Struggle for independence

After long and fierce resistance, Chechnya became part of Russia’s expanding empire in the late 1850s, but periodic fighting persisted. It enjoyed fleeting independence between 1917 and 1922 when Russia was experiencing its own civil strife. But in 1922 the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR—see Russia) was formed, and within it, the Chechen Autonomous Region. Fourteen years later, when the regions were being re-jigged, it became the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR), twinned with what is now Chechnya’s neighbouring Russian republic, Ingushetia. The population of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR were brutally punished by Joseph Stalin for their continued insurgence; in 1944 he deported the entire population to Siberia and Central Asia on the groundless accusation that they had collaborated with the Nazis. They remained there until 1957 when the next Russian president, Nikita Khrushchev, ordered their return. The deportation caused devastating loss of life. The Chechen-Ingush ASSR lasted over thirty more years until the USSR collapsed in 1991.

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