Komsomolskoye. Chronicle of the assault
Recall the dead comrades ... Komsomolsk, March 2000
To fighters who were at the forefront of the Chechen war, the orders of the command often seemed reckless. Often they were. But orders are not discussed, but carried out. Our story is about the fighters of the St. Petersburg detachment of special forces of the Ministry of Justice "Typhoon".
The “Typhoon” detachment liberated Dagestan in the fall of 1999, worked in the mountains near Harsenoi at the beginning of 2000. However, the most important test awaited the special forces in March 2000 year. They had to be in the heat of the storm during the storming of the village of Komsomolskoye.
More than one and a half thousand fighters led by Ruslan Gelayev opposed six hundred of our fighters. The bandits turned every house into an impregnable fortress. Not having heavy weapons in the first week, without support aviation and artillery, almost exclusively with machine guns and hand grenades, our soldiers stubbornly attacked the positions of the militants. Bloody battles for every street, every house, lasted more than two weeks.
For the capture of the village Komsomolsk had to pay a terrible fee. Of the one hundred soldiers of the joint detachment of the special forces of the Ministry of Justice, ten died, more than twenty were injured. Eternal memory to the fallen, honor and glory to the living!
The Hero of Russia, Colonel Alexey Nikolaevich Makhotin tells:
- Komsomolskoye we combed the first, second and third of March. Our squad went along the Goyty River. Fighters of the 33 Brigade of the Internal Troops from the village of Lebyazhye near St. Petersburg walked to the left, and the Internal Troops from Nizhny Tagil on the right. The fighting has not yet begun, but the militants have already begun to meet on the way. One of these days we see - two militants in civilian clothes from a distance saw us and began to run away. One managed to leave, and the other we filled up. Despite civilian clothes, it was immediately apparent that this was not a civilian. His face was an earthy color, like those who spent the whole winter in mountain caves without the sun. Yes, and in appearance he was a clear Arab. The head of the Komsomolsky administration was later asked: “Your man?”. Answer: "No". But for this case, we still got a scolding from the authorities: “What do you mean? They got it, you know, shooting here for no reason! ”
On the 5th of March, on the other side of the Goyta, SOBR fighters from the Central Black Earth region, those who marched with Nizhny Tagil, fought and suffered their first losses. They were dead. On that day, they shot us for the first time, and we received orders to retreat.
On March 6, neighbors on the right again suffered losses. The situation was such that they could not even take away all their dead.
In the morning of the sixth of March, we had a small operation not in the village, but in the residents' camp. By this time they had already been taken out of Komsomolsk. They camped behind the village about two hundred meters away. Even further, at the intersection of roads, stood our checkpoint, and the headquarters was located in the trailers - from six hundred meters from Komsomolsk.
The special operations officer of the division of the Internal Troops Don-100 tells me: “There is information that there are wounded militants in the camp of civilians. But we probably won't be able to pick them up. And my leadership is not eager to do this. If you can, then come on. ”
I take with me pepeesnikov (PPS, patrol-militia service of the police. - Ed.) And say: "Let's do this: we block, and you take them, and then we go back together." We burst suddenly into the camp and see that on the blankets and mattresses are wounded with characteristic earthy faces. We pulled them out very quickly, so that the population did not have time to react, otherwise they would arrange a demonstration with women and children, which is usual in such cases.
After that we broke through to the mosque. She stood in the very center of Komsomolsk. Here Nizhny Tagil asked me to stop, because as they moved with great difficulty, we had to keep one line with them.
We go in the mosque. We see that there is a dead Arab, whom we destroyed on March 5, prepared for the burial according to local customs. This alone proves that it is not a resident of Komsomolsk. Otherwise, he would, according to tradition, be buried on the same day.
The situation was relatively calm - shooting in our direction is insignificant. Militants, as can be judged by the fire, are somewhere far away. We see - in our direction goes "Volga" with Moscow numbers. They ask me from the car: “How is it better to get to the other side?”. It was an attempt to negotiate with Gelayev (call sign “Angel”), so that he would leave the village. The head of the Komsomolsky administration arrived on the Volga, with him the local mullah. They brought a mediator with them. He used to fight somewhere with Gelayev (seemingly in Abkhazia). Each of them had their own goal: the mullah wanted to preserve the mosque, and the head of Komsomolsk - the homes of the inhabitants. And I did not really understand how Gelayev could be released. Well, he would have left the village - and then what?
