Among the Sons of Togarmah, Part 6

In Part 1, we had a general overview of the Caucasus, including considering the methods Moscow has historically used to pacify the region. In Part 2 we considered how Islamic terrorists were targeting the region of Kabardino-Balkaria, a region near Sochi; significant, because Sochi is an important Russian resort city and will be hosting the 2014 Winter Olympics in February, and Russia was hoping the influx of tourism to the region would help the economies not just of Sochi but of surrounding areas as well.

In Part 3 we took a long look at how Putin was pacifying Chechnya, mainly by supporting the clan of Razman Kadyrov. With Moscow's backing, Kadyrov's clan has provided a degree of stability and pacification of Chechnya, but at a cost: corruption which leads all the way to Moscow. Moscow funds, supplies and supports Kadyrov, and, in return, Kadyrov keeps Moscow from having to send troops to Chechnya for a third war (there have been two since the Soviet Union collapsed). However, the cost runs deeper: with government essentially an extension of Kadyrov who, in turn, delivers nearly unanimous support for Putin in federal elections, the people have nowhere to turn with grievances, except to Islamic extremists. There are Chechens who support Russia against the extremists, but who would rather not support the corruption of Kadyrov (or of Putin, for that matter). Meanwhile, Moscow has cultivated other clans in Chechnya which could replace Kadyrov - a sign of Putin hedging his bet.

In Part 4 we saw how the Islamic insurgency in the entire region basically cooperates with an eye to establishing a regional caliphate. The center of the regional insurgency seemed to be Dagestan. Then, in Part 5, we considered allegations that Putin and Kadyrov were involved in trafficking narcotics - something other regional actors also do, including the Islamic terrorists, who find heroin money useful to fund their jihad.

With the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics nearly upon us, it is perhaps time to update this series.

One issue that has been on the burner for years is economic development of the region. When I use the term "the region", I am referring to the Northern Caucasus, which is that part of the Caucasus in the Russian Federation. In fact, apart from the geographical Northern Caucasus, there is also the North Caucasus Economic Region, a geographical entity which includes fertile agricultural areas around the Kuban River, as well as the resort city of Sochi.

This region is distinct from the sovereign nations of Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan, which are sovereign nations that used to be republics in the former USSR. However, it is worth considering what is going on across the international borders from the Russian Federation's North Caucasus in these latter nations.

Regarding economic development of the North Caucasus, Russia has worked to improve the tourist industry in the area, as mentioned earlier in this series, especially with an eye to the 2014 Winter Olympics in Russia's tourist resort town of Sochi. However, as far back as 2011, plans were being devised to make the North Caucasus into a Russian version of Silicon Valley. From Silicon Valley planned for Russia's North Caucasus, August 25, 2011:

Plans have been put forward to create a Caucasian Silicon Valley, at a cost of 32 billion rubles ($1.1 billion) as part of on-going efforts to generate opportunities in the troubled Russian region.

[snip]

Silicon dreams

While the US Silicon Valley is a world leader in computing and IT advances, the Russian version will focus on making the raw materials.

In Stavropol Region factories will produce polycrystalline silicon, monocrystalline silicon is planned in Kabardino-Balkaria, multicrystalline silicon will come from Karachay-Cherkessia while North Ossetia will manufacture photovoltaic cells and Dagestan will work on solar modules, RIA Novosti reported.

The idea seems to come closer to Ramzan Kadyrov's stated commitment to make Chechnya financially independent by developing a manufacturing base.

As mentioned at the beginning of this post, Russia pays a price for peace in Chechnya, and Russians are tired of paying it. However, should the Caucasus become financially independent, then that dramatically diminishes the need for ties that local rulers such as Kadyrov have with Moscow.

Later that year, as Putin campaigned for the presidency in the March, 2012, election, he promised no cuts to the funding for economic development in the Caucasus - amid cries of "Stop Feeding the Caucasus", a slogan that was gaining popularity with Russians. From Putin says no cuts in North Caucasus funding, December 20, 2011:

A "Stop Feeding Caucasus" slogan is gaining popularity among Russians, stunned with images of new mosques and shiny buildings in the Chechen capital Grozny, destroyed in heavy fighting between the separatists and the Russian army in the 1990s.

The slogan was also picked up by some nationalist-minded opposition leaders like lawyer Alexei Navalny who is serving a 15-day jail sentence for disrupting public order during mass protests in Moscow after the Dec. 4 election.

Putin said that a reduction in investment would bring more migrants from North Caucasus into the large Russian cities "along with all the problems it causes" in a clear reference to last year's nationalist riots next to the Kremlin.

"What will we do then? Kick them all out? But where will they go? They will join the insurgency," Putin said, according to a transcript of the meeting posted on the government's website. "And the fratricidal war will carry on."

Skipping down:

Critics argue that money flowing into North Caucasus is stolen by corrupt officials. In his blog in March 2011 Navalny attacked an official from Dagestan who ordered a car worth $265,000 using public money, questioning why a minister of a poor region drive such an expensive vehicle.

[snip]

Official results showed Putin's United Russia party had received 99.5 percent of the vote in Chechnya, run by Putin loyalist Ramzan Kadyrov - a result which made the opposition cry foul. Other republics also backed United Russia.

Kadyrov, who hosted a glitzy opening ceremony for a skyscraper complex that was attended by Hollywood stars and coincided with his 35th birthday, said he was receiving money from Allah.

Promise economic development, then let the local pro-Moscow (pro-Putin) strongmen spend it to consolidate power?

An interesting and readable summary/overview is provided by Ariel Cohen, Ph. D., in an article entitled A Threat to the West: The Rise of Islamist Insurgency in the Northern Caucasus and Russia's Inadequate Response, from March 26, 2012:

Russia's Northern Caucasus is turning into one of the most volatile, lawless regions in the world and a hotbed for international terrorist activity in spite of decades of Russian military operations and repeated assurances from the Russian government that peace has been achieved. As Russia continues to lose control of the region, it is becoming a significant base for Islamist terrorist organizations and organized crime and may ignite an even greater terrorist campaign inside Russia and beyond.

[snip]

To alleviate the hostilities, the Russian government has implemented many economic and developmental programs and provided billions of dollars in aid to the North Caucasus in the past few years. Russian officials have invested to curb the appeal of radical Islam among the youth, but the area's overall economic and social prospects remain grim due to the ongoing security crisis caused by heavy-handed security policy and the pervasive corruption and mismanagement of the Russian government.

Thus, Russia's entire counterinsurgency strategy is in question. Its primary goal is "to make the local population less afraid of the law enforcement than the insurgents,"[2] but the overly violent Russian approach has often produced the polar opposite. Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the North Caucasus has experienced two major wars and numerous skirmishes, resulting in hundreds of thousands of casualties and internally displaced persons, while the fear of terrorism has spread throughout Russia.

Spreading ungovernability in the Northern Caucasus facilitates the emergence of Islamist safe havens, complete with terrorist training facilities, religious indoctrination centers, and hubs of organized crime. This should be a cause for concern for the United States.

[snip]

U.S. policymakers should be concerned that the North Caucasus may devolve into an anarchic haven for Islamist terrorism and criminality. Security of America's friends and allies, prevention of a terrorist safe haven in the ungovernable North Caucasus, and ensuring the free flow of energy resources are high priorities for the U.S. in this volatile region. Such a threat should not be allowed to develop.

