KONSTANTINOV
LEONID SERGEEVICHOver the territory of the Republic of Ingushetia in the area of the village of Nesterovskaya, the helicopter was suddenly fired from the ground from a heavy machine gun. Lieutenant Colonel Konstantinov received six bullet wounds in the stomach, chest and head, but managed to maintain control of the helicopter and took it out of the fire zone. With his courageous actions, he saved the lives of all those on board. When the helicopter commander lost consciousness from severe injuries, he was replaced by the rest of the crew, who landed the damaged helicopter in a field. However, Leonid Konstantinov died from severe wounds and large loss of blood before being evacuated to the hospital...
KOSTIN
SERGEY VYACHESLAVOVYCH
...The unequal battle lasted over seven and a half hours. When there was almost no ammunition left, and the enemy was already close to the positions of the paratroopers, Kostin began to organize and lead daring counterattacks that turned into hand-to-hand combat. He personally killed twelve militants. While repelling one of the attacks, Major Sergei Kostin died the death of a hero... The militants lost over 100 people killed in that battle. The defeat at Donkey's Ear became a complete surprise for the enemy and a turning point in the battles in the Botlikh region. A few days later, the remnants of the gangs fled from there...
PEASANTS
ANDREW VLADIMIROVICH
...Fighting professionally, using ammunition wisely, it was Krestyaninov’s detachment that, having knocked out Dudayev’s men from their front line of defense, was the first of the Sobrov men to break into the village. At 10:30 a.m., Andrei Krestyaninov, being at the forward command post, was preparing to fire a grenade launcher. First, he ordered his subordinate to do this, and then, following the military habit of “not exposing the young,” he himself took up the weapon. He just looked around the corner of the house when a sniper hit him in the neck. The wound turned out to be fatal...
KROPOCHEV
IVAN ALEXEEVICH...Junior Sergeant Kropochev I.A. entered into an unequal battle with the bandits. From a burning car, he directed targeted fire at the militants, destroying them one by one and giving his wounded comrades the opportunity to retreat to a safe distance. When the ammunition ran out, junior sergeant I.A. Kropochev pulled the pin from the grenade, deciding not to surrender. Having let the bandits get close to the armored personnel carrier, he detonated a grenade and, at the cost of his life, saved his comrades and prevented the militants from seizing weapons and military equipment...
KRUPINOV
ANATOLY ALEXANDROVICH
...On August 14, 2002, near the village of Akhkinchu-Borzoi in one of the southern regions of Chechnya, a group of 4 FSB officers was ambushed by militants. When the landmine exploded, three soldiers were injured, but Krupinov remained unharmed. He immediately returned fire, ordering the wounded to retreat deeper into the forest, while he himself covered their retreat with fire. In the battle he was seriously wounded in the head, however, overcoming the pain, he pulled his seriously wounded comrade out of the burning car. While leaving I lost consciousness. Having woken up, Anatoly Krupinov saw that they were overtaken by militants who killed the wounded soldier. He shot one of the militants, and when the others rushed towards him, he blew himself up with a grenade along with them...
KUZMIN
FEDOR VASILIEVICH
...The operator-gunner Kuzmin was wounded, but refused to leave the vehicle. He shouted: “Go to the basement, I’ll cover you!” – although he could have jumped out of a burning car. Using turret machine gun fire, he calmly destroyed the militants' points. They suffered significant losses. But most importantly, by diverting the fire to himself, he gave the paratroopers the opportunity to pick up their wounded comrades, retreat to a residential building and continue the battle from more advantageous positions. Meanwhile, the bandits concentrated all their firepower on Kuzmin’s car. She flared up with a torch. But Kuzmin continued to fire at the enemy. Until I burned myself...
Based on materials from the site http://verdysh.narod.ru/geroi.html
Many of our officers and soldiers have three or four military campaigns behind them: Afghan, Tajik, two Chechen. In the battle formations of the troops, as during the Great Patriotic War, there were and are Red Star correspondents. One of them, Colonel Nikolai Astashkin, recently wrote a book in hot pursuit, in which he spoke about the dramatic events last decade in the North Caucasus (“Lone Wolf Leap. Chronicles of the times of Dzhokhar Dudayev - notes of a front-line correspondent.” Rostov-on-Don. 2002). We publish an excerpt from our colleague’s book dedicated to officers, warrant officers, young guys, soldiers of the first and second Chechen wars on this page.
We can't forget about the past
I visited Chechnya for the first time in June 1991. I really liked Grozny - a beautiful and flourishing city, whose residents were hospitable and friendly. If someone had told me then that within six months everything would turn upside down here, I would not have believed it. But...
What happened in this once calm mountain republic?
My task is to tell the reader about the dramatic events that took place in Chechnya not only in recent history Russia, but also in the distant past.
Death of a brigade commander
“We were thoroughly squeezed at the station,” senior warrant officer Shibkov continued his sad story. - The militants’ tactics were well-calibrated. Well armed, they acted in groups of 10-15 people - and shot, shot, shot, often replacing each other, and we fought back in the same composition. In addition, the armored vehicles in the brigade were old, had served all their terms: the turret did not rotate, the cannon jammed, and the tanks had no active armor protection at all, and the personnel, to be honest, were not ready to fight in the city. Maybe in the field, under the cover of aviation, artillery and armor, we are a force, but here, in this concrete jungle of an unfamiliar and hostile city, when a hail of lead flies at you from every floor, from every window of the house adjacent to the station square, - you're just a target. And then, by the end of the day on January 1, brigade commander Ivan Alekseevich Savin decided to make a breakthrough. Making our way through the dense wall of fire, we began to retreat along a familiar road - towards the village of Sadovy. In the area of the station, Ivan Alekseevich received two through bullet wounds
, but continued to command the remnants of the brigade. In my heart he will forever remain a commander with a capital C.
We retreated further and along the way we met our burnt vehicles, from which the militants had already stolen ammunition and food, and the corpses of our fighters lay right there. Finally the Printing House appeared. We look, out of nowhere, two infantry fighting vehicles of the 81st motorized rifle regiment are approaching us. The brigade commander, the brigade artillery chief, and officers from the Akula-1 aviation combat control group sat in them. And immediately they took both infantry fighting vehicles right off the bat, but, not having driven even a hundred meters, they suddenly stopped. And seconds later they burst into flames. The “spirits” shot them with grenade launchers and machine guns at point-blank range. The brigade commander was wounded for the third time.
At that time heavy fire was opened in our direction. I don’t know what would have happened to us if it weren’t for the car depot located nearby. She became a saving island in this sea of fire. Having dropped into the cluttered courtyard of the motor depot, we threw grenades at the windows of the premises, just in case. We went to bed. Then the main group with the brigade commander arrived. However, only one name remained from the group: while they were running across open areas, almost everyone died under machine-gun fire from the militants.
I approach the wounded Colonel Savin and say:
- Commander, what are we going to do?
Thinking about something of his own, he looked to the side, then, as if waking up, he said:
By that time, dusk had fallen over the city. We crawled with him around the corner of the building and saw how five or six militia fighters were secretly approaching us. I say to Ivan Alekseevich:
- Commander, grenade.
He hardly took the RGD-5 grenade out of his pouch.
“Light it up,” I say, “I’ll put them down with an efka.” And so they did. The fighters, about ten to fifteen, who were in the courtyard of the motor depot, crawled after us. I will never forget their eyes. For one, such a small and frail boy, horror was mixed with hopelessness. The other, tall and slender, also had fear for his own life in his soul. In general, as they say, people are completely morally and psychologically unprepared for combat operations. And where could it come from if we weren’t prepared for such a war, they didn’t really explain what and why. Then, during short respites between shelling, the first thing that came to mind was that we had been set up again. It was all so offensive and unpleasant.
