VTMBH Article: Body
On Saturday evening, my son called me from Sitka, Alaska. Instead of delivering news of the purchase of his new house, he asked me, So are you still pro-Chechen?
This is an old argument of ours. Its not specifically about Chechens, but about Muslim terrorism in general. My son is very negative about it, wherever it happens and for whatever reasons. I totally agree with him on that. Our disagreement concerns the individual cases and, more often than not, the Chechen issue. I am referring to the most recent war in Chechnya, the one that the Chechens did not start, nor did Russians. Rather, the Kremlin did during the elections at the end of the last century; still no one knows who blew up the apartment buildings in Moscow. My argument is as follows: the war hit not only the Chechens, both those who are fighting and those who are peaceful. It also hit Russian soldiers and officers, who are sent out to die unfairly. And there is no light at the end of this Caucasian tunnel. Like Stalin, my son thinks that if the enemy cannot be captured, it should be killed and, like Putin, he thinks that Chechen guerillas must be flushed down the toilets.
My son told me that it was a brilliant rescue operation and that the deaths of 67 people had saved hundreds of lives. By the time I hung up the phone and checked the Internet, the number had increased to 90 people. Then I left the house and, when I was driving back home and switched on the radio, the number was 118 people. I must remind the reader that at the beginning, Luzhkov announced 30 victims.
This is the official data; there is no unofficial data, only rumors from hospitals and morgues. The terrible thing is that the number of dead is not decreased, a classic Soviet maneuver, but completely cleared. There is an informational blackout, according to orders from above. The hospitals with dying hostages are guarded like military bases. The bodies of dead hostages are spread out to many morgues and doctors are afraid to give exact numbers because they are threatened with termination. People keep dying of suffocation from the unidentified gas (Inkopasiatn? Ftoran? Rimtilfentalin?) used by the special forces.
Frightened doctors complain that they could save people if they knew which psychotropic weapon was used, it would be easier for them to find the antidote and even save lives. Not only are reporters barred, but relatives are forbidden to see sick and dying hostages. In the meantime, the Special Forces keep receiving thank you notes. Putin already met with and congratulated them; they will be awarded and promoted. Maybe it is sinful to say so but I think some of the Special Forces bosses would prefer that no witnesses remain, so that the truth stays forever hidden in their uniforms.
I am not a military person, nor am I a specialist. I am just a man on the street, as are most people worldwide, and my viewpoint comes from far away, across the ocean. But if in just one day, the number of victims increases from 30 to 120, we can safely assume that the information will be changed again, thanks to manipulations by the authorities. You can also add to that number of dead terrorists32 men and 18 womenwho were shot while paralyzed by the psychotic gas. They are human beings too. But no one among the Special Forces died while sacrificing some of the hostages, whom the forces could have rescued. Triumph or shame?
And how did the hostages die? Only one hostage died from an injury, the rest of them died and are still dying from the psychotropic gas. Fifteen survivors who are recovering will be invalids for the rest for their lives.
By the time you read this commentary there will be, despite a lack of information, more figures and facts revealed than the writer knew of when he was writing this piece. But these will hardly be verifyable figures or facts. And will we find out the exact number of people killed during this last war in Chechnya, which brought Putin and his team to the Kremlin? And what about the losses among the civilian population? The war from the Caucusus moved to Moscow, where it originally started three years ago: houses blown up by unknown people were the cause for the Chechen war.
Putin came to power on the idea of order, his KGB past was a kind of guarantee for future stability, not only in the Caucasus but also in Russia itself. The cruel, bloody and senseless war in the Caucasus and the genocide of the local population, under the new term clearance, are still on-going, as are the killings in Moscow, Saint Petersburg and in other cities and towns. Entering the Kremlin on the back of his Chechen horse, Putin would like to use the same horse to keep the same Kremlin residence. We could not rescue everybody. Please forgive us, he told the people. Rescue is an inadequate verb. There are too many questions and too few answers. Doctors and nurses are not permitted to answer the questions. The authorities are trying to justify themselvesby saying that if these 150 (give or take) did not die, 700 would have.
This logic cancels itself out very few might have had to die. Moscow reporter Anna Polytkovskaya, who was the last person from the outside world to have spoken with the terrorists, thought that there was a chance for a peaceful result. In the meantime, state TV does not show facts and figures, official media releases are praising the victory of the Special Forces and only a few newspapers report doubts about the official version. The postfactum is so obvious that it reveals the participants of this fact. It was Putin himself who once uttered the formula of his power the ears should not stick out. His subordinates didnt listen to their leader the ears are sticking out.
Comrade Stalin used to say that a fact is a stubborn thing. Only figures are worse than facts. As they say, we counted and cried. But I am not sure that the people the Kremlin trusted to count the dead are crying. I am not sure they know about the tear of a child written by Dostoevsky.
Its thing to flush gangsters down the toilet; its another thing to flush down gangsters together with hostages. Ezhi Len once said that traces of a crime lead to future. The traces of the eight-year Chechen war lead back to Moscow, where it started.
