OT: Russia Tests Missile, Warns West and Chechens Claim Russians Beaten Back

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Russia Tests Missile, Warns West

By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV

.c The Associated Press

MOSCOW (AP) - Russia launched a new strategic missile Tuesday and used the occasion to warn the West against criticizing its campaign in the breakaway republic of Chechnya.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who witnessed the test, said Russia ``will use all diplomatic and military-political levers in its disposal,'' to confront Western opposition.

Putin's comments came in a speech to military officers at the Plesetsk launch pad in northwestern Russia, after the successful test-firing of a Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missile. The missile was launched from Plesetsk and flew across Russia, hitting its target on the Kamchatka peninsula, some 3,400 miles to the east.

``The diplomatic levers are clear, and as for military ones, Tuesday's successful launch of the Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missile is one of them,'' Putin said, according to Russian news agencies.

Putin's warning followed last week's tough statement from President Boris Yeltsin, who reminded President Clinton that ``Russia is a great power that possesses a nuclear arsenal.'' Yeltsin was reacting to U.S. criticism of the Chechnya campaign.

Putin at the time sought to moderate Yeltsin's statement, saying that Russia and the United States have good relations, but his statement Tuesday sounded as harsh as Yeltsin's.

``No one can accuse the government of inappropriate use of anti-terrorist measures in Chechnya, call Russia an aggressor or an occupier,'' Putin said.

The United States and other Western nations have criticized Moscow for excessive use of force in Chechnya, causing civilian casualties and the exodus of over 230,000 refugees.

``Some nations and blocs under cover of international organizations are interfering into affairs of independent states, and trying to speak to them in the language of force,'' Putin said. ``We are not used to such language, since Russia has a nuclear shield.''

Putin also warned the United States against trying to modify the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty to build anti-missile defenses. Washington says such a defense system is intended to protect the United States from possible missile attacks by rogue nations and wouldn't be capable of deflecting a massive nuclear attack of the kind Russia is capable of launching.

But Moscow dismisses the argument and warns that attempts to amend the treaty could trigger a new arms race.

The Russian military has said that fitting multiple warheads to the Topol-M missiles would be a part of Moscow's response if the United States walks out of the treaty.

Russia is pinning the future of its missile program on the Topol-M. Most of its other long-range missiles are either past their service lifetime or will have to be dismantled if the country ratifies the START-II nuclear disarmament treaty.

Unlike Russia's older missiles, the Topol-M is a relatively small, mobile missile designed to be fired from trucks or other vehicles, making it difficult for potential enemies to locate and track.

AP-NY-12-14-99 2207EST

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Chechens Claim Russians Beaten Back

By RUSLAN MUSAYEV

.c The Associated Press

GROZNY, Russia (Dec. 15) - Plumes of black smoke rose over the devastated center of Grozny on Wednesday as salvos of Russian shells screamed overhead, exploding in bright flashes of red and orange.

After enduring weeks of savage artillery bombardments, the streets of the Chechen capital were deserted, with nobody daring to move outside.

Chechen rebels claimed to have beaten back Russian ground forces even as a senior Russian commander once again predicted Grozny would fall within days.

The Russian military's march across Chechnya so far has faced limited resistance from the outgunned militants, who have repeatedly retreated rather than wage full-scale ground battles. But the confident rebels said they are now confronting the Russians head-on.

Lechi Islamov, a senior Chechen commander in Grozny, told The Associated Press that rebel forces had repulsed six Russian ground attacks in the north and southeast of the city during the past 24 hours. But the Russians were still attacking, he said.

Several thousand militants are well-entrenched in the battered capital, where they have been preparing for weeks for a Russian assault. Despite the heavy artillery fire, the Chechen fighters appeared to be holding their own from bunkers and other fortified positions.

The rebels have a wealth of experience in guarding against Russian attacks on Grozny. Chechen fighters fiercely defended the capital at the beginning of the 1994-96 war against Russia and recaptured the city near the end of the conflict.

