The recent upturn in terrorist attacks in the Northern Caucasus region has shown how fragile the relative stability has been. Although the attacks are small in scale, their frequency has caused concern in Moscow to a great extent. Especially in 2006, following the gains made against the Chechen resistance fighters, it had been assumed that stability in the region had been achieved after their presence was reduced and leaders like Ramzan Kadyrov became active. However, since the new leader of the Chechen Resistance Movement, Dokka Umarov, abolished the Republic of Chechnya and declared the Chechen Emirate in 2007, the resistance movement has gone beyond Chechnya, is spreading to the whole of the Northern Caucasus, and has heightened its activities again from 2008 onwards.

The resistance movement has ceased to be an activity based on Chechen nationalism alone and has evolved into one imbued with Islamic characteristic with a jihadist ideology; and this has caused the revolt to increase in strength in a way not anticipated by Moscow and the federation republics. The movement aims to unify the republics of the Muslim Northern Caucasus under the banner of Islam against colonial Russia, rather than exclusively Chechen or other Northern Caucasus communities seeking independence from Russia. Moreover, since this movement has an Islamist basis, it aims at being active not just in this region, but in the whole of Russia.

Following the awakening of the movement seen recently, it has become necessary for Moscow to review its counterinsurgency tactics which had acted as the basis of its earlier gains back in 2006. It is important to assess the reasons behind why this time around Russia is not able to maintain the same degree of success with the previously employed counterinsurgency tactics. Much of the answer lies in the reality that Moscow has not been able to carry out policies that achieve stability in the republics of the Northern Caucasus region. Instead, by transferring power to the elites, little headway has been made on regional development targets. Economic development has not been achieved and no progress has been made in areas of infrastructure, education and basic services provision. Moreover, the elites and local clans that gained importance have only exasperated existing inequalities and tensions in the region, causing the terrorist insurgency to step up its activities.

Moscow's Counterinsurgency Success

Moscow's counterinsurgency tactics during the Second Chechen War impaired the terrorist organizations, and by the year 2006, Chechen insurgency movements as well as its leaders were eliminated. At first, during the era that led to the 2004 Nazran attacks and Beslan, Moscow had relied almost exclusively on the use of military force. The main strategy was active engagement with the terrorist organizations, so as to remove, first, the leaders of the insurgency, and second, the mujahedeen, or the military forces active in the region. Having experienced two Chechen insurgency wars, Moscow was able to attain the necessary intelligence about the terrorist groups through its military organizations. However, the use of force alone was not enough to overcome the catastrophic attacks leveraged by the insurgents.

A more sustainable degree of success in the operations only came in sight after Moscow adopted policies that were resilient and strategic with a view towards holding sway over financial and other resources available to the insurgent groups, as well as curbing the participation of new members. The main concern for Moscow has been to cut down the popular moral and financial support for the terrorist organizations. In order to overcome this problem Moscow tried to provide a socioeconomic environment that would provide an opportunity to cut out the alienation and desperation that fuels the insurgency movement. It is well-known that poverty, instability and insecurity are among the contributing factors that decrease trust in the federal political authorities, as well as in Moscow.

It was Dmitry Kozak, President Vladimir Putin's Special Envoy for the Southern Federal District, who convinced Moscow to facilitate, in addition to the use of force, soft-power measures, like better governance and efforts to reduce the influence of leaders by co-opting nationalist and traditionalist elements. Also, Moscow tried to stimulate reconstruction efforts in Chechnya and socio-economic development in the North Caucasus region. A new amnesty program was introduced while a former separatist was appointed as the head of the Chechen Republic.

Moreover, in February 2006, a new commission - the National Anti-Terrorist Committee (NAK) - that would coordinate the power (siloviki) ministries and departments in developing new policies and new methods was established. Nikolay Patrushev, the Director of the Federal Security Service (FSB) became the head of this committee and was given broad powers. The committee formed an operational staff that was responsible for "planning the use of the forces and resources of the federal bodies of executive power and their territorial bodies."

Kozak's soft-power policies included an increase in economic and social reconstruction and development assistance for the year 2006. Different than those funds intended for reconstruction efforts for the North Caucasus, Kozak's attempts were devoted for a more efficient use of these funds by closely monitoring the local authorities, in fact by replacing most of the governments and the leaders of the republics in the region. President Putin issued a decree in September 2005 so as to establish an advisory committee headed by Kozak that would develop and monitor assistance projects and reforms for the region. This advisory commission tried to make sure that the governments of the federal republics allocated and utilized the assistance provided by Moscow for development projects. The replacement of the leaders and governments in the region was also intended for the removal of corrupt and unpopular authorities so as to make it easier for Moscow to control more effectively these republics. Among these leaders were Valeriy Kokov, Kabardino-Balkariya's President; Khachim Shogenov, the republic's MVD chief; Magomedali Magomedov, President of Dagestan; Imam Yaraliyev, Dagestan's chief prosecutor; the entire cabinet in North Ossetia; and Khazret Sovmen, Adygeya's President. The new authorities took measures to reach out to the Muslim population in the region by building mosques and cooperating with local religious organizations. The new amnesty program initiated by Kozak provided for the return of about 500 fighters in Russia, considering the estimated 700 jihadists in the region, although the numbers could be exaggerated.