The interests of the United States and its allies could suffer from Russia's failure to respond appropriately to Islamist extremism. Washington needs to develop a strategy to respond to potential "spillover" from Islamist insurgency in the North Caucasus. The U.S. and its allies need to monitor the region for early signs of danger in order to respond appropriately. A modest investment in intelligence, diplomacy, and capacity-building with U.S. friends and allies could help to mitigate the rising Islamist threat and the effects of misguided Russian policies.

As explained in the article, spillover threatens important US allies, as well as important trade routes, especially energy trade routes, that skirt Russia's southern border through Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia.

Well, fast-forward to 2013. The investment in the North Caucasus as a possible rival to Silicon Valley has begun. From New energy opportunities in Russia thanks to photovoltaics, May 23, 2013 (see original for links that I did not reproduce):

According to Tomasz Slusarz (CEO of Solar PV Consulting), Russia will consolidate its dominant position in the global energy market, above all, thanks to photovoltaic power.

Russia is one of the leading oil and gas producers and exporters in the world, but this has not stopped the government’s ambitions in the search for clean energy supplies. For this reason, and for some time, they have begun investing in alternative energy sources, including photovoltaics.

[snip]

The sun is certainly not lacking in Russia where there is a potential of about 1,870 TWh of radiation and an economic potential of 101 GWh per year. The sunniest regions are those in the south, particularly the Northern Caucasus...

[snip]

In fact, investments have been made by multi-billion dollar giants such as Renova and Lukoil both for the accomplishment of photovoltaic parks in order to encourage the creation of a national industrial sector.

A few weeks ago, they set the bases for the birth of a "Silicon Valley" in the Northern Caucasus, a joint venture between the local government and private companies to promote a project with the goal of producing polycrystalline silicon photovoltaic cells and modules.

Similarly, in Dagestan, a California-based company called Plug & Play has begun operations in the capital, helping develop businesses in the republic. From Plug & Play Tech Center opens in Dagestan, October 22, 2013:

Plug & Play, a Silicon Valley-based global business incubator, has opened a new affiliate center in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan – a praiseworthy initiative in a region in Russia’s Northern Caucasus more often in the news for political conflicts and religious extremism than for IT innovations.

As East-West Digital News, the international resource on Russian digital industries, reported earlier this month, the Plug & Play Dagestan Center is located on the Dagestan State Technological University’s campus and plans to support 10-15 startups simultaneously. These projects receive a working space, mentors, legal advice, help with the search for funding, and the opportunity to present their projects to investors after six months.

[snip]

Plug & Play, which presents itself as “Silicon Valley in a Box”, claims that its incubated startups it has have raised more than $1 billion since 2006.

The question that comes to mind, though, is how much foreign investment and foreign tourism can the region expect, given the now-deteriorating security situation? From Failed North Caucasus Policy , July 22, 2013:

Events of the last few months have created the strong impression that something serious is brewing in the North Caucasus. Fighting in Chechnya has intensified, as has the conflict over its border with Ingushetia. Meanwhile, militants continue to kill policemen in Dagestan, and Chechen warlord Doku Umarov has threatened to detonate a bomb during the Winter Olympics in Sochi.

The problem is not that the Kremlin has recently committed a fatal mistake of some sort. Rather, we are witnessing the cumulative effect of a series of many small past mistakes resulting from the lack of a coherent strategy. Now, the authorities must deal with the consequences.

[snip]

Russia's withdrawal from the North Caucasus is effectively already underway in the form of a large-scale ­departure from the region of ethnic Russians. Meanwhile, several republics in the region no longer subject themselves to Russian legal or political norms, although formally they remain under Moscow's authority.

In Kabardino-Balkaria and Dagestan, Moscow rejected its usual approach of buying loyalty from the ethnic clan elites, attempting instead to achieve stability through the use of ­siloviki. But by relying on siloviki brought in from outside the region, Moscow's presence begins to resemble more of an occupying force. That model of rule is inherently unstable, and it is unclear just what price Moscow will end up paying for it in the near future. For example, it is clear that the dismantling of strongman and former Makhachkala mayor Said Amirov in Dagestan will sharply increase the risk of serious instability there.

Meanwhile, across the international borders, Armenia is working to become the Silicon Valley of the Caucasus. From Armenia can become Silicon Valley of the Caucasus, December 20, 2012:

On December 8, Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan met with the President of the California Institute of Technology Jean Lou Chameau, the Aysor.am reported.

According to the press service of the government, the Prime Minister presented the ongoing in the country education reform, as well as the process of international accreditation of Armenian universities. They discussed the prospects of bilateral cooperation and the development of information technology in Armenia.

The U.S. Congressman Adam Schiff, who attended the meeting, said that Armenia had the potential to become the Silicon Valley of the Caucasus.

(See also Armenia could become Silicon Valley of the Caucasus – Adam Schiff.)

Why indeed would foreign workers - whose expertise would be needed for anything more than just production of raw materials - and foreign capital be sent to Russia's North Caucasus, when across the international border (indeed, with a country in between) is the potential for greater development of true high-tech industry in a country that is safe from Islamic terrorism and free of the Moscow-backed corruption?

It will be interesting to see how the Winter Olympics go in Sochi, and what happens in other places, such as Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria.

Among the Sons of Togarmah, Part 5

In Part 1 we considered how the boundaries of Soviet Republics were drawn so that, should the USSR dissolve, these would be international borders, the demarcation of which would cause unrest; and, we saw how this was especially true in the Caucasus. We also examined how oil increasingly moves through pipelines in the Caucasus, skirting Russian borders, and we keyed in on Dagestan and Chechnya as examples of militant Islamic activity, what it may bring, and how difficult it is to effectively fight it.

In Part 2 we saw how Islamic terrorists sought to destabilize Kabardino-Balkaria, countering a Russian strategy of investment to improve the tourist industry in the region, which, in turn, was hoped to remove potential recruits from the jihadists by giving them jobs.

In Part 3, we saw how Moscow's strategy of "Chechenization" of the conflict in Chechnya might actually be more appropriately named "Kadyrovization" since Moscow seems to pin its hopes on a Chechen leader named Kadyrov. I summarized this situation thusly:

It should be noted that Chechens have developed a reputation for involvement in organized crime, throughout the Russian Federation and even on a global scale. Consequently, what Putin did was put one organized crime faction in charge of running Chechnya; other groups could either be friends or enemies of the most powerful organized crime group, which was powerful due to its ties to Moscow, and which was held in check by Moscow through the availability of other clans that could be placed in charge, should Kadyrov betray the Kremlin.

Basically, Moscow pays off, via support and federal money, one organized crime family to run Chechnya. This delegimitizes both federal and local authorities, creating a niche for the expansion of Islamic militant authority, and thus creating an atmosphere conducive to further Islamic insurgent activities. One immediate effect was that as violence initially died down in Chechnya, it increased in neighboring parts of the Caucasus.

In Part 4 we considered how the same dynamic that was at work creating problems in Dagestan was also at work in the northwest Caucasus, in Kabardino-Balkaria. We also saw how Dagestan was becoming the center of jihadism in the Caucasus. A recurring theme through this series has been how jihad is funded through criminal activities, including trafficking of Afghan heroin to Russia and Europe (and America).

