In Russia, the alarming success of the Islamic State (IS), formerly the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), was lamented by many analysts and policymakers as, by and large, an indication of a short-sighted US policy under President George W. Bush leading to a virtual breakup of Iraq. In the current context of perpetual Washington-Moscow browbeating, this narrative finds Moscow supporters in the Middle East and elsewhere. However, Russians have enough to worry about for themselves as IS not only has significantly influenced regional geopolitics, but has served as inspiration for extremist sympathizers in other parts of the world, breathing new life into their activities, such as for the Caucasus Emirate (CE) operating in the Russian North Caucasus.

Currently, North Caucasus mujahedeen are split in their support for various Islamist groups operating in the greater Middle East — partly over personal loyalties to groups’ leaders and emirs, partly over ideological imperatives, interpretation of the “global jihad” idea and its tactical implementation. In the spat between Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS, the emirate signaled its support for the latter, further solidifying channels linking the two extremist groups. As Thomas de Waal of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace argues, “Many of the leading jihadists of ISIS come from the Caucasus, including Omar al-Shishani, (an ethnic Chechen) who comes from Georgia's Pankisi Gorge. If even a fraction of the vast amounts of money ISIS is said to have seized in Iraq makes a way back to the North Caucasus, it could boost the militants there.”

However, the focus on the ethnic belonging of the mujahedeen (Chechens, Circassians, Dagestani) in this case has a rather emotional component: The strategic agenda of both the Islamic State and Caucasus Emirate is religious, not ethnic, which makes them more consolidated in substance and diverse in form.

Nevertheless, the people factor is the first “bridge” between the radical groups. Indeed, many of those fighting for IS (or al-Nusra, for that matter) first joined the jihadist movement in the North Caucasus and have been reported fighting in Chechnya, Afghanistan, Iraq and other hotbeds across the Middle East. This comes as no surprise, for in the age of globalization not only can terrorism be a global threat, but terrorists themselves are “globalized” and “travel to hot spots for specific missions” as tourists do to popular destinations. There aren’t training camps in the North Caucasus the size of those in Iraq and Syria; thus the competition for human resources is strong within and between the terrorist networks.