Putin's War on Terrorism: Lessons From Chechnya

The events of September 11 precipitated a dramatic reconfiguration of Russian-American relations as well as of the international security environment more broadly. Vladimir Putin was the first foreign leader to reach President Bush by telephone to express his sympathy and support, and, despite considerable ambivalence and misgivings within the Russian military, foreign policy, and security establishments (as well as parts of Russia's Moslem religious leadership), he threw his political backing behind the US anti-terrorist campaign. Some have argued that this was a bold—and risky—shift in Russian policy. But President Putin's response was not, in fact, quite as radical a departure as some have suggested. Putin was able to treat September 11 as both a vindication of his two-year effort to define international terrorism as a major security threat (and the war in Chechnya as Russia's own effort to deal with that threat), and as an opportunity to use the issue of terrorism to reshape US-Russian relations. It strengthened his argument that however considerable America's economic and political power, only multilateral cooperation, and in particular partnership with Russia, could effectively address the security challenges that threaten the entire civilized world.