I got on the radio with my neighbors and warned them: “Now I’ll come to you.” We sit down with three fighters on the Beteer (BTR, armored personnel carrier. - Ed.) And go. “Volga” is following us. We moved to the other side, stopped at a crossroads ... And then suddenly there was a growing rumble of shooting! .. The fire is not yet aimed, the bullets fly over their heads. But shooting is fast approaching. "Volga" instantly turned around and went back.
Nizhnetagiltsy ask us: "Punch us a fence, and leave yourself!" The piercer broke through the fence, but then got confused in it. We think: "Khan to us." I am transmitting my deputy to the radio: "Take it," Dzhavdet ", command over yourself. We will leave, how and where it will turn out. ”
But we were lucky: the batteer got out of the fence. Thanks to the soldiers from the batteer - they waited for us for a bit while we ran over them through Goyta to the waist in the water. We reached the mosque. But then the Beteher began to turn around and hit a stone pillar. I so broke my head about the armor! Well, as it turned out, just cut through the skin on the head.
And on the other side of the river, the war is already in full swing: the militants went on the attack. And from our shore, they sent us two helpers with fifty fighters along the same road we entered. But they could not reach us. One of the cars "spiritual" sniper of the driver shot and the second - the commander took off.
I tell my colonel, Georgich, as I called him, I say: “Everything, you don't need to send anyone anymore. We will go out ourselves ”and decided to leave in the direction of the outskirts of the village.
With us, the mosque was the chief of intelligence from the 33 Brigade of the Internal Troops, Major Afanasyuk. All his name was Bormann. He says: "I will not go, I was not ordered to retreat." But, to the honor of this officer, he ordered his soldiers to retreat with me. He himself stayed, did not leave for a long time, and with great difficulty I persuaded him to go with us. Major Afanasyuk and his scout Sergey Bavykin ("Ataman"), with whom we were at the mosque that day, died later, on March 10th.
We have almost left the village, and then suddenly we get the command: “Return to the starting positions”. Orders do not discuss. We quickly return, again occupy the mosque. It's getting dark. I get in touch with my commanders and say: “If I stay here for another half hour, then tomorrow no one from our unit will be left alive. I'm out".
I well understood that we in the mosque at night against the militants would not last long. At headquarters, opinions were divided, but my immediate commander still made a difficult decision for him and gave me the command to retreat.
We see: on the street there are about twelve civilians with a white flag. I thought it was for the best: “As a living shield will be, Chechens shouldn’t fire at their own way.” And in fact, this time we came out without a loss.
The next day, the seventh of March, was more or less calm for us. Militants turned out to be clearly not thirty people, as the generals originally said. Therefore, now, taking into account the heavy losses, the leadership of the operation decided what to do next. Aviation began to work in the village.
On March 8, we counted our army: on the right side of the Nizhny Tagil one hundred and thirty plus SOBR with four old "boxes" (armored vehicle or tank. - Ed.), We have seventy people with two "boxes". Plus in the 33-th brigade, a hundred people with two "boxes". I was also given fifteen pepeesnikov people. But I told them not to shoot at all and go behind us.
And the front, along which we were supposed to advance, was stretched for two kilometers. On the tanks ammunition - seven to eight shells. There were also UR-70 demining vehicles, which a couple of times, with a terrible roar and noise, threw their charges of four hundred kilograms of TNT towards the militants. And then we went on the attack.
We reach the first level of houses and see a Chechen woman, a granny of eighty years. We pulled her out of the garden, showed where the camp of the residents was, and said: "You go there." She crawled.
Here we have a loss. We reach the second level of houses - an explosion on the left. Killed fighter from our Pskov squad, Shiryaev. It just broke.
Go ahead. At the cemetery, the river expands, the neighbors leave aside, and our flank remains open. Just in this place was a small height, which we can not get around. We leave on it in two groups. It is felt that the militants are she shot. They knew that they could not get past us, and from several sides began to peel along this height from a distance of one hundred or three hundred meters. They were definitely not podstvolniki, more powerful explosions, but most likely erpege (RPG, hand-held anti-tank grenade launcher. - Ed.) Or homemade mortars.
