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Abstract
Insurgencies have proven to be highly adaptive movements that exploit their environments and change and mutate in order to survive. States and international actors have long grappled with ways to thwart such adaptations. In this respect, disengagement initiatives that offer insurgents opportunities for alternative livelihood seem to present a viable mechanism for weakening insurgencies. Analyzing the case of the North Caucasus insurgency, this article examines the interrelation between such variables as insurgent crises, government disengagement programs, and foreign attempts to co-opt the insurgency. It is argued that disengagement programs implemented during the second Chechen conflict prevented the insurgent command from pledging allegiance to Al-Qaeda because insurgents had to preserve their local orientation to compete for their bases of support. In 2014, however, the North Caucasus insurgents pledged allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria as no viable disengagement opportunities existed at the time and their only route for survival was to join a global insurgency.
Notes
1. See Mendelsohn, The Al Qaeda Franchise.
2. Phillips, “Terrorist Group Cooperation.”
3. Joscelyn, “Osama Bin Laden’s Files.”
4. Vinci, “Immortal Insurgencies.”
5. Gunaratna, “The Post-Madrid Face of Al Qaeda.”
6. Biddle, “Afghanistan and the Future of Warfare.”
7. Serena, It Takes More than a Network.
8. Horgan, Walking away from Terrorism.
9. Bjorgo and Horgan, Leaving Terrorism Behind, 4.
10. Mehta, Lost Victory.
11. Noricks, “Disengagement and Deradicalization,” 302.
12. Fink and Hearne, Beyond Terrorism.
13. Checkel, Transnational Dynamics of Civil War.
14. Bakke, “Help Wanted?”
15. Orlov and Cherkasov, Rossiia – Chechnya.
16. “Chechenskii uzel.”
17. Ibid.
18. “Grozny sobiraet vse.”
19. Sokirko, “Prizraki voiny.”
20. For more on the Chechen insurgencies see Orlov and Cherkasov, Rossiia – Chechnya; Cohen, Russia’s Counterinsurgency in North Caucasus; Schaefer, The Insurgency in Chechnya; and Kramer, “The Perils of Counterinsurgency.”
21. “Pervaiia chechenskaiia.”
22. “Guerillas to target Russia.”
23. “Chechens plan to force Russian troops.”
24. “Vse chechenskie amnistii.”
25. Ibid.
26. “Amnistiia boevikov zakonchilas’.”
27. See note 16 above.
28. “Srok ul’timatuma istek.”
29. “Voiskam meshaiut boeviki.”
30. “Kommentarii voennykh spetsialistov.”
31. Vidino, “The Arab Foreign Fighters.”
32. Kudriavtsev, “Arabskie ‘afgantsy.’”
33. Williams, “The ‘Chechen Arabs.’”
34. Al-Suwailem, The Experience of the Arab Ansar.
35. Bin Laden, “Declaration of War.”
36. “Itogi kontrterroristicheskoi operatsii.”
37. Akhmadov and Lanskoy, The Chechen Struggle.
38. Akhmadov and Daniloff, Chechnya’s Secret Wartime Diplomacy.
39. “The Taliban formally recognizes Chechnya.”
40. Borisov, “Maskhadov pochti ne slyshen.”
41. See Bakke, ‘Help Wanted?’; and Pokalova, Chechnya’s Terrorist Network.
42. Al-Zawahiri, “Al-Sharq Al-Awsat Publishes.”
43. Bin Laden, “Al-Sahab Media Releases”; and Al-Zawahiri, “Al-Sharq Al-Awsat Publishes.”
44. Akaev, “Severnokavkazskii vakhkhabizm.”
45. Format preserved from the original. Souleimanov and Aliyev, The Individual Disengagement of Avengers, 64.
46. Ibid., 62.
47. See note 24 above.
48. “Massovye kapituliatsii v Chechne.”
49. “V Chechne istek srok amnistii.”
50. Stepanov, “Kto i kak.”
51. See Pokalova, Chechnya’s Terrorist Network.
52. Stepanov and Sokolova, “Za 4 dnia sdalis’.”
53. See note 26 above.
54. See Ware, “Chechenization”; Russell, “Ramzan Kadyrov”; Sakwa, “The Revenge of the Caucasus”; and Souleimanov, “An Ethnography of Counterinsurgency.”
55. Ware, “Chechenization,” 159.
56. “Kadyrov Akhmad (Akhmat-khadzhi).”
57. See note 48 above.
58. See note 49 above.
59. Krechetnikov, “Chechenskie siloviki.”
60. Allenova, “Ramzan Kadyrov zabral sebe sdachu.”
61. See note 26 above.
62. “O proekte amnistii.”
63. See Pokalova, Chechnya’s Terrorist Network.
64. Kara-Murza, “Islamskoe podpol’e.”
65. “Severnyi Kavkaz – statistika zhertv.”
66. Bondarenko, “Na Severnom Kavkaze deistvuiut.”
67. Counter-Terrorism in the North Caucasus.
68. Yemelianova, Radical Islam.
69. Sagramoso, “The Radicalization of Islamic.”
70. “Ofitsial’nyi reliz zaiavleniia.”
71. Bocharova, “Amiry otkololis’.”
72. Iaroshevskii, “Doku Umarov protiv.”
73. See The North Caucasus Insurgency and Syria.
74. Charnyi, “Vozmozhnost’ sozdaniia.”
75. Isaev and Gadzhieva, “V Dagestane komissia.”
76. Khrustaleva, “V Ingushetii 70 byvshikh.”
77. “Komissiia po adaptatsii boevikov.”
78. See note 76 above.
79. Starodubrovskaia and Kazenin, Severnyi Kavkaz.
80. See note 73 above.
81. Ibid., 16.
82. Ibid.
83. Federal Law 302.
84. “Obrashchenie Amira Imarata Kavkaz.”
85. “‘Imarat Kavkaz’ vstupil v konfrontatsiiu.”
86. Paraszczuk, “Umar Shishani’s Right-Hand Man.”
87. The North Caucasus Insurgency and Syria, 7.
88. National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START).
89. “North Caucasian Fighters in Syria and Iraq.”