in the campaign “Destruction of the Nokhchi Villages along the Sunzha and Construction of the Groznaya Fortress in Their Place (1817–1818)”
The Regular Army of the Russian Empire moved troops onto the Nokhchi lands between the Terek and the Sunzha in order to forcibly shift the forward fortified line deep into Chechen territory and place the region under military control. Historian D. A. Khozhaev defines the meaning of moving the line as squeezing Chechnya that had not submitted «with new fortresses and fortifications»[1]. The imperial general Yermolov, in his «Notes», attests to the deployment of troops: «on May 24 the entire detachment crossed over… in a single march it moved from the Terek to the Sunzha River»[2].