A Russian Diary (27 page)

“But what right do you have to kill anyone? Let alone in Ingushetia, when formally you are the security service of the president of Chechnya?”

“We have every right. We carried out this operation jointly with the Ingush FSB. We have all the necessary official permissions.” (This later proved to be a lie.)

“Currently, within the territory of Chechnya, apart from your troops, there are Kokiev's troops operating, Yamadaev's, etc.”

“You shouldn't name these troops by their leaders.”

“Why not? Don't you think there are rather a lot of them?”

“What, of troops?! The Chechen OMON is only 300 men. In other regions the OMON number 700 to 800. Kokiev's time is nearly up. His are army men. They will be withdrawn.”

“In March, just before Putin was reelected, Khambiev [the minister of defense of Ichkeria] surrendered to you. What is he doing now? Is he mustering troops too?”

“You want me to have him brought here? If I give the word, he will be brought here.”

“Isn't it rather late? He's probably asleep.”

“If I give the word, he will be woken. We use him as a negotiator with the bandits. They know him. He was good at that before, with Turlaev, for example. You want me to have Turlaev brought here as well? [Shaa Turlaev was the head of Maskhadov's personal bodyguard. He also surrendered when he was seriously wounded. His leg was later amputated.] Khambiev will not have troops of his own. We will be the only people with troops.”

“In the press Khambiev admitted he was a traitor.”

“That is a lie. They just wrote that. He is not a traitor.”

“How do you personally picture the surrender of Maskhadov: will he come to you and say, ‘Here I am’?”

“Yes.”

“He can't possibly. The age difference between you is too great. You are a boy compared to him.”

“Perhaps. What choice does he have? If he doesn't come of his own accord, we will bring him in. We are definitely going to put him in a cage.”

“Recently you issued an ultimatum to those who had not surrendered. Was that addressed to Maskhadov?”

“No, that was for seventeen- and eighteen-year-old kids who don't know better. They were tricked by Maskhadov and have gone into the forests. Their mothers are weeping, begging me, ‘Help us, Ramzan, to get our sons back.’ They curse Maskhadov. So this is an ultimatum to women to keep a closer eye on their children. I am telling the women to find their children quickly, or else not to blame us … Those who do not surrender we shall exterminate. Of course. There are no two ways about that.”

“But perhaps it's time to stop exterminating people and sit down to negotiate?”

“Who with?”

“With all Chechens who are fighting.”

“With Maskhadov? Maskhadov is nobody here. Nobody obeys his orders. The main figure is Basaev. He is a mighty warrior. He knows how to fight. He is a good strategist. And a good Chechen. But Maskhadov is a pathetic old man who is incapable of doing anything.” (He guffaws, neighing like a horse. All present follow suit.) “He's only got a couple of boys following him. I can prove that. I write everything down. At present Maskhadov has women. I know those women. They told me, ‘If we refused, we would be killed. We had no work and he gave us money’ ”

“Are you saying Maskhadov has a women's battalion?”

“No. We have broken Maskhadov. He has other people now.”

“I hear disrespect for Maskhadov in what you are saying, but also clear respect for Basaev.”

“I respect Basaev as a warrior. He is not a coward. I pray to Allah that Basaev and I may meet in open combat. One man dreams of being a president, another of being a pilot, another a tractor driver—but my
dream is to fight Basaev in the open. My troops against his troops, with no outsiders. With him in command, and with me in command.”

“What if Basaev won?”

“No way. I will. In battle I always win.”

“In Chechnya there is a lot of talk about your rivalry with the Ya-madaevs.” (Brothers from Gudermes. Khalid is a United Russia deputy in the Duma, while Salim is deputy military commandant of the Chechen Republic. They control powerful troops. Ramzan is thought to work for the FSB, while the Yamadaevs work for the GRU Central Intelligence Directorate of the army.)

“It isn't a good idea to be one of my rivals. It isn't good for your health.”

“What do you consider to be the strongest aspect of your personality?”

“What do you mean? I don't understand the question.”

“What are your strengths? And your weaknesses?”

“I consider that I have no weaknesses. I am strong. Alu Alkhanov was made president because I consider he is strong and I trust him one hundred percent. Do you think the Kremlin decides that? The people choose. It's the first time anyone has told me the Kremlin has a say in anything.”