So, we threw grenades. But it was not possible to go further. The militia fighters, who had settled in the fire boxes, opened fire in unison. I was caught in the shoulder. One of the privates was hit in the head by a bullet, and he remained there forever. I had to crawl around the corner again. Well, I think that's all - we can't get out of here. He sat down on the foundation of the building and leaned against the bullet-scarred wall. The brigade commander sat down next to me, resting his head on my shoulder. He was very weak. Cursing, he said: “If I survive, I’ll tell these bastards everything I think about them...” These were his last words. From around the corner came: “Happy New Year!” Get a gift...” - and... a grenade arrived. Spinning and rustling on the rubble, it rolled up close to us. Explosion! I felt almost nothing - only my neck burned. And the brigade commander dropped his head.
After some time, the remnants of one of the platoons of the third company, led by the brigade artillery chief, Colonel Savchenko, made their way to us.
They brought a Volga with them, into the trunk of which they loaded the body of the dead brigade commander. I stayed with a group of fighters to cover their retreat.
Inside the Volga there were passengers like sardines in a barrel. She slowly moved towards the Printing House. About a hundred meters later I stopped and the tire burst. And then the militants did not allow anyone alive to get out of the car.”
The senior warrant officer fell silent, looked for a long time and motionless through the window of the office at the box of the editorial garage. What was he thinking? What did you remember? Maybe the courtyard of that Grozny motor depot where the life of brigade commander Savin was so absurdly and tragically cut short. Maybe he thanked God that he survived.
“I made my way to the Press House, where the second battalion of the 81st regiment held the defense,” continued Vadim Shibkov, “with several soldiers in the dead of night. And, finding himself among his own people, he felt such wild fatigue that, having found a secluded place, he immediately fell asleep...”
"Black Devils
When it became clear that neither combined detachments nor combined crews could clear Grozny of militants, Defense Minister Grachev issued an order to send marine units to the combat area.
The gatherings of the “black berets” were short-lived. Early in the morning of January 8, 1995, several Anteys landed at a military airfield in Mozdok. They received two air assault battalions from the Northern and Baltic fleets, approximately 700-760 people each. All with standard weapons and dry rations. The guys are tall, as if for selection. Their goal is the center of Grozny - the damn inferno.
By that time, two groups had been created there: “Palace”, which included marines of the Northern Fleet, and “Station” - with “black berets” from the Baltic. Before going into battle, the Marines swore not to leave a single wounded or killed comrade on the battlefield and to create a bloody mess of their enemies.
Oh, how the “black berets” fought! Furiously, not sparing their lives, for which the militia called the Marines “black devils.” Under a hail of bullets, they stormed the presidential palace and other high-rise buildings in the center of Grozny. And if one of the colleagues remained on the battlefield killed or wounded, the guys, under dagger fire, pulled out the bleeding soldier or the already lifeless body of a comrade from under fire.
Colonel Nuzhny
February 5, 1995. Grozny. Command post of the joint group "West". Major General Ivan Ilyich Babichev looks at combat reports from units and subunits for the day. This February morning turned out to be more or less calm. But the commander’s thoughts are interrupted by the report of the operational duty officer: “According to intelligence data, in the area of Minutka Square there is a gang of militants dressed in the uniform of our paratroopers. They all have short hair and have Airborne Forces chevrons on their sleeves. Kill civilians, are looting, recording it all on videotape.”
The general's face turns gray.
“Colonel Necessary to come to me,” he orders.
Colonel Vasily Nuzhny was the head of the operational department of the 21st separate airborne brigade, which was stationed in Stavropol. He fully lived up to his name. In fact, Vasily Dmitrievich was right hand General Babichev and carried out, as a rule, the most complex and responsible tasks. This happened in mid-January, when an assault group under his command seized the building of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the republic. The same difficult task arose today.
The necessary one was a true professional - careful and calculating. The groups that he led on reconnaissance or into battle with Chechen militias returned with virtually no losses. Vasily Dmitrievich gained experience in combat operations in such conditions when “the front is everywhere” in Afghanistan, where he visited twice. For Afghanistan he received three military orders and a medal “For Courage”.
He managed to distinguish himself in this war. For the courage and heroism shown during the storming of the government complex in the center of Grozny, the skillful management of units was nominated for the title of Hero of Russia.
Colonel Nuzhny, taking a platoon of paratroopers, went to the Minutka area. Carefully making their way between the ruins of houses, the paratroopers examined street by street, block by block. Soon, in one of the courtyards of houses adjacent to the square, they saw four short-haired guys in paratrooper uniforms.
The right one raised his hand: “Attention.” The group dispersed and, at a signal from the elder, began to carefully and silently take the “werewolves” into the ring. When they reached the entrance of one of the houses they wanted to enter, the colonel shouted:
- Stop! Hands up!
They carried out the command. And suddenly one of them shouted:
- Allah Akbar!
This was a signal. The bandits fell to the ground and tried to open fire, but did not have time - the paratroopers destroyed all four. However, there were still militants in the house who opened fire. Colonel Nuzhny, dragging several soldiers with him, ran along the house to drop into the last entrance. When the entrance was just a stone's throw away, a grenade thrown from the window suddenly exploded from behind. A shrapnel hit the officer directly in the temple. Death came instantly.
In old thoughts
On January 17, 2000, a group of troops from a special region began destroying gangs in Grozny. The assaulting troops hated the lead-bristled city so much that they nicknamed it the Caucasian Carthage.
Two days later, on January 19, 2000, I had the opportunity to visit this area of Grozny and see with my own eyes what was happening. From the command post of the 205th separate motorized rifle brigade, which was located in a field just outside the village of Katayama, we moved in an infantry fighting vehicle to Starye Promysly, where a reinforced battalion of this brigade was fighting. Having approached the last five-story building on the 8th line, we stopped.
- Where is the battalion commander? - Major Sakun asked the soldiers who were making a fire.
“At the burnt tank,” answered the sergeant with a sooty face.
Between piles of rubble from buildings and fallen trees, it’s not only easy to drive, but also to run when you’re wearing a pound of armored armor, oh, how difficult it is.
Near the burnt tank, in a “gazebo” built from two soft kitchen corners covered with a raincoat tent, several soldiers were warming themselves by the “potbelly stove.” One of them, seeing us, stood up and walked towards us.
“Timeman,” Major Sakun asked him, “where is the battalion commander?”
“He’s resting,” he answered. - He just returned from the 6th line. There was a battle there all night. Don't wake him up, let him sleep for half an hour.
Timerman appears to be about twenty-two years old. On her head is a black knitted cap. “Packed” in “unloading” - special motorized rifle uniform. Taking a closer look at him, I noticed lieutenant stars on the shoulder straps of his field jacket.
- So you are an officer? - I ask.
“That’s right,” he answers. - Commander of the first company.
Konstantin is still very young, but he behaves sedately, speaks leisurely, as if weighing every word.
I just graduated from the Novosibirsk Military Institute. By assignment he ended up in the North Caucasian Military District, in the 205th separate motorized rifle brigade. He received his baptism of fire in August 1999 in Botlikh. Then there were Karamakhi.
“Comrade Lieutenant,” the soldier who ran up turned to Timerman. - The tractor pulled in the damaged head. Where should she go?
- Leave it here, by the burnt tank. Then we’ll take the brigade to the checkpoint.
War has its own slang. “Beshka” - infantry fighting vehicle, “bronic” - body armor, “front” - front line, “army men” - army units, “inners” - units of the Internal Troops, “darlings” - militants...
