First Chechen War

{{Main|Chechen–Russian conflict}}

Chechen resistance against Russian imperialism has its origins as early as 1785 during the rule of Sheikh Mansur, the first imam of the Caucasian peoples. Uniting various North-Caucausian nations under his command, Sheikh Mansur sought to repel Russian invasion and expansion into the region.

Despite intense resistance during the 1817–1864 Caucasian War, Imperial Russian forces defeated the Chechens, annexed their lands, and deported thousands to the Middle East throughout the latter half of the 19th century.

Following the Russian Revolution and collapse of the Russian Empire in 1917, Chechen efforts to assert independence failed, and by 1922 Chechnya was incorporated into the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) - the largest member state of the newly-formed Soviet Union (USSR). In 1936, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin established the Checheno-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, within the Russian SFSR.

{{Main|1940–1944 insurgency in Chechnya}}

In 1944, on the orders of NKVD chief Lavrentiy Beria, more than 500,000 Chechens, the Ingush and several other North Caucasian people were ethnically cleansed and deported to Siberia and Central Asia. The official pretext was punishment for collaboration with invading German forces during the 1940–1944 insurgency in Chechnya,{{Cite web |last=Aurélie |first=Campana |date=2007-11-05 |title=The Massive Deportation of the Chechen People: How and why Chechens were Deported |url=https://www.sciencespo.fr/mass-violence-war-massacre-resistance/en/document/massive-deportation-chechen-people-how-and-why-chechens-were-deported.html|access-date=2022-02-06 |website=Sciences Po |language=en |archive-date=2024-09-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240906142740/https://www.sciencespo.fr/mass-violence-war-massacre-resistance/en/document/massive-deportation-chechen-people-how-and-why-chechens-were-deported.html |url-status=live}} despite the fact that many Chechens and Ingush were loyal to the Soviet government and fought against the Nazis and they even received the highest military awards in the Soviet Union (e.g. Khanpasha Nuradilov and Movlid Visaitov). In March 1944, the Soviet authorities abolished the Checheno-Ingush Republic. Eventually, Soviet first secretary Nikita Khrushchev granted the Vainakh (Chechen and Ingush) peoples permission to return to their homeland and he restored their republic in 1957.{{Cite web |url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/uncategorized/explore-chechnyas-turbulent-past-1944-deportation/3314/ |title=Explore Chechnya's Turbulent Past ~ 1944: Deportation | Wide Angle | PBS |website=PBS |date=25 July 2002 |access-date=9 April 2022 |archive-date=9 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220409015830/https://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/uncategorized/explore-chechnyas-turbulent-past-1944-deportation/3314/ |url-status=live}}

{{unreferenced section|date=December 2023}}

Russia became an independent state after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991. The Russian Federation was widely accepted as the successor state to the USSR, but it lost a significant amount of its military and economic power. Ethnic Russians made up more than 80% of the population of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, but significant ethnic and religious differences posed a threat of political disintegration in some regions. In the Soviet period, some of Russia's approximately 100 nationalities were granted ethnic enclaves that had various formal federal rights attached. Relations of these entities with the federal government and demands for autonomy erupted into a major political issue in the early 1990s. Boris Yeltsin incorporated these demands into his 1990 election campaign by claiming that their resolution was a high priority.

There was an urgent need for a law to clearly define the powers of each federal subject. Such a law was passed on 31 March 1992, when Yeltsin and Ruslan Khasbulatov, then chairman of the Russian Supreme Soviet and an ethnic Chechen himself, signed the Federation Treaty bilaterally with 86 out of 88 federal subjects. In almost all cases, demands for greater autonomy or independence were satisfied by concessions of regional autonomy and tax privileges. The treaty outlined three basic types of federal subjects and the powers that were reserved for local and federal government. The only federal subjects that did not sign the treaty were Chechnya and Tatarstan. Eventually, in early 1994, Yeltsin signed a special political accord with Mintimer Shaeymiev, the president of Tatarstan, granting many of its demands for greater autonomy for the republic within Russia. Thus, Chechnya remained the only federal subject that did not sign the treaty. Neither Yeltsin nor the Chechen government attempted any serious negotiations and the situation deteriorated into a full-scale conflict.

Meanwhile, on 6 September 1991, militants of the All-National Congress of the Chechen People (NCChP) party, created by the former Soviet Air Force general Dzhokhar Dudayev, stormed a session of the Supreme Soviet of the Checheno-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, with the aim of asserting independence. The storming caused the death of the head of Grozny's branch of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Vitaliy Kutsenko, who was defenestrated or fell while trying to escape. This effectively dissolved the government of the Checheno-Ingush Autonomous Republic of the Soviet Union.{{cite book |title=The Chechen Wars: Will Russia Go the Way of the Soviet Union? |first=Matthew |last=Evangelista |location=Washington |publisher=Brookings Institution Press |year=2002 |page=[https://archive.org/details/chechenwars00matt/page/18 18] |isbn=978-0-8157-2498-8 |url=https://archive.org/details/chechenwars00matt/page/18 }}{{cite book |title=Russia's Chechen War |first=Tracey C. |last=German |location=New York |publisher=RoutledgeCurzon |year=2003 |isbn=978-0-415-29720-2 |page=176 }}{{cite book |title=Chechnya: Calamity in the Caucasus |author-link=Carlotta Gall |first1=Carlotta |last1=Gall |author-link2=Thomas De Waal |first2=Thomas |last2=De Waal |location=New York |publisher=New York University Press |year=1998 |isbn=978-0-8147-2963-2 |page=[https://archive.org/details/chechnyacalamity00gall/page/96 96] |quote=Vitaly Kutsenko, the elderly First Secretary of the town soviet either was defenestrated or tried to clamber out to escape the crowd. |url=https://archive.org/details/chechnyacalamity00gall/page/96 }}

Elections for the president and parliament of Chechnya were held on 27 October 1991. The day before, the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union published a notice in the local Chechen press that the elections were illegal. With a turnout of 72%, 90.1% voted for Dudayev.{{cite web |url=https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/2630476 |title=Первая война |trans-title=First war |language=ru |website=kommersant.ru |date=13 December 2014 |quote=... По данным Центризбиркома Чечено-Ингушетии, в выборах принимают участие 72% избирателей, за генерала Дудаева голосуют 412,6 тыс. человек (90,1%) ...' |access-date=September 4, 2020 |archive-date=7 May 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170507230240/http://www.kommersant.ru/doc/2630476 |url-status=live }}

Dudayev won overwhelming popular support (as evidenced by the later presidential elections with high turnout and a clear Dudayev victory) to oust the interim administration supported by the central government. He became president and declared independence from the Soviet Union.

In November 1991, Yeltsin dispatched Internal Troops to Grozny, but they were forced to withdraw when Dudayev's forces surrounded them at the airport. After Chechnya made its initial declaration of sovereignty, the Checheno-Ingush Autonomous Republic split in two in June 1992 amidst the armed conflict between the Ingush and Ossetians. The newly created Republic of Ingushetia then joined the Russian Federation, while Chechnya declared full independence from Moscow in 1993 as the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria (ChRI).

File:Evstafiev-chechnya-iternal-praying.jpg's supporters pray in front of the Presidential Palace in Grozny, 1994.]]

