Making a Martyr

In life, warriors are judged by their prowess on the battlefield; in death, by the manner of their dying. When Russian special forces cornered Chechen separatist leader Aslan Maskhadov in a basement in the village of Tolstoy Yurt, Chechnya, last week, they offered him the chance to surrender. When he refused, the Russians say, they blasted the concrete bunker in which he was hiding, killing him in the process.

That final gesture of defiance has transformed Maskhadov's reputation. For years, many former comrades disdained him as a weak political leader who, after a victorious war of secession against Russia in the mid-1990s, allowed thugs and religious fanatics to take over Chechnya. Radical guerrillas scorned him for his desire to negotiate with the Russians. Many ordinary Chechens reviled him as the cause of their misery. Now, Maskhadov has become a martyr for Islam and his beleaguered nation, and his death could lead to a further escalation of the brutal war with Russia.

No one in Chechnya dared openly mark Maskhadov's death; at least eight of his relatives disappeared last December, according to local and national press reports, in an apparent effort by the pro-Russian Chechen administration to force his surrender. But there are signs of a groundswell of support for the only Chechen President whose election was recognized as legitimate by the international community. "He did not run and he did not surrender, like the Imam Shamil," says one Chechen who fought alongside Maskhadov in the mid-1990s, recalling the legendary 19th century Chechen guerrilla who lived comfortably in Russian exile. "He was a difficult man, hard to read and closed. But we have forgiven him."

Kavkaz Chat, a website funded by radical Islamists, had little time for Maskhadov when he was alive. Within hours of his death, however, it was deluged with hundreds of messages hailing him as a national hero and shahid, or martyr, for Islam. Radical guerrilla leaders added a twist to the message. Maskhadov's death, their chief propagandist, Movladi Udugov, declared, marks a "new period" in the war with Russia. There will be no negotiations or temporary halts in fighting, he said, vowing the war will end "only when the regime that generates and nourishes aggression against the Chechen state and Muslims of the Caucasus is finally annihilated."

As the Soviet Union began to crumble in the early 1990s, Maskhadov, an artillery colonel, returned to Chechnya to mastermind the military strategy for its 1994-96 revolt against Russia. Elected Chechen President by a landslide in 1997, he quickly lost support for failing to stop the republic's descent into anarchy. After late 1999, when Russian forces reinvaded Chechnya and overthrew his secessionist government, Maskhadov became a fugitive, constantly on the move and relying largely on couriers for his communications. Three or four bodyguards usually accompanied him, while mobile security teams — most recently, about 15 men posing as pro-Russian strongman Ramzan Kadyrov's police — stayed within radio range if needed.