Whoa, I'm glad I stumbled across this. In my opinion, there are many reasons for this tragedy, but I don't believe for a moment that Russia's eschewing participation in the US-led war on terror had anything to do with it. I'm not sure where you gleaned that viewpoint, magellan, but let me set the record straight. There never really is a clear-cut reason for any terrorist attack, at least not one which civilized people can understand and agree on. The Chechnyan rebels want independence from Russia, they are savagely violent terrorists and care nothing about the US, 9/11/01 or any other part of the world. Russia needs to maintain sovereignty over Chechnya because of the oil reserves there and revenue derived therefrom (among many other less important issues) which it desperately needs. There appear to be connections between these terrorists and al Qaeda regarding funding, tactics and training camps, but that's where it ends. The politicization of this horrific event was immediate in the US because of its savagery and the fact that we happen to be engaged in our own war against similarly despicable animals. My concern is the risk of not allocating sufficient attention and weaponry toward our own war against these types, as they have shown us what is in store for the US if the war against terror finds its way to our shores, again.