The economy of Chechnya collapsed as Dudayev severed economic links with Russia while black market trading, arms trafficking and counterfeiting grew.{{cite book |editor1-last=Kempton |editor1-first=Daniel R. |title=Unity Or Separation Center-periphery Relations in the Former Soviet Union |date=2002 |publisher=Praeger |isbn=978-0-275-97011-6 |pages=120–121}} Violence and social disruption increased and the marginal social groups, such as unemployed young men from the countryside, became armed.{{cite book |last1=Tishkov |first1=Valery |title=Chechnya Life in a War-Torn Society |date=2004 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0-520-23888-6 |page=65}} Ethnic Russians and other non-Chechens faced constant harassment as they fell outside the vendetta system which protected the Chechens to a certain extent. From 1991 to 1994, tens of thousands of people of non-Chechen ethnicity left the republic.Allah's Mountains: Politics and War in the Russian Caucasus By Sebastian Smith p. 134

During the undeclared Chechen civil war, factions both sympathetic and opposed to Dzhokhar Dudayev fought for power, sometimes in pitched battles with the use of heavy weapons. In March 1993, the opposition attempted a coup d'état, but their attempt was crushed by force. A month later, Dudayev introduced direct presidential rule, and in June 1993 dissolved the Chechen parliament to avoid a referendum on a vote of non-confidence. In late October 1992, Russian forces dispatched to the zone of the Ossetian-Ingush conflict were ordered to move to the Chechen border; Dudayev, who perceived this as "an act of aggression against the Chechen Republic", declared a state of emergency and threatened general mobilization if the Russian troops did not withdraw from the Chechen border. To prevent the invasion of Chechnya, he did not provoke the Russian troops.

After staging another coup d'état attempt in December 1993, the opposition organized themselves into the Provisional Council of the Chechen Republic as a potential alternative government for Chechnya, calling on Moscow for assistance. In August 1994, the coalition of the opposition factions based in north Chechnya launched a large-scale armed campaign to remove Dudayev's government.

However, the issue of contention was not independence from Russia: even the opposition stated there was no alternative to an international boundary separating Chechnya from Russia. In 1992, Russian newspaper Moscow News noted that, just like most of the other seceding republics, other than Tatarstan, ethnic Chechens universally supported the establishment of an independent Chechen stateMoscow News. November 22–29, 1992 and, in 1995, during the heat of the First Chechen War, Khalid Delmayev, a Dudayev opponent belonging to an Ichkerian liberal coalition, stated that "Chechnya's statehood may be postponed... but cannot be avoided".Moscow News. September 1–7, 1995

Moscow covertly supplied opposition forces with finances, military equipment and mercenaries. Russia also suspended all civilian flights to Grozny while the aviation and border troops established a military blockade of the republic, and eventually unmarked Russian aircraft began combat operations over Chechnya. The opposition forces, who were joined by Russian troops, launched a poorly organized assault on Grozny in mid-October 1994, followed by a second, larger attack on 26–27 November 1994.Efim Sandler, Battle for Grozny, Volume 1: Prelude and the Way to the City: First Chechen War 1994 (Helion Europe @ War No. 31), Warwick, 2023, pp.34-40. Despite Russian support, both attempts were unsuccessful. Chechen separatists succeeded in capturing some 20 Russian Ground Forces regulars and about 50 other Russian citizens who were covertly hired by the Russian FSK state security organization (which was later converted to the FSB) to fight for the Provisional Council forces.[http://www.bdcol.ee/fileadmin/docs/bdreview/07bdr299.pdf The battle(s) of Grozny] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110927074010/http://www.bdcol.ee/fileadmin/docs/bdreview/07bdr299.pdf |date=September 27, 2011 }} On 29 November, President Boris Yeltsin issued an ultimatum to all warring factions in Chechnya, ordering them to disarm and surrender. When the government in Grozny refused, Yeltsin ordered the Russian army to invade the region. Both the Russian government and military command never referred to the conflict as a war but instead a 'disarmament of illegal gangs' or a 'restoration of the constitutional order'.{{Citation|last1=Cherkasov|first1=Alexander|last2=Golubev|first2=Ostav|last3=Malykhin|first3=Vladimir|date=24 February 2023|title=A chain of wars, a chain of crimes, a chain of impunity: Russian wars in Chechnya, Syria and Ukraine|url=https://ruswars.org/report/Report_Memorial.pdf|website=Memorial Human Rights Defence Centre|pages=17–18|access-date=28 May 2023|archive-date=6 September 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240906142631/https://ruswars.org/report/Report_Memorial.pdf|url-status=live}}

Beginning on 1 December, Russian forces openly carried out heavy aerial bombardments of Chechnya. On 11 December 1994, five days after Dudayev and Russian Minister of Defense Gen. Pavel Grachev of Russia had agreed to "avoid the further use of force", Russian forces entered the republic in order to "establish constitutional order in Chechnya and to preserve the territorial integrity of Russia." Grachev boasted he could topple Dudayev in a couple of hours with a single airborne regiment, and proclaimed that it will be "a bloodless blitzkrieg, that would not last any longer than 20 December."

{{More citations needed section|date=April 2008}}

File:Evstafiev-chechnya-women-pray.jpg, December 1994.]]

On 11 December 1994, Russian forces launched a three-pronged ground attack towards Grozny. The main attack was temporarily halted by the deputy commander of the Russian Ground Forces, General {{ill|Eduard Vorobyov|ru|Воробьёв, Эдуард Аркадьевич}}, who then resigned in protest, stating that it is "a crime" to "send the army against its own people." Many in the Russian military and government opposed the war as well. Yeltsin's adviser on nationality affairs, {{Interlanguage link|Emil Pain|ru|Паин, Эмиль Абрамович}}, and Russia's Deputy Minister of Defense General Boris Gromov (commander of the Afghan War), also resigned in protest of the invasion ("It will be a bloodbath, another Afghanistan", Gromov said on television), as did General Boris Poliakov. More than 800 professional soldiers and officers refused to take part in the operation; of these, 83 were convicted by military courts and the rest were discharged. Later General Lev Rokhlin also refused to be decorated as a Hero of the Russian Federation for his part in the war.

The advance of the northern column was halted by the unexpected Chechen resistance at Dolinskoye and the Russian forces suffered their first serious losses.

Units of Chechen fighters inflicted severe losses on the Russian troops. Deeper in Chechnya, a group of 50 Russian paratroopers was captured by the local Chechen militia, after being deployed by helicopters behind enemy lines to capture a Chechen weapons cache.{{cite news |last1=Efron |first1=Sonni |title=Aerial Death Threat Sends Chechens Fleeing From Village: Caucasus: Russians warn they will bomb five towns near Grozny unless 50 captured paratroopers are quickly freed. |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-01-10-mn-18475-story.html |access-date=31 December 2020 |work=Los Angeles Times |date=January 10, 1995 |archive-date=2023-03-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230317122524/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-01-10-mn-18475-story.html |url-status=live }} On 29 December, in a rare instance of a Russian outright victory, the Russian airborne forces seized the military airfield next to Grozny and repelled a Chechen counter-attack in the Battle of Khankala; the next objective was the city itself. With the Russians closing in on the capital, the Chechens began to set up defensive fighting positions and grouped their forces in the city.

{{Main|Battle of Grozny (1994–95)}}

File:Evstafiev-chechnya-palace-gunman.jpg, January 1995]]

When the Russians besieged the Chechen capital, thousands of civilians died from a week-long series of air raids and artillery bombardments in the heaviest bombing campaign in Europe since the destruction of Dresden.Williams, Bryan Glyn (2001).[https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1475-4967.00012 The Russo-Chechen War: A Threat to Stability in the Middle East and Eurasia?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220316202623/https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1475-4967.00012 |date=2022-03-16 }}. Middle East Policy 8.1. The initial assault on New Year's Eve 1994 ended in a big Russian defeat, resulting in many casualties and at first a nearly complete breakdown of morale in the Russian forces. The fighting claimed the lives of an estimated 1,000 to 2,000 Russian soldiers, mostly barely trained conscripts; the worst losses were inflicted on the 131st 'Maikop' Motor Rifle Brigade, which was destroyed in the fighting near the central railway station.{{cite book|last =Gall|first =Carlotta|author2 =Thomas de Waal|title =Chechnya: Calamity in the Caucasus|publisher =New York University Press|year =1998|url =https://archive.org/details/chechnyacalamity00gall|isbn =978-0-8147-2963-2}} Despite the early Chechen defeat of the New Year's assault and the many further casualties that the Russians had suffered, Grozny was eventually conquered by Russian forces after an urban warfare campaign. After armored assaults failed, the Russian military set out to take the city using air power and artillery. At the same time, the Russian military accused the Chechen fighters of using civilians as human shields by preventing them from leaving the capital as it was bombarded.{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/545672.stm|title=BBC News – EUROPE – Chechens 'using human shields'|work=bbc.co.uk|access-date=2008-05-29|archive-date=2003-03-17|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030317185829/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/545672.stm|url-status=live}} On 7 January 1995, the Russian Major-General Viktor Vorobyov was killed by mortar fire, becoming the first on a long list of Russian generals to be killed in Chechnya. On 19 January, despite many casualties, Russian forces seized the ruins of the Chechen presidential palace, which had been fought over for more than three weeks as the Chechens abandoned their positions in the ruins of the downtown area. The battle for the southern part of the city continued until the official end on 6 March 1995.

