As Chechens (led by many who grew up in the deportation) declare independence in the wake of the fall of the Soviet Union, Boris Yeltsin’s Russia does nothing for three years. Embarrassment at the new state’s defiance eventually drives an attempt to topple the Chechen government through far superior arms. Spoiler Alert: Russia, thought to be the second most powerful country in the world at the time, gets a disastrous comeuppance.