Now, we have reports that Russian troops are moving from Chechnya to Dagestan.

In Russia Deploying Troops for Temporary Dagestan Reinforcement, dated March 19, we hear about troops being moved in to fight the separatist insurgency, and in Dagestan's President Promises a Decisive Crackdown on the Insurgency, from April 9, we hear about increased fighting between government forces and insurgents, and an increased resentment of Moscow-backed forces by the local Dagestanis.

Confusion Surrounds Reported Troop Deployment To Daghestan, from April 11, points out discrepancies between some observers, who claim a movement of about 1000 troops, and claims by Kavkaz Center of tens of thousands of troops; for example, 25.000 troops and more than 300 armored vehicles deployed in Dagestan from Chechnya from March 17 places the troop movement at the equivalent of two divisions.

Interesting analysis can be found in Chechen Troops in Dagestan: A Step Toward "Kadyrovization" of the North Caucasus?, which gives excellent background about ethnic disputes between Chechens and Dagestanis. The article goes on to question the ethnic composition of the troop movement, and point out the potential for trouble should too many Chechens be allowed too free a hand in Dagestan. So far, this has been a jihadist/infidel thing, but it could easily have an added Dagestani/Chechen dimension, from which the Islamic jihadists, whose ideology claims to transcend ethnicity, could be positioned to benefit.

But then there is the question of Kadyrovization, beyond battling insurgents. As I pointed out, this can be viewed in the light of organized crime, as corrupt officials in Moscow allow their local affiliates a free hand to organize crime in the Caucasus under the control of "their" guy, Kadyrov.

Kavkaz Center certainly views the world through its own prism; occasionally, this skews the view, but sometimes they come up with some very good information. In its entirety, with any edits from me, Russian-occupied Georgian provinces are transit corridors for Putin's KGB drug trafficking:

Publication time: 9 March 2012, 15:06

Two Russian occupied Georgian provinces are a transit corridor for Putin's KGB drug shipment from Asia to Europe, reports say.

As is known, drug trafficking is the main source of income for Putin's KGB generals and officers.

"Many observers believe that Georgia's separatist regions are main corridor for drug smuggling. Georgia's legislation is not again executed in the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. There are concerns that the drugs pass through this territory. It is impossible to re-verify this information, as the Russian occupation forces or de facto government of the regions do not exchange information on movement of drugs with the Georgian side," a report says.

The document's authors also note that the trucks moving on long-distance routes, sometimes carry drugs, and these goods must be checked at the points of departure and prior to shipment must be sealed.

The report's items on Georgia say that the country does not produce drugs, except a small volume of amphetamine-type stimulants.

The so called "crocodile", which is an alternative to morphine and is becoming popular, is often mentioned as a drug shipped by the KGB. It also says that heroin, subutex, methadone and marijuana are available on the Russian and international markets.

In turn, the CIA and US Army generals and officers actively control the drug production by their puppets in the American-occupied Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.

Other information I have implicates certain US officials, both military and civilian, in trafficking Afghan heroin, including on board US military aircraft, thus confirming some of these jihadist allegations.

Could this jihadist report be accurate?

If so, could one reason for the troop movement be to secure marketshare in the trafficking of narcotics through the Caucasus?

Among the Sons of Togarmah, Part 4

In Part 1, we looked at the strategic significance of the Caucasus. We also considered how intractable the problem was for Moscow, especially considering the methods Russia is using to pacify the region.

In Part 2 we saw how the Kremlin was hoping to pacify the region by building it up economically with a focus on tourism; and how, in Kabardino-Balkaria, terrorists attacked that very tourism industry. It is interesting that, if security forces cannot defend the tourist industry where it is reasonably well-established, how can they defend its expansion into areas that have been at war for many years now?

Then, in Part 3, we saw, based on the example from Chechnya, that Moscow's main strategy was to support one local group - a clan, but essentially an organized crime faction - in its effort at "state capture" (that term was not used; do an internet search to see what it means) by a force that would do the Kremlin's bidding. We also saw how a policy of support for corruption, as long as the corruption was pro-Moscow, only served to drive people toward the jihadists, as their only alternatives were organized crime puppets of Moscow, or organized crime jihadists furthering the global caliphate.

We now consider an excerpt from Islamists Gain Upper Hand in Russian Republic: Part 2: Moscow Tries to Win Hearts and Minds by Matthias Schepp in Dagestan, July 30, 2010:

Seeking Revenge

Police investigators had leaked a list of "black widows" to the newspaper. The term is used by Russians for women whose husbands or brothers were killed by security forces and are thus suspected of seeking revenge by making themselves available to Islamists as suicide bombers. In the last 10 years, black widows have been responsible for at least 16 attacks, two of which resulted in plane crashes.

Ramazanova came into the crosshairs of investigators because of her brother Vadim, who was killed two years ago in a police raid in Makhachkala. "They don't even return the bodies to us," she says. "It's said that they even sell the organs of the people they've killed."

She recounts stories of police violence and of relatives and friends who have been tortured, of electric shocks and the "baklashka," a plastic bottle filled with water that police officers use as a particularly painful weapon to beat people with. "My brother had no choice," says Ramazanova. She insists that he was driven underground because he was constantly under suspicion and being harassed by the authorities.

A video obtained by Russian state security shows Vadim in an apartment. For 16 minutes and 7 seconds, he provides detailed instructions on how to commit a suicide bombing. He lists the ingredients for an explosive belt and names a store in Makhachkala that sells one of the ingredients, acetone, and another store where the parts for the detonator can be found. "The most important thing is that you do it for Allah. Bring chaos to the ranks of the infidels, and kill as many of them as you can," Vadim says as he calls upon the faithful to commit murder.

It's a vicious circle. Security forces crack down; the deaths of accused terrorists serve as fodder for more people to join the ranks of the terrorists. The suspicion that someone might join the jihadists furthers a dynamic which helps drive the suspect into the ranks of the jihadists. The increase in jihadist activity then justifies further crackdowns. Alleged police abuse of detainees, coupled with rumors of organ-harvesting, only cause the atmosphere to be more volatile.

To be sure, that story was about Dagestan. But, we now consider the situation in nearby Kabardino-Balkaria. From Kabardino-Balkaria Risks Becoming New Insurgency Hotspot, by Emil Souleimanov, March 2, 2011:

BACKGROUND: Until recently, the Northwest Caucasus had been considered rather immune to the manifestations of militant Islamism. Unlike the ethnic autonomous regions of the Northeast Caucasus, i.e. Dagestan, Ingushetia, and Chechnya, these tiny republics with less than a million (Kabardino-Balkaria) and half a million (Karachay-Cherkessia) inhabitants, with a sizable share of ethnic Russians, were significantly Europeanized during decades of Soviet rule. Importantly, local societies largely lack the attributes contributing to the swift mobilization in the Northeast Caucasus: the prevalence of highly traditional societies including tribalism, blood feuds, and a strong role for Islam in the public and private spheres.