However, if Russia's superior firepower overwhelms the rebels, as many predict, the militants will retreat to southern Chechnya and wage guerrilla warfare from the mountains. The strategy worked extremely well for them in the previous conflict and ultimately led to the Russian withdrawal.

Russian commanders said their forces were fighting on the edges of Grozny and had pushed the rebels back in some areas. Much of the city was leveled during the previous war, and more buildings have been reduced to rubble in recent weeks.

In Moscow, a top military official predicted that Grozny would be taken in ''a matter of days,'' and that the Russians would completely defeat the militants by February.

Russian forces now control 60 percent of Chechnya, and it will take two to three months to defeat the estimated 12,000 to 15,000 rebels throughout the breakaway republic, said Gen. Valery Manilov, first deputy chief of the Russian General Staff.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said the Russians would first complete the ''anti-terrorist operation'' and would then look to solve ''political problems by political means,'' according to his spokesman, Mikhail Kuzhukhov.

Islamov said about 7,000 rebel fighters were in Grozny. But rebel groups outside the city are finding it difficult to send reinforcements and supplies through the Russian lines encircling the city.

From 10,000 to 40,000 hungry civilians are believed to be trapped in the city, many too old and infirm to make the dangerous journey through Russian shelling out of the capital.

The Emergency Situations Ministry said almost 3,000 civilians had left the city since Saturday, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported. But reporters say they have seen only small numbers of people straggling out.

Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu said he was ready to hold talks with Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov to discuss evacuating civilians from Grozny.

''I am ready for contacts with Maskhadov, or the devil himself, to provide for the safety of the peaceful population,'' Shoigu said.

Maskhadov said it was the Russian bombardment that was keeping the civilians pinned down in the city, where many are holed up in basements, the Interfax news agency said.

According to Islamov, more than 100 Russian soldiers have been killed in the past two days of fighting and 86 civilians have died in Grozny due to Russian shelling over the past 10 days.

The figures could not be independently confirmed, and both sides routinely exaggerate casualty claims.

Amid strong international criticism of Russia's military campaign, Knut Vollebaek, chairman of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, offered to mediate a cease-fire.

''We need to find a political solution,'' Vollebaek said Wednesday in Ingushetia, the Russian region bordering Chechnya that has taken in the vast majority of the refugees.

Maskhadov has said he is ready to negotiate, but Russian officials said a cease-fire

-- anonymous (none@none.none), December 15, 1999

Answers

''We need to find a political solution,'' Vollebaek said Wednesday in Ingushetia, the Russian region bordering Chechnya that has taken in the vast majority of the refugees.

Maskhadov has said he is ready to negotiate, but Russian officials said a cease-fire would only help the Chechen fighters.

AP-NY-12-15-99 1356EST....



-- opps anonymous (why.did.@it.cut.off?), December 15, 1999.


This civil war is being fought entirely within the boundaries of a crumbling nation which posesses the worlds largest stockpiles of nuclear , chemical, and biological weapons. In a little over two weeks the entire country is going to implode. The potential for catastrophe is astounding, and not at all confined to the present borders.

-- Nikoli Krushev (doomsday@y2000.com), December 15, 1999.

I commented some time ago that Putin was just another Commie thug. This article does nothing to change my views.

Ratchet up the alert levels and target their cities. The Red bastards are at it again.

-- Irving (irvingf@myremarq.com), December 15, 1999.


Time to PREEMPT!

-- gladi'mdownhere (noradbunker@che.com), December 15, 1999.

Of course, it won't help things much now that they are embarrased at being beaten back by the people they are hoping to destroy. Boris the Corpse is likely to be bitchy and not capable of much more than pushing a button. And then confusing it with the T V Remote, and well...you know what comes next.

-- Gia (laureltree7@hotmail.com), December 16, 1999.


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