15
A few weeks later, the federal forces took Shatoy and Vedeno and the Chechen resistance retreated into the mountains, as their ancestors had done since time immemorial when outnumbered by the enemy. The fall of Grozny and the occupation of the Chechen plains hadn’t seemed like a tragedy – it was what happened whenever the enemy was too powerful. And the Chechens had always returned to the plain. But when the enemy army entered the villages of Shatoy and Vedeno, in the heart of highland Chechnya, people became dispirited, and some of the less resolute were seized with panic. For the highlands are Chechnya’s inner sanctuary, and while this sanctuary remains free of enemy soldiers, the Chechens are unconquered. Behind us we still had more mountains: Bamut, Yandi and Stary-Achkhoy were fighting on, and so the more tenacious kept up their spirits and prepared for new battles. But the Russian generals, rather than stepping up the assault, were celebrating their latest victory and doling out the awards and medals. They had, it is true, paid heavily for their victory. One Russian officer told me that after the fight for Shatoy they had to form an entire new motorized infantry regiment from a paratrooper brigade assigned to him. But who viewed these Russian Army casualties as a loss to the country? In response to the new situation, I joined a tactical intelligence team operating along this axis. I could, of course, be accused of flouting journalistic neutrality, but I had no reservations. I was fulfilling my civic and filial duty to the motherland, however grandiloquent that might sound. This war had stopped being ‘somebody else’s war’ on the night of the New Year’s Eve assault on Grozny. My starry-eyed excitement at the privilege of witnessing that first day of war had long ago given way to the cold cynicism of real combat. And that Chechen commander was a thousand times right when he smiled sadly in response to my self-assured words. A journalist can indeed take sides. And at certain moments in his life, he simply has a duty to act in the capacity of human being or citizen. Yet I never stopped being a journalist, neither then nor later. To observe impassively the destruction of your own nation is the lot of cowards, or outsiders with a homeland somewhere far away and at peace. But as subsequent events would show, I made a poor reconnaissance scout. Within just a few weeks I had committed a fateful blunder, in a clear demonstration of my reckless nature as a journalist.
News soon arrived of Shamil Basayev’s daring operation in the Russian town of Budyonnovsk.[26] The psychological impact of this operation was tremendous. Chechen resistance fighters misread it as a signal from the command authorizing them to operate deep in Russia’s vast heartland. And Russian society awoke to the reality that this was not a war waged in some faraway Chechnya; it was raging in Russia too. And the following day it could come to any town, bringing death and affliction in its wake, unless society could stop it. At that time Russian society still had the power to sway the government when it so desired. Boris Yeltsin, despite his nakedly imperialist agenda, was nevertheless deep down a greater democrat than any other ruler Russia had seen. Basayev’s operation ended with a ceasefire and the start of negotiations, meaning respite for the combatants. But this pause was merely for those fighting: intelligence could not afford to ease off. Intelligence on both sides was hard at work, for where was the guarantee that negotiations would not break down tomorrow and hostilities resume? Within a short time, thanks to the brave agents who infiltrated the enemy, we managed to discover not just the quantity and type of our opponent’s combat hardware, not just the troop strength and types of weaponry along this front, but also the enemy’s plans to expand their offensive. We received confirmation of the accuracy of these reports a year later, when the enemy tried to prolong their assault. I was on my way back from a routine meeting with the commander of our intelligence task force when I committed my blunder. And this blunder would seal my fate. If, as they say, ‘a bomb disposal specialist only ever makes one mistake,’ then I believe in war any mistake is an unaffordable luxury. In war you need to use not just your five senses: you have to know how to listen to your heart, your sixth sense, your intuition, or whatever you want to call it. Failure to listen to your heart can lead to the direst of consequences. One of the many transformations that you undergo in war is the sharpening of your intuition, the ability to scent danger. And you must learn to exploit this truly priceless gift if you wish to survive the abnormal situation that is war.
II
From the Wheel of Time into the Circle of Pain
‘How can you be enlightened if you are able to walk on past someone in pain?’ the Sufi asked the dervish. ‘The tree was suffering from the ants gnawing at its roots. And the ants were suffering from being forced to build a new nest in the roots of the tree. In their old nest they’d been disturbed by a gold ingot. Were you to feel the pain of another, you’d find reward in two realms: the gold ingot in this mortal world and blessing in the righteous world. You are not enlightened,’ he told the dervish.
1
The forest is nature’s magnificent gift to man. It is the ancient cradle of humankind. The forest can feed you when you are hungry, it can warm you when you are frozen, it can shelter you when you have no roof, and the forest can also provide you with sanctuary in time of war. The great saint of the Chechen nation, Sheikh Kunta-Haji Kishiev,[27] taught his murids (disciples): ‘When the forest sees a man with an axe, it starts grieving for its children the trees, who are still living, so hold your axe with your arm lowered. When you chop down a tree, explain to the forest that you act from necessity and ask for forgiveness, then the tree will be blessed. Respect the forest; respect the plant and animal world around you if you wish to respect God. True respect and honour for the Creator comes through respect for His creations. God does not need our Love; it is we who need the Love and Mercy of the Almighty. Remember that the condition, the purity, of our hearts is far more important than our outward demonstrations of faith.’
That great saint and humanist Sheikh Kunta-Haji alone achieved what the Russian Empire in over half a century could not manage – a cessation of hostilities on the part of the Chechen people. Yet for Russia he became the enemy. Or rather, he had been the Empire’s enemy all along, for he had opposed the physical annihilation of his and your people. The Empire wanted your motherland, but free of the people who inhabited that ancient territory. The Empire only dared arrest the saint when, at his bidding, the people had entirely disarmed. And when his disciples then charged, with daggers drawn, into the cannons’ grapeshot in an attempt to win back their Teacher, the great saint, Sufi and fatalist, with his feet now in shackles, stopped them. He did so because he had no desire, no right before God, to win freedom at the price of the lives of his disciples. The sage glimpsed far into the future and when he saw the tragic destiny that lay before his people, he became a martyr, sacrificing himself on the altar of spiritual freedom.
26
On 14 June 1995 a group of Chechen fighters led by Shamil Basayev crossed into the Stavropol territory in southern Russia and captured the town of Budyonnovsk. They held over a thousand civilians hostage and demanded an end to the war. The operation resulted in a ceasefire and peace talks.
27
Sheikh Kunta-Haji Kishiev was a peacemaker and Sufi saint, famed throughout the North Caucasus, who opposed the destruction of the Chechen people in the nineteenth-century Caucasian War. He was arrested by the tsarist authorities on 3 January 1864 and exiled for life.