Vienna in 2009.
Bogatyrev supposedly previously served in Movladi Baysarovs
Gorets unit.50
When the conict was subdued, the Zapad battalion continued to
operate until autumn 2008, when, after an involvement with the Vostok
battalion in the South Ossetia conict, both battalions were reduced to
the level of special companies associated with the 42nd division. This,
however, was preceded by a fundamental power struggle within
Chechnya, which made Ramzan Kadyrov true sovereign over the
48
Muslim Ibragimov, After Explosion in a Cafe in Capital of Chechnya Three Criminal
Cases ( ),
Kavkazsky Uzel, 10 June 2008, <http://www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/articles/139606/>.
49
Chechennews, During a Battle in Khankala Wounded Lieutenant Colonel of the
Russian Army Bislan Elimhanov (
), 9 Jan. 2011, <http://chechenews.com/develop-
ments/2092-1.html>; cf. Muslim Ibragimov, In Chechnya No Results in Investigation
of Attack Against Commander of the Batallion West (
), Kavkazsky Uzel, 19 Sep. 2008,
<http://www.kavkaz-uzel.ru/articles/141846/>.
50
Vladislav Trifonov, In Khhankalski Shots Sounded Vienna (
), Kommersant, 18 Jan. 2011, <http://www.kommersant.
ru/pda/kommersant.html?id=1569398>.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 669

territory. In 2008, there was a nal conict between the Kadyrovtsy and
the Yamadayevtsy, who formally constituted the Vostok battalion. The
Yamadaevtsy were the last armed group to have political ambitions
independent of Kadyrov.
Yamadayevtsy were originally Kadyrovs allies. In 1998, they
backed Akhmat Kadyrov in his dispute with the wahhabists. Their
armed formation was sometimes also called the Narodnaya gvardiya,
and they were originally loyal to the separatist movement. In 1999
however, they sided with the Russians; Ruslan Yamadayev penetrated
the structures of the pro-presidential party Yedinstvo, whose Chechen
branch he chaired; he served as a federal deputy for the party in 2003
07 (he previously lost his struggle with Khusein Isayev for the pre-
sidency of the Chechen State Council). His younger brother Sulim
commanded the Vostok battalion, which was independent of
Kadyrov, and relied on the Russian army. (In formal terms, the batta-
lion was under the command of the 42nd Motor Rie Division of the
Russian army, and it served the interests of the Russian military
intelligence GRU in the area.) The rst step towards the weakening
of the Yamadayevtsy was taken in December 2005, when Kadyrov
became the leader of the local branch of the United Russia party.
Subsequent to this, both clans and their armed formations became
involved in serious clashes.
A decisive clash occurred on 14 April 2008 in Gudermes, where an
incident ared up involving the bodyguards of the Chechen president
Ramzan Kadyrov and the soldiers of the Vostok battalion. The dispute
allegedly concerned the priority of passage on the road. Formally, this
was a conict between federal forces (who were actually ethnic
Chechens, and of one clan) and the Republics siloviki (of another
clan). As early as 16 April, a house search was carried out at the
Yamadayevs, and an extraordinary session of the Chechen parliament
was held on the same day, which adopted a petition demanding the
Federal Minister of Defence, Anatoly Serdzhukov, to disband the
Vostok battalion, or at least to replace its commanders. The Vostok
battalion categorically refused to yield to Ramzan Kadyrov. On 13
May 2008, Ramzan eventually announced, in a meeting with the
siloviki, that the commander of the Vostok battalion, Sulim
Yamadayev, was to be removed from his post. His duties were then
temporarily assumed by the chief of staff of the unit, Dzhambulat
Nudaev.51
This deposition was followed by acts of force: the oldest of the
Yamadayev brothers, Ruslan, a member of the federal State Duma,

51
Markedonov, Kadyrov has Completed a Campaign Against Vostok.
670 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