...A lean officer in a camouflage field jacket approached.
“Lieutenant Colonel Ignatenko,” he introduced himself, shaking hands. - Sorry, we're running out of time - there's no time to talk. Snipers became active on the left flank. Now we’ll work on them, and in an hour you’re welcome to the “front” - we’ll talk.
That's where we parted.
“Maskhadov’s house is nearby,” said Major Sakun. And he suggested: “Would you like to take a look?”
- With pleasure...
The area was clearly visible and under fire, so we placed an infantry fighting vehicle near a neighboring house.
Having jumped off the armor, we noticed a suspicious movement behind the gate of our cover. The soldiers immediately took their weapons at the ready. And at that same second a faint female cry reached us from the yard:
- Do not shoot! We are Russians... Behind the gate is a not quite elderly, but extremely emaciated woman.
“We’ve been living here in a damp basement for more than a month.” And we are afraid not so much of your bullets and shells as of the revenge of the militants. “They hate Russians fiercely,” Galina Nikolaevna said, barely holding back tears. - Last week, on a nearby street, bandits massacred a Russian family, now it’s probably our turn...
Another inhabitant of the basement entered the conversation - Baba Shura, a dry but rather nimble old lady.
“Son,” she turned to Major Sakun, “yesterday on the next street, their sniper shot your soldier.” Today he is already without a head. Take him away from here for Christ's sake, bury the poor thing.
At the officer’s command, several fighters, grabbing a soldier’s blanket from the BMP, bent down and ran along the brick fence of Maskhadov’s house to the neighboring street - to the place indicated by the old woman. And soon the headless body of a Russian soldier lay in front of us.
I couldn’t help but think that some narrow-minded “darling” had already put his “prey” on a stake and was running around with it, boasting of his prowess in front of thugs just like him...
The old women took us to the basement - their fortress-abode. Two elderly men were lying on boards covered with blankets. The flickering candlelight snatched their unshaven, haggard faces from the darkness.
One of them, Vladimir Nikolaevich Dubasov, an asthmatic, was seriously ill. Until 1993, his family lived in the center of Grozny, on Minutka Square. One day, national guardsmen showed up and demanded to vacate the apartment: “Now a field commander will live here. For refusal to vacate housing - execution." I had to urgently move to relatives in Starye Promysly.
Another inhabitant of the basement, Anatoly Dmitrievich Sagalov, was the director of a high school until 1991. His wife, Galina Nikolaevna, worked there as a teacher of Russian language and literature. When the school was closed, she began giving private lessons to Maskhadov’s daughter, Fatima, and they lived on the money from these lessons...
These are the stories, everyday ones. When I parted with these people, I promised that I would try to rescue them from this hell. And he kept his word. Looking ahead, I will say that now the Dubasov and Sagalov families live with their relatives in the Rostov region. And Baba Shura, at her own peril and risk, remained to live out her life in Grozny - she had nowhere to go.
Unfortunately, I could do nothing to help either Baba Shura or other Russian old men and women living in Grozny. Seeing how they embarrassedly beg a crust of bread from our fighters, how they cook food in rainwater, noticing anxiety and fear in their eyes, red from insomnia and tears, I felt hatred boiling in my soul for those who made these innocent people suffer. Who gave the right to the servants of the “new” order in Chechnya to mock people like that? Where do these vaunted Caucasian horsemen have men's honor and respect for their elders, no matter what their nationality and religion?!
Colonel Grudnov
While working on this part of the book, I naturally could not help but notice the “negativity” both in the statements of army officers and in operational reports regarding the actions of units of the Internal Troops of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs during the fighting in Grozny. One couldn’t help but get a painful impression: no matter which way you look at the “internals,” there are only holes where they are. But, you must admit, not all of them are incompetent or cowards? I knew that many commanders and soldiers of operational units, acting as part of assault detachments, did not hesitate to perform feats and therefore were deservedly awarded the title Hero of Russia, the medal “For Courage” and the Order of Courage.
I met one of them, Hero of Russia Colonel Igor Sergeevich Grudnov, in Pyatigorsk, where he commanded the operational division of the Internal Troops, and during the assault on the capital of Chechnya in January 2000, he led the “North” group of federal troops.
“During the operation to liberate Grozny,” Igor Sergeevich told me, “we all, both the army and our units, carried out one task - to destroy the militants entrenched in the city.
The battle in the center of Grozny on January 5, 2000 is especially memorable for Colonel Grudnov. Here's what Igor Sergeevich said about him:
- In the area of the motor vehicle fleet, we were confronted by a large group of Wahhabis - approximately 100-150 people. They were commanded by Shamil Basayev. Having blocked this object, I began to think about how to take possession of it with the least amount of bloodshed. The day before, two special carbines were delivered to me by helicopter from Mozdok, the ammunition for which was equipped with the Cheryomukha-1 special weapon. And so two soldiers began to carefully fire tear gas cartridges from them at each trench of the high-rise building. The Wahhabis thought that we had used an unknown chemical agent (fear has big eyes), and left this object without a fight.
During the assault on Grozny, there were moments when Colonel Grudnov, being on the roof of the building, controlled the fire of his artillery for 10-12 hours. He hid his subordinates behind embrasures so that they would mercilessly attack the militants with machine guns and machine guns, while he himself used the radio to adjust the fire of his group’s artillery and mortar batteries under the bandits’ bullets. Is it not this responsibility to the Motherland that lies the strength of the Russian soldier, who in critical moments of battle thinks not about himself - about military duty? And isn’t this responsibility the basis of the Russian people’s hatred of any enemy who has encroached on the integrity or independence of his country?
I ask Grudnov:
- What is the most dangerous thing for a fighter in a combat situation?
- Relax. And especially after 12 at night, when a soldier, exhausted from daytime battles, literally sleeps on the move and can die from a stray bullet. I remember after the next battle, when the fog descended over the city, I leaned against the wall of the house: my eyes were drooping with fatigue. And suddenly I saw: a tracer was ricocheting right at me. What saved me was my immediate reaction - in the past I was involved in boxing. He made an evasive move and the bullet hit the wall.
In war there is an unwritten rule - do not abandon your people in trouble: die yourself, but help your comrade. On January 3, 2000, Colonel Grudnov’s subordinates seized a brick factory. After some time, it was not the lieutenant, the group commander, who spoke to Igor Sergeevich over the radio station, but a senior sergeant named Volodya; unfortunately, Grudnov does not remember the last name of the junior commander. The senior sergeant reported:
- There are four of us left, ten people are wounded. Let's hold on as best we can. We are scared - we have never seen anything like this before. Five militants were wounded. Suddenly another fifteen or twenty people appear from behind the cover - everyone laughs, takes the wounded and runs away. They are either drug addicts or crazy - we shoot, throw grenades at them, and at least they run and laugh. They killed the sniper - she also laughed.
“Son,” Grudnov told him, “if I send you reinforcements, will you hold out?”
“Comrade Colonel,” answered the senior sergeant, “as you say, so it will be.” But know this: we will all be killed here before the morning.
“Son,” Grudnov told him, “stay in touch - I’m sending you a tank.” - On the Kenwood radio station he conveyed to the riot police:
- “55th” - “Sever-1”.
“I’m listening,” the riot policeman answered.
After checking communication with the tank, Grudnov contacted the senior sergeant:
- "Okat-11" - "Severu-I".
When he answered, Grudnov said:
- The tank is coming. Watch where to point the gun.
- Right, right...
When the cannon was aimed at the target, Grudnov commanded:
- Fire!