By the estimates of Yeltsin's human rights adviser Sergei Kovalev, about 27,000 civilians died in the first five weeks of fighting. The Russian historian and general Dmitri Volkogonov said the Russian military's bombardment of Grozny killed around 35,000 civilians, including 5,000 children and that the vast majority of those killed were ethnic Russians. While military casualties are not known, the Russian side admitted to having 2,000 soldiers killed or missing.{{cite journal

|last=Faurby

|first=Ib

|author2=Märta-Lisa Magnusson

|title=The Battle(s) of Grozny

|journal=Baltic Defence Review

|issue=2

|pages=75–87

|year=1999

|url=http://www.caucasus.dk/publication1.htm

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110720083643/http://www.caucasus.dk/publication1.htm

|archive-date=July 20, 2011

}} The bloodbath of Grozny shocked Russia and the outside world, inciting severe criticism of the war. International monitors from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) described the scenes as nothing short of an "unimaginable catastrophe", while former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev called the war a "disgraceful, bloody adventure" and German chancellor Helmut Kohl called it "sheer madness".{{cite news | title =The First Bloody Battle | work =The Chechen Conflict | publisher =BBC News | date =2000-03-16 | url =http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/482323.stm | access-date =2006-08-10 | archive-date =2016-12-03 | archive-url =https://web.archive.org/web/20161203115036/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/482323.stm | url-status =live }}

File:Evstafiev-chechnya-boy-house-burns.jpg

Following the fall of Grozny, the Russian government slowly and methodically expanded its control over the lowland areas and then into the mountains. In what was dubbed the worst massacre in the war, the OMON and other federal forces killed up to 300 civilians while seizing the border village of Samashki on 7 April (several hundred more were detained and beaten or otherwise tortured).[https://www.hrw.org/reports/1996/WR96/Helsinki-16.htm The Russian Federation Human Rights Developments] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130525150038/http://www.hrw.org/reports/1996/WR96/Helsinki-16.htm |date=2013-05-25 }} Human Rights Watch In the southern mountains, the Russians launched an offensive along all the front on 15 April, advancing in large columns of 200–300 vehicles.{{Cite web|url=http://smallwarsjournal.com/documents/alikhadzhievinterview.pdf|title=Alikhadzhiev interview|access-date=2007-05-12|archive-date=2008-10-30|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081030112906/http://smallwarsjournal.com/documents/alikhadzhievinterview.pdf|url-status=live}} The ChRI forces defended the city of Argun, moving their military headquarters first to surrounded Shali, then shortly after to the village of Serzhen'-Yurt as they were forced into the mountains and finally to Shamil Basayev's ancestral stronghold of Vedeno. Chechnya's second-largest city of Gudermes was surrendered without a fight but the village of Shatoy was fought for and defended by the men of Ruslan Gelayev. Eventually, the Chechen command withdrew from the area of Vedeno to the Chechen opposition-aligned village of Dargo and from there to Benoy.{{Cite web |url=http://smallwarsjournal.com/documents/iskhanovinterview.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080308081720/http://smallwarsjournal.com/documents/iskhanovinterview.pdf|title=Iskhanov interview |archive-date=March 8, 2008}} According to an estimate cited in a United States Army analysis report, between January and May 1995, when the Russian forces conquered most of the republic in the conventional campaign, their losses in Chechnya were approximately 2,800 killed, 10,000 wounded and more than 500 missing or captured.{{cite web |url=http://www.inetres.com/gp/military/FM3-06_11H.html |title=FM 3-06.11 Appendix H |website=inetres.com |access-date=2007-03-15 |archive-date=2007-04-18 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070418133849/http://www.inetres.com/gp/military/FM3-06_11H.html |url-status=live }} Some Chechen fighters infiltrated occupied areas, hiding in crowds of returning refugees.{{cite web |author1=Timothy L. Thomas |author2=Charles P. O'Hara |url=http://leav-www.army.mil/fmso/documents/stress.htm |work=Foreign Military Studies Office Publications |title=Combat Stress in Chechnya: "The Equal Opportunity Disorder" |archive-url=https://archive.today/20070801170345/http://leav-www.army.mil/fmso/documents/stress.htm |archive-date=2007-08-01 }}

As the war continued, the Chechens resorted to mass hostage-takings, attempting to influence the Russian public and leadership. In June 1995, a group led by the maverick field commander Shamil Basayev took more than 1,500 people hostage in southern Russia in the Budyonnovsk hospital hostage crisis; about 120 Russian civilians died before a ceasefire was signed after negotiations between Basayev and the Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin. The raid forced a temporary stop in Russian military operations, giving the Chechens time to regroup and to prepare for the national militant campaign. The full-scale Russian attack led many of Dzhokhar Dudayev's opponents to side with his forces and thousands of volunteers to swell the ranks of mobile militant units. Many others formed local self-defence militia units to defend their settlements in the case of federal offensive action, officially numbering 5,000–6,000 armed men in late 1995. According to a UN report, the Chechen Armed Forces included a large number of child soldiers, some as young as 11 years old, and also included females.{{cite web |title=The situation of human rights in the Republic of Chechnya of the Russian Federation |publisher=United Nations |date=26 March 1996 |url=http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/commission/country52/1996_13.htm |archive-date=February 11, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120211102551/http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/commission/country52/1996_13.htm |url-status=live}} As the territory controlled by them shrank, the Chechens increasingly resorted to classic guerrilla warfare tactics, such as booby traps and mining roads in enemy-held territory. The use of improvised explosive devices was particularly noteworthy; they also exploited a combination of mines and ambushes.

On 6 October 1995,{{Cite news |last=Specter |first=Michael |date=1995-11-21 |title=Pro-Russian Chechen Leader Survives Bombing in Capital |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/21/world/pro-russian-chechen-leader-survives-bombing-in-capital.html |access-date=2023-02-04 |issn=0362-4331 |archive-date=2024-04-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240422215044/https://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/21/world/pro-russian-chechen-leader-survives-bombing-in-capital.html |url-status=live }} Gen. Anatoliy Romanov, the federal commander in Chechnya at the time, was critically injured and paralyzed in a bomb blast in Grozny. Suspicion of responsibility for the attack fell on rogue elements of the Russian military, as the attack destroyed hopes for a permanent ceasefire based on the developing trust between Gen. Romanov and the ChRI Chief of Staff Aslan Maskhadov, a former colonel in the Soviet Army; in August, the two went to southern Chechnya to try to convince the local commanders to release Russian prisoners.{{cite web |url=http://www.sptimes.ru/index.php?action_id=2&story_id=11071 |title=Honoring a General Who is Silenced |work=The St. Petersburg Times |archive-date=July 17, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140717102746/http://www.sptimes.ru/index.php?action_id=2&story_id=11071}}{{cite magazine|title=Chechnya: Election Date Postponed, Prisoner Exchange in Trouble|magazine=Monitor|volume=1|issue=69|date=August 8, 1995|publisher=The Jamestown Foundation |url=http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=14&&issue_id=740|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061122084849/http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=14&&issue_id=740 |archive-date=2006-11-22}} In February 1996, federal and pro-Russian Chechen forces in Grozny opened fire on a massive pro-independence peace march of tens of thousands of people, killing a number of demonstrators.{{cite web|author=Chris Hunter|title=Mass protests in Grozny end in bloodshed|url=http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/63/080.html|website=hartford-hwp.com|access-date=2007-08-19|archive-date=2019-05-27|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190527082713/http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/63/080.html|url-status=live}} The ruins of the presidential palace, the symbol of Chechen independence, were then demolished two days later.

