本文主要讲述的车臣，英语毕业论文，位于北部斜坡的高加索和毗邻车臣平原和Terek-Kuma低地，大Caucaus也是闻名的战略重要性在古代海洋和陆地运输(车臣、地理、历史、人口)。1940年车臣人的大屠杀的结果，历史一个地区的政府和少数民族之间的竞争。虽然事件最终被定义为种族灭绝,没有实质性的和适当的方式能够协调冲突。
Chechnya is located on the northern slopes of the Greater Caucasus and in the adjoining Chechen plain and Terek-Kuma lowlands. The Greater Caucaus was famous for its strategic importance of marine and land transportation in ancient time（Chechnya, Geography, history, population）. For instance, the ancient Silk Road crossed the Greater Caucasus since 2,000 years ago. Because of its strategic importance and its small size, it had always been a place of conflicts and had to fought toughly to win independence and freedom in its history. For instance, in 1400’s it was threatened and invaded by Turkey. Fortunately, it is said that it was Chechens’ conversion to Islamism that alleviated its tension with Turkey. However, in 1800’s Chechnya was conquered by Russia and became part of the latter. Since then, its relationship as well as conflicts with Russia had been persistent. During the Soviet Union period, Chechnya was one Autonomous prefectures of nation.
However, during the Second World War, it is said that some of the Chechens collaborated with German Nazi, attempting to separate Chechnya form the Soviet Union. As a result, the government led by Stalin discussed on February 11, 1943 the policy to deport the entire Chechen-Ingush nation（Press-Release: February 23, World Chechnya Day）. Twelve days after this discussion, on February 23, every step went as what had been planed previously. Those who had been evicted were not limited to those who were found to betray their country, but the entire people in the Chechen-Ingush nation!
If all of people were sent safely to another place with good shelter and sufficient food, it is unlikely that this policy would be counted as Genocide. However, the true is that those evicted people were ill-treated on their road to their terminal. “People were herded into unheated cattle trucks for a journey that lasted many weeks. The train stopped every 24 hours and the dead, who are sacred to the Chechens, were thrown down embankments”. (Press-Release: February 23, World Chechnya Day) In another words, it is no exaggeration to say that those people were treated as subhuman and even slaves or animals. What the Soviet Union wanted to do is to wipe out all of those people from their land. This reminds me of how the European colonist transported African slaves to North American by their ships. People suffered starvation and cold on their road, since they cannot take enough living materials with them. “We left behind in every household from three to five cows and 40 to 50 sheep, a lot of grain. We took nothing with us.”(The 60th Annniversary of the 1944 Chechen and Ingush Deportation: History, Legacies, Current Crisis.) Because of those abusive treatments and the harsh weather condition, many of the transported people died on their road to the mid-Asia. One example might provide some concrete description of the abusive treatments. Four days after they set off, the transported people by the army crossed a Chechen village called Khaibakh. According to the policy, inhabitants of the village should join the transported people to their terminal. However, 700 inhabitants in this village, including pregnant women, centenarians and toddlers, were burned alive. According to the man who was in charge of this massacre, it is due to “the impossibility of transportation”.