Thus, the commander of the “North” group, Colonel Igor Grudnov, driving a tank through a riot policeman, destroyed the “spirits” who were trying to drive a handful of our soldiers out of the brick factory. A unique case, isn't it?
Two in one war
March 2000. Chechnya. Authors. A heavily built major general entered the tent where the command post of the Eastern Group was located. The commander of the group, Lieutenant General Sergei Makarov, took his eyes off the map on which he was assigning combat missions to the commanders of units providing a tactical airborne landing on a mountain ridge near the settlement of Elistanzhi.
“Hello, Nikolai Semenovich,” Makarov hugged him tightly, “we haven’t seen each other for a long time.”
General Kalabukhov said that he would like to see his son, who is in one of the units of the group.
Over the phone, the commander clarified where in this moment there was a tank company commanded by Captain Dmitry Kalabukhov, and, turning to Kalabukhov Sr., he threw up his hands with regret:
- Nikolai Semenovich, we are a little late - the convoy is already moving towards Khankala for loading, so you will see your son only tomorrow.
...During the current Chechen campaign, General Kalabukhov was most directly involved in the operation to liberate Grozny. In general, in 36 calendar years of service, this was his fifth war. For 5.5 years he was continuously in combat conditions. For his son, Dmitry, this was the first “hot spot”. On the eve of the anti-terrorist operation, several parents of officers who were sent to the combat area approached General Kalabukhov. Everyone had one request:
- Help free your son from participating in the war.
“My heart sank,” Nikolai Semenovich later recalled. “I brought my son to them and said: “Here is my son.” He goes to war not as a cook, not as a waiter, but as the commander of a tank company. I'm going too. We will fight in different directions..."
Kalabukhov Sr. was born in Siberia, in the village of Narym, in the Tomsk region. Parents were workers. And he received labor training from childhood. After graduating from the Omsk Tank Technical School, he ended up in Czechoslovakia - in the midst of the events of 1968.
In 1974 he graduated from the Military Academy of Armored Forces - and again went to war. This time - Afghan. Then there was the Ossetian-Ingush conflict, the first and second Chechen campaigns. During the anti-terrorist operation, General Kalabukhov was the deputy commander of the group of troops of the special region of the city of Grozny for weapons.
“The peculiarity of this operation was,” recalls Nikolai Semenovich, “that Grozny had to be liberated with the least losses. The operation itself was not like the operations to liberate other settlements, when the command reached an agreement with the elders who did not allow militants into the villages.”
In Grozny everything is different. It was a fortified city. Powerful fortified areas are equipped along the entire outer perimeter. To take them, you need to thoroughly process them with artillery and aviation.
General Kalabukhov’s task was to ensure that ammunition was supplied to the troops on time and in the required quantity. Unfortunately, the existing organizational structure made it difficult to complete the task. Why? Because supply transport belongs to the rear, and, naturally, there are not enough cars.
“The difficulty was precisely in the allocation of transport,” says General Kalabukhov. “And then we decided to take a different route - we began transporting ammunition by wagons. The railway troops provided us with this supply.”
The second difficulty, according to Kalabukhov, was that the main ammunition is a 152-mm howitzer shell with a reduced charge. By this time, not a single such shell remained in the North Caucasus Military District. He had to be brought from everywhere. “And in order not to disrupt the operation,” says Nikolai Semenovich, “by hook or by crook we began to accumulate a small reserve so that right time use it."
The head of the operation, Lieutenant General Vladimir Bulgakov, constantly demanded that this issue be kept under control. The tasks of the artillery were enormous, and therefore the needs were the same.
In addition, our structure also needed to provide the Internal Troops, police and militias with shells. Therefore, sometimes all sorts of inconsistencies arose - the departments were different. But we tried to resolve them quickly. In particular, we combined our weapons headquarters with the weapons headquarters of the Internal Troops units operating in Grozny. In turn, they helped the police. As a result, during the 20 days of the operation there was not a single interruption in the supply of ammunition, although, I repeat, there were enough difficulties.
...Captain Dmitry Kalabukhov fought as part of the Eastern Group of Federal Forces. His company was assigned to the 247th Parachute Regiment. For his skillful leadership of tank crews he was presented with the Order of Courage. Father and son learned about each other mainly from letters sent by their wife or mother. Only after eight long months they met in Khankala.
"Polar bears" in the Vedeno Gorge
Soon after Grozny was liberated from the militants, Shamil Basayev said: they say, we will give the main battle to the federals in the mountains - just let them go to the Vedeno Gorge. In this direction, as part of the Eastern group, fighters of a separate airborne assault battalion of the Northern Fleet Marines, who were called “polar bears” in Chechnya, fought with Chechen gangs. They were commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Anatoly Beleseko, a strong Russian man with a weather-beaten face and kind eyes.
I first met him in October 1999 on the left bank of the Terek in the Shelkovsky district of Chechnya. The commander of the group, General Gennady Nikolaevich Troshev, took with him a group of journalists, which included me. Having visited the paratroopers, Gennady Nikolaevich suggested to us:
- Would you like to work for the Marines?
“Who would refuse such pleasure,” we joked.
...The command and observation post of the Marines is in an abandoned garden. We are heading to the armored personnel carriers, which should take us to the bank of the Terek. Withered leaves crunch underfoot, awakening warm memories from childhood in my soul: a long time ago, in the distant southern Ural city of Orsk, I walked to school through a park in which there were many, many fallen leaves crunching under my feet. This fabulous rustle of yellow foliage tuned the soul to major scale: oh, how I didn’t want to go to school, answer assigned lessons - I could stand in this park for hours, admiring the creations of nature...
A machine gun burst from the left instantly brought me to my senses. A short, smiling general approached - in a field jacket, a black beret and with a machine gun in his hands.
“General Otrakovsky,” he introduced himself. - Well, are we going?
Otrakovsky sat down on the armor, lowered his legs into the commander’s hatch, and pulled the bolt of the machine gun. I positioned myself behind him.
“We’ll pass the village of Paroboch,” said Alexander Ivanovich, “and we’ll be there.”
The village we moved into seems to have died out - only here and there residents rarely appear in the courtyards. Adults glance warily in our direction, but children, both dark-haired and fair-haired, greet us with waves of their thin hands.
“This is a mixed village,” says Otrakovsky, “not only Chechens live in it, but also several Russian families.
- How are your subordinates in the mood?
“You know, I just don’t recognize the sailors,” says the battalion commander. - During the counter-terrorism operation, they noticeably matured and matured. In the fall, about 150 people from the battalion were supposed to leave. To date, about a hundred of them have signed an agreement for contract service.
- What is this high moral spirit based on?
- Based on the traditions of the Marine Corps, the “black berets” have always been famous for their high fighting spirit.
I looked at the Terek again: at this point its bed curved around a dense forest on the opposite bank.
“We are constantly being watched on the other side,” the battalion commander caught my eye. - This silence is deceptive.
And as if in confirmation, a machine gun rattled restlessly on the right flank of the battalion. Queue, second...
General Otrakovsky looked questioningly at the battalion commander, who was already heading to the signalman on duty. A few seconds later, Lieutenant Colonel Beleseko reported something to the general.
Approaching us, he said:
- It's time to go - a group of militants was discovered on the right bank. Let's not interfere with the battalion commander organizing the battle...
...At the end of December 1999, the “polar bears” received the task of blocking the Vedenskoye Gorge. Leaving Alleroy, the “black berets” moved towards the village of Andi. The route was extremely difficult - serpentine, narrow snow-covered roads; to expand them, it was necessary to cut down the aufeis on the rocky ledges. These mountains became for them the “Caucasian Alps”, which the Marines courageously overcame, reached the indicated place on time and firmly closed the Vedenskoye Gorge.