Yet life in both republics is marked by considerable tension between representatives of Turkic (Karachay, Balkar) and Adyghe (Cherkess, Kabardey, Abaza) groups that does not confine itself only to the nationalist pamphlets of local (pseudo) historians. Economic and political power is concentrated almost entirely in the hands of demographically dominant Kabardians and Karachays in their respective republics, causing permanent discontent among groups that consider themselves discriminated against. Following centuries of forced migrations implemented by Russian authorities in attempts to pacify the region, ethnic groups also clash over certain disputed territories.

As a result, the ethno-nationalist split seemed to be the main, if not single, ideological force in the Northwest Caucasus only a decade ago. Yet the hunt for real and imagined "Wahhabis" in the North Caucasus that started in 1999-2001 and intensified during the desperate Nalchik attack of 2005, led by the first generation of local insurgents, provided for a deepening "Jihadization" of the political opposition. The ongoing process has been fueled by the strong desire among local youth to distance themselves from the Turkic-Adyghe split, put an end to the power of corrupt elites, retaliate against indiscriminate activities of the local police, and establish an independent Islamic state in the North Caucasus.

Notice that the above background talks about corruption among governing elites and police oppression. To me, it seems evident that the same dynamic is helping fuel the situation in the Northwest Caucasus, just as in the Northeast Caucasus. This is not surprising; on the one side, it is the same Kremlin, and on the other, it is the same drive to establish a Caucasian (and later world) caliphate. The opposing forces are the same, the social and geographic background is in many ways similar; how different can the process and the results be?

Indeed, the author goes on to reference another work addressing Dagestan; continuing:

IMPLICATIONS: The ongoing deterioration of the security situation in Kabardino-Balkaria testifies to the inability of local authorities to really combat terrorism, even though that task should have been the easiest in this particular part of the North Caucasus. Like elsewhere in the region, the brutal and unprofessional efforts of local security forces to rid the country of "Wahhabis" have only contributed to strengthening the Islamist insurgency (see the 09/29/2010 issue of the CACI Analyst).

The referenced article, entitled Dagestan: The Emerging Core of the North Caucasus Insurgency, explains the situation in Dagestan, but the lessons are not lost on the rest of the Caucasus:

IMPLICATIONS: Fifteen years ago, there was nearly no talk about Islamist insurgency in Dagestan, a decade ago its instances were extremely rare, yet since then it has been increasing drastically. Although some Dagestani communities were the first in the North Caucasus to embrace Salafism in the beginning of the 1990s, the failed incursion of the united Dagestani-Chechen Jihadist insurgents to Western Dagestan in August 1999 largely discredited the ideology across the republic. What happened since then? First, since "Islamist terrorism" was widely recognized as a primary threat to national security in 1999-2001, thousands of mostly young Dagestanis, accused of terrorism and "Wahhabism", have been taken into custody by local authorities where they were often subjected to Soviet-style interrogation. Deep religiosity has been considered especially suspicious by the authorities, which have been waging full-scale war against real and alleged "Wahhabis" and their sympathizers. Yet for many undereducated, underpaid and corrupt policemen facing impunity, capturing people for ransom has provided for a source of solid income. As authorities have lacked enough evidence to put alleged "Wahhabis" in jail, these were eventually set free following a few months of torture. Many of them never made peace with what was done to them in prisons, and have turned to violence to retaliate the humiliation. In case someone's relative was killed or seriously wounded, their brothers, sons or cousins have pledged oaths to take revenge for the sake of family honor. As it is difficult for individuals to combat authorities on their own, many young Dagestanis have joined the insurgent movement in the mountains, where there were exposed to the basics of Salafism. The adoption of a common ideology of resistance has cemented the insurgence, shaping specific – now rather de-individualized – goals (the establishment of an Islamic state independent from Moscow) and targets (the Russian occupiers and their Dagestani "marionettes"). The collective memory of Dagestani peoples draws upon the notion of age-old anti-colonial, e.g. anti-Russian, resistance. Fighting local renegades is an even more important task.

Likewise, many Dagestanis have joined the insurgency in protest of the societal sins, be it corruption, erosion of traditional values, inability to realize themselves professionally or in search for a better, Islamic, future for their homeland. Most importantly, membership in Jihadist groups (jamaats) has helped individual combatants to overcome ethnic, sectarian and clan-based loyalties, forging an unprecedented sense of social solidarity based on religion. Thus, the ideologization of resistance has evolved side by side with the politicization of violence.

As a result, a regular civil war is now underway in Dagestan. Approximately 2,500 young Dagestanis are involved in the insurgency, which makes up at least a half of all North Caucasian combatants. Yet their numbers grow as more and more desperate youngsters join their ranks. Unlike neighboring Chechnya with its "normalized" public space, insurgents rely on sufficient sympathies and support from ordinary Dagestanis who are antagonized by both corrupt local authorities and increasingly violent and indiscriminate police forces. While many Chechens have postponed revenge to "better times" in order to avoid reprisals, this process is ongoing daily in Dagestan, where the insurgency has expanded from areas dominated by the Avars, Dargins, and Laks to the Lezgi-dominated south and Kumyk east. Moreover, in some areas of Dagestan local authorities as well as businesses have become targets of racketeering by insurgents. To survive physically, they have to pay those they are supposed to combat; something unheard of in contemporary Chechnya.

With this understanding of the situation, we now consider the calls of "Emir Dokku Abu Usman" for jihad against the infidels; from Appeal by Emir Dokku Abu Usman to Muslims of Caucasus and Russia: "Fight enemies wherever your hand reaches them!"

I seek refuge in Allah from the accursed Satan, in the name of Allah the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.

Praise be to Allah, Whom we ask forgiveness, seek refuge from the evil of our own selves and from evil consequences of our actions.

He whom Allah guides to the straight path, he will never be, and he whom Allah leaves, no one can guide him to the straight path.

I bear witness that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah. I bear witness that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger.

"O you who believed, fear Allah as He should be feared and do not die as others but Muslims".

May peace, mercy, and blessings of Allah be upon you, dear brothers and sisters, dear brothers Mujahideen.

I, Abu Usman, your brother in religion, appeal to you and want to begin with the words of our great Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him):

"Whoever died and did not fight or intend to fight died in one of the kinds of hypocrisy".

These words show us that Jihad is the greatest act of Islam, that Jihad is becoming mandatory for the salvation of the Ummah.

This call to jihad is especially resonant with groups seeing corruption and abuse of power by authorities that are essentially organized crime, and elsewhere rightly described as puppets of Moscow.

Continuing:

Today, dear brothers, Ummah is in such a degraded state, in such a poor condition that Jihad becomes obligatory for all of us. Jihad is a fard al-ayn.

Today, children are allowed not to ask permission from their parents go to the Jihad, debtor may not ask the permission from lender to go to Jihad, today wives may not ask permission from their husbands to participate in Jihad as far as they can, and help the Mujahedeen.

Dear brothers the Mujahideen, we see in what disastrous state our Ummah is. Today, the Ummah is 1.5 billion in numbers, and we know that even .05% of these numbers of this Ummah do not wage the Jihad, .05% of this Ummah wage the Jihad neither with their souls, nor with their property. Therefore, we see in what miserable condition the Ummah is.

