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[smjjames]

If we're speaking about Chechnya, then slavery of ethnic majorities e.g. Russians was also widespread in the early 90s in Chechnya. One of the top favorite activities of Chechens at the time was to drive through Russians cities, steal people from the streets, move them back into Chechnya and then either ask for a ransom, or simply use them as slaves.

Proof?

[Owlbread]

If we're speaking about Chechnya, then slavery of ethnic majorities e.g. Russians was also widespread in the early 90s in Chechnya. One of the top favorite activities of Chechens at the time was to drive through Russians cities, steal people from the streets, move them back into Chechnya and then either ask for a ransom, or simply use them as slaves.

I was going to include Russians in the list of ethnic minorities taken as slaves but I wasn't sure if there were more than a handful of Russians in Chechnya to enslave at any point. The idea of people being kidnapped for that purpose is new to me but I am not surprised. Russians in this context are an ethnic minority though, not a majority. If Russian slaves were taken they were taken from one country into a different one.

That said, it would help clear things up if someone could provide evidence of widespread enslavement of ethnic Russian civilians.

I also find the claim that a government, that has "next to no control" and have spawned dozens of warlords, was "pretty good", highly dubious.

It was a good government in the moral sense. It had pretences of democracy (unlike Chechnya under modern Russian rule) and was opposed to Islamic extremism to the greatest degree it could be while pretty much 70% of the country's defence lay in the hands of extremist militias. In practice that meant marginalising Islamist politicians, trying to run investigations into terrorist activities and engaging in open gun battles/skirmishes with the militias.

[Sergarr]

If we're speaking about Chechnya, then slavery of ethnic majorities e.g. Russians was also widespread in the early 90s in Chechnya. One of the top favorite activities of Chechens at the time was to drive through Russians cities, steal people from the streets, move them back into Chechnya and then either ask for a ransom, or simply use them as slaves.

Proof?

https://translate.google.ru/translate?sl=ru&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=ru&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.1tv.ru%2Fnews%2Fabout%2F105187&edit-text=&act=url

This is why Russians wanted to stop Chechnya from seceding, by the way. Not because they didn't particularly wanted them to get independent, no. But to stop this from happening.

[smjjames]

If we're speaking about Chechnya, then slavery of ethnic majorities e.g. Russians was also widespread in the early 90s in Chechnya. One of the top favorite activities of Chechens at the time was to drive through Russians cities, steal people from the streets, move them back into Chechnya and then either ask for a ransom, or simply use them as slaves.

Proof?

https://translate.google.ru/translate?sl=ru&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=ru&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.1tv.ru%2Fnews%2Fabout%2F105187&edit-text=&act=url

This is why Russians wanted to stop Chechnya from seceding, by the way. Not because they didn't particularly wanted them to get independent, no. But to stop this from happening.

Got a third party non-russian source? Just asking because I know how biased Russian media is.

[Owlbread]

I don't think the answer to kidnappings is to invade, occupy and annexe Chechnya. Instead the Russian government could have worked with the Chechen one to eradicate the criminals and Islamists. I can't find any real fault in that Perviy Kanal link because I am not Chechen and I wasn't there,  but the channel is known to be a direct mouthpiece for the Putin administration. Its main agenda is to present government policy as successful and the way it refers to kidnappings drying up after the year 2000 or so does seem to be pushing that agenda.

Russians can read that article and think "Those kidnappings were terrible, I'm so glad we invaded that tiny, destitute mountain country at the expense of billions of rubles and thousands of Russian lives so Kadyrov can now drive around Grozny in sports cars waving a gold plated AK47 paid for with my taxes, spitting on women who don't wear head scarves". Russian mothers can rest easy knowing their sons died for important things.

That's probably all incredibly disrespectful but I feel the same way about our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

[Sergarr]

If we're speaking about Chechnya, then slavery of ethnic majorities e.g. Russians was also widespread in the early 90s in Chechnya. One of the top favorite activities of Chechens at the time was to drive through Russians cities, steal people from the streets, move them back into Chechnya and then either ask for a ransom, or simply use them as slaves.

