Summary: Terrorism in Russia: Historical Experiences and Present-Day Development
Alexander Schrepfer-Proskurjakov
Recently the number and dimensions of terrorist attacks in Russia have increased consistently. One important reason for this has been the permanent war in Chechenia, which has changed into a cruel underground fight for some years. While in 2000 a total of 135 terrorist attacks took place in Russia - and 115 of these in Chechenia - in 2001 327 (307 in Chechenia) were registered. Compared with the 360 attacks in 2002 the number increased to 561 in 2003, which are actually 55.8%. The number of attacks is as high as the ratio of successful investigations is low. The number of successful investigations was 86 in 2003, which is 15%, and it increased in 2004 to 17.7% only. Just from 1999 to 2004 about 1000 people lost their lives and 2200 were injured in terrorist attacks.
A terrorist squad is a union of several persons who have secretly met after prior arrangement in order to carry out one or more terrorist attacks. They use terrorism for achieving tactical aims, whereas a terrorist organisation engages terrorist methods to reach strategic-political objectives. Terrorist organisation structures come into being either by the initiative of several persons, or by selection, by re-orientation when a party or a union or a group is infiltrated by members of a terrorist organisation, or by de-functionalisation, when state-structures such as the police, the military, or the secret services are infiltrated.
Women play an important part in recruiting members and more and more often they are used in suicide missions. Since October 2002 these so-called "black widows” have taken 375 lives. Apart from women also drug addicts and under age recruits are very much in demand for different reasons. They have finer motor activity when handling blasting equipment, they have sharper senses, and they hardly resist propagandistic indoctrination.
Terrorists have identified the importance of media influences and media manipulation in good time, because terrorism as "propaganda of action” can only be successful by inclusion of the media. Terrorist activities under modern circumstances are characterised by vast dimensions, by the lack of distinct borders, and by association and interrelations with international terrorist centres and organisations. Modern terrorists are provided with good technical equipment which is comparable to the equipment of security forces or exceeds it even, and with a widespread network of hideouts, training centres and training camps.
The history of terrorism in Russia gives evidence that basically modern terrorists have not invented anything new. Terrorist organisations are founded and act according to the same set of rules as, for instance, 100 years ago. Historical investigations of terrorism in Russia can come up with necessary information about the universal mechanisms of terrorist organisations, which cross time and place boundaries, and they render analyzing the present-day terrorist threat possible. This is the more important, the more much information about counter-terrorism gathered by the police and the secret services in Russia - and not only in Russia - are subject to secrecy.
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