In this regard, I recall a hadith of our great Prophet (pbuh) when he told his companions:

"'Peoples will fall upon you like greedy eaters upon a bowl of food'. And the companions asked the Prophet (pbuh): 'Will that be because we are small in numbers?' The Prophet (pbuh) replied: 'No. You will then be too many but rather like foam floating over water. And Allah will take off from the hearts of your enemies fear of you, and cast Wahn into your hearts'. So the companions asked: 'O Messenger of Allah, what is Wahn?' He said: 'The love for this world, and the fear of death'."

And today, we see that our Ummah loves this world and hates death. Today, there exists such a situation, as it was described by the Prophet (pbuh).

I appeal to the Mujahideen: we are today the vanguard of the Jihad, we are today the saviors of this Ummah.

The call is for true Muslims to love death and hate this world; the call is supported by Islamic scripture, and implicitly carries the powerful promise of an eternity in Paradise for those who hate this world and die forcing it to submit to Allah's will.

Skipping down:

The Prophet (pbuh) said:

"Similarity of the believers in their mutual love and brotherhood is similarity of the single organism. When one part hurts, the whole body hurts".

Therefore, dear brethren, we are the one Ummah, we are the single organism. If there is the Jihad here in the Caucasus against the enemy that wants to destroy Islam, then for you it is also the Jihad, for you it becomes a fard al-ayn.

I urge you to destroy the enemies of Allah wherever you are. I urge you to destroy the enemies wherever your hands reach them, that you open the fronts of the Jihad.

Today there is a total war going on. It is not us who had declared it on Russia, it was Russian who declared it on us. When there is a total war, there are not peaceful people left. If we have been declared a total war, then Allah permits us to fight with them as they fight with us.

Therefore, today we have the right to fight against them the way they are fighting against us. I urge you, fight with them, destroy them. This is the order of Allah. And we, as God-fearing, sincere believers, must obey the orders of Allah.

I also want to warn you that you do not yield to puppets of Satan who promote their venality and promote how they sold the religion of Allah for this worldly life. They sold their honor, they sold Islam.

Implicit also is a warning to those Muslims who do not support the jihad; they are takfir, and will suffer in the fate of the infidels - and perhaps even worse.

Given the extensive corruption of the pro-Moscow forces, and the powerful appeal to religiously-sanctioned total war - jihad - it is surprising the region isn't far more violent than it is.

How long can that last? Not just in the Caucasus, but closer to home?

Because, after all, this is just one facet of a larger problem...

The ties run to Osama bin Laden, and to the organized crime that funds terrorism.

Among the Sons of Togarmah, Part 1

In my previous post, which introduces the situation in Moldova and Transnistria, and connects that situation via Moscow to the Caucasus, we began to see how Moscow supports breakaway regions in border states that were either Soviet republics or at least communist in nature.

We also noted how there seems to be "ethnic" unrest in a broad part of Russia's periphery, in an arc through which flow both oil and heroin to the West.

I made the comment:

The Soviet Union's borders were designed to prevent the break-up of the Union itself. Republic borders crossed through ethnic regions. As long as the republics were constituents of the Soviet Union, people would be able to visit their relatives, and, in the event of regional disputes, minorities had recourse in Moscow. But, should the Soviet Union dissolve - as it did two decades ago - these would now be international boundaries, and the minorities within the newly-independent republics would be in danger of oppression, making any dissolution of the Soviet Union a tinderbox for ethnic violence.

Nowhere is this communist scheme more apparent than in the Caucasus.

The boundaries of constituent republics of the USSR, shown in red above, ran right through regions such as Ossetia. Also, Azerbaijan was broken up by a strip of Armenia, and the Nagorno-Karabakh region, which was a part of Azerbaijan, was comprised of mostly ethnic Armenians.

Since the Soviet collapse, these two parts of the Caucasus have been among the region's many hotspots.

A short excerpt from Moscow's Troubles in the Caucasus, by Uwe Klussmann and Matthias Schepp, August 3, 2009, helps explain:

Nowhere in the world are so many conflicts raging in such a small region than in the Caucasus, where roughly 40 ethnic groups speaking 50 different languages come together in an area about the size of Sweden. The region is home to only 26 million people, and yet they are separated by a total of 3,500 kilometers (2,180 miles) of borders, some of them contested.

Six wars have raged in the Caucasus since the collapse of the Soviet Union, making it the most dangerous region in proximity to the European Union.

It is precisely through the Caucasus that gas coming from Central Asia and Azerbaijan is expected to flow to Europe one day, bypassing Russia. The pipeline is less than 100 kilometers from the border of South Ossetia, the bone of contention in the most recent war, in a region where Moscow's tanks are now stationed.

A close-up from a map of oil pipelines in Europe shows the growing importance of the Caucasus:

There are numerous pipelines going through Russia, leading to markets in Europe. But, in the close-up, you can see a pipeline skirting Russia, going from Baku in Azerbaijan through Georgia.

One existing pipeline leads to the Georgian coast on the Black Sea, but this region is within easy range of Russian naval power, and, in any case, tankers have to traverse the Turkish Straits, which are increasingly busy with shipping traffic.

Another pipeline is the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, which runs to Georgia, then turns south into Turkey, going to a port on the coast of the eastern Mediterranean. This route is far more difficult to interdict from Russia, and it avoids the Turkish Straits.

As mentioned in the excerpt above, the pipeline also just skirts all of the hotspots in the Caucasus, named in red in the map below:

In the map above, the Nabucco pipeline is shown - it is planned to run the length of Turkey, cross the Turkish Straits, and lead into Austria.

The obvious goal in all of this is to cut Russia out of the loop.

This adds importance to the situation in the Caucasus. Instability in Caucasian Russia ties Russia down, mired in counterterrorism - a war Russia is widely perceived to be losing and frustrated with, despite certain perceived successes.

However, problems in Azerbaijan or Georgia could leave Europe more dependent on Russia.

Consequently, this series should be considered a companion to another, entitled "Treasures in the Land of Az" (Part 1, Part 2), which has a focus on Azerbaijan.

One hotspot in the region is Dagestan, up the Caspian coast from Azerbaijan. The problem is summarized by a Russian general in an excerpt from Islamists Gain Upper Hand in Russian Republic: Part 2: Moscow Tries to Win Hearts and Minds, written by Matthias Schepp in Dagestan, July 30, 2010:

An Unwinnable Struggle

"Everyone here has his own truth," says a high-ranking Russian general who was in command of the effort to fight the Islamists in the Caucasus for years. The general, who doesn't want to be named, says that he no longer believes that the fight against the extremists can be won quickly, despite the tens of thousands of elite troops, police officers and agents that are now deployed in the troubled region. For every dead terrorist, the general says with a sigh, two new ones rise up to take his place. "It will take years to change the situation here."

According to the general, the Islamists cannot be controlled with the normal means that a state based on the rule of law has at its disposal. He thinks that it is naïve for Western Europeans to hope that radical Islam can be forced into retreat by improving social conditions. "If these people seize power, we will have fascism cloaked in religion," the general predicts.

This "fascism cloaked in religion" is a nice summary of what Islamic extremists seek to bring everywhere they are active; the potential for it to crop up in Egypt, the Arabian Peninsula, and elsewhere is very real. Even if democratic governments should arise in the wake of revolutions, that is no guarantee that Islamic extremists won't take over somehow. The only good news is that many extremists will not accept a mandate that has been voted on; there is a strong current of thought in extremist Islam that to be true Islam, it must be forced on people (though apologists point out that there is no compulsion in religion in Islam).

