Russia’s President Vladimir Putin visited Chechnya this week for the first time in 13 years.
“As long as we have men like you, we are absolutely, absolutely invincible,” Putin told troops at the training school, according to a transcript on the Kremlin’s website.
Kadyrov said on Telegram that more than 47,000 fighters, including volunteers, have trained at the facility since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Chechen resistance
Putin has tried to keep Chechnya, a predominantly Muslim region in the North Caucasus, under Russia’s control ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Similar to Ukraine, Chechnya has had a long history of opposition to Russian rule, as outlined in an NPR report,
Chechen resistance dates back at least two centuries.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Chechnya sought to break away from the Russian Federation. Under Boris Yeltsin, the Russians had to come to an agreement with the Chechens in 1996.
John Lough, an associate fellow at Chatham House, told Business Insider that many in Moscow saw this agreement as “way too generous, opening the past to further instability not just within the North Caucasus but in the Russian Federation generally.”
Then-Prime Minister Putin took a much stronger stance against Chechnya, placing the blame for apartment bombings on Chechen militants and taking the opportunity to order a large-scale bombing of the region, launching the Second Chechen War.
Experts believe the Second Chechen War was crucial to cementing Putin’s strongman reputation.
In one of his most famous quotes, Putin said” “We will pursue the terrorists everywhere. You will forgive me, but if we catch them on the toilet, we will wipe them out in the shithouse.”
“Putin, from a very early stage, signaled that Chechnya was going to be subdued and they would do this, whatever the cost, and to that degree, he was successful,” Lough told BI.
Similarities to Ukraine
To many, Putin’s insistent claims to victory in Chechnya sound similar to his rhetoric about Ukraine. “Victory will be ours” is an oft-repeated line in his speeches about the war.
The use of heavy artillery, high civilian casualty toll, and indiscriminate bombing in Ukraine is also reminiscent of his hardline campaign in Chechnya, which spanned a decade.
At least two all-Chechen battalions have fought on the Ukrainian side during the ongoing war.
Meanwhile, Chechen leader Kadyrov has deployed Chechen military forces — sometimes called Kadyrovtsy — to fight on behalf of Russia since 2022.
The UK’s Ministry of Defence estimated in May that around 9,000 troops were fighting in pro-Russian Chechen units in Ukraine. This includes the Chechen “TikTok” forces on the front lines, who are filling gaps left by the Wagner group since they ceased operations.
The visit comes as Ukrainian forces continue to gain ground in Russia’s Kursk region.
The invasion, which is now in its third week, shocked both Moscow and Ukraine’s Western allies. It is believed to be the biggest attack by a foreign enemy on Russian soil since the Second World War.
Oleksandr Syrskyi, the commander in chief of the Ukrainian military, said on Tuesday that his forces control some 1,263 square kilometers (roughly 488 square miles) of Russian territory in Kursk and 93 settlements within that area.
Elsewhere in the war, however, Ukraine is struggling to hold its ground. Putin’s visit to a part of Russia that once fought for independence serves as a chilling warning about the fate that may still befall Ukraine.