And then the “black berets” blocked Kharachoy, Benoy, Serzhen-Yurt, Tsa-Vedeno and, finally, Vedeno - the family nest of the Basayev brothers. What kind of resistance is there - empty threats! When the militants learned that “polar bears” were acting against them, they left their prepared positions and avoided direct confrontation with the marines.
It was on the first day of spring 2000 that paratroopers of the 6th company under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Mark Evtyukhin entered into an unequal battle with Khattab’s militants near Ulus-Kert. They prevented the breakthrough of 2.5 thousand members of illegal gangs, destroying 700 of them. Of the 90 fighters, 84 died. For their courage, 22 military personnel were awarded the title of Hero of Russia, 69 soldiers and officers were awarded the Order of Courage, 63 of them posthumously.
Almost all the officers died in the first minutes of the battle. Trained snipers worked at the paratroopers' positions. Later it would become known that Khattab brought the best mercenaries, among whom were many Arabs, to the Argun Gorge.
They walked without even shooting. In the last attack - at full height. Later, strong drugs would be found at the heights, which were injected into themselves by militants twenty times superior to the paratroopers. But the sixth one still fought.
Paratroopers of the 6th company in the Argun Gorge Battle at height 776. Feat of the 6th airborne company.
Before the fight
February 2000. Federal troops are blocking a large group of Khattab militants in the Argun Gorge. According to intelligence data, the bandits number from one and a half to two thousand people. The militants hoped to break out of the gorge, reach Vedeno and hide in Dagestan. The road to the plain lies through height 776.
On February 28, the commander of the 104th regiment, Colonel Sergei Melentyev, ordered the commander of the 6th company, Major Sergei Molodov, to occupy the dominant heights of Isty-Kord. Note that the 104th Parachute Regiment arrived in Chechnya 10 days before the battle at height 776, and the regiment was consolidated, and it was staffed on the spot at the expense of the 76th Airborne Division. Major Sergei Molodov was appointed commander of the 6th company, but in 10 days he did not and could not have time to get to know the soldiers, much less create a combat-ready formation from the 6th company. Nevertheless, on February 28, the 6th company set out on a 14-kilometer forced march and occupied height 776, and 12 scouts were sent to Mount Isty-Kord, located 4.5 kilometers away.
Progress of the battle
February 29, 2000
At 12:30 on February 29, reconnaissance of the 6th company came across militants, and a battle began with a group of about 20 militants. During the battle, the scouts were forced to retreat to Hill 776, where the 6th company entered the battle. In the very first minutes of the battle, commander Sergei Molodov was killed, and the position of the paratroopers from the very beginning began to look hopeless: they did not have time to dig in, there was thick fog at the height.
After the death of Molodov, battalion commander Mark Evtyukhin took over command, asking for reinforcements and air support. But his requests for help went unheard. Only the regimental artillery provided assistance to the 6th company, but due to the fact that there was no artillery spotter among the paratroopers, the shells often fell inaccurately.
The most paradoxical thing is that the outskirts of Argun were literally filled with army units. Moreover, units of federal forces located on neighboring heights were eager to come to the aid of the dying 6th company, but they were forbidden to do so.
By the end of the day, the 6th company lost 31 people killed (33% of the total number of personnel).
Fortunately, among the officers of Yeltsin’s rotten army there were still honest and decent people who could not stand by and watch the militants destroy their comrades. 15 soldiers of the 3rd platoon of the 4th company, led by Major Alexander Dostavalov, were able to make their way to the 6th company in just 40 minutes and, under heavy fire from the militants, connect with Evtyukhin. 120 paratroopers under the command of the chief of reconnaissance of the 104th regiment, Sergei Baran, also voluntarily withdrew from their positions, crossed the Abazulgol River and moved to help Evtyukhin, but they were stopped by a categorical order from the command to immediately return to their positions. The commander of the marine group of the northern fleet, Major General Otrakovsky, repeatedly asked for permission to come to the aid of the paratroopers, but never received it. On March 6, because of these experiences, General Otrakovsky’s heart stopped. Another casualty of the battle at height 776...
March 1, 2000
At 3 o'clock in the morning, a group of soldiers led by Major Alexander Vasilyevich Dostavalov (15 people) was able to break through to the encircled people, who, having violated the order, left the defensive lines of the 4th company at a nearby height and came to the rescue. During the battle, all paratroopers of the 3rd platoon of the 4th company were killed. Alexander Dostavalov was repeatedly wounded, but continued to lead the fighters. Another wound turned out to be fatal.
At 6:11 the connection with Evtyukhin was interrupted. According to the official version, he called artillery fire on himself, but, as witnesses of those events say, the last thing the battalion commander said before his death were the words:
you are goats, you betrayed us, bitches!
After which he fell silent forever, and Hill 776 was occupied by militants who slowly finished off the wounded paratroopers and mocked the body of Mark Evtyukhin for a long time. Moreover, all this was filmed and posted on the Internet.
After the battle at height 776 The soldiers of the 1st company of the 1st battalion sought to rescue their comrades. However, while crossing the Abazulgol River, they were ambushed and were forced to gain a foothold on the bank. Only on the morning of March 3 did the 1st company manage to break through to the positions of the 6th company
After the battle at height 776
Paratrooper losses
84 soldiers of the 6th and 4th companies, including 13 officers, were killed in the battle.
Dead paratroopers at height 776 Militant losses
According to federal forces, militant losses amounted to 400 or 500 people.
The militants claim the loss of up to 20 people.
Surviving paratroopers
After the death of Dostavalov, only one officer remained alive - Lieutenant Dmitry Kozhemyakin. He ordered senior guard sergeant Alexander Suponinsky to crawl to the cliff and jump, and he himself picked up a machine gun to cover the soldier.
Kozhemyakin’s both legs were broken, and he threw cartridges at us with his hands. The militants came close to us, there were about three meters left, and Kozhemyakin ordered us: leave, jump down.
- Andrey Porshev recalls.
Following the officer's order, Suponinsky and Andrei Porshnev crawled to the cliff and jumped, and by the middle of the next day they reached the location Russian troops. Sergei Kozhemyakin himself, while covering the soldier, was mortally wounded and died. Alexander Suponinsky, the only one of the six survivors, was awarded the Gold Star of the Hero of Russia.
I would return everything so that all the guys would remain alive.
- Alexander Suponensky later said.
Guard Private Timoshenko was also wounded. The militants searched for him following a trail of blood, but the soldier was able to hide under the rubble of trees.
Privates Roman Khristolubov and Alexey Komarov were in the third platoon, which did not reach the height and died on the slope. They did not participate in the battle at height.
Private Evgeniy Vladykin was left alone without ammunition; in the battle he was hit on the head with a rifle butt and lost consciousness. When I woke up, I was able to get to my people.
Only 6 fighters survived.
Also, as a result of the ensuing battle, two GRU officers, Alexei Galkin and Vladimir Pakhomov, who were being escorted by militants near Ulus-Kert at that time, managed to escape from captivity. Subsequently, Alexei Galkin was awarded the title of Hero of Russia, and his image was used as the prototype for the main character of the film “Personal Number”
For their feat, the paratroopers of the 6th company were awarded the title of Hero of Russia (21 of them posthumously), 68 soldiers and officers of the company were awarded the Order of Courage (63 of them posthumously)
Betrayal?
Such a massive death of paratroopers who entered into battle with a significantly superior detachment of Chechen militants raises a lot of questions. The main ones are why something like this could happen and, no less important, did the command remain unpunished?