Continuing with the excerpt:

Another problem is that the fronts in the multiethnic Republic of Dagestan are particularly unclear. In addition to Islamists, the underground consists of a mix of common criminals, hustlers and con artists. But it's also a haven for drug addicts unable to pay their debts and vicious murderers fearing acts of retaliation by the survivors of their victims.

But criminals work on both sides of the law. From Islamists Gain Upper Hand in Russian Republic: Part 3: Islamists Obtain Funds Through Protection Rackets (I fixed some spelling errors that obscured the meaning):

The Russian propaganda machine never tires of claiming that the Islamists are being funded from abroad. In reality, however, they generally raise their own funds by robbing banks and businesses. SPIEGEL has obtained a video that shows a group of rebels dividing up their loot after robbing a mobile phone store.

The protection racket is the most important source of income for the Islamists. In many cases, all it takes to intimidate a victim is a text message with a reminder about zakat, the principle of giving alms to the poor described in the Koran. The Islamists' targets range from the owners of bakeries, kiosks and sporting goods stores to local oligarchs. The victims fear for their lives, but at the same time they feel that by submitting to the protection racket, they are also protecting themselves for the event that the Islamists ever seize power in their village or region.

Conversely, Moscow's agents try to bribe Islamists with money and thus convince them to switch back to the Russian side. But the successes are few and far between. The secular state is losing its appeal, now that Dagestan is no longer capable of guaranteeing its citizens prosperity and security.

'Unparalleled Corruption'

"Is 15 minutes enough for you?" Russian Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev recently asked one of his officers who was about to report on the situation in Dagestan. But it took the colonel three times as long to describe a litany of problems, including the ubiquitous practice of buying one's way into office, contract killings, hostage-taking, protection rackets, drug and arms dealing. The colonel wasn't describing the activities of criminal gangs, however: He was talking about conditions in Dagestan's Interior Ministry.

Russian Prosecutor General Yury Chaika has said in Moscow, behind closed doors, that the blame for unsolved crimes is simply pinned on the Islamists, that statistics are manipulated, and that the "level of corruption is unparalleled."

In Dagestan, subordinates reported that Lieutenant Colonel Shamil Omarov, the head of a police unit in Makhachkala, embezzled the compensation money for the survivors of police officers under his command who had been killed in action. He also sold the gasoline for police vehicles and paid salaries to relatives who were not even required to report for duty.

Corruption is also a major problem in nearby Chechnya. Beyond that, Russians seem to have little understanding of what is going on there. From Chechnya is worth defending, by Elena Milashina, February 14, 2011:

The Chechens are worth fighting for. What they want is at once little and much. They need Russia's support. We were waging war there because some Chechens wanted independence. We killed many people there because they, too, killed our soldiers. We have not apologised, but we demand their loyalty. We know nothing about the Chechens who have always been on Russia's side. We are not even aware that there are such Chechens. We are not aware that they form the majority.

Unfortunately, the Chechens have a fierce reputation, including as bandits and mafiosos. Consequently, many Russians are frustrated with Chechnya especially; some are ready to grant Chechnya its independence just to be done with the problem, while Russian officialdom seems to use a heavy hand in dealing with the rebels there.

Corrupt government officials at the highest levels (Medvedev and Putin, and Obama, Biden and Clinton), inept and incompetent politicians dealing with power politics, petty corruption, fundamentalist Islam, organized crime and heroin trafficking, and big business and the profit incentives of big oil... this is the brew that is simmering fiercely in the Caucasus.

More to follow.

Treasures in the Land of Az, Part 2

Has anything changed?

Please read Part 1, and then you will know what I am talking about.

Last month, there was an incident in Moscow, wherein terrorists attacked an airport, attempting to target international victims - trying to get some political bang for their suicide bomber buck.

Supposedly, the case is solved (?); Wahhabi connections are suspected, but questions remain. Speculation is that the police may have had advance warning of the attack, but were unable to thwart it.

Meanwhile, in an unrelated (?) incident, terrorists planned to target New Year's Eve celebrations in Moscow; one female suicide bomber was going to blow herself up causing casualties, and another bomber was going to blow up responding security forces.

Does any of this sound familiar?

Farther south, in Dagestan, we have more. From Four dead in Dagestan car bomb, January 27, 2011:

Four people have been killed and six wounded in a car bomb explosion outside a cafe in the Russian region of Dagestan.

The attack is the deadliest to hit the Northern Caucasus region since Monday's suicide bombing on a Moscow airport that killed 35 people and been blamed on fighters from the overwhelmingly Muslim area.

The blast took place at just after 10:00pm local time (1900 GMT) on Wednesday outside the Karavan cafe on the outskirts of the town of Khasavyurt.

"Four people were killed, all of them civilians," a local interior ministry spokesman told the RIA Novosti news agency.

Six people were wounded, three of whom were hospitalised.

A criminal investigation has been opened into an "act of terror and illegal use of explosives", the Interfax news agency said, quoting the local branch of the investigative committee.

Investigators believe that about 30kg of TNT equivalent explosives were used in the blast.

Attacks by fighters have claimed hundreds of lives in the Northern Caucasus over the last years as they wage a campaign against the authorities with the aim of imposing an Islamic state in the region.

Airport suspect

In a separate development, Russian media reports on Thursday said that investigators were searching for an ethnic Russian member of a North Caucasus group who vanished last year and is suspected of involvement in the attack on the Moscow airport.

Investigators have yet to publish any firm conclusions three days after the attack but unofficial reports have made a link with the group and a mysterious explosion in Moscow on December 31.

The Kommersant newspaper said the investigation was focusing on a man named Razdobudko from the Stavropol region, just north of the Caucasus mountains, who is suspected of belonging to a local armed Muslim group, Nogaisky Dzhamaat.

Suggesting that he could have been the suicide bomber, Kommersant said the authorities now believed that the attacker was most likely to have been a male ethnic Russian rather than from one of the Caucasus ethnic groups.

An ethnic Russian?

Supposedly, this guy's name was Vitaly Razdobudko; he was a convert to Islam who, together with his wife, disappeared in October. The trail supposedly leads not to Chechnya, but to Dagestan. From Russians name Muslim convert as prime suspect for airport bombing, January 28, 2011:

In this case, suspicion has fallen on a cell called the Nogai Brigade, which is thought to operate around Stavropol and in the northern part of neighbouring Dagestan. Police said they were looking for 10 members of the group, which is also suspected of being behind a failed attack on New Year's Eve, when a female suicide bomber was believed to be preparing to attack crowds of Russians celebrating the New Year on Manezh Square near the Kremlin.

Dagestan is a Republic in the Russian Federation, located along the coast of the Caspian Sea. The region is rich in oil (and a major transshipment point for heroin and Islamic terrorism), but Dagestan itself remains poor.

Der Spiegel has an excellent background series on the conflict there; I suggest you begin with Part 1.

Hmmm....