And then it began ... Events unfolded rapidly: the targeted hit in our machine gunner Volodya Shirokov. He dies. Immediately kill our sniper Sergei Novikov. Kolya Evtukh tries to pull out Volodya, and here the “spiritual” sniper hits Kolya in the lower back: his spine is broken. Wounded another of our sniper.
We pull out the wounded, begin to dress up. I look at the wounded sniper. And his injury was severe. Oleg Gubanov tries to pull out Vovka Shirokov - again an explosion, and Oleg flies at me from top to bottom! Shoot from all sides! .. Again, getting into Vovka - it burns! We can’t be caught in any way ... We are about fifty meters away, taking three wounded and one dead. Shirokov remains lying on top ...
On the right flank, too, the cut goes. Reporting losses. The generals give everyone a command to retreat - aviation will work in the village. Tagil'tsy and we ask first for half an hour, then for another half hour to collect our dead.
Here comes a pair of attack aircraft SU-25 and begins to bomb us! They dropped two huge bombs on parachutes. We hid as we could: some lie down behind a stone, some just in the yard. Bah-bah ... and about fifty meters away from us, bombs are entering the ground! .. But they do not explode ... My first thought is a slowdown bomb. We lie quietly, do not move. And there is no explosion and no. It turned out that the bombs were the fifties of release, it is not standard. So did not explode, for our happiness.
The next day, the ninth of March, we again go to the same positions. A hundred and fifty meters long, the militants meet us with a barrage of fire. The place where Shirokov died, we cannot be seen from here, and there is no way closer.
We thought that Volodya was no longer on the hill. Everyone had already heard about how the militants mocked the dead. They began to ask other teams. Somewhere there, it turns out, the hand cut off was found. Our question: "Is there such a tattoo?" No tattoo. So, not him. And Volodya, as it turned out, was in the same place where he was killed. We did not manage to approach the skyscraper that day.
March 10, we go forward with Timur Sirazetdinov. Next to the 33 Brigade, guys with a tank cover us. Left them with a tank behind the house, and crawled. Ahead - a bump. We agree: I throw a grenade, and Timur thirty meters from the barn should run across. I throw a grenade over the hill. Timur ran. And then the line from a machine gun from afar ... The machine gunner was tracking us, it was understandable.
Timur shouts: “Alexey, I am wounded! ..”. I - jump to him. The machine-gunner is watering again with a queue ... The fountains from the bullets around and dance! "Jackson" shouts from behind: "Lie! ..". It feels like there is some kind of dead zone where I pressed to the ground - the machine gunner cannot reach me. I can not rise - he immediately cut me off.
And then an officer from the 33 Brigade saved me - he diverted the machine gunner’s attention to himself (his name was Kichkaylo, on March 14 he died and received the title of Hero posthumously). He went with the soldiers for the tank in the direction of Timur. The machine-gunner switched attention to them, began to shoot at the tank - only bullets clicked on the armor! I took advantage of this second and slipped into a ravine that stretched toward the militants. There is a dead zone, no one shoots me.
The fighters dragged Timur into the tank and retreated. I crawled up - Timur had a wound in the groin area. He is unconscious. I cut the pants, and there blood clots, like jelly ... We overtighten the leg above the wound, bandaging it. Our doctor gives him a direct injection in the heart. We call emteelbashka (MTLB, small light armored tractor. - Ed.), But she can’t find us at all! .. But the second one, sent after, nevertheless found us. We throw Timur at her, send him to the rear.
We once really hoped that Timur would get out. After all, in the first war he had been wounded - fifty-five fragments then fell into it. He survived that time. But an hour later they passed me on the radio: "Cyclone", your "300th" - "200th" ("300th" - wounded, "200th" - killed. - Ed.). And Timur is my close friend. Went to the barn. A lump at the throat ... I didn’t want my men to see my tears. I sat there for five or ten minutes, and went out again to my own.
On this day everybody had big losses. No artillery support, tanks without ammunition. We go to the attack with machine guns and machine guns without artillery preparation. Therefore, on the eleventh and twelfth of March, the leaders of the operation again took time out.
On March 11, we were replaced by the Izhevsk detachment of the Ministry of Justice. We moved to complete the ammunition. As a commander, I was worried about one more thing. The fact is that twenty snipers transferred me to the operational submission, who occupied positions in the gorge above Komsomolsk. And with these snipers I lost the connection. We had to look for them now.