File:Evstafiev-chechnya-handshake.jpg

On 6 March 1996, a group of Chechen fighters infiltrated Grozny and launched a three-day surprise raid on the city, taking most of it and capturing caches of weapons and ammunition. During the battle, much of the Russian troops were wiped out, with most of them surrendering or routing. After two columns of Russian reinforcements were destroyed on the roads leading to the city, Russian troops eventually gave up on trying to reach the trapped soldiers in the city. Chechen fighters subsequently withdrew from the city on orders from the high command.{{cite book |last1=Akhmadov |first1=Ilyas |last2=Lanskoy |first2=Miriam |title=The Chechen Struggle: Independence Won and Lost |date=2010 |publisher=PALGRAVE MACMILLAN |page=64 }} In the same month in March, Chechen fighters and Russian federal troops clashed near the village of Samashki. The losses on the Russian side amounted to 28 killed and 116 wounded.{{cite book |last1=Гродненский |first1=Николай |title=Неоконченная война: история вооруженного конфликта в Чечне |url=https://history.wikireading.ru/73073 |access-date=2023-04-09 |archive-date=2024-09-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240906142636/https://history.wikireading.ru/73073 |url-status=live }}

On April 16, a month after the initial conflict, Chechen fighters successfully carried out an ambush near Shatoy, wiping out an entire Russian armored column resulting in losses up to 220 soldiers killed in action. In another attack near Vedeno, at least 28 Russian soldiers were killed in action.[https://web.archive.org/web/20010530184645/http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/9604/01/russia_chechnya/ Russian fighting ceases in Chechnya; Skeptical troops comply with Yeltsin order] CNN

As military defeats and growing casualties made the war more and more unpopular in Russia, and as the 1996 presidential elections neared, Boris Yeltsin's government sought a way out of the conflict. Although a Russian guided missile attack assassinated the Chechen president Dzhokhar Dudayev on 21 April 1996. Yeltsin even officially declared "victory" in Grozny on 28 May 1996, after a new temporary ceasefire was signed with the Chechen acting president Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev.[http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/9605/28/russia.chechnya/ Yeltsin declares Russian victory over Chechnya] CNN {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081211122357/http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/9605/28/russia.chechnya/ |date=December 11, 2008 }}[http://www.waynakh.com/eng/chechnya/history/ History of Chechnya] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120130002537/http://www.waynakh.com/eng/chechnya/history/ |date=2012-01-30 }} WaYNaKH Online While the political leaders were discussing the ceasefire and peace negotiations, Russian forces continued to conduct combat operations. On 6 August 1996, three days before Yeltsin was to be inaugurated for his second term as Russian president and when most of the Russian troops were moved south due to what was planned as their final offensive against remaining mountainous Chechen strongholds, the Chechens subsequently launched another surprise attack on Grozny.

{{Main|Battle of Grozny (August 1996)}}

Despite Russian troops in and around Grozny numbering approximately 12,000, more than 1,500 Chechen guerrillas (whose numbers soon swelled) overran the key districts within hours in an operation prepared and led by Aslan Maskhadov (who named it Operation Zero) and Shamil Basayev (who called it Operation Jihad). The fighters then laid siege to the Russian posts and bases and the government compound in the city centre, while a number of Chechens deemed to be Russian collaborators were rounded up, detained and, in some cases, executed.{{cite web|url=http://www.memo.ru/hr/hotpoints/chechen/checheng/fin_rep.htm|title=czecz|website=memo.ru|access-date=2006-12-13|archive-date=2016-12-15|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161215094538/http://www.memo.ru/hr/hotpoints/chechen/checheng/fin_rep.htm}} At the same time, Russian troops in the cities of Argun and Gudermes were also surrounded in their garrisons. Several attempts by the armored columns to rescue the units trapped in Grozny were repelled with heavy Russian casualties (the 276th Motorized Regiment of 900 men suffered 50% casualties in a two-day attempt to reach the city centre). Russian military officials said that more than 200 soldiers had been killed and nearly 800 wounded in five days of fighting, and that an unknown number were missing; Chechens put the number of Russian dead at close to 1,000. Thousands of troops were either taken prisoner or surrounded and largely disarmed, their heavy weapons and ammunition commandeered by Chechen fighters.

On 19 August, despite the presence of 50,000 to 200,000 Chechen civilians and thousands of federal servicemen in Grozny, the Russian commander Konstantin Pulikovsky gave an ultimatum for Chechen fighters to leave the city within 48 hours, or else it would be leveled in a massive aerial and artillery bombardment. He stated that federal forces would use strategic bombers (not used in Chechnya up to this point) and ballistic missiles. This announcement was followed by chaotic scenes of panic as civilians tried to flee before the army carried out its threat, with parts of the city ablaze and falling shells scattering refugee columns.[https://web.archive.org/web/20021120100946/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/htmlContent.jhtml?html=/archive/1996/08/22/wrus22.html Lebed calls off assault on Grozny] The Daily Telegraph The bombardment was however soon halted by the ceasefire brokered by General Alexander Lebed, Yeltsin's national security adviser, on 22 August. Gen. Lebed called the ultimatum, issued by General Pulikovsky (replaced by then), a "bad joke".[http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/9608/21/chechnya.final/ Lebed promises peace in Grozny and no Russian assault] CNN {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081211122033/http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/9608/21/chechnya.final/ |date=December 11, 2008 }}{{cite web|author=Lee Hockstader and David Hoffman|url=http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1996-08-22/news/9608220016_1_grozny-gen-konstantin-pulikovsky-alexander-lebed|title=Russian Official Vows To Stop Raid|publisher=Sun Sentinel|date=1996-08-22|access-date=2012-02-03|archive-date=2012-02-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120207065343/http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1996-08-22/news/9608220016_1_grozny-gen-konstantin-pulikovsky-alexander-lebed}}

During eight hours of subsequent talks, Lebed and Maskhadov drafted and signed the Khasavyurt Accord on 31 August 1996. It included: technical aspects of demilitarization, the withdrawal of both sides' forces from Grozny, the creation of joint headquarters to preclude looting in the city, the withdrawal of all federal forces from Chechnya by 31 December 1996, and a stipulation that any agreement on the relations between the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and the Russian federal government need not be signed until late 2001.

File:A Chechen woman with a wounded child.jpg

Human rights organizations accused Russian forces of engaging in indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force whenever they encountered resistance, resulting in numerous civilian deaths. (According to Human Rights Watch, Russian artillery and rocket attacks killed at least 267 civilians during the December 1995 raid by the Chechens on the city of Gudermes.) Throughout the span of the first Chechen war, Russian forces have been accused by human rights organizations of starting a brutal war with total disregard for humanitarian law, causing tens of thousands of unnecessary civilian casualties among the Chechen population. The main strategy in the Russian war effort had been to use heavy artillery and air strikes leading to numerous indiscriminate attacks on civilians. This has led to Western and Chechen sources calling the Russian strategy deliberate terror bombing on parts of Russia.{{cite web|url=http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/research_pubs/chechna.pdf |title=Russia's invasion of Chechnya: a preliminary assessment |last=Blank |first=Stephen J. |website=dtic.mil |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080308081654/http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/research_pubs/chechna.pdf |archive-date=8 March 2008}} According to Human Rights Watch, the campaign was "unparalleled in the area since World War II for its scope and destructiveness, followed by months of indiscriminate and targeted fire against civilians".{{cite web |title=Human Rights Developments |url=https://www.hrw.org/reports/1996/WR96/Helsinki-16.htm |website=Human Rights Watch |access-date=14 May 2022 |archive-date=25 May 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130525150038/http://www.hrw.org/reports/1996/WR96/Helsinki-16.htm |url-status=live}} Due to ethnic Chechens in Grozny seeking refuge among their respective teips in the surrounding villages of the countryside, a high proportion of initial civilian casualties were inflicted against ethnic Russians who were unable to find viable escape routes. The villages were also attacked from the first weeks of the conflict (Russian cluster bombs, for example, killed at least 55 civilians during the 3 January 1995 Shali cluster bomb attack).

