First, he specifies the number of guerrillas and their targets: 217 Mujahideen participated in the assault operation, who at 9:14 a.m. simultaneously stormed 15 military objects of all power structures of KB in territory of city: FSB, the Center ‘Т’, HQ of GRU (military intelligence), RUBOP (department for combating organized crime), the Ministry of Internal Affairs, 1st, 2nd and 3rd Departments of Internal Affairs, regiment of PPS (Patrol-Guard Service), OMON (special police detachments), special troops of GUIN (Russian Prison Service), frontier troops, the airport, Ministry of Defence company, and a brigade of VV (Internal Troops). ...Exactly after 2 hours at 11:15 a.m. the main units of Mujahideen left the city.
Next, he details his organization's command structure: Amir of the Kabardino-Balkarian sector of the Caucasian Front Seyfullah was the commander of this operation. I’ve carried out the general operative management (this our rules -- Amir of sector on which territory’s happenig the operation commands the operation, and all high-ranking Amirs who participates in operation pass into his command for the period of its carrying out).
His inability to persuade local commanders to postpone the operation despite a rapidly worsening situation (which reflects the decentralized open source nature of this conflict): ...five days before the operation there was a serious information leakage and kafirs have dispatched additioanly 1000 Special Forces units to Nalchik by planes, trains and motor vehicles. On 11-12 October, they dispatched even tanks and BMPs. However, the Mujahideen in Majlis on 11 October, have refused to postpone the operation and as it had been planned, in the morning on 13 October, they carried out two-hour-long assault operation – “One of two best”. (“the Victory or Paradise”).
And the high casualties that were the result: Our casulties – 41 Shaheeds, insha Allah. Including his personal loss: During the storm of FSB building my naib (assistant) on operative work Amir of Ingush Jamaat Gorchkhanov Ilyas who commanded the assault groups of Mujahideen ‘Center’ became Shaheed, insha Allah. Amirs Osetin and the Krasnodar sectors got light wounds.
He then puts the operation into perspective (an ability to mount an attack despite a rapidly deteriorating tactical and supply situation): Peculiarity of this operation consists of that for the first time the operation was not a blocking one but a cleanly assault operation of such scale. And at sharp change of quantity and quality of the enemy, sharp shortage of an ammunition, in a situation allowing to cancel or postpone operation for later term.
My take is that this operation was intended to announce the spread of the insurgency into a new area and show that it could mount large offensive operations in the face of adversity. It did both, but at a high cost. For observers, it demonstrates that Russia is unable to contain the spread of the Islamic insurgency even with prior knowledge. An additional take-away is that this demonstrated operational capability is more than enough to completely disrupt Russia's fragile oil and gas systems. All it will take for this open source insurgency to shift to systems disruption (given our experience in Iraq) is one simple act of innovation.
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