Could the hostage crisis in a Moscow theatre two weeks ago have produced good news? Boris Nemtsov certainly thinks so. Three days after the rescue that killed not only most of the Chechen separatists but also around 120 of their hostages, President Vladimir Putin spoke of a new role for Russia's army in the fight against terrorism. Some read that as a sign that he would step up the war in Chechnya. But Mr Nemtsov, leader of the opposition Union of Right Forces, thinks the opposite: that by drawing attention to the army's failure in Chechnya, Mr Putin will press the generals harder for a sorely-needed military reform. For the last ten years there has been endless talk about turning the massive armed forces, designed to give the Soviet Union its muscle against the West, into a smaller, more compact shape. Even the staunchest cold-war generals now accept that the shaky former Soviet republics in Central Asia or separatist rebels in Chechnya are likely to pose more immediate problems to Russia.
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