Russian soldiers often prevented civilians from evacuating areas of imminent danger and prevented humanitarian organizations from assisting civilians in need. It was widely alleged that Russian troops, especially those belonging to the Internal Troops (MVD), committed numerous and in part systematic acts of torture and summary executions on Chechen civilians; they were often linked to zachistka ("cleansing" raids on town districts and villages suspected of harboring boyeviki – militants). Humanitarian and aid groups chronicled persistent patterns of Russian soldiers killing, raping and looting civilians at random, often in disregard of their nationality. Chechen fighters took hostages on a massive scale, kidnapped or killed Chechens considered to be collaborators and mistreated civilian captives and federal prisoners of war (especially pilots). Russian federal forces kidnapped hostages for ransom and used human shields for cover during the fighting and movement of troops (for example, a group of surrounded Russian troops took approximately 500 civilian hostages at Grozny's 9th Municipal Hospital).{{cite web |title=Grozny, August 1996. Occupation of Municipal Hospital No. 9 Memorial |url=http://www.memo.ru/hr/hotpoints/chechen/szczyt/eng/Chapter7.htm |website=memo.ru |access-date=2007-01-08 |archive-date=2016-03-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303195318/http://www.memo.ru/hr/hotpoints/chechen/szczyt/eng/Chapter7.htm}}

The violations committed by members of the Russian forces were usually tolerated by their superiors and were not punished even when investigated (the story of Vladimir Glebov serving as an example of such policy). Television and newspaper accounts widely reported largely uncensored images of the carnage to the Russian public. The Russian media coverage partially precipitated a loss of public confidence in the government and a steep decline in President Yeltsin's popularity. Chechnya was one of the heaviest burdens on Yeltsin's 1996 presidential election campaign. The protracted war in Chechnya, especially many reports of extreme violence against civilians, ignited fear and contempt of Russia among other ethnic groups in the federation. One of the most notable war crimes committed by the Russian army is the Samashki massacre, in which it is estimated that up to 300 civilians died during the attack.{{cite web |title=Mothers' March to Grozny |url=https://wri-irg.org/en/story/1995/mothers-march-grozny |website=War Resisters' International |access-date=14 May 2022 |date=1 June 1995}} Russian forces conducted an operation of zachistka, house-by-house searches throughout the entire village. Federal soldiers deliberately and arbitrarily attacked civilians and civilian dwellings in Samashki by shooting residents and burning houses with flame-throwers. They wantonly opened fire or threw grenades into basements where residents, mostly women, elderly persons and children, had been hiding.[http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/commission/country52/1996_13.htm The situation of human rights in the Republic of Chechnya of the Russian Federation – Report of the Secretary-General] UNCHR {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120211102551/http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/commission/country52/1996_13.htm |date=11 February 2012 }} Russian troops intentionally burned many bodies, either by throwing the bodies into burning houses or by setting them on fire.[http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=14&issue_id=564&article_id=4076 DETAILS OF SAMASHKI MASSACRE EMERGE.], The Jamestown Foundation, 5 May 1995 {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070625152714/http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=14&issue_id=564&article_id=4076 |date=25 June 2007 }} A Chechen surgeon, Khassan Baiev, treated wounded in Samashki immediately after the operation and described the scene in his book:{{cite book |last=Baiev |first=Khassan |title=The Oath A Surgeon Under Fire |year=2003 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing USA |isbn=0-8027-1404-8 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/oathsurgeonunder00baie/page/130 130–131] |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/oathsurgeonunder00baie/page/130}}

Dozens of charred corpses of women and children lay in the courtyard of the mosque, which had been destroyed. The first thing my eye fell on was the burned body of a baby, lying in fetal position... A wild-eyed woman emerged from a burned-out house holding a dead baby. Trucks with bodies piled in the back rolled through the streets on the way to the cemetery.

While treating the wounded, I heard stories of young men – gagged and trussed up – dragged with chains behind personnel carriers. I heard of Russian aviators who threw Chechen prisoners, screaming, out their helicopters. There were rapes, but it was hard to know how many because women were too ashamed to report them. One girl was raped in front of her father. I heard of one case in which the mercenary grabbed a newborn baby, threw it among each other like a ball, then shot it dead in the air.

Leaving the village for the hospital in Grozny, I passed a Russian armored personnel carrier with the word SAMASHKI written on its side in bold, black letters. I looked in my rearview mirror and to my horror saw a human skull mounted on the front of the vehicle. The bones were white; someone must have boiled the skull to remove the flesh.

Major Vyacheslav Izmailov is said to have rescued at least 174 people from captivity on both sides in the war, was later involved in the tracing of missing persons after the war and in 2021 won the hero's prize at the Stalker Human Rights Film Festival in Moscow.{{cite web |title=The Jury Prize of the Stalker Festival was awarded to a film about Major Izmailov |website=247 News Bulletin |date=17 December 2021 |url=https://247newsbulletin.com/entertainment/55278.html |access-date=4 September 2022 |archive-date=4 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220904074838/https://247newsbulletin.com/entertainment/55278.html}}{{cite magazine |title=Can Russia's Press Ever Be Free? |magazine=The New Yorker |date=12 November 2021 |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/11/22/can-russias-press-ever-be-free |access-date=4 September 2022}}

File:Evstafiev-chechnya-tank-helmet.jpg submachine gun]]

The declaration by Chechnya's Chief Mufti Akhmad Kadyrov that the ChRI was waging a Jihad (struggle) against Russia raised the spectre that Jihadis from other regions and even outside Russia would enter the war. {{citation needed|date=July 2023}}

Limited fighting occurred in the neighbouring a small republic of Ingushetia, mostly when Russian commanders sent troops over the border in pursuit of Chechen fighters, while as many as 200,000 refugees (from Chechnya and the conflict in North Ossetia) strained Ingushetia's already weak economy. On several occasions, Ingush president Ruslan Aushev protested incursions by Russian soldiers and even threatened to sue the Russian Ministry of Defence for damages inflicted, recalling how the federal forces previously assisted in the expulsion of the Ingush population from North Ossetia.{{cite web |url=http://psi.ece.jhu.edu/~kaplan/IRUSS/ARCHIVE/2.94.html |access-date=2006-12-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160608021010/http://psi.ece.jhu.edu/~kaplan/IRUSS/ARCHIVE/2.94.html |archive-date=2016-06-08 |title=July archive |website=jhu.edu}} Undisciplined Russian soldiers were also reported to be committing murders, rapes, and looting in Ingushetia (in an incident partially witnessed by visiting Russian Duma deputies, at least nine Ingush civilians and an ethnic Bashkir soldier were murdered by apparently drunk Russian soldiers; earlier, drunken Russian soldiers killed another Russian soldier, five Ingush villagers and even Ingushetia's Health Minister).{{Cite web |url=http://www.nupi.no/cgi-win/Russland/krono.exe?3271 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927213430/http://www.nupi.no/cgi-win/Russland/krono.exe?3271 |title=Army demoralized |archive-date=September 27, 2007}}

Much larger and more deadly acts of hostility took place in the Republic of Dagestan. In particular, the border village of Pervomayskoye was completely destroyed by Russian forces in January 1996 in reaction to the large-scale Chechen hostage taking in Kizlyar in Dagestan (in which more than 2,000 hostages were taken), bringing strong criticism from this hitherto loyal republic and escalating domestic dissatisfaction. The Don Cossacks of Southern Russia, originally sympathetic to the Chechen cause,{{Citation needed|date=February 2010}} turned hostile as a result of their Russian-esque culture and language, stronger affinity to Moscow than to Grozny, and a history of conflict with indigenous peoples such as the Chechens. The Kuban Cossacks started organizing themselves against the Chechens, including manning paramilitary roadblocks against infiltration of their territories. {{citation needed|date=July 2023}}