was shot in Moscow in September 2008,52 and the battalion disbanded

in November 2008. Prior to its dissolution, a part of it, including
Suliman Yamadayev, fought on the Russian side in the conict with
Georgia. Sulim Yamadayev was nearly killed in April 2009; it is
thought that he continued to live in Dubai on a life support machine,
from which he was allegedly disconnected in spring of 2010. The last
remaining important representative is Isa Yamadayev, who was elected
as MP to the rst Chechen parliament after the second Chechen
war. He was also the director of the construction company Yamad,
and he too survived attempts on his life (July 2009). Another of the
brothers, Dzhabrail, was one of the founders of the Vostok battalion;
he was killed in 2003. Musa Yamadayev likewise served in the Vostok;
we have no information about his fate at present. The youngest brother
Badruddi focused on his boxing career; a warrant is still out for
his arrest. In autumn 2010, reports appeared that Isa Yamadayev and
Ramzan Kadyrov had found a way towards reconciliation, which
has been read as denitive conrmation of Kadyrovs monopoly on
power.53
The whole dispute between the two clans might have led to a large-
scale armed conict, which could easily have spoiled the success
hitherto in stabilising the situation in Chechnya. In this respect, it
must be admitted that the Kadyrovtsy have shown sufcient sangfroid
in managing the conict.
However, the battle with Vostok did not increase the Russian
generals fondness for Kadyrov; many of them believe that the system
which was created in Chechnya disrupts the outcomes of the military
victory over the boeviki. In this respect, this particular conict can be
viewed in the broader context of tensions between Putins and the
armys siloviki, in which the latter appear to have lost the struggle
for inuence on both the federal level and that of the North
Caucasus, or more precisely, Chechnya. Either way, the 42nd divi-
sion based in Khankala did not rise to support a battalion that had
52
Ruslan Yamadaev was one of Ramzan Kadyrovs greatest enemies. Versions have
appeared, however, according to which the murder was committed precisely with the
assumption that Kadyrov would be blamed. Ruslan, who died at age 46, was a retired
colonel, Hero of the Russian Federation, former deputy of the State Duma, former
brigadier general of the Ichkeria and former deputy of the Chechen commander-in-
chief. He was shot in Moscow at 5:15 pm a few hundred meters from the seat of the
government. Kadyrov claimed to be shocked by his death and speculated that the
murder might have been committed by boeviki or Yamadaevs business enemies, or
that it was a blood feud (cf. Stanovaya, Death of the Enemy).
53
Sergey Markedonov, Concilation in Gudermes ( ), Politcom.
ru, 24 Aug. 2010, <http://www.politcom.ru/10609.html>; Woiciech Goretski, Kaukaz,
Nowa Europa Wschodnia, 6 (2010), XIV.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 671

been formally part of it, in a struggle with what was a structure

merely at the republican level. This is symptomatic of the
Chechenisation of the conict, in which the region was left at the
mercy of local elites, and where formal afliations with the
Federation did not play a role.

The Present Position of the Kadyrovtsy

Chechnya is the only region in which the Kremlin agreed to the creation
of local units, falling under the de facto control of the Head of the
Republic. According to various estimates, Kadyrov has under his formal
control 10,000 to 30,000 armed men suitable to ght. Some observers
even consider them to be the main buttress of Vladimir Putins regime,
i.e. his oprichnina. This is used to explain the affection of the re-elected
Russian president for the Chechen leader, which is otherwise difcult to
understand at times. The power of one of the nine Chechen tukkhum
pleases the other eight very little.
Ramzan Kadyrovs army consists mainly of the co-workers of the
Republics MVD; the OMON; the independent regiments of the
Chechen MVD (a special-purpose regiment, an oil regiment, and a
monitoring and guard regiment); the two special battalions Sever and
Yug of the 46th Division of the Internal Troops deployed in Chechnya;
the two special companies within the former 42nd and also several
companies protecting the headquarters and providing personal protec-
tion. The Chechen OMON, comprising about 300 men, is formally part
of Russias MVD, but in reality it is personally subordinated to
Ramzan, who is a major general of the MVD.
At the same time, the Kremlin had disbanded, as part of its army
reform, the only operational Russian army unit in Chechnya, the 42nd
division, which had about 16,000 soldiers. Three independent motor
rie brigades have appeared in its place: the 18th Independent, the 17th
Independent and the 8th Independent Mountain Motor Rie brigades.
The number of men serving remains secret, but allegedly it is smaller
than the size of the former 42nd division.
The structure of Ramzan Kadyrovs army at the beginning of 2011
was as follows:

Departmental protection regiment attached to the Chechen MVD

(Neftyanoy polk): 24003000 men;
Spetsnaz regiment attached to the Chechen MVD: 16001800 men;
Battalions Sever and Yug of the 46th Division, Internal Troops of
the Russian Federations MVD: about 2000 men;
672 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

Two independent monitoring and guarding regiments: 12001500

men;
Companies protecting the headquarters: 5001000 men;
Two special companies of the former 42nd Motor Rie Division:
300500 men;
54
MVDs OMON: 300 men; and
Personal protection of Ramzan Kadyrov and the Chechen leader-
ship: about 500 men.