On the way, I drove to the headquarters, where the tragicomic and very revealing story. We drive to the sawmill, where the headquarters has moved, and we observe such a picture. People run about six generals and journalists are different. It turns out that two soldiers climbed into a ravine behind a calf. And it was here that their militants laid fire on the ground and thrashed at them! All run, fussing, but no one does anything to change the situation.
I was with Vovka "Grumbler". We grabbed some emtaelbashka, pulled up and pulled the soldiers. Then we went in search further.
While we were looking for them, the commander of the Udmurt squad Ilfat Zakirov was summoned to headquarters for a report. General Baranov, the commander of the Group of our troops, arrived at the meeting.
There was a very unpleasant story at this meeting that had tragic consequences. And it is doubly unfair that General Troshev in his book about the Chechen war described it according to the words of General Baranov. And he wrote — no more, no less — that in the Ministry of Justice special forces there were panties who were comfortably seated in sleeping bags in a quiet place and didn’t really want to fight. And only the personal intervention of the valiant General Baranov made these cowards take hold of the mind and then show themselves heroically.
Until now, I can’t understand how it was possible to write about sleeping bags and a quiet place when our position was in the very center of Komsomolsky, to the right of the mosque, which was not even visible from the command post?
And here is how it really was. There were always two colonels in the headquarters, military commanders of Komsomolsk and Alkhazurovo. They told me exactly what was happening at this meeting. Ilfat reports the situation (and before the meeting I told him what was happening in the positions) as it is - it is impossible to go there, there is a gap on the right flank, from here the militants shoot. And Baranov to him, without having understood: “You are a coward!”. Then only one person stood up for Ilfat, the militia general Kladnitsky, whom I personally respect for that. He said something like this: “You, comrade commander, are not behaving properly with people. You can't talk like that. ” I heard that after that Kladnitsky was pushed somewhere.
And Ilfat is an Oriental guy, for him such an accusation is generally terrible. When he returned to the positions from this meeting, he was all white. Says detachment: "Forward! ..". I told him: “Ilfat, wait, calm down. Give me an hour of time. I will go to a height where Vovka Shirokov lies, pick him up and then go together. Do not go anywhere.
Shortly before that, we stole, secretly from our headquarters, the militant of the murdered field commander. There are several of them, at the headquarters, lay for identification. And now, through the head of the Komsomolsky administration, we pass on to the militants a proposal to exchange him for Volodya. But nothing came of it. We did not wait for an answer. I sent the body of the militant to the commandant's office of Urus-Martan. Already the numbers of the seventeenth ask me from there: “What shall we do with it?”. I answer: "Yes, bury it somewhere." So he was buried, I do not even know where.
Then I took four fighters, a tank, and again went to the same unfortunate height. And the militants are beating at it with might and main! .. We put the tank in the hollow, the guys cover me. I myself crawled to the edge of the cliff with the "cat", and then threw it and hooked on the shoe (no longer what it was) that was left of Volodya. What I saw Volodya is scary ... Only a half of the healthy twenty-five year old guy remained. In appearance, it was now the body of a ten-year-old teenager — he was all burned, collapsed. From clothes, only shoes on the body remained. I carefully wrapped it in the cloak, I crawled to the tank, loaded it with the guys and sent it to the headquarters.
I was torn by conflicting feelings. On the one hand, I was terribly shocked by how he looked. On the other hand, he is relieved from the heart - he has not disappeared without a trace, and it will be possible to bury, as expected, in his native land.
These feelings are hard to describe in words. More recently, still alive, warm person, your close friend, meaning so much to you, suddenly dies before your eyes for some moments - and you not only cannot do anything for him, but you cannot even take away his dead body, so that the enemies could not jeer at him! .. Instead of lively, cheerful eyes, a bright smile and a strong body, “something”, riddled with shrapnel, burnt by fire, silent, dumb, is spread out before you ...
I request by Ilfat's radio - does not respond. And before that, on the radio, he again repeated to me: "I went forward." I told him again: “Wait, do not rush. I'll come, then let's go together. " Here our general on the radio gives me an order: “I am removing you, Cyclone, from the command of the joint detachment of the Ministry of Justice. Senior Lieutenant Zakirov will be in command. ” Well pushed aside. I understand him too. He is there among the other generals. Well, that the lieutenant colonel pushed aside, and the elder appointed, - his question.