Odd, but that's what he said.

No more than an hour later, Ramzan was saying that absolutely everything was decided by the Kremlin, that the people were just cattle, and that he had been offered the presidency of Chechnya in the Kremlin immediately after his father's assassination, but had turned it down because he wanted to fight.

“If you left us in peace, we Chechens would have reunited long ago.”

“Who do you mean by ‘you’?”

“Journalists, people like you. Russian politicians. You don't let us sort things out. You divide us. You come between Chechens. You personally are the enemy. You are worse than Basaev.”

“Who else are your enemies?”

“I don't have enemies. Only bandits to fight.”

“Do you intend to become president of Chechnya yourself?”

“No.”

“What do you most enjoy doing?”

“Fighting. I am a warrior.”

“Have you ever killed anyone yourself?”

“No. I've always been in command.”

“But you're too young always to have been in command. Somebody must have given you orders.”

“Only my father. Nobody else ever gave me orders, or ever will.”

“Have you given orders to kill?”

“Yes.”

“Is that not terrible?”

“It is not I, but Allah. The Prophet said the Wahhabis must be destroyed.”

“Did he really say that? When there are no more Wahhabis left, who will you fight?”

“I will take up bee farming. Already I have bees, and bullocks, and fighting dogs.”

“Don't you feel sorry when dogs kill each other?”

“Not at all. I like it. I respect my dog Tarzan as much as a human being. He's a Caucasian sheepdog. Those are the most fair-minded dogs there are.”

“What other hobbies do you have? Dogs, bees, fighting … and?”

“I very much like women…”

“Doesn't your wife mind?”

“I don't tell her.”

“What education have you had?”

“Higher education, law. I'm just finishing it. I am taking my exams.”

“What exams?”

“What do you mean, ‘What exams?’ The exams, that's all.”

“What's the institute called where you are studying?”

“It's a branch of the Moscow Institute of Business. In Gudermes. It's a law college.”

“What are you specializing in?”

“Law.”

“But what kind of law? Criminal? Civil?”

“I can't remember. Someone wrote the topic down for me on a piece of paper, but I've forgotten. There's a lot going on at the moment.”

At this moment Shaa Turlaev is brought to Ramzan, the former head of Maskhadov's security, a major of the presidential guard who had been awarded the Chechen orders “Pride of the Nation” and “Hero of the Nation.” He is a completely gray-haired man of thirty-two, his left leg amputated to the thigh. He is kept in Tsentoroy under guard, a hostage, but he is not being beaten or tortured. Later, Mahomed Khambiev also appears. Mahomed speaks Russian to me, but Shaa has apparently been forbidden to talk to a journalist in Russian. Ramzan says he can't speak Russian, but, later, people who knew Shaa told me he used to speak excellent Russian.

Khambiev is brazen and smug, while Shaa seems haunted but dignified. Khambiev keeps agreeing with Ramzan, while Shaa remains proudly silent. As translated, his words are: “I fought from 1991. Until 2003 I was in Maskhadov's personal security detail. I haven't seen Maskhadov for a year and a half now. I had a wound in my leg for two years. There was a doctor there and an operating theater. I could have stayed, but didn't want to, even before the wound, because Ramzan and I had fought together in the past. When Ramzan sent people to me from my village they said, ‘Follow Ramzan. His is the correct path. Maskhadov is weak. You cannot see any strength in him. He is on his own. He only has twenty to thirty people.’ ”

“Does he have a women's battalion?”

Shaa does not reply. He lowers his head and shakes it. It is not clear whether this means yes or no. The general conversation is unfocused and edgy. Shortly after Shaa's arrival, an older person with a round tyu-beteika cap on his head appears and sits at Ramzan's right hand. He introduces himself as Nikolai Ivanovich, at which everybody smirks, indicating that whatever else his name may be, it is not Nikolai Ivanovich. Ramzan orders him to translate Shaa's words into Russian. It soon becomes clear that when Shaa says two or three words, “Nikolai Ivanovich” spins them into several sentences about how Shaa recognized the ruinous nature of Maskhadov's war.

I complain indignantly about this “interpreting,” and Nikolai Ivano-vich, like a dog breaking free from its chain, attacks and insults me. Nobody stops him. Ramzan chuckles, pleased. His real hobby is setting people at each other's throats, and nobody at the table can rival him in this, with his enthusiasm for dog fights.