Proof?

https://translate.google.ru/translate?sl=ru&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=ru&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.1tv.ru%2Fnews%2Fabout%2F105187&edit-text=&act=url

This is why Russians wanted to stop Chechnya from seceding, by the way. Not because they didn't particularly wanted them to get independent, no. But to stop this from happening.

Got a third party non-russian source? Just asking because I know how biased Russian media is.

I've found this:

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/chechnya-sl/conversations/topics/1122

Relevant part:

KHASBULATOV: ....I can assure you that Chechnya is not fighting for its
independence. 90-95% of the people are fighting for THEIR LIVES. To save
their lives, and the lives of their children. Since the war ended in 1996,
the new authorities have built what is essentially a concentration camp. I
mean Maskhadov has. What we see is gangs of bandits, stealing people,
throwing them in pits, selling them...

[smjjames]

If we're speaking about Chechnya, then slavery of ethnic majorities e.g. Russians was also widespread in the early 90s in Chechnya. One of the top favorite activities of Chechens at the time was to drive through Russians cities, steal people from the streets, move them back into Chechnya and then either ask for a ransom, or simply use them as slaves.

Proof?

https://translate.google.ru/translate?sl=ru&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=ru&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.1tv.ru%2Fnews%2Fabout%2F105187&edit-text=&act=url

This is why Russians wanted to stop Chechnya from seceding, by the way. Not because they didn't particularly wanted them to get independent, no. But to stop this from happening.

Got a third party non-russian source? Just asking because I know how biased Russian media is.

I've found this:

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/chechnya-sl/conversations/topics/1122

Relevant part:

KHASBULATOV: ....I can assure you that Chechnya is not fighting for its
independence. 90-95% of the people are fighting for THEIR LIVES. To save
their lives, and the lives of their children. Since the war ended in 1996,
the new authorities have built what is essentially a concentration camp. I
mean Maskhadov has. What we see is gangs of bandits, stealing people,
throwing them in pits, selling them...

Yeah, people in general, not just Russians, and I'm with Owlbread in saying that invading and annexing Chechenya would have solved nothing. The problem is that Chechenya was a massive mess, one that a war wasn't going to solve.

[Sergarr]

The fact is, the war didn't actually solve it, but supporting one warlord to kill all of the others did. As bad as Kadyrov is, he's preferable to what was before him. He of course would need to get replaced in the future, with an actual administrator and not warlord-pretending-to-be-an-administrator, but without instating him, that would not be possible.

[Owlbread]

Khasbulatov is an interesting figure. On the one hand he is a Russian and politically pro-Russian and his analysis is pretty terrible (e.g. claiming "Maskhadov is just as bad as Basayev!" then providing no evidence) but his conclusions are entirely at odds with what ultimately happened in Chechnya. He suggested Chechnya's independence should be respected, but the state rebuilt from the ground up and power given to the people. I also don't understand his idea of Chechens "fighting for survival" - they could simply throw down their arms and proclaim allegiance to Russia to save their villages. The fact that guerrillas are still fighting Russian security services even now under the glorious paternal hand of Putin shows they have extensive public support. They simply couldn't survive without it.

[smjjames]

The fact is, the war didn't actually solve it, but supporting one warlord to kill all of the others did. As bad as Kadyrov is, he's preferable to what was before him. He of course would need to get replaced in the future, with an actual administrator and not warlord-pretending-to-be-an-administrator, but without instating him, that would not be possible.

He'd have to be replaced with an actual government, not just 'an actual adminstrator'.

[Owlbread]

The fact is, the war didn't actually solve it, but supporting one warlord to kill all of the others did. As bad as Kadyrov is, he's preferable to what was before him. He of course would need to get replaced in the future, with an actual administrator and not warlord-pretending-to-be-an-administrator, but without instating him, that would not be possible.

He'd have to be replaced with an actual government, not just 'an actual adminstrator'.

All of my this.

[Sergarr]

Well, an actual government is obviously included with an actual administrator packet...

[Descan]

Not really. A dictator could be an actual administrator. :V

[Sergarr]

Not really. A dictator could be an actual administrator. :V

And a dictator cannot actually function without a government to carry out his orders.

[smjjames]

Not really. A dictator could be an actual administrator. :V

And a dictator cannot actually function without a government to carry out his orders.

I meant a non-dictator government.