in the campaign “First Russian-Chechen War (1994–1996)”
In the autumn of 1994, Russia attacked the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria under the name of a puppet opposition, and on 11 December 1994 the Russian army openly invaded the republic. The occupiers shelled and bombed entire villages and towns of Ichkeria for refusing to submit.
As a rule, the command of the occupation troops demanded that the Chechens in the villages hand over their weapons, not fire at Russian soldiers, or make the Armed Forces of Ichkeria leave the village[1]. In other villages Russian commanders demanded the handover of captured Russian servicemen or passage for their vehicles through the village[2][3]. Commanders of the occupation troops, citing their intelligence data, demanded that the Chechens in a village hand over an arbitrary number of assault rifles in exchange for safety[4].
If a village did not meet the demands, Russian troops surrounded it. The occupiers did not let Chechens out of the village and did not let food and medicine through to them (see: "Medical and Humanitarian Blockade"). Russian artillery shelled the surrounded village, and aircraft bombed it (see: "Indiscriminate Attacks"). The Russian military opened fire before the deadline they themselves had set, or after the village had handed over its weapons[1][4].
After fighters of the army of Ichkeria took Russian special forces soldiers prisoner on 8 January 1995, Russian pilots in helicopters threatened to bomb Komsomolskoye, Alkhazurovo and Roshni-Chu, villages to the southwest of Grozny, and then struck the outskirts of Roshni-Chu, although the special forces soldiers were not in the village[1][2]. In January the crews of Russian helicopters scattered over Bamut, a village to the southwest of Grozny, leaflets of the command of the occupation troops threatening to respond with "powerful missile and bomb strikes" if fire was opened from the village at Russian troops[1]. In January the occupiers scattered over Shali, a town to the southeast of Grozny, leaflets threatening to open "return fire" "on the whole village" for "a single shot [toward the occupiers] from Shali"[1][5].
From 26 February to 3 March 1995 the Russian military at the post near Samashki, a village in the west of Ichkeria, threatened the elders with a strike on the village if they did not persuade their fellow villagers to "settle the matter peacefully"[5]. On 8 March the elders undertook to get the army of Ichkeria out of the village and hand over heavy weapons, and the Russian general Kosolapov signed an agreement with them under which Russian troops would not enter Samashki and would not use force against Chechen civilians (see: "False Guarantees of Safety"). The elders fulfilled their obligation, but from 13 March the Russian military at the posts let no one out of Samashki for 25 days and did not let food and medicine through (see: "Transport Blockade")[5]. On 6 April Romanov, the deputy commander of the occupation troops, demanded that by seven in the morning of 7 April the village hand over 264 assault rifles, two machine guns and one infantry fighting vehicle and let the Internal Troops of the Russian MVD (predecessors of today's Rosgvardia) into the village, but the elders replied that there were not that many weapons in the village[1][5]. On 7 April a Russian general who refused to give his name gave the elders until 4 p.m., but the occupiers began shelling the village with mortars earlier. Yuzbek Shovkhalov, an elder of Samashki who took part in the talks with the command of the occupation troops, told a Memorial observer on 9 April 1995 what happened when Russian troops stormed the village: "'Give us the militants [this is what the Russians called the Armed Forces of Ichkeria].' I say: 'There are no militants here'… Armored personnel carriers... They fire from heavy machine guns. Right in the village. At the house where people live... Either they burn the house down, or the house perishes, anything at all..."[5]. On 7 and 8 April the Russian military killed 103 Chechen civilians in Samashki, whom human rights defenders recorded by name (see: "Mass Killings of Civilians")[5][1].
On 3 March 1995 the command of the occupation troops demanded that the Chechens in Argun, Gudermes and Shali, towns to the east and southeast of Grozny, persuade the Armed Forces of Ichkeria to leave in order to save people's lives[1][5]. On 23 March the occupiers captured Argun, and on 30-31 March, when the defenders were forced to leave, Gudermes and Shali (see: "Military Intervention")[1]. On 8 April Labunets, the commander of the occupation troops in the south of Ichkeria, threatened in writing to shell Zakan-Yurt, a village to the east of Samashki, with artillery if the Chechens in the village did not hand over their weapons and surrender the fighters of the army of Ichkeria, and on 11 April soldiers of the Russian MVD searched every yard and found no weapons[6][5]. In April 1995 the Chechens in Bachi-Yurt, Koshkeldy and Alleroy, villages in the east of Ichkeria, under threat of bombing bought assault rifles and handed them over to the occupiers, but the Russian military shelled these villages anyway (see: "Total Destruction of Infrastructure")[4][1]. The Internal Troops of the Russian MVD and the Russian police kept Sernovodsk, a village in the west of Ichkeria where more than 10,000 people and more than 3,000 refugees lived, encircled for more than five months, from 30 September 1995 until the storming in March 1996[3][1]. Artemov, the commander of the occupation troops in the southwest of Ichkeria, threatened the village in writing with artillery and air strikes if the village did not disarm about a hundred fighters of the army of Ichkeria and let Russian vehicles through Sernovodsk[3].
