Robert Schaefer, colonel of an elite squad of the US Army Green Beret, who in the early 2000s, became one of the main developers of the plan of military exercises in Georgia, and later as a result of years of research wrote the book “The Insurgency in Chechnya and the North Caucasus: From Gazavat to Jihad”, gave an interview to radio station Voice of America, in which he told about the Jihad in the Caucasus Emirate.
According to him, today in the Caucasus there is a war of liberation, which the Russian stubbornly refuse to call such by a very obvious reasons:
“If they suddenly started saying that they have there a rebellion and rebels, then they would have to admit that there is a war going on in the Caucasus, and this means that there may have reasons for dissatisfaction, and perhaps there is reason to negotiate with the other side”, says Schaefer.
According to him, in the Caucasus Emirate there is a liberation Jihad in its full bloom. And this Jihad is the later manifestation of the war, which continues in the Caucasus over last 300 years.
“Resistance is transformed, and there were periods of complete calm. But if you look big, then what is happening now is not much different from what happened in the mid-19th century”, said Col. Schaefer
He offers to look at the types of operations carried out by the Mujahideen: obviously there are attacks that are the manifestation of a guerrilla war. According to him, the overwhelming number of Mujahideen attacks directed at invaders and minions.
“According to international military law, they are all combatants – and are regarded as legitimate targets”, indicates Col. Schaefer.
He criticizes the bankrupt Russian statements on ending the war in the North Caucasus:
“In certain months the number of dead Russian soldiers and officers in the North Caucasus exceeds the number of coalition soldiers killed in the hottest periods of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan (as Schaefer is a member of American aggressors, then the estimates of eliminated Americans he will have official, Pentagon’s).
And no one says these conflicts are over. Then why do not we call the Caucasian war a conflict?”, asks the colonel.
The problem of the Kremlin, says Robert Schaefer, is a wrong approach to the war in the Caucasus Emirate. Full control over the information flow gives Russia an advantage and an opportunity to form in the West the position it needs in regard to the Caucasian war.
At the same time, says Col. Schaefer, Russia can not stop the growth of Jihad “precisely because of the falsification of reality”.
“Improper identification of the enemy deprives government of possibility of forming programs and strategies that would stop the violence (even the Americans with “their programs and strategies could not stop the Jihad in Afghanistan). The designation of each and every terrorist is not useful to anyone …
Terrorism and insurgency is different phenomena. And it is impossible to apply against insurgency the technique of struggle with terrorism … There is a insurgency. If they are going to have to deal with the real problem, it requires an entirely different set of skills and operations”, Schaefer advises Russians.
According to him, after the formation of the Caucasus Emirate in 2007, the Mujahideen are capable of operating much more efficiently.
Jihad is spreading. Significantly increased the number of attacks on the invaders and minions, the territory of combat has spread across the region.
The main part of this conflict – the inhabitants of the Caucasus Emirate, said Schaefer, and now they fear not the Mujahideen, but the invaders and minions. “This is the main problem of Russians”, says the colonel.
“And the main lesson to be learned from all this kind of war, lies in the fact that communication is much more important part of what is happening on the battlefield. This tiny, invisible war is going on continually in millions of places throughout the Caucasus. And each man stands there in front of such a choice”, concludes Schaefer.
Department of Monitoring
Kavkaz Center
