Tamerlan Tsarnaev: Was He Named After the Brutal Islamic Ruler Tamerlane?

The latest news on the Boston Marathon bombing is that two suspects have been identified: brothers Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26. Tamerlan has since died after a confrontation with police in Watertown, Mass., while Dzhokhar is still on the run.

Details are sketchy, but the general picture seems to be that the Tsarnaev family is from Chechnya, a republic in southern Russia (i.e., the Russian Caucasus). Since the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, Chechnya has had a bloody history involving attempts to gain independence from Russia, with subsequent Russian crackdowns and attacks by Chechen terrorists. The conflict has a religious edge to it, as Chechens are Muslim, making them a religious minority in Russia.

Assuming the Tsarnaev brothers are the perpetrators of the Boston Marathon bombing, was their act of terror motivated by Islam, as with the September 11 attacks? Were they, like al-Qaeda, aiming to revive an Islamic Caliphate to rule the world? You can almost hear the argument already: "One of them was named after a Muslim ruler: Tamerlane. The Tsarnaevs are terrorists, and Muslims, so they're seeking to establish Islam across the globe." (A caller in the second hour of the Rush Limbaugh show Friday noted the Tamerlane connection.)

But we should be careful about attributing motives for the bombing. At the same time, we should never let a crisis go to waste, if only because they're good opportunities to learn history. So, first, who was Tamerlane?

The name "Tamerlane" is based on a derisive epithet used by Persians, which translates to "Timur the Lame." Despite being hobbled by injuries sustained early in his life, Timur (1336-1405) rose quickly from what is now Uzbekistan to rule a huge empire stretching from Baghdad in the west to Delhi in the east. Timur fancied himself as being both an inheritor of the throne of the Mongolian conqueror Genghis Khan (c. 1162-1227) and a good candidate for Islamic Caliph. But Timur never had the credentials to officially hold either title, so he contented himself with being de facto ruler.

Timur is remembered as a brilliant military thinker who was ruthlessly brutal to his opponents. His conquests of Baghdad and Delhi were particularly bloody. He was also a patron of the arts (funny how often the two go together), and turned his capital city of Samarkand into a place of architectural innovation. European leaders were gleeful at Timur's successes against the Ottoman Empire, even as they feared that he would turn his armies on them, too. They needn't have worried, because Timur died as he was gathering together a campaign to invade China, which was in the early stages of the Ming Dynasty. His empire gradually fell apart after his death.

Many Hindus and Christians have a dim view of Timur, given his atrocities, but the same can be said about many Muslims. Timur's victims were often Muslims living in what is now Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and elsewhere. But the name "Tamerlane" (or variation of it) is nonetheless popular, particularly in Russia, Uzbekistan, and other parts of Central Asia. (Perhaps it became a favorite among people who didn't like the Ottoman Turks.)

Tamerlan Tsarnaev may share a name with Timur, but that could be all they share. Timur certainly wanted to craft a large empire with Islam as its religion. But Chechen rebels and terrorists, though they are frequently Muslims, typically don't have the same designs. They're separatists who want the Russian government out of Chechnya, not creators of a new Islamic world order.

That being said, it's still not clear what the motive of the Tsarnaev brothers was. Maybe they were Al-Qaeda-style jihadis. After all, it's not clear how bombing Boston helps the Chechen separatist movement (though it's not clear how the 2002 Moscow theater or 2004 Beslan school hostage incidents helped, either). And, certainly, some Chechen rebels likely are in agreement with Al-Qaeda, or at the very least work with them.

But there's also the possibility that the Tsarnaev brothers are terrorists with a simple separatist agenda. Or maybe they're just antisocial sociopaths looking for a reason to kill, using Russian bullying as a justification the same way Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold used school bullying as a reason to shoot up Columbine High School.

That would still make them terrorists and terrible people. But it wouldn't make them part of a larger plot to impose a religion on anyone. They would be terrorists who are Muslims, not Islamic terrorists.

>>>They’re separatists who want the Russian government out of Chechnya, not creators of a new Islamic world order.<<<

Liberal lies. Chechens were talking about Caliphate since the very beginning. They actually won their independence in First Chechen War and used it not to create any kind of stable government but to expand further into South Russia and Dagestan. In 1999 Dagestanis rebelled against Chechens and their Arab masters, federal government supported locals and it is how the Second War started.
IMHO, Chechen success in the first war was a precedent. It shown jihadis they can bite pieces from non-muslim nations and establish their rule.
I don’t think Kosovo was possible before 1996, muzzies in France and Britain had no guts to declare sharia zones in inner cities or said any crap on ‘islam will rule’ too.