Meanwhile, the war in Chechnya spawned new forms of resistance to the federal government. Opposition to the conscription of men from minority ethnic groups to fight in Chechnya was widespread among other republics, many of which passed laws and decrees on the subject. For example, the government of Chuvashia passed a decree providing legal protection to soldiers from the republic who refused to participate in the Chechen war and imposed limits on the use of the federal army in ethnic or regional conflicts within Russia. Tatarstan president Mintimer Shaimiev vocally opposed the war and appealed to Yeltsin to stop it and return conscripts, warning the conflict was at risk of expanding across the Caucasus.{{Cite web |date=10 November 2022 |title=Mintimer Shaimiev: "Stop the Civil War". The first Chechen war and the reaction of the authorities of Tatarstan |url=https://www.idelreal.org/a/32118934.html |access-date=2022-12-08 |website=Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty |language=ru |archive-date=2024-09-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240906143816/https://www.idelreal.org/a/32118934.html |url-status=live}} Some regional and local legislative bodies called for the prohibition on the use of draftees in quelling internal conflicts, while others demanded a total ban on the use of the armed forces in such situations. Russian government officials feared that a move to end the war short of victory would create a cascade of secession attempts by other ethnic minorities.{{citation needed|date=July 2023}}

On 16 January 1996, a Turkish passenger ship carrying 200 Russian passengers was taken over by what were mostly Turkish gunmen who were seeking to publicize the Chechen cause. On 6 March, a Cypriot passenger jet was hijacked by Chechen sympathisers while flying toward Germany. Both of these incidents were resolved through negotiations, and the hijackers surrendered without any fatalities being inflicted. {{citation needed|date=July 2023}}

File:Рисунок Жеребцовой Полины, 1995 год (автору 10 лет).jpg from her diary showing the battle of Grozny.]]

File:Evstafiev-chechnya-killed-in-truck.jpg

According to the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, 3,826 troops were killed, 17,892 troops were wounded, and 1,906 troops are missing in action. According to Krivosheev, the authoritative Russian military historian, 5,042 Russian soldiers died during the war and 510 missing, 16,098 Russian soldiers were wounded and 35,289 became diseased.{{cite book |editor1-last=Кривошеев |editor1-first=Г. Ф. |title=Россия и СССР в войнах XX века. Потери вооруженных сил |date=2001 |publisher=Олма-Пресс |isbn=5-224-01515-4 |pages=582-584 |language=ru}} Later, independent researcher Pavel Milyukov estimated the losses at 5,391 dead.{{sfn|Norin|2025|p=309}} According to the independent Memorial agency, the Russians lost 4,379 dead in Chechnya, 703 missing and 705 deserters. However, the Committee of Soldiers' Mothers of Russia estimated that the total number of Russian military deaths was 14,000,[http://www.cdi.org/russia/245-14.cfm Casualty Figures] Jamestown Foundation {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140814003203/http://www.cdi.org/russia/245-14.cfm |date=August 14, 2014 }} based on information which it collected from wounded troops and soldiers' relatives (only counting regular troops, i.e. not the kontraktniki (contract soldiers, not conscripts) and members of the special service forces).{{cite web |url=http://www.hrvc.net/htmls/references.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20021228053504/http://www.hrvc.net/htmls/references.htm |archive-date=2002-12-28 |title=hrvc.net }} In 2009, the official number of Russian troops who fought in the two wars and were still missing in Chechnya and presumed dead was some 700, while about 400 remains of the missing servicemen were said to have been recovered up to that point.{{cite web |title=700 Russian servicemen missing in Chechnya – officer |website=Interfax |url=https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/chechnya-sl/conversations/topics/56847 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20150410094647/https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/chechnya-sl/conversations/topics/56847 |archive-date=April 10, 2015}} The Russian military was notorious for hiding casualties.

{{Blockquote|text=Let me tell you about one specific case. I knew for sure that on this day – it was the end of February or the beginning of March 1995 – forty servicemen of the Joint Group were killed. And they bring me information about fifteen. I ask: "Why don't you take into account the rest?" They hesitated: "Well, you see, 40 is a lot. We'd better spread those losses over a few days." Of course, I was outraged by these manipulations.|author=Anatoly Kulikov{{Cite web|date=3 March 2022|title=So 500 people or 9 thousand? We tell you how many people Russia lost in past wars and what numbers they called|url=https://news.zerkalo.io/cellar/10754.html|access-date=6 June 2022|website=Zerkalo|language=ru|archive-date=27 May 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220527193444/https://news.zerkalo.io/cellar/10754.html|url-status=live}}}} It is impossible to determine the exact losses of the militants, the first figure was given by Aslan Maskhadov, who claimed the death of 2,800 Chechen fighters.{{sfn|Norin|2025|p=309}} Subsequently, this figure migrated to the work of Grigory Krivosheev, his data was accepted as the official Russian side.{{cite book |editor1-last=Кривошеев |editor1-first=Г. Ф. |title=Россия и СССР в войнах XX века. Потери вооруженных сил |date=2001 |publisher=Олма-Пресс |isbn=5-224-01515-4 |page=584|language=ru}}The Russian military has privately claimed the deaths of 4,000–4,500 Chechens.{{sfn|Norin|2025|p=309}} Evgeny Norin notes, these figures are clearly inaccurate. He also suggested that it was impossible to determine the losses of the Chechen side, but expressed the theory that they were hardly much less than those of the Russians.{{sfn|Norin|2025|p=310}}

According to the World Peace Foundation at Tufts University,

Estimates of the number of civilians killed range widely from 20,000 to 100,000, with the latter figure commonly referenced by Chechen sources. Most scholars and human rights organizations generally estimate the number of civilian casualties to be 40,000; this figure is attributed to the research and scholarship of Chechnya expert John Dunlop, who estimates that the total number of civilian casualties is at least 35,000. This range is also consistent with post-war publications by the Russian statistics office estimating 30,000 to 40,000 civilians killed. The Moscow-based human rights organization, Memorial, which actively documented human rights abuses throughout the war, estimates the number of civilian casualties to be a slightly higher at 50,000.{{cite web | title=Russia: Chechen war – Mass Atrocity Endings | website=sites.tufts.edu | date=2015-08-07 | url=https://sites.tufts.edu/atrocityendings/2015/08/07/russia-1st-chechen-war/#Fatalities | access-date=2020-09-08 | archive-date=2020-09-08 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200908013220/https://sites.tufts.edu/atrocityendings/2015/08/07/russia-1st-chechen-war/#Fatalities | url-status=live }}

Russian Interior Minister Anatoly Kulikov claimed that fewer than 20,000 civilians were killed. Médecins Sans Frontières estimated a death toll of 50,000 people out of a population of 1,000,000.{{cite book|last=Binet|year=2014|first=Laurence|title=War crimes and politics of terror in Chechnya 1994–2004|publisher=Médecins Sans Frontières|url=https://www.msf.org/sites/msf.org/files/pdf_inter_tchetchenie_va.pdf|page=83|access-date=2019-01-02|archive-date=2015-04-06|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150406215338/https://www.msf.org/sites/msf.org/files/pdf_inter_tchetchenie_va.pdf|url-status=live}} Sergey Kovalyov's team could offer their conservative, documented estimate of more than 50,000 civilian deaths. Alexander Lebed asserted that 80,000 to 100,000 had been killed and 240,000 had been injured. The number given by the ChRI authorities was about 100,000 killed.

