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without serious resistance, this would discourage future attacks on any of the North 
Caucasian peoples. 
However, despite the success of the Confederation and the Abkhazia, the 
developments did not result in a consolidation and the emergence of true 
Confederation. Russia managed to achieve its desire of forcing Georgia to accept 
the membership of the CIS and to secure military bases to control the region. In 
addition, the Russian authorities decided to establish their own organizations in the 
region to neutralize the Confederation. Moreover, the possibility of the Chechen 
supremacy and the reaction from the other members of the Confederation caused 
the alienation between the members of it. 
 
6- The Chechen Struggle
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 for Independence and Seeking for a United 
Front: 
The Chechens and the Abkhaz had always been the cardinal components of 
the Assembly and later the Confederation. During the struggle between the 
Confederation and Georgia, the Chechens comprised the main combat force and 
provided the necessary financial means and ammunitions. Nevertheless, the 
increasing tensions between the Russians and Chechens, beyond the destruction of 
the Chechen independence, caused internal strife within the Confederation as well. 
 
                                                 
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 For the Chechens and the Chechen war see Anatol, Lieven, 1998. Chechnya: Tombstone of 
Russian Power, New Haven: Yale University Press. Sebastian Smith, 1998. Allah’s Mountains: 
Politics and War in the Russian Caucasus, London: Tauris. Carlotta Gaal and Thomas De Waal, 
1997.  Chechnya: A Small Victorious War, London: Pan Books. John B. Dunlop, 1998. Russia 
Confronts Chechnya: Roots of a Separatist Conflict, Cambridge: Cambridge Un. Press. 

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The Chechens, as it was in the other peoples of the North Caucasus, has a 
dual sense of identity: that of Mountaineer and, more narrowly but strongly, the 
national one as a Chechen or Nokhchi. In compliance with this dual identity while 
they had been living in their independent state from 1992, under the leadership of 
Djokhar Dudayev on the one hand, they were trying to establish an independent 
larger North Caucasian State on the other. However, because of the serious 
economic problems and power struggles between the Chechen teips, the fragile 
political stability in Chechnya disintegrated and the political fragmentation started. 
In response to the demonstrations that were asking the president’s resignation, 
Dudayev dissolved the parliament and imposed a curfew by issuing a decree in 
April 1993. Then, in addition to Yaragi Mamodayev, Salambek Hajiev, and Doku 
Zavgayev, even his former allies of Dudayev, like Omar Avtorkhanov, Bislan 
Gantemirov and, Ruslan Labazanov had started to oppose him. 
 
Similarly, because of Dudayev’s ambitions to control the ‘pan-Caucasian’ 
movement, the relations between the Confederation and the Chechen Republic 
began to deteriorate. The ‘Dudayev factor’, thus, caused the alienation between 
Chechens and other peoples of the North Caucasus. Dudayev believed that with its 
economy, history, geographic location as well as the impact of current 
developments, the Chechens should play the leading role in the efforts toward 
independence and unity in the North Caucasus.
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 He put the Chechen Republic 
into the center of the struggle of the North Caucasian peoples but chose Russia as 
its main rival, while the other peoples of the North Caucasus, especially the 

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Abkhaz were willing to side with Russia against Georgia. Therefore, this basic 
difference of an outlook resulted in a split within the Confederation. 
 
In fact, from the outset, Dudayev intended to establish an organization, 
which encompassed the whole Caucasus, including Azerbaijan, Georgia and even 
Armenia. To accomplish this aim, together with Zviad Gamsakhurdia he set up a 
‘Caucasian Home’ (Kavkazskiy Dom) or International Caucasian Home Forum
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 in 
September 1992 for the purpose of uniting the local peoples in their struggle for 
freedom and national independence. This was, like the Confederation, an informal 
alliance heralding political and economic integration in the form of a 
Confederation. 
 
Nevertheless, this initiative of Dudayev, especially in cooperation with 
Zviad Gamsakhurdia created distress in the Confederation. Gamsakhurdia accepted 
by the Confederation’s leaders as the leader of the Georgian nationalism and 
blamed in every condition as the instigator of the Georgian assaults on the Abkhaz. 
Dudayev, however, from the early days of Gamsakhurdia’s escape from Georgian 
territory supplied him a safe shelter. In several occasions the Confederation 
expressed its distrust and dissatisfaction at the former president’s presence in 
                                                                                                                                        
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 Marje, June 1992, 20-22. 
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 For the Caucasian Home ant some other similar organizations see Rafig Aliev, “‘Caucasian 
Home’: A view from Azerbaijan,” in Commonwealth and Independence in Post-Soviet Eurasia, 
Bruno Coppieters and et al. eds., 1998. London: 99-110. Also see “Cohar Dudayev’le bir söyleşi,” 
Kafkasya Gerçeği, (Samsun), January 1993, 11: 12-14; and “Chechens try to rally Caucasian 
peoples: tension with Russia rising,” SWB SU/1488, B/3, 17 September 1992 and “Caucasian Home 
group calls for removal of Russian troops,” SWB SU/1639, B/3, 17 March 1992. 

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