Boston Amputee Actor Fake Blood Staged ← EN For Dummies enfordummies.com/.../boston-amputee-actor-fake-blood-staged/5 days ago – This is the same man who will pretend to hold the tourniquet of the fake amputee actor later on. Look to center of the photo and you will see the ... 24 images Visually similar images - Report images Amputee Actors Help Make Boston Look Real - Think Inside the Box!

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"They’re separatists who want the Russian government out of Chechnya, not creators of a new Islamic world order."

All this on the namesakes of not only their son Tamerlane, but also Dzhokhar was covered (where else but) on FreeRepublic - 10 days ago.

Note especially the highlighted sentence in the final paragraph of the following, regarding how, under the leadership of the living terrorist son's namesake, the 1st Chechen-Russian War was waged as a holy Islamic war.

On namesake Tamerlane (the Sword of Islam):

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3009967/posts?page=10#10
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3009962/posts?page=63#63

On namesake Dzhokhar (Dudaev):

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3009967/posts?page=24#24
"Before the fall of Grozny, {Dzhokhar} Dudaev abandoned the {Chechen} presidential palace, moved south with his forces and continued leading the war throughout 1995, reportedly from a missile silo close to the historic Chechen capital of Vedeno. He continued to insist that his forces would prevail after the conventional warfare had finished, and the Chechen guerrilla fighters continued to operate across the entire country picking off Russian units and demoralising their soldiers. A jihad was declared on Russia by the Dudaev-appointed Mufti of Ichkeria, Akhmad Kadyrov, and foreign volunteers began pouring into the republic, mostly from neighbouring North Caucasian Muslim republics such as Dagestan." (wikipedia: Tamerlane)

>>>He was given the Order of the Red Star and the Order of the Red Banner for dropping lots of bombs on Afghans and he refused to shut down the Estonian parliament and TV during the KGB coup in 1991, so he’s wasn’t always pure evil.

What aspect of Dudayev’s actions represented pure evil?<<<

Dudaev’s bombing campaign in Afghanistan could be defined as evil. It was of little military significance being mostly aimed against civilian population (it also angered people and helped jihadi recruitment).

I'm gonna have to disagree. What helped jihadi recruitment was Pakistani funding preferences. Zia ul Haq took Saudi and American money and used it to fund only the most extreme Islamist anti-government forces. His successors continued this fine tradition, arguably right up to the present day.

It seems to me that Dudayev was a vanilla Soviet general who was at sea after the dissolution of the USSR, and decided to go into business for himself at the head of an independent country. While generally worthless as a political leader, both in the sense of unifying the country and running the economy, or handing it over to someone who knew how, he seems to have had the cleanest hands of all the post-Soviet Chechen leaders.

However debatable Dudaev's prior record was, that he later turned the 1st Chechen-Russian war into a Jihadi crusade is not debatable:

"A jihad was declared on Russia by the Dudaev-appointed Mufti of Ichkeria, Akhmad Kadyrov, and foreign {Jihadi} volunteers began pouring into the republic, mostly from neighbouring North Caucasian Muslim republics such as Dagestan." (From post #22.)

Naming your 2 sons Tamerlan & Dzhokhar is as coincidental as would have been naming them Vladimir & Josef, Fidel & Che, Adolf & Benito...

However debatable Dudaev's prior record was, that he later turned the 1st Chechen-Russian war into a Jihadi crusade is not debatable:
"A jihad was declared on Russia by the Dudaev-appointed Mufti of Ichkeria, Akhmad Kadyrov, and foreign {Jihadi} volunteers began pouring into the republic, mostly from neighbouring North Caucasian Muslim republics such as Dagestan." (From post #22.)

Naming your 2 sons Tamerlan & Dzhokhar is as coincidental as would have been naming them Vladimir & Josef, Fidel & Che, Adolf & Benito...

While Dudayev did ask for help from Muslims around the world, I'd liken his request to the Byzantine Emperor's request for assistance from Western Christendom against the Muslim armies that were constantly on the verge of overrunning them. The military disparity between Russia and Chechnya is obviously far greater than that between Muslim forces and Byzantine forces.