I go out to the house where the people of Izhevsk have gone, and I see that there is a detachment. I ask: "Where is the commander?". Show in the side of the house. Four of my fighters are with me. I also take “Grandfather” from the Izhevsk detachment. He is an experienced man, participated in previous campaigns. We rush into the courtyard, throw grenades, arrange shooting in all directions. We see that in the courtyard near the house there are two bodies, completely disfigured, the clothes are in tatters. This is Ilfat with his deputy. The dead. "Grandfather" threw them on the tank, although it is very difficult to raise the dead. But he is a healthy man.
And it was like that. Ilfat and his deputy entered the courtyard, and they grappled with the militants almost hand to hand. It turned out that the militants behind the house had dug trenches. Ilfat and his deputy were shot dead by several militants, and the rest of them themselves were bombarded with grenades.
So Izhevsk detachment was left without a commander. The guys are in shock. I immediately took them back a little. And then generally sent for replacement in reserve. They still remember me with a kind word. But I really understood their psychological state: it was impossible then to send them forward.
When the generals yelled at the officers, they reacted differently to this. Someone like me, for example, swallowed it all. I shoot further - that's all. And someone emotionally reacts, like Ilfat, and dies ... By the way, after his death, the squad leader again appointed me.
Once again, my thoughts return to that offensive for me and my comrades in arms that two generals allowed themselves: to blacken in their book a man who is completely innocent of what they accused him of. It was in Komsomolskoye that I understood that the generals who commanded us did not know the soldiers. For them, this is a combat unit, not a living person. No wonder they are called "pencils". I had to drink this bitter cup to the bottom. When I arrived in St. Petersburg, I looked into every relative of the victims — my wife, parents, children.
As for the soldiers-conscripts, about them there, at the top, no one really thought. So on March 8, at the headquarters, I asked a platoon to close the gap on the flank between us and the Nizhny Tagil. And they answer me: “I will give you a platoon, and the enemy will have thirty targets more. Losses will be more. Give me the coordinates, I'll cover with the mortar. ” Well what can I say ... stupidity, lack of professionalism? And to pay for it has the most expensive - life ...
The numbers of the thirteenth of March to us in the position approached rocket launcher "Storm". They ask: "Well, where are you going to fuck up?" I answer: “Look at that house. There is a firing point. ” This is seventy meters or a hundred from our positions. They say: "We can not, we need four hundred and fifty meters." Well, where on four hundred and fifty can they fuck up? After all, everything that shoots at me is at a distance of seventy to one hundred and fifty meters. This wonderful rocket launcher was completely unnecessary here. So they left with nothing ...
On the same day, the ammunition supply office asks: “What should I send you?”. Before that, nothing was serious weapons, machine guns and machine guns fought with grenade launchers. I say: "Send" Bumblebees "(flamethrower. - Ed.) Eight pieces." They send eight boxes of four each, that is, thirty-two pieces. Lord, where have you been before ?! Although they gave us all this without receipts, but it is a pity good. To drag so much iron forward was very hard.
Starting from March 8, we did not leave Komsomolskiy anymore, stayed in our positions for the night. It was very unpleasant. After all, until March 15, nobody really covered us from the rear, the militants ran through us periodically. On March 10th, one reached the cemetery that was next to us. We worked on it and crawled in that direction. In the cemetery found duffel bags with cartridges. Militants have prepared them in advance. And only after the fourteenth-fifteenth of March, near Moscow, riot police began to clean up our courtyards and gardens.
On March 15, Komsomolskoye shrouded such fog that nothing was visible in three meters. Once again, we went with the fighters to the height, where Shirokov died, and took the weapon. By the way, we have not lost a single barrel for all the fighting.
And then the neighbors from the Internal Troops called me to coordinate the actions. So after all, I was not nearly shot dead there, but I still did not understand, it was my own or someone else's! That's how it was. Neighbors sat in a house nearby. I went into the yard and saw that some twenty-five figures in camouflage were running past the barn about twenty meters away. They turned to me, looked at me, and how they would give me the automatic line in my direction! Frankly speaking, unexpectedly ... Thanks for the fact that you only hit the wall nearby.
It was really very difficult to distinguish ours from others - they were all mixed up. After all, all look the same: camouflage, all dirty, with beards.