On 11 February 1996 the command of the occupation troops demanded that the Chechens in Novogroznensky, a settlement in the east of Ichkeria, hand over their weapons and expel the defenders, and when the defenders did not leave, the occupiers killed at least 50 Chechen civilians in the settlement by shelling and storming (see: "Indiscriminate Attacks")[1]. In March 1996 the Russian military demanded that Katyr-Yurt, a village to the southwest of Grozny, hand over assault rifles and ten captured Russian soldiers who were not in the village, and on 28 March a Russian pilot dropped bombs on the village and killed nine people from the Khazhgiriyev family (see: "Indiscriminate Attacks")[2][1].
In the spring of 1996 the command of the occupation troops and the puppet government in Grozny forced villages to sign a "Protocol on Peace and Accord". Under this document a village undertook to surrender the defenders, hand over weapons and let the Russian military in, and for a single fighter of the army of Ichkeria found in the village the occupiers threatened to shoot Chechens and destroy the village[2]. On 31 March 1996 Russian President Yeltsin, by Decree No. 435, made the signing of such protocols part of his program for Ichkeria[7], and Russian aircraft bombed villages that refused to sign the protocol[1].
On 17 April 1996 the Chechens in Chiri-Yurt, a village to the south of Grozny, released captured Russian servicemen under an ultimatum from General Shamanov, but as the occupiers' vehicles were leaving the village, Russian tank crews with a single shot razed to the ground the house of the family of Abdulla Dakhayev, the representative of the authorities of Ichkeria in Chiri-Yurt[1]. On 19 April the occupiers surrounded Shali, and on 25 April demanded that the town surrender the defenders, hand over weapons and release captured Russian soldiers. On the same day Russian pilots bombed the town (see: "Indiscriminate Attacks")[8][1]. At the end of April the elders of Komsomolskoye signed a peace agreement with the occupiers, but from 30 April to 1 May Russian pilots bombed the village and wounded four Chechen civilians[9]. On 6 May Russian troops captured Shali without a fight; there turned out to be no defenders or prisoners there[1]. On that day the occupiers surrounded Komsomolskoye and threatened to destroy it if the fighters of the army of Ichkeria did not hand over their weapons by nightfall, but at about three in the afternoon, before the deadline, Russian artillery opened fire and killed several Chechen civilians[2].
On 8 July 1996 Tikhomirov, the commander of the occupation troops, at a press conference in Khankala, the main base of the occupation troops on the eastern outskirts of Grozny, threatened Ichkeria with retaliatory measures if Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, the acting president of Ichkeria, did not return all Russian prisoners on 9 July[10]. From 9 to 15 July Russian troops surrounded and shelled Gekhi, a village to the southwest of Grozny where a unit of the army of Ichkeria was stationed, and Makhkety, a mountain village in the southeast of the republic. In Gekhi the occupiers killed 19 Chechen civilians, in Makhkety 25 (see: "Indiscriminate Attacks")[11][12][13]. From 10 July the occupation command introduced a curfew in Ichkeria and banned driving into and out of Grozny by car[1][12].
The Russian military destroyed the houses of relatives of the leaders of Ichkeria and the commanders of its army[1][12]. On 15 July 1996 the crews of seven Russian helicopters struck Starye Atagi, a village to the south of Grozny, with missiles and destroyed the house of the mother of Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, the acting president of Ichkeria, but the mother and the neighbors survived[12][11]. In the summer of 1996 the Russian military blew up the house of the father of Shamil Basayev, one of the commanders of the army of Ichkeria, in the mountain village of Vedeno[1].
On 19 August 1996 Pulikovsky, the acting commander of the occupation troops, demanded that the army of Ichkeria leave Grozny and gave the citizens of Ichkeria 48 hours to leave the city, where, according to some data, at least 50-70 thousand people remained, and according to others, 300 thousand[1][12][14]. The general threatened after that deadline to strike the city with aircraft, artillery and multiple rocket launchers, which cannot fire with precision, and on the night of 20 August, without waiting for the deadline to expire, the occupiers resumed the shelling and bombing of Grozny[12].
The human rights defenders of Memorial write that the command of the occupation troops made its demands of a whole village and, in case of refusal, threatened reprisals against everyone who lived in it[1]. A Human Rights Watch report of May 1995 says that demands to hand over weapons sometimes serve the Russian military as a pretext for attacking a village or for detaining Chechens[4]. It is unknown how many such crimes the occupation troops committed from December 1994 to August 1996.
On 21 August 1996 General Lebed, the secretary of the Russian Security Council, canceled General Pulikovsky's threat to strike Grozny and called it a bad joke to journalists[12][15].
In August 1996, the Armed Forces of Ichkeria liberated Grozny from the occupiers, forcing Russia to the negotiating table[12]. On 31 August 1996, peace agreements were signed in Khasavyurt (see: "Sham Treaties")[16]. On 31 December 1996, the last Russian troops left the republic[1].