As to the naming of one son after Tamerlane - the guy's not a Muslim hero - the Arabs hate his guts for destroying the last Arab dynasty to control the Middle East, and slaughtering so many Arabs. This is why you will never hear of an Arab with the name Tamerlane. My impression is that the guy was a major league Turkic hero - he was the guy who finally showed the world what Turks were made of, after getting pushed out of China, and being incorporated into various armies as lowly mercenaries and auxiliaries. For Turks, he was their Alexander, before the Ottomans came on the scene. By today's standards, he's obviously beyond the pale, but that was an era in which the almost universal penalty for resisting a siege was for the entire city's population to be put to the sword. When the Crusaders finally broke through Jerusalem's defenses, that's exactly what they did, and justifiably so, based on the practices prevalent at the time.

1) The Byzantine Emperor ask for Christian help and got Christian crusaders. Dudaev, through his appointed Mufti called for Muslim help and he got Islamic Jihadis and officially an Islamic war.

2) As conqueror (by massacres & atrocities) of fellow Muslim rulers in the Middle East, Tamerlane is not hero of Arab (or Persia) Muslims. But after Central Asia was conquered in the name of and converted to Islam by none other than Tamerlane “The Sword of Islam", he made that area the center of his dynasty. When his Islamic Central Asia prospered (at the expense of other Islamic areas) he became a hero for the Islamized ethnic groups of that area, who profited from his rise.

But after Central Asia was conquered in the name of and converted to Islam by none other than Tamerlane “The Sword of Islam", he made that area the center of his dynasty.

I have a small quibble with this account. As far as I know, the Arabs conquered Central Asia all the way to China back in the 8th century. At the Battle of Talas River in 751 AD, I believe the Arab commander won a Pyrrhic victory against an outnumbered Tang Dynasty counterpart that nonetheless determined the future of Central Asia as a Muslim rather than a Buddhist one.

Dear FRiends,

Below, Anderson Cooper Interviews a very brave Boston Bombing victim Heather Abbott.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCt7ABe-_a8&feature=youtu.be

We can't help feel for this attractive and very well turned out victim as she comes out of surgery to tell her brave story of survival.

However, a quick search of Hollywood actors and actresses who are available to perform in TV, movies etc, we find a professional actress advertising her trade. She's not the only crisis actor we found advertising their skills on Hollywood Amputees. Look at Heather's professional bio. below

http://www.amputeesinhollywood.com/Videos.html

The truth is a valuable commodity that our government is using to deceive us. Why are they boosting the terror in Boston through the use of actors & actresses? They don't seem to be trying to hide their involvement very well, might be a more important question?

Stay Safe,

Michael

Despite the 8th century invasion of Central Asia you cite, the Islamic conversion of the region was a totally different thing. Here's an excerpt from wikipedia (Link) concerning the later Mongol 13th & 14th century invasions. Note that the Mongols only converted to Islam in the early 14th century, long after their military and demographic invasion & occupation.

William of Rubruck, the emissary of the Kingdom of France to Sartaq Khan (son of Batu) travelled to the Caucasus in 1253. He wrote that the Circassians (Circassians here does not refer to the Circassians proper, but rather from all North Caucasians from Anapa to Avaria, including Circassians, Ubykhs, Abazins, Ossetes, Ingush, Chechens and Avars) had never "bowed to Mongol rule", despite the fact that whole fifth of the Mongol armies were at that time devoted to the task of crushing Caucasian resistance once and for all....
Second Mongol Invasion
In order to avoid future conflicts with the Mongols and give the Dzurdzuks time to recover, the ruler of the Princedom of Simsir (also known by the shorter name of "Simsim"; it was a small Dzurdzuk-run feudal principality separate from Alania and Dzurdzuketia, located between the two rivers, known to the Mongols as Gayur Khan (though this probably was not what his own subjects called him), allied itself with the Golden Horde. To underline Simsim's loyalty to the Horde, Gayur even adopted Sunni Islam as a state religion, althoughthis move was purely symbolic (as the bulk of the Chechens were still pagan and those that were Muslim or Christian were highly syncretic in their practice).

And my idea that Tamerlane did the real conversion was also off base.

The Chechen feudal state of Simsim, after the First Mongol Invasion (which its monarchy somehow miraculously survived), allied itself not to Georgia, but to the Golden Horde,[5] and even nominally converted to Islam, when faced with the threat of invasion. This underlines the causes for the later conversion of the Chechens to Islam in the 16th to 19th centuries, in order to secure the sympathy of the Ottomon Empire and the rest of the Muslim world in their conflict with the Christian state of Russia. (Same link as above.)

But before this Tamerlane "The Sword of Islam" had in the late 14th century made peace with the Chechens. He gave them his sabre (which became a treasured cultural relic to them) and they grew to honor him to the point of erecting statues of him and not of any Ottoman leaders. ( Check google image search on "tamerlane statue chechnya" )

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