Rebellion in Russia

The obscure land called Chechnya is about the size of Connecticut, a mere pinprick even on a large world map. Its 1.3 million people make up less than 1% of the population of the Russian Federation from which it is trying to secede. But the war in this mountain enclave in the northern Caucasus involves stakes that are hardly Ruritanian. Obviously, there are the lives of many thousands of Chechens and Russian soldiers that could be snuffed out in the promised guerrilla struggle; at week's end, at least 16 and possibly 70 Russians -- counts differed wildly -- and hundreds of Chechens had already fallen in heavy fighting. Even more ominous, a drawn-out campaign could deal a devastating blow to Boris Yeltsin's presidency and Russia's endangered democracy.

The survival of Russia as a single country could also be imperiled. A successful bid for independence by Chechnya could encourage secessionist movements in scores of other unhappy ethnic and economic enclaves. On a broader canvas still, the worldwide trend of small ethnic groups to break away from larger sovereignties and form their own mini-nations could get either a stiff setback or a strong boost from Chechnya's fate.

Though Russia sent in a heavy force on Dec. 11 to stop the rebellion, and the Chechens vowed to fight, both sides appeared to be drawing back from a blood-soaked showdown. As many as 40,000 Russian troops converged on the Chechen capital of Grozny but were holding off on a final assault. Yeltsin extended for 48 hours, until Saturday midnight, an ultimatum for Chechens to surrender their weapons. His first ultimatum was a flat failure; as it was about to expire Thursday, the Moscow news agency TASS reported that "not a single gun has been turned in." On Saturday, Moscow issued a harsher threat: missile strikes against strategic targets in Grozny if the Chechens did not disarm. The rebels refused to blink. Said a spokesman: "When the bombing starts, we will first go to our shelters. When it is finished, the command will go out to our forces to defend the city against the Russian attack."

On Wednesday, Dec. 14, Chechen president Jokhar Dudayev had broken off negotiations with a Russian team and summoned his people to "a war for life or death." But on Friday he proclaimed a cease-fire and announced that he would reopen talks. The stated positions of the two sides would seem to leave nothing to talk about. Dudayev was demanding that Russia immediately pull out its forces and recognize the full independence he had proclaimed for Chechnya three years ago, while Yeltsin insisted as a precondition for any withdrawal that the Chechens disarm and end their secession. The view in Moscow was that by extending his ultimatum and appealing for new talks, Yeltsin had made significant concessions and was looking for a way to avoid continuing the war.

Certainly Yeltsin appeared unlikely to win any cheap or easy victory. His forces could probably storm and occupy Grozny, a city of 400,000, within hours. But that would begin rather than end the war. Dudayev has called on his ! people to "strike and withdraw, strike and withdraw" until the invaders flee in "fear and terror." That was the strategy Chechen forebears followed in fighting czarist armies. They lost, but it took the Russians 47 years between 1817 and 1864 to subdue them.