This is an old argument of ours. Its not specifically about Chechens, but about Muslim terrorism in general. My son is very negative about it, wherever it happens and for whatever reasons. I totally agree with him on that. Our disagreement concerns the individual cases and, more often than not, the Chechen issue. I am referring to the most recent war in Chechnya, the one that the Chechens did not start, nor did Russians. Rather, the Kremlin did during the elections at the end of the last century; still no one knows who blew up the apartment buildings in Moscow. My argument is as follows: the war hit not only the Chechens, both those who are fighting and those who are peaceful. It also hit Russian soldiers and officers, who are sent out to die unfairly. And there is no light at the end of this Caucasian tunnel. Like Stalin, my son thinks that if the enemy cannot be captured, it should be killed and, like Putin, he thinks that Chechen guerillas must be flushed down the toilets.
My son told me that it was a brilliant rescue operation and that the deaths of 67 people had saved hundreds of lives. By the time I hung up the phone and checked the Internet, the number had increased to 90 people. Then I left the house and, when I was driving back home and switched on the radio, the number was 118 people. I must remind the reader that at the beginning, Luzhkov announced 30 victims.
This is the official data; there is no unofficial data, only rumors from hospitals and morgues. The terrible thing is that the number of dead is not decreased, a classic Soviet maneuver, but completely cleared. There is an informational blackout, according to orders from above. The hospitals with dying hostages are guarded like military bases. The bodies of dead hostages are spread out to many morgues and doctors are afraid to give exact numbers because they are threatened with termination. People keep dying of suffocation from the unidentified gas (Inkopasiatn? Ftoran? Rimtilfentalin?) used by the special forces.
Frightened doctors complain that they could save people if they knew which psychotropic weapon was used, it would be easier for them to find the antidote and even save lives. Not only are reporters barred, but relatives are forbidden to see sick and dying hostages. In the meantime, the Special Forces keep receiving thank you notes. Putin already met with and congratulated them; they will be awarded and promoted. Maybe it is sinful to say so but I think some of the Special Forces bosses would prefer that no witnesses remain, so that the truth stays forever hidden in their uniforms.
I am not a military person, nor am I a specialist. I am just a man on the street, as are most people worldwide, and my viewpoint comes from far away, across the ocean. But if in just one day, the number of victims increases from 30 to 120, we can safely assume that the information will be changed again, thanks to manipulations by the authorities. You can also add to that number of dead terrorists32 men and 18 womenwho were shot while paralyzed by the psychotic gas. They are human beings too. But no one among the Special Forces died while sacrificing some of the hostages, whom the forces could have rescued. Triumph or shame?
And how did the hostages die? Only one hostage died from an injury, the rest of them died and are still dying from the psychotropic gas. Fifteen survivors who are recovering will be invalids for the rest for their lives.
By the time you read this commentary there will be, despite a lack of information, more figures and facts revealed than the writer knew of when he was writing this piece. But these will hardly be verifyable figures or facts. And will we find out the exact number of people killed during this last war in Chechnya, which brought Putin and his team to the Kremlin? And what about the losses among the civilian population? The war from the Caucusus moved to Moscow, where it originally started three years ago: houses blown up by unknown people were the cause for the Chechen war.
Putin came to power on the idea of order, his KGB past was a kind of guarantee for future stability, not only in the Caucasus but also in Russia itself. The cruel, bloody and senseless war in the Caucasus and the genocide of the local population, under the new term clearance, are still on-going, as are the killings in Moscow, Saint Petersburg and in other cities and towns. Entering the Kremlin on the back of his Chechen horse, Putin would like to use the same horse to keep the same Kremlin residence. We could not rescue everybody. Please forgive us, he told the people. Rescue is an inadequate verb. There are too many questions and too few answers. Doctors and nurses are not permitted to answer the questions. The authorities are trying to justify themselvesby saying that if these 150 (give or take) did not die, 700 would have.
This logic cancels itself out very few might have had to die. Moscow reporter Anna Polytkovskaya, who was the last person from the outside world to have spoken with the terrorists, thought that there was a chance for a peaceful result. In the meantime, state TV does not show facts and figures, official media releases are praising the victory of the Special Forces and only a few newspapers report doubts about the official version. The postfactum is so obvious that it reveals the participants of this fact. It was Putin himself who once uttered the formula of his power the ears should not stick out. His subordinates didnt listen to their leader the ears are sticking out.
Comrade Stalin used to say that a fact is a stubborn thing. Only figures are worse than facts. As they say, we counted and cried. But I am not sure that the people the Kremlin trusted to count the dead are crying. I am not sure they know about the tear of a child written by Dostoevsky.
Its thing to flush gangsters down the toilet; its another thing to flush down gangsters together with hostages. Ezhi Len once said that traces of a crime lead to future. The traces of the eight-year Chechen war lead back to Moscow, where it started.