This brings the total number of armed men loyal to Kadyrov to about
10,00012,000.55
This personal army is being built up from the federal budget and in
terms of size is equal to that commanded by the head of the Minister for
Emergency Situations, Sergey Shoygu or the Federal Protective Service.
In terms of tness to ght, Kadyrovs soldiers surpass the more numer-
ous armies of the Russian state corporations: RZhD, Transneft or
Rosatom. The overwhelming majority of the Kadyrovtsy have combat
experience, good military training and motivation and are formally part
of the Russian forces.

Are Kadyrovtsy a Risk for Russia?

The Kadyrovtsy exhibit features of paramilitary militias that have
been incorporated into the regular security services of the state.
These are built primarily on a clan basis and are in the service to the
clan and the state (specically, its federal units), as controlled by the
clan. They are mostly comprised of young men who seek employment,
status, money and power. They operate outside the law and full two
roles: that of a protector and that of a predator. In military terms,
their present training is weak. They are constantly being reorganised
and are highly fragmented.
With respect to the strategy of Chechenising the conict, the
Kadyrovtsy did full in the second half of the rst decade of the
twenty-rst century the role prescribed to them by the Kremlin.
However, in the future, their position and loyalty to Moscow need
not necessarily remain constant. In fact, the fragility of the loyalty of
some of the gunman towards Ramzan can be gleaned from Umar
Israilovs testimony.
Contemporary Chechnya can be considered a criminal quasi-state.
Moreover, Kadyrovs regime is suspected of engaging in illegal oil trade:
it supports the siphoning off of oil and a deliberate decrease in ofcial
54
Novaya Gazeta, Country.
55
Ibid.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 673

gures concerning the amount of oil extracted, distributing unofcial

production outside the Russian federal control and tax system.56
The regime also commits violence, which can be classied not only in
terms of an iron st approach to counterinsurgency, but also as a non-
democratic power struggle. The main types of violence of which the
Kadyrovtsy have been accused since their conception are the following:
kidnappings, torture and extrajudicial executions. This violence is car-
ried out to excess, and its targets are not only their opponents and
supporters thereof, but also those who are close to the Kadyrovtsy,
including relatives. The charges are often entirely trumped up.
Before he was murdered on 13 January 2009 in Vienna, the Chechen
refugee and former Kadyrovite gunman Umar Israilov provided inter-
esting testimonies in this respect. Austrian police arrested eight people
on suspicion of murder, all of them were ethnic Chechens who had
received asylum in Europe. NY Times sought to obtain a comment on
the event from Kadyrov and other highly positioned Chechens, but they
refused to comment.57 According to Israilov, Kadyrov participated in
torture committed during the interrogation of captives, including
Muslim ghters. FSB cooperatives were allegedly often present at the
base in Centoroy where the interrogations took place: two of these were
Dagestanis and one was an older Russian colonel.58
There are many more instances of Kadyrovs licence. The elimination
of Lechi Talkhadov provides an example: Talkhadov was a deputy
commander of the Neftepolk and as such a well-known militiaman in
Chechnya. He had been serving since the Soviet times. Although for-
mally a Kadyrovite himself, he fought the lawlessness of the
Kadyrovtsy, tried to bring order to Neftepolk and to free kidnap
victims. The investigation into Talkhadovs killing was Khusein
Magomadovs responsibility. Under the nickname Iran, Magomadov
is a former member of the Gorets unit, who after a clash between
Baysarov and Kadyrov sided with the latter. He had those people
who were allegedly responsible for the murder eliminated.
Interestingly, no attempt was made to capture them to put them on
trial. The journalist Politkovskaya reported on a number of similar
cases before she herself was murdered.
As the co-author of this article observed in 2012, marauding opera-
tions continue in Chechnya, enriching their perpetrators and terrorising

56
Authors interview with Vyacheslav Ismailov, correspondent of Novaya Gazeta,
Moscow, November 2009. Information was also provided by some Chechen observers
who wished to remain anonymous.
57
Novaya Gazeta, Murder in Vienna ( ), 4 Feb. 2009, <http://www.
novayagazeta.ru/politics/46269.html>.
58
Ibid.
674 Tom md and Miroslav Mare

