As war rages on Russian soil for the first time in fifty years, its companion -- a sense of chaos -- has spread to Moscow and there is open talk of the possibility that President Boris Yeltsin already has been or soon could be pushed aside.


To some observers the Chechen crisis is not the cause of a political crisis, but the result of one, the outcome of a power struggle for the ear of the president that has taken place over the past four months and ended with victory for the so-called "party of war."


NTV television's current affairs program "Itogi" on Sunday night outlined its version of how Yeltsin has come to depend almost exclusively on hardliners in his entourage, who want a more authoritarian Russia and to that end launched the Chechen operation.


"Itogi" traced a path from political stability last summer to the present crisis, via the collapse of the ruble on so-called "Black Tuesday" last October, the assassination of investigative journalist Dmitry Kholodov and the surrounding of the Most Bank headquarters by masked soldiers of the presidential guard Dec. 2.


The key axis of the party of war that provoked these destabilizing events, "Itogi" said, consists of First Deputy Prime Minister Oleg Soskovets and the head of Yeltsin's personal guard, Alexander Korzhakov.


Soskovets is an economic conservative and a representative of the military-industrial complex. Korzhakov, the president's closest companion, has taken an increasingly high political profile in recent months and has begun to show signs of independence from his boss.


The two men appear to have identified Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin -- whose position makes him Yeltsin's interim successor should anything force the president to step down -- as their chief rival.


Last month Izvestia published a letter from Korzhakov to Chernomyrdin on Kremlin note paper in which he far exceeded his brief by urging the prime minister not to liberalize Russian oil exports. He recommended that Soskovets supervise the whole process.


Throughout the fall, Soskovets gained ground at the expense of Chernomyrdin. It was he who met Irish Prime Minister Albert Reynolds when Yeltsin mysteriously did not get off his airplane at Shannon airport, and he who, to the surprise of everyone, met Britain's Queen Elizabeth when she arrived in Russia.


On Oct. 16, while the prime minister was vacationing by the Black Sea at Sochi, the rumor was spread by a Moscow radio station that he had resigned. Chernomyrdin strongly denied the rumor on his return to Moscow. He accused unspecified forces of "inflaming" the situation.


"Itogi" quoted "informed sources" as saying that "two people highly influential and close to the president" had intrigued against Chernomyrdin. One -- almost certainly Korzhakov -- was lobbying for the candidature of Soskovets.


According to this scenario, the hawks' growing influence culminated with the intervention in Chechnya. Their focus was the Kremlin Security Council, chaired by Oleg Lobov, an old comrade of Yeltsin from his days as First Party Secretary in Sverdlovsk. The president's more liberal national security adviser, Yury Baturin, admitted Friday that he has not taken part in Security Council meetings since the Chechen crisis began.


The crisis also coincided with Yeltsin's two-week absence in hospital, leading to speculation that the president may not have been fully in control of the crisis. Last Saturday, he also failed to appear as scheduled to lay the foundation stone for the reconstruction of the Church of Christ the Savior a few hundred yards from the Kremlin.


"Who is he -- the engine or the victim?" Yeltsin's former ally Lev Ponomaryov asked rhetorically in an article in Segodnya. "Is he the real center of the 'party of war' or is he simply surrounded on all sides?"


Certainly, the Chechen operation has seemed to acquire a momentum of its own and has escalated constantly, often against Yeltsin's expressed policy of a few days before.


The initial ground offensive started Dec. 11, even though peace talks were scheduled for the next day in Vladikavkaz and the ultimatum to the Chechens to disarm was not due to expire until Dec. 15. Twice in recent days Yeltsin has publicly announced that the bombing of Grozny would stop. Both times the bombing has continued.


Meanwhile Chernomyrdin, who was in a position of immense power a year ago, has kept a low profile. His few comments on the crisis have been relatively pacific. Shortly before the intervention in Chechnya he offered to talk personally with Dudayev and Dudayev last week returned the offer.


Chernomyrdin's strengths are as a man of consensus. As late as the autumn Yeltsin still regarded him as a linchpin of stability together with the speakers of the two houses of parliament Ivan Rybkin and Vladimir Shumeiko.


Although they are now more distant from Yeltsin, Chernomyrdin, Shumeiko and Rybkin still remain close to each other. They met last week for closed talks.


The popular daily Moskovsky Komsomolets speculated Thursday that Chernomyrdin may be trying to keep his hands clean from the Chechen conflict in order to reap the rewards should Yeltsin's authority collapse.


"He may be such a far-seeing politician that he has preferred not to interfere in a doubtful enterprise, but to stay in the background and have every right to aspire to the highest post in the government if the whole adventure fails," the paper said.