According to claims made by Sergey Govorukhin which were published in the Russian newspaper Gazeta, approximately 35,000 ethnic Russian civilians were killed by Russian forces which operated in Chechnya, most of them were killed during the bombardment of Grozny.{{cite web |url=http://jamestown.org/chechnya_weekly/article.php?articleid=2371378 |title=Do Ethnic Russians Support Putin's War in Chechnya? |publisher=The Jamestown Foundation |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080303175832/http://jamestown.org/chechnya_weekly/article.php?articleid=2371378 |last=Dunlop |first=John B.|date=January 26, 2005 |archive-date=March 3, 2008}}

According to various estimates, the number of Chechens who are dead or missing is between 50,000 and 100,000.{{cite web |url=http://www.hrvc.net/htmls/references.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20021228053504/http://www.hrvc.net/htmls/references.htm |archive-date=December 28, 2002 |title=Civil and military casualties of the wars in Chechnya |access-date=June 1, 2016 }} Russian-Chechen Friendship Society

Approximately 40,000 housing units were damaged or destroyed by July 1996.{{sfn|Cottam|Mastors|Preston|2022|p=392}}

In the Khasavyurt Accord, both sides agreed to an "all for all" exchange of prisoners to be carried out at the end of the war. However, despite this commitment, many persons remained forcibly detained. A partial analysis of the list of 1,432 reported missing found that, as of 30 October 1996, at least 139 Chechens were still being forcibly detained by the Russian side; it was entirely unclear how many of these men were alive.{{cite web|url=https://www.hrw.org/reports/1997/russia2/Russia-03.htm|title=RUSSIA / CHECHNYA|website=hrw.org|access-date=2016-12-04|archive-date=2024-09-06|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240906143755/https://www.hrw.org/reports/1997/russia2/Russia-03.htm|url-status=live}} As of mid-January 1997, the Chechens still held between 700 and 1,000 Russian soldiers and officers as prisoners of war, according to Human Rights Watch. According to Amnesty International that same month, 1,058 Russian soldiers and officers were being detained by Chechen fighters who were willing to release them in exchange for members of Chechen armed groups.[https://www.amnesty.org/ailib/aireport/ar98/eur46.htm AI Report 1998: Russian Federation] Amnesty International {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071114133042/http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/aireport/ar98/eur46.htm |date=November 14, 2007 }} American freelance journalist Andrew Shumack has been missing from the Chechen capital, Grozny since July 1995 and is presumed dead.{{Cite news|url=http://www.refworld.org/docid/4b29fd4d2.html|title=Journalists Missing 1982–2009|last=United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees|work=Refworld|access-date=2017-06-12|language=en|archive-date=2024-09-06|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240906143715/https://www.refworld.org/reference/themreport/cpj/2009/en/71346|url-status=live}}

{{anchor|izmailov}}

Major Vyacheslav Izmailov, who had rescued at least 174 people from captivity on both sides in the war, was later involved in the search for missing persons. He was honoured as the human rights hero in the Stalker Human Rights Film Festival after he featured in Anna Artemyeva's film Don't Shoot at the Bald Man!, which won the jury prize for Best Documentary at the festival in Moscow. He later worked as military correspondent for Novaya Gazeta, was part of the team of journalists investigating the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya in 2006 {{cite journal | title=Vyacheslav Izmailov: we know who ordered Anna Politkovskaya's murder | via=The Jamestown Foundation|journal= North Caucasus Weekly| volume= 8| issue= 22| date=31 May 2007 | url=https://jamestown.org/program/vyacheslav-izmailov-we-know-who-ordered-anna-politkovskayas-murder/ | access-date=4 September 2022}} He also helped families to find their sons who had gone missing in the Chechen war.

File:Grozny2.jpg

The Khasavyurt Accord paved the way for the signing of two further agreements between Russia and Chechnya. In mid-November 1996, Yeltsin and Maskhadov signed an agreement on economic relations and reparations to Chechens who had been affected by the 1994–96 war. In February 1997, Russia also approved an amnesty for Russian soldiers and Chechen fighters alike who committed illegal acts in connection with the War in Chechnya between December 1994 and September 1996.{{cite web|url=http://www.worldaffairsboard.com/showthread.php?t=1965|title=Account Suspended|website=worldaffairsboard.com|date=7 May 2004|access-date=14 November 2008|archive-date=6 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171206093506/http://www.worldaffairsboard.com/showthread.php?t=1965|url-status=live}}

File:Interwar Crisis in Chechnya 1997-1999.png in green the territory under the control of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and in grey the areas under the control of the islamists{{cn|date=August 2024}}.]]

Six months after the Khasavyurt Accord, on 12 May 1997, Chechen-elected president Aslan Maskhadov traveled to Moscow where he and Yeltsin signed a formal treaty "on peace and the principles of Russian-Chechen relations" that Maskhadov predicted would demolish "any basis to create ill-feelings between Moscow and Grozny."{{cite web|url=http://www.friends-partners.org/friends/news/omri/1997/05/970512I.html(opt,mozilla,unix,english,,new)|title=F&P RFE/RL Archive|website=friends-partners.org|access-date=2006-12-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171206093451/http://www.friends-partners.org/friends/news/omri/1997/05/970512I.html(opt,mozilla,unix,english,,new)|archive-date=2017-12-06}} Maskhadov's optimism, however, proved misplaced. Little more than two years later, some of Maskhadov's former comrades-in-arms, led by field commanders Shamil Basayev and Ibn al-Khattab, launched an invasion of Dagestan in the summer of 1999 – and soon Russia's forces entered Chechnya again, marking the beginning of the Second Chechen War.

{{further|Reactions to the First Chechen War}}

From the outset of the First Chechen conflict, Russian authorities struggled to reconcile new international expectations with widespread accusations of Soviet-style heaviness in their execution of the war. For example, Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev, who was generally regarded as a Western-leaning liberal, made the following remark when questioned about Russia's conduct during the war; "'Generally speaking, it is not only our right but our duty not to allow uncontrolled armed formations on our territory. The Foreign Ministry stands on guard over the country's territorial unity. International law says that a country not only can but must use force in such instances ... I say it was the right thing to do ... The way in which it was done is not my business."{{Cite journal|last=Hanna|first=Smith|date=2014|title=Russian Greatpowerness: Foreign policy, the Two Chechen Wars and International Organisations|journal=University of Helsinki}} These attitudes contributed greatly to the growing doubts in the West as to whether Russia was sincere in its stated intentions to implement democratic reforms. The general disdain for Russian behavior in the Western political establishment contrasted heavily with widespread support in the Russian public.{{Cite journal|last=Horga|first=Ioana|title=Cfsp into the Spotlight: The European Union's Foreign Policy toward Russia during the Chechen Wars|journal=Annals of University of Oradea, Series: International Relations & European Studies.}} Domestic political authorities' arguments emphasizing stability and the restoration of order resonated with the public and quickly became an issue of state identity.

On 18 October 2022, Ukraine's parliament condemned the "genocide of the Chechen people" during the First and Second Chechen War.{{cite news|url=https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2022/10/18/ukraines-parliament-declares-the-chechen-republic-of-ichkeria-temporarily-occupied-by-russia-and-condemns-genocide-of-chechens-en-news|date=18 October 2022|work=Novaya Gazeta|title=Ukraine's parliament declares the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria 'temporarily occupied by Russia' and condemns 'genocide of Chechens'|access-date=19 October 2022|archive-date=27 November 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231127153903/https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2022/10/18/ukraines-parliament-declares-the-chechen-republic-of-ichkeria-temporarily-occupied-by-russia-and-condemns-genocide-of-chechens-en-news|url-status=live}}{{cite news|url=https://meduza.io/en/news/2022/10/18/ukraine-s-parliament-declares-chechen-republic-of-ichkeria-russian-occupied-territory|date=18 October 2022|work=Meduza|title=Ukraine's parliament declares 'Chechen Republic of Ichkeria' Russian-occupied territory|access-date=19 October 2022|archive-date=26 March 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230326182241/https://meduza.io/en/news/2022/10/18/ukraine-s-parliament-declares-chechen-republic-of-ichkeria-russian-occupied-territory|url-status=live}}

• 1940–1944 insurgency in Chechnya
• Deportation of the Chechens and Ingush
• History of Chechnya
• History of Russia (1991–present)
• Islam in Russia
• Military history of the Russian Federation
• {{annotated link|Second Chechen War}}
• Circassian genocide
• List of wars involving Russia

