Comparison of Nazism and Stalinism
Two ethnic groups that were specifically targeted for persecution by Stalin's Soviet Union were the Chechens and the Ingush. Unlike the other nationalities that could be suspected of connection to foreign states which shared their ethnic background, the Chechens and the Ingush were completely indigenous people of the Soviet Union. Rather than being accused of collaboration with foreign enemies, these two ethnic groups were considered to have cultures which did not fit in with Soviet culture – such as accusing Chechens of being associated with “banditism” – and the authorities claimed that the Soviet Union had to intervene in order to “remake” and “reform” these cultures. In practice this meant heavily armed punitive operations carried out against Chechen “bandits” that failed to achieve forced assimilation, culminating in an ethnic cleansing operation in 1944, which involved the arrests and deportation of over 500,000 Chechens and Ingush from the Caucasus to Central Asia and Kazakhstan. The deportations of the Chechens and Ingush also involved the outright massacre of thousands of people, and severe conditions placed upon the deportees – they were put in unsealed train cars, with little to no food for a four-week journey during which many died from hunger and exhaustion.
Chechens
Chechen culture puts a strong value on the concept of freedom. This asserts itself in a number of ways. A large majority of the nation's national heroes fought for independence (or otherwise, like the legendary Zelimkhan, robbed from the nation deemed the oppressor in order to feed Chechen children in a Robin Hood-like fashion). A common greeting in the Chechen language, "marsha oylla", is literally translated as "enter in freedom". The word for freedom also encompasses notions of peace and prosperity.