In the end, in 2006, the Russian counterinsurgency strategy achieved considerable success, killing first Aslan Maskhadov, and then Abdul-Khalim Sadulayev, who had succeeded Maskhadov as Chechen president and resistance commander following Maskhadov's killing in March 2005, and several fighters. Shamil Basayev died of an accident in Ingushetia. With the demise of these two leaders there has been a sharp decline in terrorist activity. Civilian casualties also harmed the claim to legitimacy of the organizations, as popular support was already on the decline because of the attacks against civilians in Beslan and elsewhere. Russian forces also liquidated numerous fighters and emirs in Chechnya and other republics in 2006. Along with the amnesty, these successful operations brought a slight decline in the number of active fighters in the region. The weapon stores were overrun and financial sources were eliminated. Patrushev stressed that the FSB probed last year over 1,000 organizations and 3,000 individuals in a search for financial sources of terrorism, adding that over 50 criminal cases were launched as a result of the probe and 17 extremist organizations banned.

The Insurgency's Revival

Still, Moscow's success has its limits. Although Dokka Umarov's rise to the positions of Emirate and president was interpreted as a sign of a shift in the insurgency movement's character, the shift in power back to Chechen Sufi nationalism from the jihadist discourse did not take place as expected. As most observers agree, Doku Umarov maintained the Islamic element as he declared the dissolution of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and the establishment of a ‘Caucasus Emirate.' Thus the basis of the insurgency that prioritized the jihadist ideology, namely against all those fighting against Muslims around the globe and the establishment of an Islamic state, maintained its centrality. With these ambitions, Dokka Umarov began to restructure the organization's diminished financial and personnel flow.

The insurgency movement's restructuring efforts proved successful and the organization adopted itself to the changing political circumstances. Umarov promised to limit the insurgency movement's targets to the military and police, refraining from operations against civilians. Under Umarov's leadership, the group now uses pure Islamist ideology and promotes a regional concept of jihad which appeals to youth who have joined local Islamist movements. The restructuring efforts included the ‘distribution of forces across a maximally wide territory and the creation of a network structure' in which the separate cells acted autonomously while being able to coordinate and communicate their operations. Thus, Shariat Jamaat leaders openly pledged allegiance to Umarov in 2007, adopted the goal of establishing a North Caucasian Emirate and joined together in the regional Unified North Caucasian Front in 2005. Moreover, the insurgents were able to take advantage of the oppression by the local police forces against the local population, in order to recruit new members across the region.

By mid-2007, President Ramzan Kadyrov and other Chechen officials were claiming that the jihadist insurgency had been defeated once and for all in the republic. However, despite the decline in the number and the scale of the attacks, Umarov's insurgency movement began to become more effective beginning in 2007. He claimed "Allah has helped us, in the meanwhile, to restore all Jamaats (groups) in Caucasus... I consider that the main victory is that we have restored Riyad-us Saliheen, Jamaat of our dear brother Shamil [Basayev]." There occurred numerous attacks on Russian forces and their local allies in Chechnya and in other republics in the region Thus, Chechnya is no longer the only focus of the resistance in the North Caucasus. The insurgents employ different, more effective, tactics. The main objective seems to be to spread the conflict geographically as much as possible so as to reduce the effectiveness of the Russian security forces by forcing decentralization of their main focus. Moreover, Chechens are no longer the only identifiable insurgents, since the geographical expansion and the jihadist ideology proved successful in attracting other North Caucasus people to join the ranks of the insurgency movement.

Since 2007 until August 2009, there have been approximately 44 attacks on Russian forces that cost about 146 lives. In the last 5 months the frequency of the attacks has escalated. Most of these attacks were directed towards Russian forces and local policemen as well as officials and their relatives. In August alone, 51 policemen and civilians died as a result of the terrorist attacks. On August 17, a suicide bomber attacked a police station in Ingushetia, leaving 25 people dead and nearly 80 wounded.