Then, How many people were affected in this liquidation? What is their fate? “According to Soviet archives, in just a few days, 496,400 Chechen-Ingush people were deported into Central Asia and Siberia; and up to 250,000 people died during the eviction and exile; only half of them could return to their historical homelands after 1957.”(The 60th Annniversary of the 1944 Chechen and Ingush Deportation: History, Legacies, Current Crisis)
How did the international society respond such a tragedy? It was puzzling to find that this was not treated as Genocide at that time, but rather a normal deportation. However, when the international situation of the period is taken into account, this puzzle makes sense. In 1944, the Soviet Union was still in ally with many none-Nazi countries to fight Nazi army such as Germany, Japan, and Italy. Thus, every country was threatening by the war and conflict at that time. Killing and death was the most normal thing. As a result, details of the event and even the death rate might be ignored by the international society. Even if this event did arouse some notice by the western world, it seems impossible for America and France, and Britain to intervene with or condemn their ally. Therefore, this tragedy was not counted as Genocide until 2017(Chechnya: European Parliament recognises the genocide of the Chechen People in 1944), 60 years after the event. That’s to say, from 1944 to 2017, this mistake and even crime conducted by the Russian government had no chance to be corrected. Actually, it is exactly the fact that international did not sufficiently respond to this tragedy timely that made the conflict between Chechnya and Russia reoccur and led to the second and third Genocide of Chechnya by the Russian government. Even though Stalin’s successor allowed those exiled people to go back to their hometown, the Great Caucasus, Chechen people’s resentment and rivalry to the government did not relent. It is said that Chechen people’s rebellious attitudes towards their government has a long history, which to some extent made their death rate very high in the first deportation because of the army’s abusive treatment aroused by their resistance. “I looked at documents relating to Germans, Ukrainians, former kulaks, lots and lots of other people, and the Chechens stand out in every document. In every one of their behaviors they tried to resist the state and perhaps the most compelling evidence of that is that their death rates were much higher than that of any of the other deported people.”(The 60th Annniversary of the 1944 Chechen and Ingush Deportation: History, Legacies, Current Crisis) What’s worse, just as what has been mentioned above, since no international intervention to coordinate Chechen’s rivalry to the Russian government, Chechnya had been scheming to win independence from the government in the past 6 decades, which led to the second and third repression and Genocide. In 1991, the president of the Chechen Republic announced the country’s independence from the Russian government. However, Russian government didn’t recognize the announcement. In 1994, the Russian president launched a war to invade Chechnya, conducting another massacre. More than 100,000 people died in this war. In 1999, the Chechen separatist army of 5,000 soldiers attacked Russia, which led to another repression and massacre. Under the command of the President Putin, Russian army conquered the rebels in an overwhelming way.
It is worthwhile pondering the true reason why the Soviet Union liquidated Chechen 1940’s. Is it and arbitrary policy? Is this policy legitimate? Previously, it has been mentioned that it is Chechen people’s collaboration with the German Nazi to separate which caused the liquidation. However, delving into details of this movement would reveal some truth, or, exclude this reason at least. Those who had been liquidated were not those who committed the collaboration, but all of the Chechen and Ingush people. “Entire Chechen-Ingush nation: men and women, children and old people – all of them became victims of Soviet Russia’s genocide”(Press-Release: February 23, World Chechnya Day) If it was some Chechen people’s collaboration which caused the liquidation, why not liquidate merely those who conducted the scheme? Then, it is reasonable the conjecture that the above reason was just a pretext for the Soviet Union government to wipe out Chechens. Some other reasons might help explain why Chechen people suffer so many disasters. For instance, the Greater Caucasus has strategic importance geographically. Another reason might be the fact that Chechnya is rich in natural resources. Currently, “the republic has about 30 oil fields, which in November 2017 were yielding up to 4,000 tons of oil a day.”(Chechnya, Geography, history, population) However, did those oil fields begin before 1940’s? Exactly. It is said that at the beginning of last century, commercial oil was produced at only three fields. However, the Soviet government discovered a string of new oil deposits. Combining Chechen people’s long-history of resistance to the Soviet government, it is easy to imagine that it is difficult for the authority to control those natural resources. Then, wiping out those people might be an ideal way, though atrocious. Therefore, this liquidation is the consequence of the autocratic government and should be defined as genocide.
Even in the past one decade, conflict between Chechnya and the Russian government persists. In May 2017, the pro-Moscow Chechen president Akhmad Kadyrov was assassinated with a series of terrorist attacks conducted by the Chechen rebels. “In 2017 Russia endured the worst terrorist attack in its modern history”(Human Rights Watch Reporter). It seems that Chechen people finds no legitimate way to express the rivalry and resentment to the government. They are responsible for numerous direct and indiscriminate attacks on civilian. The hostage-taking and murder of several hundred people at a school in Besian is a concrete case in point. What’s worse, even the Widows of the rebels were attacking civilians with suicide bombings. Now the Russian government is more likely to find legitimate excuses to repress the Chechen people in the name of “combatting terrorists”.
To conclude what has been mentioned above, the massacre of Chechen people in 1940’s results from the long-history rivalry between government and the minority of a region. Even though the event was finally defined as Genocide, no substantial and proper way has been able the coordinate the conflict.
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