SONIA RUSELER, CNN ANCHOR: To news from overseas now and the latest on the conflict in Chechnya. Russian attempts to gain control over a key area in the capital, Grozny, have been thwarted by rebels, but fierce fighting continues. Heavy snow forced Moscow to halt its air campaign and rely instead on ground artillery. CNN's Steve Harrigan has our report.</s>STEVE HARRIGAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It takes a good part of the morning to prepare 300 missiles for launching, then to load them onto trucks, but less than a minute to fire them. There are no computer screens or smart bombs in the low-tech world of the Russian army, just steel and smoke, pencil and paper, bending and lifting. Men do the menial part. The work of destruction is done by simple machines. In the part of Grozny now under Russian control, that work is complete. Hardly a building has been missed.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): My house is destroyed, my husband was taken away, I live in the basement with my mother who is blind and I have no money.</s>HARRIGAN: Russian control over this section of Chechnya means control over a battlefield the opponent has fled, control over houses without windows, hospitals without heat, children without parents, control that time and again somehow slips away. In such a world, a quiet corner is the best some could hope for.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): It doesn't matter if the Russians are here or if the rebels come back. The only thing worse than the past 10 years is death.</s>HARRIGAN: That verdict comes from a history teacher with no school who spends his days alone, mending soles. Steve Harrigan, CNN, Grozny, Chechnya.
Russia Continues Low-Tech War to Regain Grozny, Chechnya