Moscow's Response and its Implications

These attacks indicate that the insurgency is regaining its influence in the North Caucasus. Thus, after the suicide bombing in Nazran, Russian President Medvedev convened a Security Council meeting in Stavropol on August 19 in order to evaluate the security situation in the North Caucasus. In line with the previous strategy presented to then President Putin by Dmitry Kozak, Medvedev also emphasized the domestic factors as playing a prominent role in the resurgence of the terrorist attacks in the region. By highlighting the impact of internal elements, such as poverty, unemployment and other socio-economic indicators, Medvedev also refuted his officials' response to the terrorist attacks: the new Interior Minister of Dagestan and former FSB officer Ali Magomedov , Ingushetian President Yunusbek Yevkurov, Federation Council First Deputy Chairman Aleksandr Torshin, had argued that the "Islamic radicalism in the North Caucasus is an artificial phenomenon fuelled by foreign intelligence services and financed from abroad." Both the President and the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation are acutely aware that recognizing the role of foreign aid for the insurgency would imply the involvement of Muslim countries of the Middle East, a situation which they think would endanger the high-level relations Russia enjoys with the countries of the region. Thus, Russia's success in the North Caucasus was also a result of a mutual and unofficial agreement that these countries would not meddle and would indeed prevent any intervention from the Middle East, which entails measures to cut financial backing and fresh recruits.

The most intriguing among the factors that Medvedev referred to was his focus on the "corrupt clans indifferent to people's needs that divert subsidies from the federal budget for their own private purposes." In the past, Russia's new strategy of using soft-power together with the use of force that focused political and economic means to restructure the region succeeded thanks to these types of federal aid. Now, the Russian leadership thinks that the aid funds, although they were closely monitored by the National Anti-Terrorist Commission (NAK) under the FSB and Dmitry Kozak, have not been used efficiently. This would imply that Moscow's 2005 strategy consolidated the power of a new generation of leaders including Ramzan Kadyrov, thereby paving the way for the emergence of new clan inequalities. When in 2006 Moscow replaced these leaders, loyalty to Moscow seemed enough to transfer the responsibility in the region to the new authorities. But now, it seems even Moscow understands that supporting these local figures could contradict the strategy laid out in 2006 and Medvedev's plans for the region in the forthcoming months.

It is beginning to seem evident that Moscow is losing faith in the regional leaders. In the coming days, as the insurgents continue to increase the range and scale of their attacks, Moscow will be focusing first on militarily countering these attacks, while simultaneously promising the people of the region with delivery of more economic and social reforms, as well as measures to improve governance. Those leaders who are not well suited for this scheme and who continue to consolidate their power bases will be eliminated, despite their loyalties to Moscow. In this way, Moscow will likely try to marginalize the terrorist organizations and their bases of support. It can be argued that Medvedev's new strategy will not differ drastically from the Kozak plan that was presented in 2005, but is a reformulation of it. But now, Moscow's emphasis will be more deliberately focused and pursue an efficient implementation of the plan, together with some political corrections and fine tuning in the region. Still, the implementation of this new strategy probably will take some time, and looking ahead, it is more likely than not that we will be hearing more about the terrorist campaign in the North Caucasus.

i Gordon M. Hahn, "The Jihadi Insurgency and the Russian Counterinsurgency in the North Caucasus," Post-Soviet Affairs 24/1 (2008): 10.
ii Ibid., 11
iii Ibid., 12
iv "Eurasian Secret Services Daily Review," Axis Information and Analysis, June 25, 2007, http://www.axisglobe.com/article.asp?article=1334.
v Akhmet A Yarlykapov, "Separatism and Islamic Extremism inthe Ethnic Republics of North Caucasus," Russian Analytical Digest 22 (June 5 2007): 6.
vi Benjamin Shapiro, "Caucasus Jihad: Terror tactics back on the horizon?" The Long War Journal, May 21, 2009, http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/05/caucasus_jihad_terro.php.
vii Ibid.
viii "Suicide Bomb Kills 20 At Ingushetian Police Station," RFE/RL, August 19, 2009, http://www.rferl.org/content/Bomb_Kills_Eleven_At_Ingushetian_Police_Sta....
ix www.yuga.ru , August 14, 2009.
x "Medvedev Outlines Strategy to Contain North Caucasus Violence," RFE/RL, August 20, 2009, http://www.rferl.org/content/Medvedev_Outlines_Strategy_To_Contain_North....
xi Ibid.
xii Liz Fuller, "Is Chechen Leader Losing Moscow's Trust?" RFE/RL, April 7, 2009, http://www.rferl.org/content/Is_Chechen_Leader_Losing_Moscows_Trust/1604....
xiii Mairbek Vatchagaev, "More Russian Troops Headed to Ingushetia," The Jamestown Foundation, August 21, 2009, http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=35448&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=ae134f1c80