There was such a characteristic case. The commander of the Chuvash special forces unit GUIN occupied the house with his fighters. As expected, they first threw the grenade. After some time, the commander descends with a flashlight into the basement. He shone a flashlight and saw that an insurgent was sitting, looking at him and blinking with his eyes. Our - jump up: but can not get out - the machine caught on the edges of the manhole. He jumped out all the same, a grenade into the basement. And the turn from the automaton ... It turned out that there was almost a lifeless injured fighter sitting, he already had gangrene. That is why he did not shoot, but only with his eyes and could blink.
It was on March 15, as the commandants of Komsomolsky and Alkhazurovo later told, that all the generals, by satellite phone, as one, each to their superiors, report: "The Komsomolskoye is taken, is controlled completely." What kind of control is there if on March 16th we have losses again - three people dead, about fifteen wounded? On this day, Sergey Gerasimov from the Novgorod “Rusichi” squad, Vladislav Baygatov from the Pskov “Zubr” squad and Andrei Zakharov from the “Typhoon” died. On March 17, another fighter from the Typhoon was killed, Alexander Tikhomirov.
On the sixteenth of March, together with the platoon of the Yaroslavl riot police, assigned to us, from the middle of Komsomolsk we moved to the school - to converge with the 33 brigade. We begin to close and see - the T-80 tank is coming straight at us! By that time, the army equipment was already up. And we all have a different connection. I can only talk with my general, riot policemen with my command, fighters from the 33 brigade only with mine. I ask my general: “What to do? But now he will start thrashing at us! .. ”. It’s good that we had a Russian flag with us. I deployed it and went into the zone of visibility of the tank. He oriented me, and we successfully connected with the 33-th brigade.
The numbers of the seventeenth and eighteenth militants began to surrender en masse. In one day two hundred people were taken prisoner. Then they began to dig them out of the basements. There were some attempts to break through the twentieth of March, but by that time, by and large, it was all over. Crosses at the height where Shirokov and Novikov died, was badly wounded by Kolya Evtukh, we put on March 23rd.
Later we learned that, under an amnesty for the presidential election (March 26 of 2000, elections of the President of the Russian Federation were held. - Ed.), Many of the militants were released. But, if it were known in advance that they would be released, then, logically and in good conscience, it was not necessary to take them prisoner. True, all typhoonists specially left when the militants began to surrender. I sent one of his deputies and those of ours who did not take part in the hostilities to work for the reception of the captives. It is necessary to understand: we had the most severe losses. My friends Vladimir Shirokov and Timur Sirazetdinov, with whom I went through Dagestan, died. I was just afraid that not everyone can stand it. I did not want to take a sin.
Now I look back at what was in Komsomolsk, and I am surprised that the human body has sustained such loads. After all, we all crawled Komsomolsk many times along and across the spot. That snow will fall, then rain. Cold and hungry ... I myself suffered pneumonia on my feet there. The fluid from the lungs came out when breathing, a thick layer settled on the radio when I spoke. The doctor injected me with some medications, thanks to which I continued to work. But ... like some kind of robot.
It is not clear what kind of resource we all endured. For two weeks of continuous fighting no food normal, no rest. In the afternoon in the basement we will kindle a fire, boil some chicken, then drink this broth. We didn’t eat either suhpayki or stew. Do not climb into the throat. And before that, we still got eighteen days on our mountain starved. And the break between these events was only two or three days.
Now you can, all thinking, to summarize the assault Komsomolsk. The whole operation was carried out illiterately. But it was an opportunity to block the village for real. The population had already been withdrawn from the village, so that it was possible to bomb and fire as much as necessary. And only after that already storm.
And we stormed the town not with the forces that should be according to all the rules of tactics. We should have been four to five times more than the defenders. But there were less of us than defenders. After all, only selected fighters of Gelayev were six hundred or eight hundred people. And also local militiamen, who from all the surrounding villages came at his call.
The positions of the militants were very good: they were above us, and we went from the bottom up. They shot at us from pre-prepared positions because of each angle. We start moving forward, and sooner or later they notice us. When they open fire from one firing point, and we focus our fire on it, then they start shooting at us from two or three points and let the first point move away. In addition, in the first week, both we and the militants were armed approximately equally. On those tanks that were given to us, there was practically no ammunition - seven or eight rounds per T-62 tank. T-80 tanks sent us only the numbers of the twelfth. Flamethrowers "Bumblebee" appeared about ten days later.
