As a correspondent for the London Times, Anatol Lieven gained a deserved reputation as an exceptionally brave war correspondent in the Caucasus where he covered the dreadful events in Chechnya and the less well-reported war in which the region of Abkhazia seceded from Georgia with Russian help.

There is far more, however, to this authoritative work on Chechnya than colourful descriptions of battle scenes or of analyses of military strategy or of profiles of bravery under fire. He not only analyses the immediate background to the war but paints a striking picture of the state of Russian culture, politics and military preparedness in the build up to the full-scale hostilities of January 1995. The depth of his research and analysis is such that the title of the book does not do justice to its contents. This work is probably the best work on the most horrific conflict of the 1990s, but it doesn't stop there. Indeed, there have been few better books on the condition in which Russia finds itself in the post-communist period.

Lieven, who comes from an emigre family with a distinguished history of service to Tsarist Russia, sets out to counter three prominent views on Russia which are prevalent today. The first pictures Russians as prisoners of their own imperial history, the second attempts to portray them as inherently nasty and aggressive, while the third, employed by some though not all American newspapers, makes the shallow plea that the move from command to market economics has been enough to put Russia on the path to becoming a normal democratic state.

Of the three approaches, the "nasty Russian" one is the least acceptable in a civilised society and has been expressed in terms of near-racism by the right-wing American columnist, George Will, whose view that "expansionism is in the Russians' DNA" is rightly debunked by Lieven.

If Western "experts" come out badly from Lieven's examination of their analyses, those in power in Russia itself fare no better. The bravery of the soldiers' mothers who tried to get their sons back from Chechnya is acknowledged, but people of their age group and older, most of them communist supporters, have no power in today's Russia. Lieven points out that communism is fading fast if only because its supporters are dying out as an electorate. But he adds strikingly: "I say this without any great feeling of satisfaction. This is after all the Soviet generation which at the cost of immense sacrifice saved the Soviet peoples and the world from Nazism, and for its pains has been betrayed twice: by Stalin and his regime after 1945, when instead of using victory to seek reconciliation between state and society, they exploited it to strengthen their own tyranny; and by Russia's present rulers, who have fattened themselves at their expense and left them to starve in their old age."

It follows from this that the portrait of Mr Yeltsin and his administration's role in the Chechen debacle is far from a pretty one. The President's "entourage" at the time included nationalities minister, Mr Sergei Shakhrai, a Cossack with a personal antipathy to Chechens, and defence minister, Gen Pavel Grachev, one of the most discredited men in Russia. Provoked by hostage-takings, drunk on its own propaganda that Grozny could be taken by a couple of regiments in a couple of hours, Russia sent in the troops, got into a hole and kept digging furiously. Russia's military defeat at the hands of a much smaller but much more determined force has rankled with the ruling elite, but ordinary Russians, far from being expansionist, are glad the war is over. Their concerns centre on the basic needs of food, clothing and accommodation.

The military's self-esteem is at its lowest and, Lieven argues, serious demonstrations and even attempted military coups cannot be completely ruled out in Russia's future. But, as has happened in many Latin American countries, the new ruling elite is likely to survive all such convulsions just as they did the Chechen debacle.

Seamus Martin is an Irish Times staff journalist

Book Service

To order this book and have it sent directly to your home or office call The Irish Times Book Service at 1850 30 60 60