Within minutes the tragedy at the Lubyanka Metro was headline news around the world. The following day became a National Day of Mourning, with a two-minute silence observed across Russia, the public mood both sombre and angry when the latest casualty figures gave some measure of the human cost: at least 90 killed, almost 400 hospitalised.
Of the terrorist groups that had quickly claimed responsibility, only one, signing itself simply as August 14, offered definitive proof. In an aggressively-worded media statement written first in Russian, and then repeated in English, it condemned the Government’s failure to renounce Russia’s imperialist past. Moscow still controlled its own vast empire, a hundred diverse nationalities subjugated in the cause of Russian colonialism. To the terrorists, Lubyanka was just the start, their ultimate – if unlikely – aim the complete and irrevocable fragmentation of the Russian Federation.
Exactly a week after Lubyanka, a parcel bomb killed its innocent courier and six bystanders at the entrance to the Kazansky Rail Terminal, a day later the National Security Advisor was murdered, together with his driver and two bodyguards. The next week two car bombs exploded close to the Bolshoi Theatre – sixteen dead. Then on successive days more car bombs killed another twenty-three. The spring thaw saw the terrorists’ target shift to city-centre stores, nightclubs and restaurants, a deadly mix of bombs and incendiaries resulting in another ninety-three deaths and insurance claims close to three billion U.S. dollars.
The authorities’ response was rapid and determined. Within 48 hours of the Lubyanka attack, they had identified, but not named, all four bombers: the only female, a 21-year-old student from Poland had died at the scene, but despite a massive police hunt the other three terrorists remained at large. With few other leads to work with, the police soon concentrated on thwarting further attacks; hundreds of known activists and dissidents were detained and interrogated, the movements of others closely monitored, their phones tapped, homes searched. An intensive media campaign urged the public to stay vigilant, and a security cordon was thrown around central Moscow with all vehicles subject to random checks. Security on the Metro became oppressive, armed guards patrolling every station and platform; yet passenger numbers still plummeted by almost a third.
In spite of such extreme measures, support for the Government’s response was generally positive. The images from Lubyanka had left an indelible public memory and many in Moscow could still recall the bloody scenes from the apartment bombings of ‘99, when almost 300 were murdered during a two-week killing spree. If lives could be saved and the terrorists stopped by abandoning the rights of a few dissidents or by adding a few minutes to the daily commute – then so be it.
And by the beginning of May the terrorist attacks had seemingly stuttered to a halt, the high-profile police action provoking a renewed sense of optimism. For Eglitis and his paymasters, however, it was merely a lull before the crescendo of the next phase.