Coming Apart in the North Caucuses?

Image by Thomas Roche via Flickr

The BBC reports that human rights activists and opposition politicians are now calling the unrest in Ingushetia as a civil war. The President of the republic has been seriously wounded in a bomb blast that killed his bodyguard.

Medvedev and Putin may have a messy problem on their hands after calling the uprisings in neighboring Chechnya over. Russian security forces have responded in the usual manner - heavy-handed and repressive.

Historically, it took the Russian Empire about 150 years to subdue the northern Caucuses. They never really won...