And if according to the mind, then it was necessary to bypass Komsomolskoye from the side of the village of Alkhazurovo, above which stood our regiment of the Ministry of Defense, and from the standpoint of the regiment push militants from the heights down. I have a very good attitude to the special forces soldiers of the Internal Troops and very badly to the command of the Internal Troops, which carried out the general leadership of this operation. Though I am without a higher military education, but I can say for sure that the way they conducted the fighting in Komsomolsk cannot be fought. On the one hand, they did not learn the tactics of warfare in the academies. On the other hand, the desire to get high rewards with a rash and report back in time was noticeable to the naked eye. No cowards were our generals. But not the generals. Far not commanders ...
Of course, looking back, I understand that our command was very much in a hurry. The presidential election was approaching. Therefore, the operation was carried out in spite of casualties. The operation was commanded by about seven generals. General command was first carried out by a general from the Internal Troops, from the special division "Don-100". Then commanded the commandant of Urus-Martan, then the commander of the Internal Troops, Colonel-General Labunets, familiar to us from Dagestan. Later came the commander of the group, General Baranov. But I can only say kind words about Lieutenant-General Kladnitsky from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. It was a man who truly understood what was really going on there.
And one more thing I can say for sure - conscript soldiers showed themselves heroically. I have not seen a single case of cowardice. They were hard workers. But only platoon and other officers of this level regretted them. But the generals did not spare them. They had a main task: so that they themselves were not shook up. And on occasion, perhaps, get a high reward.
But the main result of this inept operation - Gelayev - “Angel” with his elite still left. True, he suffered great losses. However, most of the militia were killed, they pulled up from the surrounding villages.
Then they began to say everywhere: “We broke Gelaev”. But I do not think we broke it. There was no victory over Gelayev, since he was gone. And the losses we suffered were unjustified. Now, if we had destroyed it, then these losses could have been somehow justified.
I myself was not Alexander Matrosov, in Komsomolsky I didn’t rush into an embrasure in a battle. But for myself, then I decided that the reckless orders of the generals would have to be done by me along with everyone. It is impossible to go forward, but it is necessary, because there is an order. Therefore, I went forward with the fighters. There was such a situation that I could not do otherwise. If you do not go yourself, and you send the guys, you're the wrong person. And you will not go along with them in general, they will call everyone a coward. Just like in the Russian folk tale: “If you go to the left - you will perish, to the right - you will perish, you will go straight - you will lose yourself and the horse”. And you have to go ...
Although I had a tough relationship with our general during the operation, he told the management everything as it was. That “Typhoon” was walking along the most dangerous direction along the Goyta River, which was the longest in positions and suffered the greatest losses. I think this: our squad really fought heroically, and I was even introduced to the title of Hero of Russia for the merits of the entire squad.
A week later, on the twenty-sixth of March 2000, the election of the President of the Russian Federation took place. And the inhabitants of the village of Komsomolskoy, which we “heroically” erased from the face of the earth, also vote in one of the schools of Urus-Martan. And we, the “Typhoon” detachment, are honored to ensure the security of this particular polling station. We check it in advance, we are guarded from the night. The head of the Komsomolsky administration appears. He witnessed how we did not leave a single whole house in the village, including his own house ...
I organized the work, and therefore I could only check, driving in from time to time the site. I come in the evening to pick up the ballot box. Although it was dangerous to move around Urus-Martan late in the evening, it was still more dangerous to leave an urn at night and protect it in the precinct. In accordance with all democratic procedures, we sealed the sealed urn, accompanied by an armored personnel carrier, safely to the commandant's office.
And the voting ended with the fact that the head of Komsomolsk and I drank a bottle of vodka. He says: “I understand that there was nothing personal about what happened. You are soldiers. ” We told him: “Of course, we have no hostility towards the inhabitants. We have enemies - militants. ”
The result of the election in this area has hit everyone outright. Eighty percent of the vote - for Putin, ten percent - for Zyuganov. And three percent - for Chechen Jebrailov. And I can testify that there were no signs of fraud on the part. So voted the heads of the Chechen families of Komsomolsk. Here are the layouts ...
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