--- John Bizwas <bizwas at lycos.com> wrote:
First, I'm just not very interested in the spiked article -- sorry, it just doesn't shed much light, positive or negative, on the situation IMHO so I'm going to forget about it and pass on to material that I think is relevant. Mea culpa.
> Made all too abundantly clear by all sides in the
> matter, including Putin's government announcing
> efforts to re-double mutual efforts in the struggle
> against terrorism with Israel (oh, or maybe he
> hadn't noticed that this country is a major exporter
> of state-sponsored terror, perhaps not, he's a busy
> guy, fighting terror and taking tips from Sharon).
Why shouldn't Russia cooperate on information sharing with Israel? Israel has a lot of data. So does Saudi Arabia, with which Russia concluded an anti-terrorist agreement a couple of weeks ago.
>
> Yet other reports deny this while talking of
> Ukrainians and turncoat anti-terrorist police hired
> in Ossetia. I'm all ears if you've got the lowdown
> because I really do want to understand and know
> more.
I believe you are referring to the Ingush policeman who was implicated? None of these contradict each other. Basayev mentioned Chechens, Ingush, Slavs, Arabs and others. The information I have been receving is very contradictory.
>
> Which segues to discussion of the Igor Rotar
> article. First off, like the spikedonline article, I
> can't quite grasp the ideology that motivates the
> article. I mean, I'm not a Russian Orthodox
> nationalist nor am I someone who thinks Clinton was
> a leftist. Nor would I cite Huntington to support a
> thesis. But I will try to be generous here:
I don't know if you are implying that Rotar is a Russian Orthodox nationalist or not. I have no idea if he is, but Russian Orthodox nationalism is quite weak (note the rapidly declining prestige of the arch-Russian Orthodox nationalist Solzhenitsyn, who thinks Russia should abandon all the non-Christian territories so as to have a purely Slavic Orthodox country). Rotare is probably trying to be trendy by tossing in a Western reference (and he's writing for a Western audience, after all). Few people in Russia believe that a "clash of civilizations" is in the works. I think that if such a class does occur, it will be because Bush is creating it.
> So is an opponent of the opposition in Tajik a
> pro-establishment person? And what is that
> establishment? I'm confused. There seemed to be a
> lot of interference in independent Tajikistan from
> Iran and from Russia.
And from Uzbekistan and Turkey, AFAIK.
>
> Asking in all earnestness now, did some Shia
> fundamentalists(a major minority in Tajikistan) form
> a unity front with Sunna fundamentalists in the
> Tajikistan conflict? I would predict Iran backing
> Shia factions, as they did in the Afghanistan civil
> wars of the 1990s. Do you have a profile of the
> major viable factions? At the start, and now that a
> more stable form of post-Soviet government has
> emerged?
I don't know Tajik history very well at all, so I have no comment. "More stable" should I think definitely be understood in terms of "stable only against an alternative of civil war." Tajikistan is in bad, bad shape. 1/7 of Tajik citizens are in Russia working as Gastarbeiters.
> I doubt that because apparently some of the
> criticism was coming from Shia groups backed by Iran
> and , as far as I know, there is just no way to
> refer with derision to them as 'Wahhabi' in any
> serious way.
"Wahhabi," as the study I sent illustrates, is not understood in a sophisticated sense but the people who use it in the fSU. It is a blanket term for "those foreign-influenced Muslims who barge in and tell us how we, supposedly fake Muslims, should live our lives."
>
> This makes sense and seems quite reasonable. Sharia
> law is one way of imposing a system that treats
> everyone on the same footing (however, traditional,
> fundamentalist, and with different rights according
> to gender), at least in theory. It can be
> interpreted, declared and manifested in practice as
> a 'fair' system of rule for many traditional
> systems, and people of various backgrounds can adapt
> to it even as it evolves in actual practice over
> time. In other words, it is one way in the world to
> overcome ethnic differences and even quell
> conflicts.
>
In fact I believe that one of the main reasons for the growth of "Wahabbism" in Chechnya from 1996-1999 was to quell tribal conflicts by providing a unifying ideology that transcended clan ties. Chechnya, especially in the mountains, is a tribal society (actually kinship-based, but I'm not going to split hairs). There are about 160 different Chechen "tribes" (teips), who historically have been fighting each other whenever they haven't been more-or-less united against an external force. I think that this is probably a significant factor that caused Chechen society (what was left of it), which had been sort-of united against the Russian Army from 1994-1996, to immediately collapse into inter-clan bloodshed after Chechnya achieved de facto independence. The introduction of Shariah was probably an attempt to rectify this.
