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#4 - RW 269
Irish Times
August 14, 2003
Find is not even tip of the Russian arms iceberg -
Shoulder-held missiles - effective and simple to use - are easy to come by
Chris Stephen in Moscow
Western intelligence agencies may be congratulating themselves over the
interception of the Igla missile sale, but the truth is air-to-air missiles are
easily available in eastern Europe's arms bazaars.
On August 19th last year, a giant Russian transport helicopter was shot down
over the Chechen capital, Grozny, by a rebel firing a Russian-made Strela
missile. The attack was one of the worst disasters of the Chechen war, with 115
people losing their lives when the badly overloaded helicopter fell to earth in
a fireball.
How the rebels got the Strela has never been explained, but the buying of
weapons by Chechens from agents inside Russia's own armed forces is routine.
Strela missiles are a less sophisticated weapon than the Igla, but are freely
available in the murky arms markets in Russia and other former Soviet states.
Much of the weaponry is sold, via mafia middlemen, to the Chechens by
disgruntled soldiers in Russia's badly paid military.
Others may come straight from the factory: Russia and her neighbours have
vast weapons industries, a legacy of Soviet times. Many factories are at full
productivity, after Moscow concluded half a dozen huge arms sales agreements,
including a (pounds) 7 billion deal with India signed two years ago. All of
which means there are lot of weapons to police.
While shoulder-launched air- to-air missiles have proved a constant menace to
Russian helicopters in the Chechnya war, they are also a major headache for the
West. Much of the money to finance Chechen forces comes from the Middle East and
there are fears that arms supplies flow the other way.
Just this week, the US Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, said that the
Chechen rebel leader, Shamil Basayev, was being put on the official list of
terrorist threats to the United States. The move allows US officials to raid
bank accounts in America thought to be used to aid the Chechens.
Moscow has long claimed that the rebels are backed by Middle Eastern
terrorist groups. The latest evidence of links comes from the similarities in
design of suicide belts worn by Chechen 'Black Widows' suicide bombers and
Palestinian bombers in Israel.
Formations of Middle Eastern volunteers continue to fight alongside Chechen
units. Basayev's former second-in-command, killed in fighting against Russian
forces, was a Saudi Arabian.
America tried and failed to shut the arms pipeline last year, sending
commandos into neighbouring Georgia. The units moved into the Pankisi Gorge to
close down Chechen base camps, but the rebels simply moved their operations into
the mountains.
Georgian forces have proved unwilling to follow them.
The sort of missiles available on the arms market are older-generation Soviet
models. They have little use against military targets, which employ shielding,
but they can be deadly against civil targets. Civil airliners have huge heat
signatures on which the missiles home.
They are particularly vulnerable when taking-off and landing, when their slow
speed and proximity to earth make them easy targets for even the oldest
generation of missiles.
British troops recently ringed Heathrow after intelligence indicated
terrorists were preparing to shoot at an airliner.
An Israeli passenger jet was lucky to escape when two missiles were fired at
it shortly after it took off from Kenya.
Missiles are not the only headache: Russia is also awash with spent nuclear
fuel and weapons, idea for making a 'dirty bomb' together with thousands of
tonnes of chemical weapons.
America has been financing a programme to destroy these weapons, but only a
much larger programme, aimed at collecting all dangerous material and regulating
the arms markets, is likely to have a lasting effect.
All of which means this week's sting by intelligence agencies should be
little cause for comfort: there are still plenty of weapons out there somewhere.
CDI Russia Weekly #269 ~ Contents • Next
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