Almost die in in full force the company could not simply by definition. The command could have come to her aid more than a dozen times during the day, but this was not done. Why come to the rescue! The command could do nothing at all: it was enough to simply not interfere with those units that arbitrarily decided to help the Pskov paratroopers. But even this did not happen.
While the 6th company died heroically at height 776, someone purposefully blocked all attempts to save the paratroopers
There are suggestions that the militants’ passage from the Argun Gorge to Dagestan was purchased from high-ranking federal leaders. “All police checkpoints were removed from the only road leading to Dagestan,” while “the airborne group had information about the militants at the level of rumors.” The price for the retreat corridor was also mentioned - half a million dollars. A similar amount (17 million rubles) was mentioned by the former commander of the 104th Guards Parachute Regiment, Colonel S. Yu. Melentyev:
Don’t believe anything they say about the Chechen war in the official media... They traded 17 million for 84 lives
According to Vladimir Vorobyov, the father of the deceased senior lieutenant Alexei Vorobyov, “Regimental Commander Melentyev asked for permission to withdraw the company, but the commander of the Eastern Group, General Makarov, did not give permission to retreat.” It is clarified that Melentyev 6 times (according to the testimony of people who personally knew him) asked permission to withdraw the company immediately after the start of the battle, but without receiving permission, he obeyed the order.
Military observer Vladimir Svartsevich argued that “there was no heroism, an outright betrayal of the guys by specific persons of our command”:
Contrary to the counterintelligence ban, we managed to talk to a witness to the death of the guys - a boy who was sent by battalion commander Mark Evtyukhin, who died in that battle, to tell the truth. The material was written overnight; I compiled a complete chronicle of what was happening, hourly and minute by minute. And for the first time he named the real number of deaths in one battle. Everything was true. But the pathetic words that Mark Evtyukhin allegedly said on the radio - “I’m calling fire on myself” - were not true. In fact he said:
You assholes, you betrayed us, bitches!
The successful raid by Dostavalov’s platoon clearly refutes all the claims of the Russian command about the impossibility of getting through to the dying 6th company.
Officials initially did not want to talk openly about the story of the death of the 6th branch of Pskov paratroopers - journalists were the first to talk about what happened at Hill 766, and only after that the military broke the many-day silence.
Video
Report from the RTR TV channel in 2000. Feat of the Pskov Paratroopers of the 6th company of the Airborne Forces 104 RAP
Documentary film about the feat of the 6th Airborne Company. Chechnya battle near Ulus-Kert Argun Gorge
On August 31, 1996, the Khasavyurt Agreements were signed, ending the First Chechen war. Journalist Olesya Emelyanova found participants in the First Chechen Campaign and talked with them about the war, their life after the war, Akhmat Kadyrov and much more.
Dmitry Belousov, St. Petersburg, senior warrant officer of the riot police
In Chechnya there was always a feeling: “What am I doing here? Why is all this needed?”, but there was no other work in the 90s. My first wife told me after my first business trip: “It’s either me or the war.” Where will I go? We tried to stay on business trips, at least we paid our salaries on time - 314 thousand. There were benefits, “combat” pay - it was pennies, I don’t remember exactly how much. And they gave me a bottle of vodka, without it I felt nauseous, in such situations it doesn’t make you drunk, but it helped me cope with stress. I fought for wages. We have a family at home, we had to feed them something. I didn’t know any background to the conflict, I didn’t read anything.
Young conscripts had to be slowly soldered off with alcohol. They are just after training, for them it is easier to die than to fight. Their eyes run wide, their heads are pulled out, they don’t understand anything. They see the blood, they see the dead - they cannot sleep.
Murder is unnatural for a person, although he gets used to everything. When the head doesn’t think, the body does everything on autopilot. It was not as scary to fight with the Chechens as with the Arab mercenaries. They are much more dangerous, they know how to fight very well.
We were prepared for the assault on Grozny for about a week. We - 80 riot police - were supposed to storm the village of Katayama. Later we learned that there were 240 militants there. Our tasks included reconnaissance in force, and then the internal troops were supposed to replace us. But nothing worked out. Ours also hit us. There was no connection. We have our own police radio, the tankers have their own wave, and the helicopter pilots have their own. We are passing the line, the artillery is hitting, the aviation is hitting. The Chechens were scared and thought they were some kind of fools. According to rumors, the Novosibirsk riot police were initially supposed to storm Katayama, but their commander refused. That's why they sent us from reserve to the assault.
I had friends among Chechens in opposition areas. In Shali, for example, in Urus-Martan.
After the fighting, some people drank themselves to death, others ended up in a mental hospital - some were taken straight from Chechnya to a psychiatric hospital. There was no adaptation. The wife left immediately. I can't remember anything good. Sometimes it seems that it is better to erase all this from memory in order to live on and move forward. And sometimes you want to speak out.
There seem to be benefits, but everything is only on paper. There are no levers on how to get them. I still live in the city, it’s easier for me, but for rural residents it’s completely impossible. There are arms and legs - and that’s good. The main trouble is that you rely on the state, which promises you everything, and then it turns out that no one needs you. I felt like a hero and received the Order of Courage. It was my pride. Now I look at everything differently.
If they offered to go and fight now, I would probably go. It's easier there. There is an enemy and there is a friend, black and white - you stop seeing the shades. And in peaceful life you have to twist and bend. It's tiring. When Ukraine began, I wanted to go, but my current wife dissuaded me.
Vladimir Bykov, Moscow, infantry sergeant
When I came to Chechnya, I was 20 years old. It was a conscious choice; I applied to the military registration and enlistment office and left as a contract soldier in May 1996. Before that, I studied at a military school for two years, and at school I studied bullet shooting.
In Mozdok we were loaded into a Mi-26 helicopter. It felt like you were seeing footage from an American movie. When we arrived in Khankala, the soldiers who had already served for some time offered me a drink. They gave me a glass of water. I took a sip, and my first thought was: “Where should I throw this out?” The taste of “war water” with bleach and pantocides is a kind of point of no return and the understanding that there is no turning back.
I didn’t and don’t feel like a hero. To become a hero in war, you must either die, commit an act that becomes public knowledge, or be close to the commander. And commanders, as a rule, are far away.
My goal in the war was minimal losses. I didn’t fight for the Reds or the Whites, I fought for my guys. In war, a reassessment of values occurs; you begin to look at life differently.
The feeling of fear begins to disappear after about a month, and this is very bad; indifference to everything appears. Each of them came out differently. Some smoked, some drank. I wrote letters. He described the mountains, the weather, the local people and their customs. Then he tore up these letters. It was still not possible to send.
It was psychologically difficult, because it is often not clear whether you are a friend or an enemy. It seems that during the day a person calmly goes to work, and at night he goes out with a machine gun and fires at checkpoints. During the day you are on normal terms with him, and in the evening he shoots at you.
For ourselves, we divided the Chechens into lowland and mountainous. Lowlanders are more intelligent people, more integrated into our society. But those living in the mountains have a completely different mentality; a woman is nothing to them. If you ask a lady for documents for verification, this may be perceived as a personal insult to her husband. We came across women from mountain villages who didn’t even have passports.
One day, at a checkpoint at the intersection with Serzhen-Yurt, we stopped a car. A man came out with a yellow ID card in English and Arabic. It turned out to be Mufti Akhmat Kadyrov. We talked quite peacefully about everyday topics. He asked if there was anything he could do to help. At that time we had difficulties with food; there was no bread. Then he brought us two trays of loaves of bread to the checkpoint. They wanted to give him money, but he didn’t take it.
