Analysis: The bloody history of a people with an unquenchable thirst for independence

The siege of the Moscow theatre, which ended so tragically early on Saturday, is the latest chapter in the blood-drenched history of relations between Russia and the peoples of the northern Caucasus. With most of the estimated 50 terrorists killed and more than 100 hostages dead, Vladimir Putin faces the most wrenching dilemma of his presidency: does he continue to try to subjugate Chechnya by force, or does he move towards talks that would grant the Chechens the autonomy they so crave – and have so recently squandered?

One of the chain of small mountainous regions on Russia's southern border, Chechnya has been fought over for more than 150 years. It has suffered decades of war and oppression, with a few fleeting and rarely successful years of independence in between.

Russia conquered Chechnya in 1858 after wars that live in Russian literature and folk memory for the ferocity of the fighting, the romantic desperation of the Chechen warriors and the dramatic grandeur of the scenery. The Chechens next tasted independence in the turmoil that followed the Russian Revolution. They hoped for it again when Moscow's attention was focused on the German invasion – earning themselves demonisation as a "traitor-nation" and enforced deportation to the wastes of Siberia and Central Asia. Along with other exiled peoples, they were allowed to return to their homeland in the mid-Fifties – beneficiaries of Khrushchev's political "thaw".

The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 prompted their most recent dash for independence. Again, though, the Chechens were to be disappointed. Russia's leader, Boris Yeltsin, decided that enough break-up was enough. The border of the Russian Federation was set at the former border of Soviet Russia. The "autonomous republics" of the north Caucasus retained this dubious status and were expected to resume their 19th-century role as Russia's protector against the presumed threat from instability and Islam. Their strategic position and oil resources were deemed indispensable to post-Soviet Russia. Let one domino fall, so the argument went in Moscow, and they will all fall.

Of the six autonomous republics bordering Russia, Chechnya was the most committed to independence and the most determined to fight for it. The last eight years of conflict between the Russians and the Chechens have been dominated by war and horrifying atrocities, but there was one brief glimmer of hope and opportunity. At the end of 1996, after a series of startling Chechen victories, the Russians withdrew their troops and a peace deal was brokered, giving the shattered republic considerable autonomy.

The Chechen chief of staff, General Aslan Maskhadov, was elected President. It seemed that a particularly horrific war was at last at an end. The optimism did not last long, and nor did the peace.

At that stage – although the major powers stood firmly behind Boris Yeltsin – the Chechens enjoyed a degree of international sympathy, not least because of the sheer brutality of the Russian army, who flattened the city of Grozny, set up "filtration" camps for young Chechens, ransacked towns and raped women.

But the new Chechen leadership had no sooner gained the moral high ground than they began to lose it. Working in extremely difficult conditions, including a devastated economy and infrastructure, Mr Maskhadov proved incapable either of building a functioning government or of exercising stable control over his republic. Kidnapping and banditry became big business, destroying any prospect of significant foreign investment.

In less than three years, more than 1,100 Russian citizens were abducted by Chechen-led gangs. The details that emerged of the kidnappings and killings were often horrific. In December 1996 – in a repellent foretaste of what was to come – six Red Cross workers, including five women nurses, were murdered in a rural hospital.

The several dozen Westerners who were abducted during this period included three Britons and a New Zealander, who had gone to Chechnya on a telecoms contract. They were beheaded, and their heads dumped in a sack by a roadside. That particular crime is believed to have been carried out by Arbi Barayev, a leading warlord and uncle of the leader of the gang who stormed into the theatre in Moscow last week.

Mr Maskhadov tried to stem the tide by setting up an anti-terrorism unit; its leader was killed by a car bomb. The Chechen prosecutor general was also abducted.

The contours of the conflict had clearly changed. Many of the Chechens who fought the first war against Russia – and certainly, Mr Maskhadov himself – had portrayed themselves primarily as freedom fighters. But now, Islamic militants, keen to wage a jihad against Moscow, started to come to the fore. In August 1999, they made their presence felt. A group of Islamic militants with ties to the Taliban crossed the eastern border from Chechnya and invaded Dagestan, a Muslim republic which, like Chechnya, is part of Russia, but unlike Chechnya has an outlet to the sea, with a long coastline on the Caspian. Their declared aim was to establish an Islamic state uniting the two Muslim republics.

There were several large bombing attacks – one killed 51 in North Ossetia and another killed 64 in Dagestan – which attracted only fleeting attention worldwide. Then, in September 1999, came the mysterious apartment bombings in Moscow and elsewhere, in which 300 people were killed. Some, in Chechnya and abroad, saw the hand of the Russian security services behind the Moscow bombings. Most, though, including the Russian authorities, had no hesitation in blaming Chechen rebels.

The unrest in the northern Caucasus was suddenly felt in the Russian capital, just as it was last week, and the response from Moscow was uncompromising: invasion. The scale of the assault in 1999 soon became apparent. Russia's second Chechen war of the 1990s was another horrific episode of rape, killings, torture and destruction, in which the Russian army played a dismal role. The terrorist attacks on the United States of 11 September 2001 served indirectly to strengthen Moscow's hand and silence what Western criticism there was. Russia added the Chechens to the ranks of global terrorists and lumped their quest for independence together with the anti-Western jihad of al-Qa'ida.

Moscow has milked the association for all it is worth after the seizure of the theatre last week. One Russian state-run television channel mixed its coverage from the scene last week with lengthy reports about the spread of Islamic militancy, bunching together Palestinian groups, al-Qa'ida, the World Trade Centre and assorted bombings carried out by Islamists in central, south and south-east Asia. In one of these, a map was produced purporting to show a plan to establish an Islamic empire stretching around the globe. It was almost as if it was preparing the audience for the worst.

CENTURIES OF CONFLICT

1858 Chechnya conquered by Russia after defeat of its Islamic leader, Imam Shamil.

1922 Chechen autonomous region established within Russian Federation.

1944 Mass deportation of Chechens to Soviet central Asia, along with other Caucasus peoples accused of supporting Nazi Germany.

1957 The Soviet leader, Nikita Khrushchev, allows Chechens to return home.

1991 Soviet Union collapses; Dzhokhar Dudayev proclaims Chechnya's independence.

1994 Russia's President, Boris Yeltsin, sends in troops to re-establish Russian rule.

1995 Chechen rebels seize hospital in Budennovsk, in southern Russia. More than 100 killed in raid and Russian commando operation.

1996 April Dudayev, located by his mobile phone, killed in Russian missile attack.

May Yeltsin signs peace deal with Dudayev's successor, Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev.

August Chechen rebels recapture capital, Grozny.

1997 Russia recognises new government of President Aslan Maskhadov and signs peace treaty, which includes offer to consider recognition of autonomy within five years.

1998 Spate of kidnappings and murders, including four telecoms engineers from Britain and New Zealand who are beheaded, and Moscow's chief envoy to region.

1999 July/August Chechen incursion into neighbouring Dagestan in failed attempt to found Islamic state.

September Chechen rebels are blamed for the bombings of blocks of flats in Moscow.

October Russia withdraws recognition of Maskhadov government and invades Chechnya again.

2000 February Grozny falls; President Vladimir Putin declares direct rule.

2001 September Putin declares war on Chechnya part of "war on terrorism".

2002 August Russian helicopter shot down over Chechnya, 116 killed.

October Chechen fighters mount assault on theatre in Moscow.