The mystery of Putin and the apartment bombs

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0:37Asma:When you're trying to make sense of the world in this moment, one person central to it all is Vladimir Putin. And although here on this show we have looked at Putin's backstory and how it informs Russia today, there remains a pivotal series of events during his rise to power that is still shrouded in confusion and controversy. In September 1999, just weeks after Putin became prime minister, four bombs blew up four apartment buildings across Russia. The bombs exploded in the middle of the night, killing hundreds of people while they slept. In the aftermath of the bombings, many strange things happened.

1:16Asma:And that led to several different theories about who could have been behind those attacks. The Russian government blamed militants from Chechnya, a rebellious region in the south of Russia. But some said the bombings were the work of the FSB, Russia Security Services. There's a theory that Vladimir Putin himself had a hand in them, although the FSB and President Putin have always denied this. Putin has called the suggestion utter nonsense and totally insane. What isn't in dispute is that the atmosphere of terror that followed the bombings was part of Putin's case for launching a war in Chechnya that set the stage for his rise to the presidency.

1:59Asma:A new BBC podcast tells the story of the apartment bombings in detail and tries to get close to the truth behind this 26-year-old mystery.

2:11Asma:I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, D.C., and today on The Global Story, how the 1999 apartment bombings helped propel Putin's rise to power.

2:35So I'm Helena Merriman. I'm a journalist. I reported for the BBC for many years, from frontline war reporting to elections. And I'd say for me, one of the interesting things through my career has been looking at that meeting point between journalism and history, which is partly what this podcast does.

2:54Asma:Helena is the host of the new BBC podcast I mentioned. It's called The History Bureau, Putin and the Apartment Bombs. I started out by asking Helena why she wanted to tell this particular story. Well, as a journalist, as much as I love looking at what's going on right now in the present, I think I've always been drawn to stories in the past where the dust hasn't quite settled. and I think the story of the apartment bombs is probably one of the most intriguing examples of that. In fact, I'd say it's probably one of the most important unresolved stories of recent history. So it's about four bombs that blew up four apartments in September 1999, killing hundreds of people while they slept.

3:38What's interesting about this story is that even now there are these huge disagreements about who bombed those four apartments. So the government blamed Chechen militants, but others blamed the FSB, which is Russia's internal security service, partly because of very strange, murky things that went on at the time, which I'm sure we'll get into. But it's also a story that tells us so much about one of the most powerful men in the world today, Vladimir Putin, because he becomes president right at the time of the bombs. So if you want to understand Putin's origin story, this is a really important place to start.

4:17Asma:Well, I will say many listeners might not know this story at all. So can you take us back to the beginning? Where does it all begin? So it all begins in September 1999. And maybe it's helpful to give a bit of political context at the time. So this is eight years after the collapse of the Soviet Union. You have this new country, Russia, with a new president, Boris Yeltsin. And at first, everyone loved him. He was flamboyant. He was charismatic. But by 1999, he's old, he's an alcoholic, inflation has gone through the roof, people's savings are wiped, there's vast amounts of corruption. And Yeltsin and the oligarchs around him know that he needs a successor.

4:59But the problem is there's no one obvious. So that sets the scene for what then happens on September the 4th.

5:09In a city called Boynaksk, this is a remote town which is thousands of miles from Moscow. People are bedding down for the night when a truck which is parked outside the apartment explodes.

5:21Asma:Southern Russia is in turmoil tonight. Crumbles to the ground, 64 people killed. Rescue workers have spent the day searching for survivors in this mound of rubble. It's all that remains of a block of flats torn apart by a massive car bomb And it makes the news But it's not seen as a big deal Because this city is near the border with Chechnya Where there's been fighting in the past So at that point the country moves on But then, just a few days later, on September 9th You have a second bomb Russian investigators say a bomb caused the explosion Which destroyed a block of flats in Moscow And it goes off in Moscow in the early hours of the morning.

6:02Asma:At least 46 people were killed in the blast, with more missing and feared dead.

6:11And the footage from the time, it's really harrowing. You see the front of the apartment is peeled off. One journalist at the time described it as looking like a doll's house. You can see all the people's clothes and bathtubs inside. And 94 people are killed in that second bomb. And this time, because it's Moscow, the story breaks out. And who are the leading suspects? After the first two bombs go off, the question everyone's asking is who did this? And the answer comes pretty quickly. People seem pretty sure that it's Chechen militants. And that's partly because very recently there's been a horrific war between Russia and Chechnya.

6:49It goes back to 1991 when the Soviet Union was falling apart. You had different states breaking free. and Chechnya, which is a republic in the south of Russia, wanted it too. So they declare independence, but Russia has no intention of letting Chechnya go. So they sent in the tanks. There's a very brutal war between 94 and 96, thousands killed, horrific accounts of human rights abuses on both sides. And it ends with a peace deal, but the Chechens don't win their independence. So there's this real sense of unfinished business on both sides. And that's why when the first two bombs explode, a lot of people in Russia immediately blame Chechen militants.

