Assault on Grozny in 1994 becomes an example of Russia's hybrid military campaign

An unsuccessful assault on Grozny by the Chechen opposition in November 1994 was planned by Moscow as part of a hybrid military campaign, said political analyst Ruslan Martagov and human rights defender Oleg Orlov. In Chechnya, none of the parties expected a full-scale war, eyewitnesses said.

At first, the opposing forces avoided firing, says Zaindi, a former fighter of a Chechen armed forces unit.

The November assault on Grozny was the occasion for the outbreak of a full-scale war, said a former member of the anti-Dudaev opposition groups.

According to political analyst Ruslan Martagov, the Russian authorities used the defeat of the tank brigade of the anti-Dudaev opposition to legitimize the military operation in Chechnya.

The assault on Grozny on November 26, 1994, was caused by a conflict between Dudaev and the Chechen opposition, and Moscow took advantage of that fact, said Oleg Orlov, a member of the board of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial".

In modern Chechnya, the authorities try to hush up events related to aggression from Moscow, but in some places, facts from the past life of the republic still emerge, Oleg Orlov believes.

"We've got a whole generation of women who have no husbands and no children. This is an 'echo of war'," noted historian Movsar Ibragimov.