Fierce fighting in Chechnya continues Wednesday

January 19, 2000
Web posted at: 10:17 a.m. EST (1517 GMT)

In this story: Hundreds of airstrikes in the mountains Giving rebels their due RELATED STORIES, SITES

From staff and wire reports

GROZNY, Russia -- Russia stepped up its attempts to take the Chechen capital Grozny on Wednesday, with street battles raging around a strategic downtown square and top Russian officials predicting the fighting in Chechnya will be over in a month.

Lt. Gen. Gennady Troshev, Russia's deputy chief commander in Chechnya, said Wednesday the war is expected to be over by February 26, though Troshev added "nobody is giving the forces any firm deadlines for ending the operation," the Interfax news agency reported.

"The operation in Chechnya is close to completion," echoed military spokesman Lt. Col. Konstantin Kukharenko.

Russian ground troops reportedly now are fighting so close to the rebels that the two sides can hear each other yelling and swearing.

MESSAGE BOARD Russia's future

The military says its forces have seized parts of Grozny's city center, including a key bridge across the Sunzha River and Minutka Square, just a short drive from the heart of downtown Grozny.

Chechen rebel leaders say the bridge is "the most strategically important" site in Grozny. The rebels use the bridge to move about the city.

Hundreds of airstrikes in the mountains

Moscow also continues to hit rebel targets in the mountains south of Grozny, where the Russian military says rebels are fortifying their positions. The ITAR-Tass news agency reports that the Russians carried out more than 180 airstrikes on Tuesday, killing an estimated 150 rebels in Grozny and in the Argun and Vedeno gorges. The casualty figures could not be independently verified.

Paratroopers strengthened positions over the Argun gorge, and ITAR-Tass said more than 60 percent of the southern mountains are under Moscow's control.

Interfax news agency said some rebel forces were regrouping in remote areas of neighboring Dagestan or the former Soviet republics of Georgia and Azerbaijan. It said the rebels also planned raids on Russian-held towns in Chechnya.

A Russian soldier places a grenade in his pocket

After facing relatively little resistance in Chechnya's northern lowlands, Russian forces have been stalled in Grozny for months.

Giving rebels their due

Grozny has been the main rebel stronghold in Chechnya and its capture would give Russian forces a huge victory.

But capturing and controlling the city are two different things, as Russia found out in its 1994-96 war with Chechnya. Russians took the city, held it for more than a year, then lost it back to the Chechens in a humiliating and costly defeat.

One rebel commander told CNN that despite Russia's progress in the past few days, the military's control of the city is like a ship at sea: it moves along with the troops, leaving rebels to retake any land the Russian troops leave unguarded.

"In the end the Russians will most likely manage to take Grozny and put the Russian flag on the ruins," military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer told CNN. But he said it is not enough to seize Chechen cities -- the Russian military must capture the rebel fighters as well.

"You take over cities and the guerrilla force has ample opportunity to attack you here, there and everywhere," Felgenhauer said. "That doesn't bring you victory, it never does."

Russian Maj. Gen. Vadim Timchenko acknowledged the rebels had built strong defenses in the capital.

"You have to give them their due," Timchenko was quoted as saying by the ITAR-Tass news agency. "They have excellently prepared the city for defense in engineering terms, turning it into a many-layered fortress."

Felgenhauer

But Russian military official say some of the 2,000 Chechen militants in Grozny are trying to flee or surrender, a claim that could not be confirmed.

Estimates of the number of civilians still left in the city range from 10,000 to 25,000. Most hide in basements, venturing out during lulls in the fighting to look for food.

Acting Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered troops into Chechnya last September to wipe out Islamic rebels that Russia blames for two incursions into Dagestan and for apartment bombings that killed about 300 people in Russian cities. The rebels deny any involvement in the apartment bombings.

The Chechen war has earned Putin runaway popularity among ordinary Russians, and he is heavily favored to win the presidential election in March.

Correspondent Steve Harrigan, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.