7:29Asma:Is that just because of the war that it was considered to be so brutal and somewhat unfinished that people thought it might be related to this? Or was there actual evidence on the ground at that point pointing to the Chechens? At that time, there was no evidence pointing to Chechen militants. But then just a few days later, you have a third bomb. Yesterday's deadly explosion has triggered a massive security clamp down here. Every nook and cranny is being searched. This is on the 13th of September. Over 100 people killed. As for the survivors, only two people were pulled from the rubble alive. And it's at that point that the panic really sets in.

8:09Asma:People here are bracing themselves for further attacks. It's as if the whole city was on a war footing. It's partly because almost everyone in Russia lives in these very tall, precarious, prefab apartment blocks. And I think what makes these attacks so horrific is that most of them happen in the middle of the night, so when people are in their beds asleep. And so you have people now sleeping on the streets at night to protect themselves. And it's that night of the third bomb when Russia's new prime minister, it's their fifth in just 18 months because none of them last, speaks to the press, and his name is Vladimir Putin.

8:50A name, of course, we all know well, but what's interesting about this moment then is that this is the first time most Russians have seen him talk. You know, he's only been in the job a few weeks. He's short. He's got a forgettable face. The only thing people really know about him is that he was recently head of the FSB, which is Russia's Internal Security Service, formerly the KGB. And he gives a speech, a very powerful speech, where he says he's going to go after the rabid animals that did this and wipe them out.

9:19Asma:And how does that speech go over with the public? What did you hear from reporters who were there at the time? So reporters at the time say this went down really well. People wanted to hear this strong talk, vengeful talk. They wanted a sense that here was someone taking this seriously. Especially when just a few days later, on the 16th of September, there's a fourth bomb. And this is in a town called Volgodonsk. The facade of another apartment block was ripped off by a bomb in the southern town of Volgodonsk on Thursday, causing a further 17 deaths. Security has been stepped up at government buildings and citizens have been encouraged to be more vigilant by organising watch committees in their blocks of flats.

10:03So by this point you now have four apartment buildings blown up, around 300 people killed. and people are terrified at this point. And then this is where the story takes a very strange turn. And in fact, I think of all the things that happen in the story of the apartment bombs, this is probably the most contested part of it. So it all happens in a city called Rezan, which is about 100 kilometers south of Moscow. And this is now about a week after the fourth bomb. And at this point, everywhere in Russia, you have people patrolling apartment buildings, looking out on the streets, because everyone's terrified that maybe their apartment will be next.

10:41And at around 9.30 in the evening, a man called Alexei spots this white Larder car. It's parked outside his apartment. But he notices something strange about it, which is that part of the license plate has been covered up with a piece of paper. So he calls the police. They come. They go into the basement. And they rush out. And they say there's a bomb in the building. The whole building's then evacuated. You know, babies taken from bathtubs. People are racing outside in their pajamas and their dressing gowns. And the police then send an explosives expert into the basement and they find three white sacks of powder connected to a detonator and a timer.

11:21And they then test the powder and they find it positive for hexagon, which is a military explosive that was used in at least one of the other apartment bombs. So the residents are racing outside and they end up staying in a local cinema for the night. Someone takes them in, gives them cups of tea to keep them warm. And the next day you have this manhunt which begins because everyone's desperate to try and catch these bombers. So the city's under siege. You have the local FSB, local police residents all looking for the bombers. You have the roads and trains and airports all blocked. And then one of the most extraordinary parts of this story is a call comes into the Roseanne phone exchange.

12:02And there's a man at a payphone in Roseanne who wants to be connected to a number outside the city. So the operator puts the call through and then she listens in. And she hears a man saying, the city is locked, we can't get out. And the person at the other end says to the man, you know, you've got to split up and leave the city immediately. So she's understandably suspicious. So she writes down the number that they called, the phone number, send it to local police. And they trace it. And you'd expect at this point that it might go to Chechen militants, given the narrative at the time. But instead, it goes to a number belonging to the FSB, Russia's Internal Security Service.

12:39This is a bizarre detail.

12:43Asma:So at this point, what does the FSB say when that number is traced back to them? This is where the story gets even stranger. So the police then find the car abandoned. They then find two men who look just like people who eyewitnesses saw. But the men then say, we're FSB, and they get out their ID cards to prove it. So none of this is making sense until two days later, there's an announcement given by the government. Russia's interior minister is speaking to the police.

13:18And he mentions what happens in Rezan as a successful example of people finding and stopping what could have been a bomb. So he says, you know, well done, you were vigilant, your vigilance paid off. But then, and again, this is another very strange part of the story, there's a 30-minute gap, and half an hour after that speech, the head of the FSB, a man called Nikolai Patrushev, he says something that completely contradicts what the interior minister says.

13:46He says, oh no, it wasn't a bomb. It wasn't a thwarted terrorist attack. It was a training exercise.

13:59It was all just a drill. Those sacks of hexagon, it wasn't explosives, it was just sacks of sugar. And we were doing this just to test you, and well done, you passed the test, and he gives the phone operator a colour TV for passing this test. And it's so extraordinary that even the local FSB in Rosanne at that point don't appear to believe it. The residents don't believe it. Journalists at the time don't believe it.