From Secular Nationalism Versus Political Islam in Azerbaijan, dated February 9, 2005 (numbers in brackets refer to footnotes; see original):

Being one of only four countries in the world with a majority of Shiites, Azerbaijan represents an interesting case of secular Shiism surrounded by countries and regions where theocracy and religious movements (both Shiite and Sunni) seem to thrive. After the fall of the Soviet Union, this South Caucasus country witnessed a civil war, several coup d'état, war with its western neighbor Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh and the rise to power of its former Communist era leader Heydar Aliyev. What puts the country on the international map is that it has a substantial amount of oil reserves – both on and off-shore – and that Azerbaijan is a pro-Western country neighboring troubled regions of the North Caucasus and Islamic Iran.

While the majority of Azerbaijan's approximately eight million citizens are followers of the Shiite branch of Islam, there are substantial Sunni communities in the north and the west of the country. The religious cleavage between Sunnis and Shiites is reinforced by the fact that most of the non-Azeri minorities (such as the Lezgin) are Sunnis who live in the north of the country, neighboring Dagestan.

Perhaps as a direct result of Azerbaijan's Soviet legacy, Islam as a political force has not flourished despite increasing interaction with Iran. Moreover, historically speaking, Azerbaijan has had a nationalist orientation rather than a religious one. The close ethnic ties between Azeris and Turks played an important role in Azerbaijan's adoption of the Turkish model of strong nationalism and secularism (also known as Kemalism). The short lived presidency of the mercurial and Turkic irredentist Abulfazl Elchibey in 1992-93 witnessed the rise to power of the Azerbaijani Popular Front and increasing cooperation with Ankara. The coming to power of Heydar Aliyev in 1993 brought a more balanced orientation in Azerbaijan's relations with its neighbors. Having been part of the former Soviet elite, Aliyev was able to gradually control the political scene and in due course stabilized the country's domestic and foreign policies.

[snip]

Aside from mainstream Shi'a Islamism, there are two other Islamist tendencies in Azerbaijan. The first is the so-called Wahhabi movement which has some adherents among Sunni Lezgin minorities in the north and some parts of the capital Baku. The Wahhabi movement has been active in Chechnya, Dagestan and northern Azerbaijan for over a decade. Most of the radical Islamic groups operating in the North Caucasus are either followers of or funded by Wahhabi movements from overseas. [6]

The presence of strong Wahhabi networks in the north of the country overlaps with the growing nationalist and ethnic sentiments of the Lezgins, thus making it difficult to contain. [7] In July 2004, Azerbaijani news sources reported the arrest of over 200 people who were believed to be followers of the Wahhabi movement in Baku and were accused of plotting a coup d'état against the government under the disguise of training people to fight the war in Nagorno-Karabakh. Later in December in a television interview, the chairman of the SCRA, Rafiq Aliyev, estimated that there are about 15,000 Wahhabis operating in Baku alone. [8]

[snip]

The Azeri state apparatus is in tight control of all political and religious activities in the country and ensures that Islamic movements are either closely monitored or supervised by various government agencies. As far as the transit of Islamic fighters through Azerbaijan is concerned, officials in Baku have been in close contact with Russian security agencies to guarantee that the border crossings between Azerbaijan and Dagestan are not exploited by terrorists or radical groups. Whether these promises and guarantees are being duly enforced is anyone's guess.

In the final analysis, while the threat from Islamic Iran is minimal and perhaps even non-existent, the danger of transnational al-Qaeda linked Islamic groups targeting Azerbaijan is very real. Broadly speaking, there are two reasons to be fearful. Firstly, Azerbaijan remains an extremely important geographic link between the Islamic groups in the North Caucasus, Central Asia and the Middle East. Thus any serious attempts by the Azeri authorities to constrain these links might directly lead to a terrorist attack. Secondly, Azerbaijan's enthusiastic alignment with the U.S. and the west automatically makes it a potential target for al-Qaeda. Privately Azeri authorities recognize the magnitude of the threat and are terrified of a massive attack on their oil infrastructure. The most troubling aspect of the situation is that they can not do much more to protect against the looming threat.

You know, I can't help but wonder if someone isn't backing Wahhabi Sunni Muslims in the region. This would connect with Saudi Arabia, whose ruling family long ago cut a deal with a guy named Wahhab to promote his version of Islam. This would also connect with the narcotics-trafficking terrorists who are giving us problems in Afghanistan and Pakistan. And, the price would be paid by Russia, a major destination and transshipment route of the trafficked heroin, as well as a target of the terrorism.

Another benefit would be the isolation of Iran. If Wahhabi Sunni Islamic extremism could grow there, that would allow an avenue for Islamic expansion to compete with the avenue opened by Iran's Shia Islamic Fundamentalism.

Also, the Azeri-Turkish connection is significant, as Turkey is a key US ally in the region, and the Turkish Deep State is a big mover of heroin, as well as of arms and nuclear secrets. The Turkish Deep State is implicated in the Sibel Edmonds case with corruption of high-ranking US officials. A push in the direction of Sunni Islam in the Caucusus could help drive Azerbaijan more into the US/Turkey camp, again away from Iran or Russia.

From The rise of Islam in Azerbaijan, March 28, 2005:

While the rise of Islam might hinder the overall pro-Western development and integration of Azerbaijan, large-scale oil and gas projects may be in immediate danger. The construction of the $3 billion worth Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline is about to be completed and the gas pipeline Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum has recently commenced. These vital regional projects will smooth Azerbaijan's integration into the economic and security space of Turkey and Europe. Yet a stable pro-Western political environment is prerequisite for the operation of the pipelines.

Pro-Western? On the surface, they can be whatever they want, just as long as the energy corridor is secure, the oil keeps flowing, Tehran is stiff-armed, and Moscow is on the defensive.

Real US interests are being outmaneuvered by those who seek to promote perceived US interests (oil, power politics against Russia and Iran) as a cover for their own interests (profit in the oil, narcotics and arms markets).

I think I see the hand of the US Deep State in this one.

Treasures in the Land of Az, Part 1

"R-e-s-p-e-c-t"...

Oh, sorry.

I'm starting yet another series, though I have many ongoing.

First, let's consider Bad Blood in Baku, by Thomas Goltz, June 11, 2010:

BAKU, AZERBAIJAN -- If I were still a journalist, I would have had juicy scoop last Saturday when I learned of the imminent but still unannounced arrival in Azerbaijan of U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates. Gates had been tasked with hitting the reset button -- there are a lot of those in the former Soviet Union these days -- on Washington's increasingly problematic relationship with Baku.

I learned of the emergency visit when an old friend of mine called to say he knew I was in the Azerbaijani capital, and that his former boss, a U.S. intelligence officer, wanted to buy me a few beers and chat about my nearly 20-year hobby of reading tea leaves and goat entrails in the Land of Az.

"The American chargé d'affaires told me not to talk to you, but he is State Department and I am not," the official said -- I'm paraphrasing from memory here, but closely -- putting initial pleasantries out of the way. "I am here to set up the Gates visit tomorrow. We finally decided to give the Azerbaijanis something before this thing deteriorates any further." Then he sort of smirked while saying the following: "We frankly don't care about human rights or democracy-building, or Israel and Turkey, or peace in Karabakh or Georgia, or even Azerbaijani energy. There is only one thing we really care about right now, and that is Afghanistan."

I was not surprised, but had to ask:

"Afghanistan," he said, and then repeated the word.

Afghanistan.