The conversation becomes more animated. “You are putting the case for bandits;” “You are an enemy of the Chechen people;” “You should have to answer for this”—all this addressed to me. Ramzan is shouting, jumping up and down in his chair, and Nikolai Ivanovich is goading him on. We are seated around a large, oval table and the scene increasingly resembles a thieves’ convention. Ramzan behaves more and more oddly, as if he is the oldest person in the house, though he is in fact the youngest. He laughs at inappropriate moments. He scratches himself. He orders his bodyguards to scratch his back. He arches himself, wriggling, and keeps making irritating, inane remarks.

I try to talk to Shaa, but Ramzan really doesn't like Shaa getting more questions than him. He cuts in and forbids Shaa to say any more. It's time to end. I ask one last question, and it is the only one Shaa answers himself.

“When was the happiest time in your life?”

“There has been no such time.”

Ramzan interrupts even this: “Did you know that Khambiev voted for Putin?”

Khambiev nods agreement, with the mocking smile of a liar: “Yes. He is hard. He wants order in Chechnya.”

“What is missing,” I ask Khambiev, “before there can be complete order in Chechnya?”

“Very little. Yandarbiev has been taken out. If Berezovsky and Maskhadov's men Zakaev* and Udugov are taken out, there will be order. They are pulling the strings. Basaev carries out their wishes. Basaev is not fighting on behalf of the Chechen people.”

“What are you fighting, and living, for?”

“For ourselves. For the people.”

“In what capacity do you see yourself serving it?”

“As Ramzan decides.”

“Why should that be up to Ramzan?”

“He is the first among Chechens. Ramzan is promising to make me president of the Freestyle Wrestling Federation.”

“How old are you?”

“The right side of forty-two.”

“How do you feel about the fact that Ramzan's people abducted your relatives to force you to surrender?”

“No problem. My relatives were at fault, and they were captured.”

“What were they guilty of?”

“They brought me cassette messages from Maskhadov, and bread.”

Ramzan, satisfied, chuckles insolently. He leans backward smugly, then goes to watch himself on television. He is very pleased about this, and comments on the way Putin walks: “He's got real class!” He declares that Putin walks like a mountain dweller.

Outside the windows it is night. The temperature is rising in here and it is time for me to get out. Ramzan gives orders for me to be taken back to Grozny. Musa, a former fighter from Zakan-Yurt, sits at the wheel and there are two bodyguards. I get into the vehicle and think that somewhere along the route, in the dark, with checkpoints everywhere, I am obviously going to be killed. But the ex-fighter from Zakan-Yurt is just waiting for Ramzan to leave. He wants to bare his soul, and when he starts telling me the story of his life, how he had been a fighter, why he joined Ramzan, I know he is not going to kill me. He wants the world to hear his story.

I understood that, but sat there crying from fear and loathing. “Don't cry,” the fighter from Zakan-Yurt finally said to me. “You are strong.”

*

When argument has been exhausted, and at Tsentoroy they don't understand the meaning of the word, all that is left is tears. Tears of despair that someone like this can exist, that the vagaries of history should have raised up, of all people, Ramzan Kadyrov. He really does have power, and rules according to his own ideas and abilities. Nobody, not a single man present in Tsentoroy, dared to stop his getting out of hand. It was Ramzan Kadyrov who was telephoned from the Kremlin by “Vladislav Yurievich”—in other words, by a deputy head of Putin's administration,

Vladislav Surkov. That was the only time Ramzan stopped misbehaving, scratching himself, shouting and hooting with laughter.

It is an old story, repeated many times in our history: the Kremlin fosters a baby dragon, which it then has to keep feeding to stop him from setting everything on fire. There has been a total failure of the Russian intelligence services in Chechnya, something they try to represent as a victory and a “restoration of civilian life.” But what about the people of Chechnya? They have to live with the baby dragon. First the Kremlin tried to show the Chechens that resistance to Putin was useless. That more or less worked; most of them gave up. Then it was the turn of the rest of Russia.

September 1

Censorship and self-censorship in the mass media have reached new extremes and increased the probability that hundreds of adults and children in School No. 1 in Beslan, which has been seized by terrorists, will die.