"But still, the most successful operation?"

"The March assault on Grozny. That operation was very well planned... But when the Russian army started launching missile and bomb attacks on the civilian population, we gave our troops the command to withdraw."

"Our generals claim that the capture of Grozny in August was a complete surprise to everyone..."

"They lie... Seven to ten days before the operation, I prepared an appeal to Russian soldiers, police officers, and citizens of the republic stating that we would enter the city in the near future. I wrote: 'We have nothing against you; stay at your checkpoints and don't stick your heads out... If you don't shoot, we won't open fire either.' Our entire war was against Zavgayev. We had to prove to Russia and the world that there was no Zavgayev government! There is one legitimate authority in Chechnya... The uniqueness of this operation was that the day the Chechen resistance army would enter the city was known in advance. And the Russian generals and the puppet government—everyone ran away!"

"So you warned them that you were coming for them?"

"Yes. And each of those who entered Grozny, 830 people, was ready to stand to the last! It was funny for us to hear: 'Oh, they'll loot the city and leave...' They thought the March scenario would repeat itself... No, everyone decided to fight to the death... I remember when Aslan told me that we had to surrender one position and give up eighteen prisoners, thirteen of whom were high-ranking officers—I was ready to die rather than obey the order..."

"And..."

"But I couldn't disobey the order of the Chief of the General Staff, and I had to hand over those prisoners. And even abandon two or three positions... By the way, we could have taken the city in two hours back in January '96, but Dzhokhar categorically forbade it: there would be unnecessary casualties... Maybe something would change in Russia, maybe Yeltsin wouldn't win the elections... In August '96, we understood: we couldn't wait any longer."

"Tell me, which of our generals, in your eyes, was a worthy opponent?"

"Romanov. He was a true patriot of Russia..."

"Many officers who participated in the war told me that two-thirds of our troops' losses were from their own side..."

"Possibly... I'll give an example. At 5:30 AM on January 1, 1995, with eighteen fighters, I was surrounded between Lermontov and Pervomayskaya streets, where the first city hospital is... The ring closed completely. I had to fight my way out of there—for three days. And at 5:30, I decided to leave... Russian APCs spotted me, and I had to engage in battle. The Russian unit retreated about fifty meters and called for reinforcements. And the 'reinforcements' started shooting at their own men... We sat, watched this strange battle, and ate apples we found in the house... The battle lasted about three hours.

And there was another moment. On December 31st, '94, a column was moving along the Grozny-Garagorsk highway, and in the fifteenth state farm between the first and second sections, internal troops were stationed. And when the column was moving—at night, at half past twelve, the Internal Troops opened fire on this column. They retaliated... The battle lasted about four hours... By morning, so many armored vehicles had been hit, so many cars burned... This was all due to lack of coordination."

"The war is over... But when you hear Raduyev's statements about the possibility of terrorist attacks in Russia..."

"We have strong reasons to believe that explosions are currently being prepared in three Russian cities. But who is preparing them? A criminal boss came to Grozny and offered a well-known field commander thirty million dollars to take responsibility. And this criminal boss's family was taken hostage. When we had all the information, I was forced to make a statement that these sabotage acts had nothing to do with Chechnya, and pursued only one goal: to stop the peace process in Chechnya and prevent the signing of a peace treaty between the Chechen Republic and Russia..."

"But still, Raduyev's statements..."

"After that, I called Salman and spoke with him very seriously... He apologized and said that there could be no talk of any campaigns into Russia, and he would only carry out the orders of the legally elected president..."