LATEST ATTACK SUGGESTS NOT

As if to support Politikovskaya’s contention that the suicide attacks are largely uncoordinated, a female bomber mounted another strikingly amateurish attack on July 27. This one occurred at a base commanded by Ramzan Kadyrov, who heads the personal army of his father, Akhmad Kadyrov, the head of the pro-Moscow Chechen administration. The woman blew herself up without causing any casualties to Kadyrov’s or Moscow’s troops; a female civilian passerby was lightly wounded.

During the twenty-four hours preceding that failed attack, four federal servicemen were killed and eight wounded in mine explosions and firefights with rebel guerrillas, a source in the Kadyrov administration told the Associated Press.