> So one distinction that might need clarified here
> is, are these national identities really a
> post-Soviet form quite analogous to 19th century
> nationalism (where the artifices of state and the
> mother culture and language become the basis of a
> new religion)? One drift of your ongoing argument
> Chris, is that they aren't traditional nationalists
> but something else. I deny the Huntington thesis of
> supercultural groupings in inevitable conflict.
I deny the Huntington thesis as well. I do not believe (in contradistinction to the article) that "Wahabbism" in the sense I'm talking about is usually similar or supplemental to nationalism. I think that, in many or most cases, it serves as a _substitute_ for nationalism. It served to some extent, for instance, to unite the various Chechen clans, which have very little concept of being part of a single "nation" at all.
Moreover, nationalism in the fSU, execpt perhaps in its Russian form, is pretty much a spent force, and has always been largely an ideology of the intelligentsia. "Wahabbism," on the other hand, has attracted, not the intelligentsia, but rural, poorly educated, and very very poor people. In Uzbeksistan, for instance, it is not (mainly) people in Tashkent -- which is educated, cosmopolitan, and affluent by the standards of Central Asia -- but the people who live in villages.
Let's use Chechnya, as it is the quintessential example. Who supported the nationalists and, later, the "Wahabbis"? It was not the Chechen intelligentsia, who fled en masse from 1991-1996 and no live mostly in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Nor was it the plains Chechens, who are more urbanized and de-tribalized, had more access to education and income from the oil industry, and are historically more-or-less pro-Russian. The people who supported them were mostly mountain Chechens, who live by farming, are largely uneducated (especially today, given 10 years of conflict), base their lives around their teip membership, and are very poor. They were the ones to whom the ideas of "Chechen exceptionalism" and later "Wahabbism" appealed.
(By "Chechen exceptionalism" I mean the idea, expressed by Nukhayev and others, that Chechens, uniquely out of all the Caucasian peoples, have the capability to form an independent state without Russia. This is because, so the ideology goes, the Chechens are historically alien to civilization and therefore can do without the blandishments of cities, electricity and so forth that are only possible with the assistance that Moscow can provide. Later this became transformed into the idea that the Chechens -- as the numerically largest Caucasian people and the only ones who have remained true to their roots -- are destined to lead the Caucasus, by force if need be, back to the premodern ways of their ancestors.)
On
> the other hand, I also tend to theorize and hope for
> some supergroupings that can reconcile differences,
> find commonalities. If, for example, western
> Trinitarian Christianity, its proponents and
> believers, could come to recognize Islam as the
> major line of evolution of NON-TRINITARIAN branch of
> CHRISTIANITY, might they come to see that there is
> more in common than in conflict?
I agree with you.
>
> BTW, even Russians cite the 'destructive' influence
> of the West.
That depends on which Russians -- certainly today the
pro-Western forces in Russia are in serious decline
(they are associated with the Yeltsin era, selling out
the country's interests, etc.).
>
> Well, that's a nice little leap of 'therefore', but
> I'm not sure I can make it. The Uzbek vs. Tajik
> dichotomy is one largely created by Russian dominion
> over the region, and they are basically,
> linguistically speaking, Turks.
Uzbek is a Turkish language. Tajik is Persian, although yes they were Turkified because of the invasion of the Khans. Tajikistan, unless I am wrong, has only had one experience of statehood before 1991 -- the 10th-century Perso-Arabic Samanid empire. Uzbekistan experienced statehood from the 1500s until the fell to Russia around 1850. The people who are now the Uzbeks subjugated many of the Tajiks in the 1500s and created vassal states, if I am not mistaken. So the Uzbek-Tajik dichotomy precedes their assimilation into the Russian Empire. Tajikistan is also largely rural and tribal -- the tribes can't even decide on a single anthem they all like -- and is almost a classic example of a failed state. Uzbekistan has a large educated, urban population and is a nominally functioning state. So there are big differences between them.
Both republics were kicked out of the USSR. They did not want to leave.
>
> Also, the US wanted Turkey to assert influence in
> the region to offset Russian and Iranian power, but
> then also worried about fundamentalists in Turkey
> asserting too much power. Now the US even has
> military bases in the region, while Turkey's
> government is more keen on getting into the EU and
> pursuing a European future.
I have heard a great deal of speculation about Turkey's role in the region, but little hard data. Do you have anything handy?
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