Against the backdrop of epic music, dozens of armored vehicles and thousands of armed men, many of them hooded, are lined up in the central square of Grozny, the Chechen capital. They would be 70,000 ready to go to the front in Ukraine, assures their leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, recognizable by his long beard and star of this video published on October 9 on the Internet. “With the help of Allah Most High, we will clean the Earth of this vermin!” he thunders, speaking of the Ukrainians, the “satanists” whose president Volodymyr Zelensky is, according to him, “the envoy of the Sheitan [le diable, en arabe]”Allah Akbar!” roar his men in unison, in a mixture of religious exaltation and Russian ultra-nationalism dear to Kadyrov, who claims to have sent three of his sons, aged 14, 15 and 16 , “on the front line.” The camera complacently zooms in on his new general-colonel shoulder pads: the Chechen dictator received this title from Vladimir Putin four days earlier, a few months after being named general-lieutenant.
An express promotion which vividly illustrates its rise to power since the start of the war in Ukraine. To the point that none of the people contacted by L’Express agreed to testify openly. “It has become too easy to have someone killed in Moscow”, explains an expert. Because Ramzan Kadyrov and his men, the kadyrovtsy, scares them.
Since the first days of the invasion, they have been at the forefront. And despite the contemptuous nickname of “TikTok soldiers” earned by their propensity to stage themselves on social networks, they demonstrate their brutal efficiency. They took part in the capture of the twin towns of Serevodonetsk and Lyssytchansk in the Donbass and carried out bloody assaults in the underground passages of the Azovstal factory in Mariupol. “Pro-Russian residents of Mariupol say they realized they had arrived when they heard ‘Allahu Akbar’ shouted in the streets of their city,” recalls a Caucasian political specialist, who also wishes to remain anonymous. .
“It’s a strong relationship, man to man”
How did the man who is officially only the leader of one of the poorest regions of Russia find himself at the head of a private army estimated at 10,000 men? To understand this, we must go back to the sources of Ramzan Kadyrov’s power. In 1999, in the middle of the second Chechen war, Akhmad Kadyrov, one of the independence warlords, pledged allegiance to Moscow. Vladimir Putin bets on his clan and installs it in power. But on May 9, 2004, Akhmad Kadyrov was killed in a bomb attack, probably organized by rivals. His son Ramzan is chosen by Putin to continue to hold the region in the name of Moscow. It does so by making a reign of terror: human rights organizations count hundreds of cases of torture, assassinations and enforced disappearances each year in Chechnya.
One by one, the Chechen clans gather under his banner. Those who refuse are massacred or forced into exile. “Ramzan Kadyrov has obtained the monopoly of armed force in Chechnya, sums up our expert from the Caucasus. He is even the first Chechen leader to have achieved this.” It is from this core group of veterans of the Chechen wars that the kadyrovtsy, personal guard turned army. “It was necessary to feed and pay all these people. It was therefore necessary to legalize this army within the official Russian structures, continues this source. kadyrovtsy formally belong to the Russian state, but their commanders are loyal to Kadyrov, who pays them very generously.”
As for the loyalty of the master of Chechnya, it goes directly to Vladimir Putin. “There were very strong images at the time of his father’s death, remembers a good connoisseur of the mysteries of the Kremlin. Putin receiving Ramzan Kadyrov in the Kremlin, taking him in his arms when he is completely haggard, in tracksuit. It’s a strong relationship, man to man.” But also based on well-understood interests: Moscow generously finances the clan in power in the former separatist republic, allowing Kadyrov to equip his troops with equipment that has nothing to envy to that of the Russian special forces, but also with s greatly enrich.
Post-Putin, a huge challenge for Kadyrov
In exchange, Ramzan Kadyrov guarantees that Chechnya no longer poses political and security problems for Moscow. “The reconquest of Chechnya is one of the founding moments of Putin’s regime, underlines the same expert. If it is called into question, a whole section of Putin’s legitimacy collapses.” Kadyrov takes advantage of this. Whether he sharply criticizes the staff of the Russian army after the debacles of Kharkiv and Lyman and calls for striking Ukraine with nuclear weapons or whether he openly refuses to organize in his region the “mobilization partial” decreed by the Russian government, arguing that Chechnya has already largely fulfilled the quotas indicated, he has a freedom of tone inconceivable for anyone other than him.
“When Putin disappears, everyone will work to get rid of him”
In fact, his link with Vladimir Putin resembles an alliance between independent heads of state. Ramzan Kadyrov even leads a parallel international policy, forges ties with Chechen communities abroad, the Gulf countries… In his region, he has created a theocracy in which homosexuals are murdered, women assigned to guardianship of their family and the non-existent Russian laws. “The maintenance of Chechnya within the Russian Federation is a fiction that everyone pretends to accept, but it is enough to set foot in Grozny to realize that we are actually in another country”, concludes an observer. The whole issue is knowing how long this fiction will last… especially after Vladimir Putin.
Whatever the scenario of the departure from power of the Russian dictator, it will represent an immense challenge for his Chechen ally. Ramzan Kadyrov has no shortage of enemies: “The military and the special services hate him, the establishment hates him, the Chechen clans he subjugated are biding their time… When Putin disappears, everyone will be rushing to get rid of him, prognosticates a researcher. But Ramzan knows that he will one day have to do without Putin, who is twice his age. He is preparing for it. He has accumulated immense wealth, perhaps enough to keep paying his private army.” This post-Putin period, which promises to be chaotic, could also be an opportunity for Kadyrov. That of leaving his small region, where he obviously feels cramped. Proclaiming the independence of Chechnya again, swallowing up the neighboring regions of the Russian Caucasus, carving out an emirate based on its image as the leader of Russian Islam… “If there is chaos, he will do very well, considers one of our witnesses. People like him are made for chaos.”