January 14, 1965 - Shamil Basayev
Basayev occupies a singular place in the history of post-Soviet armed insurgency — a military commander whose campaign against Russian forces in Chechnya escalated, over time, into operations that deliberately targeted civilians at catastrophic scale, most notoriously the 2002 Moscow theater siege and the 2004 Beslan school siege. His effectiveness as a guerrilla leader was inseparable from his willingness to use mass hostage-taking as a strategic instrument, a posture that drew both fierce loyalty within the insurgency and near-universal condemnation outside it. The arc of his career illustrates how nationalist armed struggle and deliberate mass civilian harm became, in his hands, a single continuous project.
From Wikipedia
Shamil Salmanovich Basayev (Chechen: Салман ВоӀ Шамиль; Salman Voj Şamil; Russian: Шамиль Салманович Басаев; 14 January 1965 – 10 July 2006), also known by his kunya Abu Idris, was a Chechen guerrilla leader who served as a senior military commander in the breakaway Chechen Republic of Ichkeria. He held the rank of brigadier general in the Armed Forces of Ichkeria, and was posthumously declared generalissimo. As a military commander in the separatist armed forces of Chechnya, one of his most notable battles was the separatist recapture of Grozny in 1996, which he personally planned and commanded together with Aslan Maskhadov. He also masterminded several of the worst terrorist attacks that occurred in Russia.
Starting as a field commander in the Transcaucasus, Basayev led guerrilla campaigns against Russian forces for years, as well as launching mass-hostage takings of civilians, with his goal being the withdrawal of Russian soldiers from Chechnya. From 1997 to 1998, he also served as the vice-prime minister of the breakaway state in Aslan Maskhadov's government. Beginning in 2003, Basayev used the nom de guerre and title of "Emir Abdullah Shamil Abu-Idris". As Basayev acquired a reputation for ruthlessness, he became revered among his peers and eventually became the highest ranking Chechen military commander and was considered the undisputed leader of the Chechen insurgency as well as being the overall senior leader of all other Chechen rebel factions.
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