Coming to grips with the memories and lessons of America’s long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is a task that would be difficult to better than Leo Tolstoy’s novella HADJI MURAT which reports on the the 30-year war between the Russians and Muslim holy warriors in the Caucasus in 1829-59, a precursor to the war in Chechnya and the long engagement against the Taliban, al-Qaeda and the Islamic State.
By the time Tolstoy had finished this book, he was a long-bearded pacifist recalling when he spent much of the 1850s as an army officer and later a war correspondent at the Siege of Sevastopol during the Crimean war. He saw the face of battle and the complexity of a war against Muslim insurgents. There he came face-to-face with the real-life historical figure, Hadjit Murat, a tribal leader who held the entire campaign in balance. Tolstoy completed the the book nearly 50 years later which was published posthumously in 1912.
The book is a reminder to readers of the timeless truths about the nature of war, showing how from the front lines to the capital, wars are fought and commanded by people subject to the vagaries of human nature, personal biases and outright selfish purposes. Much of the foibles described by Tolstoy have existed in different forms by many who have made decisions affecting America’s long wars. In essence this story concerns the defection of Hadji Murat, the most famous lieutenant of Shamil, the leader of the Caucasian resistance. Hadji switches sides out of fear for his life, being a rival of Shamil and because Shamil’s forces have kidnapped his entire family. Hoping to liberated them with the help of the Russians, Hadji brokers an alliance with Prince Mikhail Vorontsov. Few Russians trust him as he made his name mowing down Russian officers.
The story opens with the narrator reflecting on Hadji’s death and the sense of grim inevitability haunts every twist and turn. The book excitedly travels through the experiences of everyone, large and small, engaged in the conflict. Tolstoy’s opening preface sets the stage for the entire work which is about history rather than a work of history and how people get swept up in the wake of human progress. Similar to War and Peace, Tolstoy’s contempt for the ‘great men’ of Empire is reserved not for Napoleon but for Tzar Nicholas I, who emerges from the shadows of history as a wrathful, boastful tyrant, with a narrow vision and the inevitable downfall of Russia under his guidance. Not surprisingly, Tolstoy has more sympathy for Hadji, who emerges as a fascinating contradiction himself. Sadly Hadji’s defection and subsequent coup falls apart out of sheer bureaucratic indifference by the powerbrokers involved.
Tolstoy refuses to glorify the past, his nation, or even the hero of his talep. But whoever reads this story can never, ever forget the tragic portraits of men and women stuck in the gears of history, their actions rendered meaningless by so many Nicholas’s and Shamils. The author stoically suggests that we cant change the past or demand an accounting of the present, but we can stand our ground and force the executioner to look us in the eyes before lopping our heads off. Or as he writes in the preface of this story “Man has conquered everything, destroyed millions of plants, but still this will not give in.”
A wonderful read with beautiful prose.