{{notelist}}

{{Reflist}}

• {{cite book |last=Norin |first=Yevgeny |date=2025 |lang=ru |script-title=ru:Чеченская война |trans-title=Chechen War |place=Moscow |publisher=Chernaya Sotnya |volume=1: 1994-1996 }}
• {{Cite book|last=Bennett|first=Vanora|title=Crying Wolf: The Return of War to Chechnya|publisher=Picador|year=1998|isbn=978-0-330-35170-6|location=London}}
• {{cite book| title=Introduction to Political Psychology |first1=Martha L. |last1=Cottam |first2=Elena |last2=Mastors |first3=Thomas |last3=Preston |publisher=Taylor & Francis |year=2022

|isbn=9780429534843 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u6dnEAAAQBAJ&pg=PT392}}

• {{Cite book|last=Goltz|first=Thomas|title=Chechnya Diary: A War Correspondent's Story of Surviving the War in Chechnya|publisher=Thomas Dunne Books|year=2003|isbn=978-0-312-26874-9|location=New York|author-link=Thomas Goltz}}
• {{Cite book|author1-link=David R. Stone|last=Stone|first=David R.|title=A Military History of Russia: From Ivan the Terrible to the War in Chechnya|publisher=Praeger Security International|year=2006|isbn=978-0-275-98502-8|location=Westport}}
• {{Cite book|last=Politkovskaya|first=Anna|title=A Small Corner of Hell: Dispatches from Chechnya|publisher=University of Chicago Press|year=2003|isbn=978-0-226-67432-2|location=Chicago|author-link=Anna Politkovskaya}}
• {{Cite book|last=Smith|first=Sebastian|title=Allah's Mountains: The Battle for Chechnya|publisher=Tauris Parke Paperbacks|year=2006|isbn=978-1-85043-979-0|location=London|author-link=Sebastian Smith}}
• {{Cite book|last=Seierstad|first=Åsne|title=The Angel of Grozny: Inside Chechnya|publisher=Virago Press|year=2008|isbn=978-1-84408-516-3|location=London|author-link=Åsne Seierstad}}
• {{Cite book|last1=Gall|first1=Carlotta|title=Chechnya: Calamity in the Caucasus|last2=de Waal|first2=Thomas|publisher=New York University Press|year=1998|isbn=978-0-8147-2963-2|location=New York|author-link=Carlotta Gall}}
• {{Cite book|last=Hughes|first=James|title=Chechnya: From Nationalism to Jihad|publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press|year=2007|isbn=978-0-8122-4013-9|location=Philadelphia}}
• {{Cite book|last=Wood|first=Tony|title=Chechnya: The Case for Independence|publisher=Verso|year=2007|isbn=978-1-84467-114-4|location=London}}
• {{Cite book|last=Lieven|first=Anatol|title=Chechnya: Tombstone of Russian Power|publisher=Yale University Press|year=1998|isbn=978-0-300-07398-0|location=New Haven|author-link=Anatol Lieven}}
• {{Cite book|last1=Nikitina|first1=Elena|title=Girl, Taken: A True Story of Abduction, Captivity and Survival|last2=Quinlan|first2=Patrick|publisher=Iliad Books|year=2017|isbn=978-0-9882138-6-9|location=London|author-link2=Patrick Quinlan (author)}}
• {{Cite book|last=Goytisolo|first=Juan|title=Landscapes of War: From Sarajevo to Chechnya|publisher=City Lights Books|others=Introduction by Tariq Ali|year=2000|isbn=978-0-87286-373-6|location=San Francisco|translator-last=Bush|translator-first=Peter|author-link=Juan Goytisolo}}
• {{Cite book|last=Collins|first=Aukai|title=My Jihad: The True Story of an American Mujahid's Amazing Journey from Usama Bin Laden's Training Camps to Counterterrorism with the FBI and CIA|publisher=Lyons Press|year=2002|isbn=978-1-58574-565-4|location=Guilford|author-link=Aukai Collins}}
• {{Cite book|last=Greene|first=Stanley|title=Open Wound: Chechnya 1994 to 2003|publisher=Trolley Books|year=2003|isbn=978-1-904563-01-3|location=London}}
• {{Cite book|last=Dunlop|first=John B.|title=Russia Confronts Chechnya: Roots of a Separatist Conflict|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=1998|isbn=978-0-521-63184-6|location=Cambridge}}
• {{Cite book|last=Cassidy|first=Robert M.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7D1ou91YCi8C|title=Russia in Afghanistan and Chechnya: Military Strategic Culture and the Paradoxes of Asymmetric Conflict|publisher=U.S. Army War College|year=2003|isbn=978-1-58487-110-1|location=Carlisle}}
• {{Cite book|last=German|first=Tracey C.|title=Russia's Chechen War|publisher=Routledge|year=2003|isbn=978-0-415-29720-2|location=London}}
• {{Cite book|last=Galeotti|first=Mark|title=Russia's Wars in Chechnya 1994–2009|publisher=Osprey Publishing|year=2014|isbn=978-1-78200-277-2|series=Essential Histories|location=Oxford|issue=78}}
• {{Cite book|title=Russian Military Reform, 1992-2002|publisher=Routledge|year=2003|isbn=978-0-7146-5475-1|editor-last=Aldis|editor-first=Anne C.|location=London|editor-last2=McDermott|editor-first2=Roger N.}}
• {{Cite book|last=Evangelista|first=Matthew|title=The Chechen Wars: Will Russia Go the Way of the Soviet Union?|publisher=Brookings Institution Press|year=2002|isbn=978-0-8157-2498-8|location=Washington, D.C.}}
• {{Cite book|last=Grammer|first=Moshe|title=The Lone Wolf and the Bear: Three Centuries of Chechen Defiance of Russian Rule|publisher=Hurst Publishers|year=2006|isbn=978-1-85065-743-9|location=London}}
• {{Cite book|last=Baev|first=Pavel K.|title=The Russian Army: In a Time of Troubles|publisher=SAGE|year=1996|isbn=978-0-7619-5187-2|location=London}}
• {{Cite book|last1=Baiev|first1=Khassan|title=The Oath: A Surgeon Under Fire|last2=Daniloff|first2=Nicholas|last3=Daniloff|first3=Ruth|publisher=Random House Canada|year=2003|isbn=978-0-679-31156-0|location=Toronto|author-link=Khassan Baiev}}

{{Commons category}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20070927174621/http://www.boyntonweb.net/Policy/Chechnya.htm Chechen War 1994–96] The World Regional Conflicts Project
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20061011145310/http://www.crimesofwar.org/thebook/chechnya.html Chechnya] Crimes of War Project
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20070217004454/http://smallwarsjournal.com/reference/chechnya.php Chechnya Reference Library] A collection of analyses and interviews of Chechen commanders conducted by the United States Marine Corps
• {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20070606104703/http://russianremote.com/1241.html Damned and forgotten]}} Documentary by Sergey Govorukhin
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20061206141050/http://www.ccc.nps.navy.mil/people/tsypkinConf/Felgenhauer%2095_.doc The Chechen Campaign] by Pavel Felgenhauer
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20040921000456/http://www.hro.org/war/source_e.htm War and Human Rights] Memorial human rights group
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20071013100354/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,982351,00.html Why It All Went So Very Wrong] Time
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20070928120605/http://www.amina.com/article/whyrus_failed.html Why the Russian Military Failed in Chechnya] U.S. Foreign Studies

{{Chechen wars}}

{{Russian Conflicts}}

{{Boris Yeltsin}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:Civil wars in Russia

Category:Conflicts in territory of the former Soviet Union

*1

Category:Wars involving Chechnya

Category:Conflicts in 1994

Category:Conflicts in 1995

Category:Conflicts in 1996

Category:1994 in Russia

Category:1995 in Russia

Category:1996 in Russia

Category:Rebellions in Russia

Category:Separatist rebellion-based civil wars

Category:Wars involving Russia

Category:Wars involving the Circassians

Category:Wars involving the Karachay-Balkars