J’Accuse! [Update #2]

On the simplistic left-right, political spectrum, every good USian knows that communism is on the far left.  Anti-capitalism.  The Soviet Union and Russia today equals communism regardless of how little or poorly implemented such an economic policy prevails there.  They are the enemy.  And Putin is always guilty.

Putin’s Foe Boris Nemtsov Gunned Down Outside Kremlin, Days After Family Predicted His Murder

Boris Nemtsov, a charismatic Russian opposition leader and sharp critic of President Vladimir Putin, was gunned down Saturday near the Kremlin, just a day before a planned protest against the government.
The death of Nemtsov, a 55-year-old former deputy prime minister, ignited a fury among opposition figures who called the brutal killing an assassination. Putin quickly offered his condolences and called the murder a provocation.
Nemtsov himself had said in recent days that his family believed he would be murdered for his anti-Putin activism. Britain has said it will follow closely investigations in to the killing.
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“He did so without fear, and never gave in to intimidation. He was greatly admired in Britain, not least by his friend Lady Thatcher, who visited him in Russia and who would have been appalled by today’s news.

Mark Ferguson tweet

Boris Nemtsov is dead. Another opponent of Putin gunned down or poisoned or imprisoned. No-one can claim these are coincidences.

The quick denunciation of Putin in the west whenever a Russian of minor or modest public profile who opposed the Russian government is murdered is interesting because high level, western leaders are never suspected when one of their opponents is bumped off.  Not that assassinations and murders of politicians, judges, and journalists are unheard of in the west.  (Ten US assassinations in the past eighteen years.)   And no, the CT folks that finger LBJ in the assassination of JFK is not analogous to accusing Putin of the murder of Nemtsov in Russia.

We have to go somewhat far back in time to consider something that could have been similar.  Not for how it would have played in the US, but in the USSR.  Did Moscow newspaper headlines scream in 1935:

Roosevelt rival assassinated!

With opinions from the press and denizens of the Kremlin not too subtly suggesting that FDR was the murderer?  After all, politically Huey Long was further to the left than FDR and many viewed FDR as having dictatorial aspirations.

Long often attempted to upstage FDR and the congressional leadership by mounting populist appeals of his own, most notably his “Share Our Wealth” program.
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In the critical 100 days in spring 1933 Long was generally a strong supporter of the New Deal, but differed with the president on patronage. Roosevelt wanted control of the patronage and the two men broke in late 1933.  Aware that Roosevelt had no intention to radically redistribute the country’s wealth, Long became one of the few national politicians to oppose Roosevelt’s New Deal policies from the left.
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Long was shot [9/8/35] a month after announcing that he would run for president. …

Americans would have rightly scoffed at suggestions from the USSR that FDR had Long assassinated.

The Vineyard of the Saker provides an antidote to the anti-Putin western hysteria with regard to this murder, but likely errs as well.

There is no doubt in my mind at all that either this is a fantastically unlikely but always possible case of really bad luck for Putin and Nemtsov was shot by some nutcase or mugged, or this was a absolutely prototypical western false flag: you take a spent politician who has no credibility left with anyone with an IQ over 70, and you turn him into an instant “martyr for freedom, democracy, human right and civilization”.

“Nutcases” are too frequently responsible for assassinations of political figures to declare that it would be “fanstastically unlikely” in the case of Nemtsov.  What’s more typical is that assassinations are perpetrated by powerless or not powerful people that have a personal grudge against the target or an intra-group conflict.  Long’s assassin was the son-in-law of a Long LA political rival.  Ousted American Nazi Party member murdered George Rockwell.  Derwin Brown, sheriff-elect, was a contract killing by his defeated opponent.  General rule, losers murder.  

Don’t necessarily disagree with Saker that the assassination of a “spent politician” can turn him/her into an instant martyr.  (Why I said a little prayer for the odious George Wallace to live after he was shot.)  But it’s not a guarantee, and seriously question the assertion that it’s a “prototypical western false flag.”  Saker should have stuck with the observation that Nemtsov wasn’t much of a threat to Putin and Putin isn’t Stalin (or J. Edgar Hoover or the mafia).  OTOH, would rule out an anti-Russian Ukrainian “false flag” in this instance.  Considering that when the 55 year old Nemstov was murdered, he was in the company of his 23 year old anti-Russia Ukrainian girlfriend.  Plenty of anti-Russian Ukrainians could have come up with such a plot all on their own.
Update –

Suspects Named in Nemtsov’s murder

The Nemtsov murder investigation has focused on the theory that the crime was organized  by a Chechen militant commander Adam Osmayev, of the Dzhokhar Dudayev battalion, who also was named in the case concerning the attempt to assassinate Vladimir Putin. …

I have no idea how credible this source is, but it appears to me that this reported focus of the Russian investigators is spot on even if they don’t catch the operational perps and those who directed the assassination.

This was a sophisticated hit. Not Russian. Only remotely possible that there was any US involvement. Possible but unlikely that the Kiev government was a participant. More possible that Kolomoisky, one of his associates, or his Dnipro Battalion were involved. However, in tone and feel, it points to someone educated in the west, and that’s a reason why Adam Osmayev is at the top of the focus list.

Things I didn’t know that are required to appreciate why it was Nemtsov that was assassinated.

Chechens fighting for Ukraine

In a statement dated August 28, Isa Munayev appeals to the United States and “the countries of the democratic world” to provide “comprehensive military assistance” to the Ukrainian people, whom Munayev describes as victims of Russian imperial aggression, just as the Chechens were 20 years ago.