I think that we could end the war in such a way that there would not be a second Chechen one. It was necessary to go to the end, and not conclude a peace agreement on shameful terms. Many soldiers and officers then felt that the state had betrayed them.
When I returned home, I threw myself into my studies. I studied at one institute, at the same time in another, and also worked to keep my brain occupied. Then he defended his Ph.D. dissertation.
When I was a student, I was sent to a course in psychosocial support for survivors of hot spots, organized by a Dutch university. I then thought that Holland had not fought with anyone recently. But they answered me that Holland took part in the Indonesian war in the late 40s - as many as two thousand people. I suggested showing them a videotape from Chechnya as educational material. But their psychologists turned out to be morally unprepared and asked not to show the recording to the audience.
Andrey Amosov, St. Petersburg, SOBR major
I knew that I would be an officer from the third or fourth grade. My dad is a policeman, now retired, my grandfather is an officer, my brother is also an officer, my great-grandfather died in Finnish war. At the genetic level, this bore fruit. At school I went in for sports, then I was in the army, a special forces group. I have always had a desire to give back to my homeland, and when I was offered to join a special rapid response unit, I agreed. There was no doubt whether to go or not, I took the oath. During my military service I was in Ingushetia, it was clear to me what kind of mentality awaited me. I understood where I was going.
When you go to SOBR, it’s stupid not to think that you could lose your life. But my choice was conscious. I am ready to give my life for my homeland and for my friends. What doubts are there? Politics should be handled by politicians, and military structures should carry out orders. I believe that the introduction of troops into Chechnya both under Yeltsin and under Putin was correct, so that the radical theme would not spread further on Russian territory.
For me, the Chechens have never been enemies. My first friend at the technical school was a Chechen, his name was Khamzat. In Chechnya we gave them rice and buckwheat, in our country good food it was, but they needed it.
We worked on the leaders of gangs. We captured one of them in battle at four o'clock in the morning and destroyed it. For this I received a medal “For Courage”.
On special missions we acted coherently, as a single team. The tasks were set different, sometimes difficult to achieve. And these are not only combat missions. It was necessary to survive in the mountains, to freeze, to take turns sleeping near the stove and to warm each other with hugs when there was no firewood. All boys are heroes to me. The team helped overcome fear when the militants were 50 meters away and shouted “Surrender!” When I remember Chechnya, I more imagine the faces of my friends, how we joked, our unity. The humor was specific, on the verge of sarcasm. I think I underestimated this before.
It was easier for us to adapt because we worked in the same department and went on business trips together. Time passed, and we ourselves expressed a desire to go to the North Caucasus again. The physical factor worked. The feeling of fear that adrenaline gives had a strong influence. I regarded combat missions as both duty and relaxation.
It would be interesting to look at modern Grozny. When I saw it, it looked like Stalingrad. Nowadays I periodically dream about the war and have disturbing dreams.
Alexander Podskrebaev, Moscow, GRU special forces sergeant
I came to Chechnya in 1996. We didn’t have a single conscript, only officers and contract soldiers. I went because adults should defend the Motherland, not young puppies. In our battalion we had no travel allowances, only combat allowances; we received $100 a month. I didn’t go for money, but to fight for my country. “If the homeland is in danger, then everyone should go to the front,” Vysotsky also sang.
The war in Chechnya did not appear out of the blue; it was Yeltsin’s fault. He himself armed Dudayev - when our units were withdrawn from there, all the warehouses of the North Caucasus Military District were left to him. I talked to ordinary Chechens; they saw this war in their graves. They lived normally, everyone was satisfied with life. It was not the Chechens who started the war and not Dudayev, but Yeltsin. One complete setup.
The Chechens fought, some for money, some for their homeland. They had their own truth. I didn't have the feeling that they were completely evil. But there is no truth in war.
In war you are obliged to follow orders, there’s no escape, even criminal orders. Afterwards you have the right to appeal them, but first you must comply. And we carried out criminal orders. That's when, for example, they brought the Maikop brigade into Grozny under New Year. The scouts knew that this could not be done, but the order was from above. How many boys were driven to their deaths? This was betrayal in its purest form.
Take, for example, the cash-in-transit KamAZ with money, which was standing near the headquarters of the 205th brigade when the Khasavyurt agreements were signed. Bearded guys came and loaded bags of money. The FSB allegedly gave money to the militants for the restoration of Chechnya. But we didn’t pay wages, but Yeltsin gave us Zippo lighters.
For me, the real heroes are Budanov and Shamanov. My chief of staff is a hero. While in Chechnya, he managed to write a scientific paper about the rupture of an artillery barrel. This is a person through whom the power of Russian weapons will become stronger. The Chechens also had heroism. They were characterized by both fearlessness and self-sacrifice. They defended their land, they were told that they were attacked.
I believe that the occurrence of PTSD greatly depends on the attitude of society. If they constantly say to your face, “You’re a murderer!”, this can traumatize someone. There were no syndromes during the Great Patriotic War, because the homeland of the heroes greeted us.
We need to talk about the war from a certain angle so that people don’t do stupid things. There will still be peace, only part of the people will be killed. And not the worst part. This makes no sense.
Alexander Chernov, Moscow, retired colonel, internal troops
In Chechnya, I worked as the head of a computer center. We left on July 25, 1995. There were four of us traveling: me as the head of the computer center and three of my employees. We arrived in Mozdok and got off the plane. The first impression is wild heat. We were taken by helicopter to Khankala. By tradition, in all hot spots the first day is a non-working day. I brought with me two liter bottles of White Eagle vodka and two loaves of Finnish sausage. The men put out Kizlyar cognac and sturgeon.
The internal troops camp in Khankala was a quadrangle surrounded by barbed wire. At the entrance there was a rail in case of artillery attacks to raise the alarm. The four of us lived in a trailer. It was quite convenient, we even had a refrigerator. The freezer was filled with bottles of water because the heat was unbearable.
Our computer center was engaged in collecting and processing all information, primarily operational information. Previously, all information was transmitted via ZAS (classified communication equipment). And six months before Chechnya, we got a device called RAMS - I don’t know how it stands for. This device made it possible to connect a computer with the ZAS, and we could transmit secret information to Moscow. Besides internal work like all kinds of information, twice a day - at 6 am and 12 am - we transmitted operational reports to Moscow. Despite the fact that the volume of files was small, the connection was sometimes poor, and the process took a long time.
We had a video camera and filmed everything. The most important filming is the negotiations of Romanov (Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of Russia, Commander of the Internal Troops Anatoly Romanov) with Maskhadov (one of the separatist leaders Aslan Maskhadov). There were two operators at the negotiations: from their side and from ours. The secretaries took the tape from us, and it future fate I don't know. Or, for example, a new howitzer appeared. Romanov told us: “Go and film how it works.” Our cameraman also filmed the story of how the heads of three foreign journalists were found. We sent the film to Moscow, they processed it there and showed the story on television.
May 1996, airfield of the military base in Khankala
The war was very unprepared. Drunk Grachev and Yegorov sent tankers to Grozny on New Year’s Eve, and they were all burned there. Sending tanks to the city is not entirely the right decision. And the personnel were not prepared. It got to the point that the Marines were removed from Far East and they threw it there. People need to be trained, but here the boys were almost straight out of training and thrown into battle. The losses could have been avoided; in the second campaign there were an order of magnitude fewer of them. The truce provided a short respite.
I am sure that the first Chechen war could have been avoided. I believe that the main culprits of this war are Yeltsin, Grachev and Yegorov, they unleashed it. If Yeltsin had appointed Dudayev deputy minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and entrusted him with the North Caucasus, he would have restored order there. The civilian population suffered from the militants. But when we bombed their villages, they rose up against us. Intelligence during the first Chechen war worked very poorly. There were no agents, they lost all the agents. Whether there were militants in the destroyed villages or not, it is impossible to say for sure.