14:56Asma:Transcription by CastingWords new episode every weekday. Just tap into iHeart to start watching, and we hope you enjoy the show.

15:08Asma:One small detail you mentioned in this series that caught my attention is that there was an attempt to publicize this story beyond Russia. You spoke to a journalist who actually tries to get this story out into a newspaper at the time, known here as the Washington Times, And I was struck by the fact that it doesn't seem to resonate. What happened and why was that? Yeah, it's a really good question because when you look back at it now, you think, why wasn't everyone asking these questions all over the world? And this journalist I interviewed, David Satter, who was one of the first Western journalists to ask these questions.

15:46He writes an article for The Washington Times. He speaks to some of his sources who are former members of the intelligence services who raise a lot of questions, particularly about Rezan, but also about the bombs and whether Chechen militants really could have been capable of doing it. And he writes this article, but it disappears into the wind. And I think it's partly because the idea back then that the FSB could have been involved in something like this just seemed so unimaginable, so beyond the realms of what anyone thought was possible at that time, that people just couldn't believe it. It sounded like a conspiracy theory you're saying.

16:23Exactly. And so you almost have this divide between what happens in the Western press, which moves on, partly because you then have President Yeltsin resigns on December 31st, Putin becomes acting president. So events are moving very quickly. And so in the Western press, it's full of coverage of Vladimir Putin, the new acting president of Russia. And it was warmly welcomed by the West, it seems at that time, right? Exactly. He was thought to be leading Russia in a new direction. Exactly. And you have Western leaders lining up to meet him and court him. And Tony Blair comes to Russia and watches opera with him.

16:59And people want to make friends with this new leader who they think is someone they can do business with. Meanwhile, in Russia, a lot of Russian journalists are asking very uncomfortable questions still. But in a way, those questions get sidelined. Because there's this new distraction, which is Putin sending fighter jets to bomb the Chechen capital, Grozny.

17:21Asma:Misery returns to Chechnya. Just three years after its war with Russia, the fighter bombers are back. It's the start of the second Chechen war. Moscow says it's targeting what it calls bandits. The Islamic rebels it holds responsible for the recent spate of bomb blasts in Russia's cities. But it's ordinary Chechens who are dying. Those pictures are now flooding into the newsrooms of TV stations around the world. And journalists at the time drew a direct line between the apartment bombs in this new war. What's so interesting about the effect of that war is that at the same time, Vladimir Putin is undergoing this huge transformation from being this rather forgettable former KGB guy in a suit.

18:09People in Russia called him the Syrian Mishka, which is the grey mouse. And he's now swapped those suits for military uniform. He's jumping on planes. He's giving heart-thumping speeches to soldiers on the front line. And his popularity ratings soar. I mean, when you look at his ratings back in August, before the bombs, only 2 % of Russians thought that Putin would make a good president. Just a few months later, after the bombs, after this new war in Chechnya, Putin being all over the news, his ratings have soared to over 40%. It's that quick. And as a result of that war, did Russian authorities arrest any suspects related to the bombings?

18:53So here's where it gets interesting. So you have these apartments are blown up in September over a matter of just a few weeks. You then have this new war in Chechnya. But at the same time, Putin is now campaigning to become president. So really, by that point, he is president in all but name. And so it's just a few months before the election. He barely campaigns. Again, he carries on his rides in fighter jets flying over Chechnya. And he wins outright in the first ballot. So the 26th of March 2000, Vladimir Putin is now president of Russia.

19:25Asma:So you say he is seen, it sounds like in Russia, as a popular sort of war hero. And yet this question of who was involved or who was responsible for these apartment bombings, is that ever resolved? Yeah, so what you then have is a number of very brave Russian journalists, parliamentarians who are desperate to get to the truth. And in February 2002, there's a group of Russian parliamentarians who say, look, we need an official public inquiry into the bombs. And there's a vote. And hundreds of parliamentarians in the Russian Duma actually vote for it. Only a few vote against. But because that has to be unanimous, it fails.

20:07So there's no independent commission? Well, there's no parliamentary commission. I see. But there's an independent one. So a few parliamentarians say, OK, well, if there can't be a parliamentary inquiry, we'll just do one ourselves. And a bunch of them get together. It's a bunch of politicians, journalists, lawyers, some grieving family members. But right from the start, things are very hard for them. So one of the people on this commission, a lawyer called Mikhail Trapashkin, within just a few days of him agreeing to be on this commission, his house is raided. There's another member of the commission, Sergei Yushchenkov.

20:40He's the vice chair. This is a year after they've begun their work. He's coming home one day and he's shot to death in front of his apartment in Moscow. His wife finds his body lying in the street. And just a few months later, another member of the commission starts feeling unwell. He goes to hospital. His internal organs shut down. His skin peels off. Takes about 16 days for him to die. Doctors at the time say he just had an allergic reaction to something, but journalists at the time said they're sure that he was poisoned. So you have these very mysterious deaths that eventually result in that commission falling apart.