NYT on Chechnya, a dollar short and ten years late

The time for following the prescription of the NYT regarding Chechnya was ten years ago when Yeltsin first attacked the de-facto independant state of Chechnya. Now it is too late to negotiate because the Russians have already killed everyone worth negotiating with. The only Chechnyans left are embittered by ten years of murderous war and the indifference of the world to their plight.

But even though negotiations can no longer work at this stage is no excuse for continnuing the barbarity of Russian operations inside Chechnya. Can we really expect to win a war against terrorism inside Chechnya while the Russians murder, torture and extort the inhabitants routinely? How well would following the Russian example work for America in Afghanistan or Iraq?