My friend, a military officer, with orders all over his chest, took off his shoulder straps and refused to go to Chechnya. He said that this is the wrong war. He even refused to apply for a pension. Proud.
My illnesses have worsened in Chechnya. It got to such a point that I couldn't work on the computer. Another mode of operation was that I slept only four hours plus a glass of cognac at night to fall asleep.
Ruslan Savitsky, St. Petersburg, private of internal troops
I came to Chechnya in December 1995 from the Perm region, where I had training in an operational battalion. We studied for six months and went to Grozny by train. We all wrote petitions so that we would be sent to the combat area and not be forced. If there is only one child in the family, then he could easily refuse.
We were lucky with the officers. These were young guys, only two or three years older than us. They always ran ahead of us and felt responsible. Of the entire battalion, we only had one officer with combat experience who had served in Afghanistan. Only riot police were directly involved in the clean-up operations; we, as a rule, held the perimeter.
In Grozny, we lived in a school building for six months. Part of it was occupied by a riot police unit, about two floors were occupied by us. There were cars parked around, the windows covered with bricks. In the classroom where we lived there were potbelly stoves and they were heated with wood. We washed ourselves once a month and lived with lice. It was undesirable to go beyond the perimeter. I was taken out of there two weeks earlier than the others for disciplinary violations.
It was boring hanging around at school, although the food was normal. Over time, out of boredom, we started drinking. There were no shops, we bought vodka from the Chechens. You had to go outside the perimeter, walk about a kilometer around the city, come to an ordinary private house and say that you need alcohol. There was a high probability that you would not return. I walked around without a weapon. Just one machine gun could get you killed.
Destroyed Grozny, 1995
Local banditry is a strange thing. It seemed like a normal person during the day, but in the evening he dug out a machine gun and went to shoot. In the morning I buried the weapon and was back to normal.
The first contact with death was when our sniper was killed. He shot back, he wanted to take the weapon from the dead man, he stepped on a tripwire and blew himself up. In my opinion, this is a complete lack of brains. I had no sense of value own life. I wasn't afraid of death, I was afraid of stupidity. There were a lot of idiots around.
When I returned, I went to get a job in the police, but I did not have a secondary education. I passed the exams as an external student and came back again, but they gave me a ride again because I developed tuberculosis in Chechnya. Also because I drank a lot. I can’t say that the army is to blame for my alcoholism. Alcohol was present in my life before. When the second Chechen war began, I wanted to go. I came to the military registration and enlistment office, they gave me a bunch of documents, this discouraged me a little. Then a criminal record appeared for some bullshit, and my service in the army ended. I wanted courage and excitement, but it didn’t work out.
Daniil Gvozdev, Helsinki, special forces
I ended up in Chechnya by conscription. When the time came to join the army, I asked my coach to place me in good troops - we had a special purpose company in Petrozavodsk. But at the assembly point, my name was heard with those who are going to Sertolovo to become grenade launchers. It turned out that the day before, my coach had left for Chechnya as part of a combined special forces detachment. I, along with the whole “herd,” got up, went to the train, and was in the training unit for three months. Nearby there was part of the paratroopers in Pesochny, I wrote applications there several times to be accepted, and came. Then I realized that everything was useless, I passed the exams to become a radio operator of the 142nd command and staff vehicle. At night, our captain and officers raised us. One walked around in tears, saying how much he respects and loves us all, the second tried to warn. They said that we were all leaving tomorrow. The next night it was so interesting to look at this officer, I still didn’t understand why he shed tears in front of us, he was younger than I am now. He cried: “Guys, I’m going to worry about you so much!” One of the guys told him: “So get ready and come with us.”
We flew to Vladikavkaz via Mozdok. We had three months of active training, and they gave me the 159th radio station on my back. Then I was sent to Chechnya. I stayed there for nine months, I was the only signalman in our company who more or less understood something about communications. After six months, I managed to knock out an assistant - a guy from Stavropol who did not understand anything, but smoked a lot, and for him Chechnya was a paradise in general.
We performed different tasks there. One of the simple ones - they can dig up oil there with a shovel and they installed the following devices: a barrel, under it there is a gas or diesel heater, they drive the oil to a state where in the end gasoline is obtained. They sell gasoline. Huge convoys of trucks were driving. ISIS, banned in Russia, is doing the same thing in Syria. Some won't come to an agreement, they hand him over to their own people - and his barrels will burn, but some will calmly do what is needed. There was also constant work - we guarded the entire leadership of the North Caucasian Military District headquarters, we guarded Shamanov. Well, reconnaissance missions.
We had a task to capture a militant of some kind. We went out into the night to search on the outskirts of the village, and saw that cars were approaching there and draining gasoline. We noticed one comrade there, he was constantly walking around, changing the heating under the barrels, he had a machine gun, well, since a machine gun means an action movie. He had a bottle, he would come over, take a sip and hide it, well, we were lying there, watching with a friend, he said: “He has vodka, they are Muslims, you can’t drink it, so he comes here, drinks it and hides it.” The task of capturing the tongue has faded into the background; we must first grab the vodka. We crawled around, found a bottle, and there was water! This angered us and took him prisoner. This militant guy, so thin, was sent back to us after interrogation by the intelligence department. He said that he used to do Greco-Roman wrestling and did a handstand with a broken rib, I respected him greatly for that. He turned out to be the field commander’s cousin, so he was exchanged for two of our soldiers. You should have seen these soldiers: 18-year-old boys, I don’t know, their psyche is clearly broken. We wrote to this guy on a green scarf: “Nothing personal, we don’t want war.”
He asks: “Why didn’t you kill me?” We explained that we were wondering what he was drinking. And he said that they had only one Russian left in the village, they didn’t touch her, because she was a witch, everyone went to her. Two months ago she gave him a bottle of water and said: “They can kill you, drink this water and you will live.”
We were permanently located in Khankala and worked everywhere. The last time we had a demobilization chord was when Bamut was liberated. Have you seen Nevzorov’s film “Mad Company”? So we walked with them, we were on one side along the pass, they were on the other. They had one conscript in the company and it was he who was killed, but all the contract soldiers are alive. One day I was looking through binoculars, and there were some bearded people running around. The company commander says: “Let’s give them a couple of cucumbers.” They asked on the radio station, they told me the coordinates, I looked - they were running around, waving their hands. Then they show a beluga whale - what they wore under camouflage. And we realized that they were ours. It turned out that their batteries did not work for transmission and he could not transmit, but he heard me, so they started waving.
You don't remember anything in battle. Someone says: “When I saw this man’s eyes...” But I don’t remember this. The battle is over, I see that everything is fine, everyone is alive. There was a situation when we got into the ring and caused fire on ourselves, it turns out that if I lie down, there is no connection, and I need to adjust so that we don’t get hit. I wake up. The guys shout: “Good! Lie down." And I understand that if there is no connection, they will shut down their own people.
Who came up with the idea of giving children weapons at the age of 18, giving them the right to kill? If you give it, do it so that when people return they will be heroes, but now it’s Kadyrov’s bridges. I understand that they want to reconcile the two nations, everything will be erased in a few generations, but how can these generations live?
When I returned, it was the wild nineties, and almost all my friends were busy with something illegal. I came under investigation, a criminal record... At some point, when my head began to clear of the war fog, I waved my hand at this romance. We opened it with veteran guys public organization to support combat veterans. We work, help ourselves and others. I also paint icons.