Of course, we are thinking of Afghanistan, and Azerbaijan's role as a stop along the way to and from... and, to be sure, that is the context in which the article addresses it, as well. In fact, on page 2, the article makes the point bluntly:

"Our attitude is that Washington should stop thinking of Azerbaijan in terms of Afghanistan and start thinking of Azerbaijan in terms of Azerbaijan," my old pal Araz Azimov, now deputy foreign affairs minister, told me. "The official attitude as enunciated by the president is, 'We want respect.'"

But, a stop along the way to Afghanistan isn't the only treasure that the Land of Az has, is it? In fact, the word "Azerbaijan" was ādurbādagān in the Pahlavi geographical text Shahrestānihā i Erānshahr, translatable in modern Persian as "the treasury" or "the treasurer" - and treasures are abundant in Baku!

We now consider Azerbaijan Grapples with Growing Drug Addiction, dated February 22, 2007:

In the past decade, the official number of registered drug addicts has more than tripled -- from 6,000-7,000 drug addicts in 1996-1997, to almost 20,000 by 2006, according to the Azerbaijani Ministry of Health.

The interior ministry reports that every eighth crime committed in Azerbaijan in 2006 -- or some 2,309 registered offenses -- was related to drugs. Police seized 531 kilograms of various drugs that year, including 50 kilograms of heroin.

As an aside, drug abuse is only part of the problem. Drug addicts pay for their drugs through street crime. If you interdict the supply of, say, heroin, what happens to its price? And, if its price goes up due to the interdiction (supply and demand), what happens to street crime as addicts try to pay for it? Keep in mind, heroin is VERY addictive, and addicts will do whatever they have to do to get their fix....

By the way, as I mentioned in the previous paragraph, drug abuse is only part of the problem. Another part is the offical corruption that accompanies the movement of drugs into a place where the drugs are in demand.... :)

One expert, however, believes that the true number of drug-related crimes -- and drug addicts -- is actually much higher.

Citing his own statistical analysis, Mazahir Effendiyev, chief of the United Nations Development Program Law Enforcement Unit in Baku, puts the real number of addicts in Azerbaijan at "not less than 300,000." The number would amount to roughly four percent of the country's estimated 2006 population of over 7.96 million.

Similarly, official statistics on drug-related crimes, he said, are only "ten percent of the real drug turnover." Effendiyev, who formerly worked as chief coordinator for the UN's drug prevention program for the South Caucasus, estimates that "at least 500 kilograms" of heroin were sold and used in Azerbaijan last year. "It is a big number which shows how serious the problem is."

One thing I've noticed is that, anywhere in south or southwest Asia where heroin addiction is rising dramatically in the past decade tends to be a place important in trafficking heroin from Afghanistan to markets in Russia or Europe... just a general rule-of-thumb, you know.

What does that tell us about Azerbaijan? Skipping down:

Meanwhile, the obstacles for access to illicit drugs are steadily decreasing. In Baku, large supplies of low-quality heroin have pushed prices down from the approximate $50-per-dose norm to as low as $3, said Dr. Shaig Sultanov, chief physician at Baku's #2 psychiatric hospital. "It has increased the number of potential addicts," he commented. "Not only rich people can afford [heroin] now."

That would make sense. Skipping down again:

Pure geography is one. Azerbaijan now features as part of drug smuggling routes running from Afghanistan to Europe via neighbor Iran and from Afghanistan to Russia via the former Soviet republics of Central Asia.

Some observers point to reported police involvement in the drugs trade as minimizing the obstacles to supply by silencing public criticism. A 2004 op-ed by political analyst Zardush Alizade that accused the interior ministry's anti-narcotics unit of working with drug syndicates resulted in a lawsuit that makes "people afraid to openly speak about it," charged Ilgar Ibrahimoglu, head of the DEVAM human rights center and imam for Baku's Juma mosque community.

Geography and corruption....

Without questioning this imam's sincerity, I would like to point out that some imams don't have a problem with narcotics trafficking.

But what else is mixed in the brew, here? From Azerbaijan oil: a mixed blessing, by Yigal Schleifer, December 30, 2005:

BAKU, AZERBAIJAN
On the outskirts of the Azeri capital, one can find the starting point of the $4 billion Baku-Tbilisi- Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline, a marvel of 21st-century construction and engineering that has just begun to pump oil on a 1,093-mile journey from the Caspian Sea to the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan.

On the other end of town, one can also find Veli Garacayli's crumbling cement apartment building, the product of 1960s-era Soviet construction and engineering. Hot water hasn't flowed through the radiators in a decade, after the boiler that serves the building and several others nearby broke down, and water for bathing and drinking is available only two or three hours a day.

Mr. Garacayli, a radio and television repairman who has been unemployed for the past five years, says the sorry state of his building and the ones around it makes him question whether any of the growing oil revenues in Azerbaijan - one of the world's most corrupt countries - will make their way to his neighborhood.

Now, a quick blurb from Echoing Moscow attack, Dagestan bombings underscore Russia's terrorism threat, by Fred Weir, March 31, 2010:

Moscow
Two suicide bombers, one disguised as a policeman, killed at least 12 people and injured 23 in attacks against Russian security forces in the turbulent southern republic of Dagestan Wednesday.

Bombings, murders, and gunfights between authorities and a rising extremist insurgency on Russia's seething southern flank have become so common in recent months that even Russian media might have scarcely noticed Wednesday's attacks, had it not been for a pair of devastating terrorists strikes in the Russian capital Moscow on Monday that killed 39 people and riveted the world's attention on Russia's growing terrorist problem.

"In the northern Caucasus, terrorist acts like this have been routine for the past several years," says Pavel Salin, an expert with the independent Institute of Political Conjuncture in Moscow.

You know, it seems to me Dagestan is on Azerbaijan's northern border....

Finally, Medvedev vows revenge on visit to Dagestan, from April 1, 2010:

Russia's pain is mixed with a thirst for vengeance as it continues to bury the remaining victims from Monday's Moscow metro attacks.

Earlier, while more funerals of the 39 dead were being held in the Russian capital, President Dmitry Medvedev made a surprise visit to the North Caucasus republic of Dagestan.

After holding a minutes silence with top security chiefs, Medvedev vowed to destroy the bombers.

"Recently we have had some success in the fight against terrorism," Russia's president said.

"We have succeeded in destroying the most hateful bandits. But apparently this is not enough. In any case we will find them all in good time, and we will punish them all like we did before. Only this way things will happen," he added.

That tougher tone follows yesterday's chilling video posting by Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov. He promised to bring war to Russia's streets after claiming he was behind Monday's bloodshed.

Medvedev's visit to the Caucasus comes amid growing unrest in the region and fears Islamist militants may attempt to launch a major bombing offensive in Russia’s heartland.

Overnight, a further two people were killed in Dagestan when their car blew up. It is thought they were carrying explosives. That came only hours after another 12 people died in a twin suicide attack in the north of the country.

A wayside stop on the way from the West to the War on Terror, a wayside stop on the way from the poppy fields of Afghanistan to the heroin markets in the West, and a wayside stop on the way from Caspian Basin's petroleum reserves to an oil-thirsty world... with extremist Islamic holy warriors based in the region, waging war on nuclear-armed permanent members of the UN Security Council... yes, the Land of Az has many treasures indeed, and their mix is explosive.