Munayev identified himself in that statement as commander of the Dzhokhar Dudayev international volunteer peacekeeping battalion and a brigadier general of the armed forces of the Chechen Republic Ichkeria (ChRI) of which Dudayev was the first president. He spoke to RFE/RL’s Radio Marsho a week ago, shortly before he travelled to Ukraine to show “international support for the Ukrainian people.” The strength of his battalion, and who is bankrolling it, is not known.

Munayev died fighting in Ukraine on 2/1/15. Revenge for his death is one motive for the assassination of Nemtsov. Not an intuitively obvious target since he was aligned with Kiev. They want Putin. But Nemtsov held the potential to be an even better than a direct hit on Putin. A detour is needed to explain that.

With the Muslim Kadyrov as President of Chechnya, he, and not Russia and Putin, handle the internal conflicts (and alliances) with the remaining Muslim rebel separatists and apparently with little regard for human rights. Yet,

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Meanwhile, evidence continues to mount of the presence on the side of the pro-Russian separatist forces in eastern Ukraine of hundreds of fighters sent by Chechen Republic head Ramzan Kadyrov. Those fighters are apparently primarily volunteers from among the various police and security forces subordinate to Kadyrov, who has consistently denied that there are any “Chechen battalions” in Ukraine, even after the “Financial Times” quoted a fighter named Zelimkhan who said he and his comrades in arms had been sent to Ukraine in mid-May on Kadyrov’s orders.
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An enemy of my enemy is my friend sort of situation. (We USians have some experience with that, but the shifting alliances in many conflicts confounds us. One reason we should stay away from them.) A recent confounding variable in the three-part (Chechnya, Ukraine, Russia) internal-external nexis takes us to France. The Charlie Hebdo cartoons and the Islamic terrorist attack on Charlie Hebdo personnel on January 7, 2015. “Je suis Charlie Hebdo” didn’t take hold everywhere.

In January 2015, Kadyrov said he would organize protests if a Russian newspaper published the Charlie Hebdo cartoons, saying “we will not allow anyone to insult the prophet, even if it will cost us our lives.”

Nemtsov got on the “Je suis Charlie Hebdo” side. That made this darling of the west, Kiev supporter, and Putin opponent the perfect, expendable martyr for Muslim Chechen purposes. DC, London, Kiev, etc. fell for it faster than a New York minute. Confirmation that Putin is a monster. Now, surely monies and arms would quickly begin to flow to rebel Chechen fighters in Ukraine. An alliance that wants to take out Putin and take down Russia. Because funding the Afghan Mujahideen and the imported Saudi fighters worked out so well for the US.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”

And the same damn architect of that the Afghanistan debacle continues playing his fiddle:

Brzezinski also said that Western governments should provide “defensive” weapons to Ukraine …

Update #2 Rounding up the usual suspects?

From RT 5 suspects arrested over Nemtsov murder, 1 ‘confessed’ – court RT lists the names of those charged but little else.
Al Jezeera released more

State news agencies Tass and RIA Novosti said they were detained in Ingushetia, a republic bordering Chechnya, citing Ingush Security Council chief Albert Barakhoev.

Zaur Dadayev, served in a battalion of Interior Ministry troops in Chechnya, Barakhoev was quoted as saying.

He said Anzor Gubashev, had worked in a private security company in Moscow, according to the reports.

According to the WSJ, Chechen officials aren’t talking other than Kadyrov who has denied any involvement in the murder. The sparse information released according to a senior security official in Ingushetia. So, was the assassination plot hatched in Chechnya, Ingushetia, or a joint effort?
Plenty of animosity and armed conflicts between Ingushetia rebels and Moscow. A cursory impression is that Nemtsov as a target of these rebels seems a stretch as they and Nemtsov were on the same side in support of Kiev and opposed to Putin, but anything to make Putin appear bad can’t be rejected. Note:

10 December 2013 Ingush opposition leader Magomed Khazbiev, who was a close friend of assassinated Magomed Yevloyev, attends Euromaidan in Ukraine and participates in anti-Russian campaign there after which his parents were threatened and harassed in Russia. On his website he writes: “the fact that Putin’s slaves harass my parents do not make any sense, if you [Russians] want me to stop you have to kill me like Magomed Yevloyev and Makhsharip Aushev”

Not noted in the first update is that there was personal animosity between Kadyrov and Nemtsov.

Radio Free Europe – Radio Liberty (no less !! )

But the possibility of a Chechen connection should not be dismissed out of hand, given Nemtsov’s repeated criticism of Chechen Republic head Ramzan Kadyrov, and the fact that since 2011, security personnel loyal to Kadyrov have reportedly engaged with total impunity in abductions and killings in Moscow. …

Radio Free Europe is not exactly a reputable source, but this information is probably correct. Particularly since the report went on to speculate that Kadyrov could have ordered the murder as a favor to Putin. Doubt Mr. Putin would consider this a favor.

The NYTimes reports that the suspects are Chechen. Will wait for further confirmation* as it’s possible that the NYTimes reporters accepted “ethnic north Caucus” suspects to mean that they are, or was in the case of the one that blew himself up before being apprehended, Chechens.

Also note that western leaders and media are backing away from the strident accusations that the murder of Nemtsov was a Putin/Moscow/FSB hit job.

*Several sources now reporting that Zaur Dadayev, who has allegedly confessed to the murder, is Chechen and had recently been dismissed as deputy commander of a unit of the Chechen Republic Ministry of Internal Affairs’s “Sever” battalion per Sputnik News