the population. Nowadays, these are carried out almost exclusively by

the Kadyrovtsy. The involvement of Russian soldiers is minimal or nil,
and other pro-Moscow groups have either been subordinated to the
Kadyrovtsy or dispersed.59 Ofcially, these are special operations
looking for, arresting or possibly eliminating, individuals suspected of
participating in terrorist attacks, or of involvement in illegal armed
formations. Hence, these operations are extremely easy to misuse.
Today, heavy weaponry is rarely used in operations, which is a differ-
ence from previous practice. Occasionally it does happen, however, that
helicopters and armoured vehicles with machine guns are deployed; a
village maybe encircled around the entire perimeter and escape routes
cut off, especially those leading to the forest; the village is then thor-
oughly scoured, and violence committed on civilians, including women
and children. Nowadays, not all men present are arrested, as used to be
the case, and tanks are not witnessed. Such large operations are now
rare, however, and are concentrated in the mountain areas where those
traditional teips, who are least loyal to Ramzan, live. Men nevertheless
continue to disappear. Some are later found dead; others are sold back
to their families, and surprisingly, others nd their way to the so-called
boeviki, where they are then eliminated during special operations.60

Conclusion
The case of the Kadyrovtsy is an example of a Machiavellian policy
employed to supress counterinsurgency on ones own territory. Russia
rst applied a blank iron st strategy against the main Chechen
military structures. It then gradually chose clans as its allies, applying
a certain selective hearts and minds strategy with the aim of
Chechenising the conict, that is, to pit insurgents and local structures
of power against each other. This succeeded thanks to the paramilitar-
isation of powerful Chechen clans, which subsequently began to vie for
power. In these struggles, the Kremlin sided with the Kadyrovtsy and
betrayed a number of its previously loyal allies (the Baysarovtsy and
partially also the Kakiyevtsy and Yamadayevtsy). However, this was
not a novelty: the Chechens who fought on Russias side, even in the
rst Chechen war in 1995, and those who later largely joined the ranks
of the Baysarovtsy and Kakiyevtsy, were equally sidelined. The
Kadyrovtsy do full their role, but the price for that is their excesses,
which also affect Central Russia, Europe and other areas. Such excesses
are tolerated in order to preserve their loyal partnership. To a certain
degree, the Russian strategy has been relatively successful the
59
Inhabitants of the Chechen Republic.
60
Ibid.
 Russias Counterinsurgency Strategy 675

Caucasus Emirate, which is the main representative of Islamist insur-

gency, is largely active in Dagestan, and outside the territory of
Chechnya, although sustaining it effectively in the future will be a
demanding task.

Funding
This contribution was prepared as part of the research project Methods
of Predicting Long-term Geopolitical Development in Central Europe
(VF20102015005), funded by the Ministry of Interior of the Czech
Republic.

Notes on contributors
Tom md is assistant professor of Security and Strategic Studies at
Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic. He focuses on research into
ethnic conicts and terrorism, especially in Caucasus and Eastern
Europe. He cooperated with the Organization for Cooperation and
Security in Europe. He is the author of several studies, articles and
books and the author of (with co-author Vladimr Vaura) Ethnic
Conicts in Post-Communist Area (CDK, 2007, in Czech).

Miroslav Mare is associate professor of Security and Strategic Studies

at Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic. He focuses on research
into political violence and terrorism, especially in East-Central Europe.
He was the consultant for the Organization for Cooperation and
Security in Europe. He is the author of many studies, articles and
books and most recently the co-author (with Astrid Btticher) of the
book Extremismus: Theorien Konzepte Formen (Oldenbourg Verlag
2012, in German).

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Interviews
Chechen, B.M., Police Ofcer Who Wished to Remain Anonymous, interviewed by Author,
Khasavyurt, July 2012.
Dzhabrailov, Taus, Former Chechen Politician, interviewed by Author, Moscow, Nov. 2009.
Felgengauer, Pavel, Russian Military Journalist, interviewed by Author, Moscow, Jan. 2012.
Inhabitants of the Chechen Republic interviewed by Author, Nov. 2009, Feb. 2010, July 2010,
JulyAug. 2012, Aug. 2013.
Ismaylov, Vyacheslav, Russian Journalist and Military Expert of Novaya Gazeta, interviewed by
Author, Moscow, Dec. 2009.
Istamulov, Abdulla, Chechen Political Analyst, interviewed by Author, Grozny, July 2012, Aug.
2013.
Markedonov, Sergey, Russian Expert on the Issues of the Caucasus Region, interviewed by
Author, Moscow, Nov. 2009 and Washington DC, Apr. 2013.
Pazderka, Josef, Czech Journalist and Former Czech TV Correspondent, interviewed by Author,
Moscow, Oct. 2009.
SJ, MP of the Chechen Parliament Who Wished to Remain Anonymous for Security Reasons,
interviewed by Author, Grozny, Feb. 2010.