Chronicle of special operation and losses
Units of the 103rd Airborne Division at the Kabul airfield. Late December 1979.
Late December 1979. A change of power took place in the capital of Afghanistan as a result of the special operation "Baikal-79". During the night of December 27-28, 1979, key objects in Kabul were captured: the Taj-Bek Palace, the General Staff, the headquarters of the Central Army Corps, the Dar-ul-Aman Palace, the intelligence and counterintelligence service, the Air Force headquarters, the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Tsarandoy), the Pul-i-Charkhi prison for political prisoners, the radio and television center, as well as a number of other objects.
Hafizullah Amin (object No. 1) was killed in the Taj Beg Palace, which was officially registered as a decision of the "revolutionary court" to execute him. His loyal comrade and relative, Chief of the General Staff Mohammed Yaqub (object No. 2), was killed in the General Staff. Members of the Afghan government were arrested.
What losses did the Soviet troops suffer on the night of December 27-28, 1979? All publications on this topic only mention a few fighters who died at the Taj Beg Palace. That's all. Could such a large-scale operation to capture the capital of Afghanistan, storm facilities in the city and block the Kabul garrison have taken place with such minimal losses?
Even before the start of Operation Baikal-79, seven Il-7 crew members and 76 paratroopers of the 37th Guards Parachute Regiment of the 350rd Guards Airborne Division were listed as dead; they died in a plane crash on December 103, 25, during the airlift of troops to the Kabul and Bagram airfields.
The duty officer at the operation control point, Colonel E. V. Chernyshev, makes an entry in his diary:
“The rate of aircraft arrivals is high. That is why at first we did not notice that the next, seventh in a row, aircraft had not been reported from the airfield. When there was a short pause, we asked the airfield for information on the IL-76D, the seventh in a row. After clarifying, they replied that it had not yet arrived. This should not be. The aircraft were flying in a chain, one after another, and their tail numbers were known in advance. We asked the task force in Moscow. They scolded us for our inattentive work. We tried to clarify again at the airport. Nothing new. They only reported that the duty dispatcher had observed a bright flash in the sky, away from the course of the arriving aircraft.
At about two o'clock in the morning, a report was requested from Moscow: where did the Il-76D disappear to?
The city of Mary, where the planes were refueling, reported that the plane had left for Kabul on schedule. The crew of the eighth plane reported that they had seen a bright flash, like an explosion, on the left as they approached Kabul. It became clear that the transport had crashed. It was found that there were 44 people (a platoon) on board, along with the crew, a vehicle with ammunition, and a vehicle with fuel.
Throughout the day, planes continue to arrive. The number of troops and cargo at the airfields increases. The population gets used to the roar of planes. In the evening, Moscow requests the names of those killed on the IL-76D. It turns out that the lists for the entire regiment were on the plane that crashed. Therefore, it is impossible to determine the names."
The regiment’s clerk, Guard Senior Sergeant Antonina Zaitseva, recalls:
"Nevertheless, the names were determined. Guards Major Vladimir Ivanovich Reznik opened the sealed combat unit at the regiment headquarters in Borovukha-1, the safe with personal files and the UPK card index (registration and service cards of conscripts). The sad work of drawing up documents for the dead began. Thus, through tears, I became the clerk of the combat unit."
But this tragedy occurred on December 25, 1979, before the start of the special operation. And what irretrievable and sanitary losses did the troops suffer on the night of December 27-28, 1979 as a result of combat operations during the capture of objects in the capital of Afghanistan? The exact figures of irretrievable (killed) and sanitary (wounded) losses in those battles are unknown; they vary depending on the sources, since this data was often classified or distorted.
The participants in the operation themselves in those days knew only about what was happening in their units. Probably, the headquarters had information about the total losses, at least approximate. But no one in the companies or battalions had such information.
Colonel E.V. Chernyshev:
“December 28.12.79, XNUMX, Friday. By midnight, everything was basically over. The shooting had died down. The job was done. However, reports of killed and wounded were coming in from everywhere. This was a clear miscalculation in the long-prepared operation. Medical support was not deployed, there were no medical forces and resources. Now we are forced to go around the houses where the advisers’ families lived, to gather their wives, who were involved in medicine. We gathered everyone in the clinic. The wounded and killed were taken there. There were more than a hundred of them. Some were wrapped in sheets soaked in blood. They were given first aid and taken to the hospital.”
Sergeant of "Poltinnik" Sergei Odinets took part in the capture of the Ministry of Internal Affairs - Tsarandoi. He said that during the storming of the ministry building, a captain from the "Zenit" group was killed from their combined detachment, and three paratroopers from the 350th Guards Parachute Regiment were wounded. Sergei recalled that they were brought to the hospital at the embassy; he called the medical institution that, but it was probably an embassy hospital, not a hospital. According to Sergei, when they were taken to the surgical department, they noticed that there were many wounded soldiers lying on couches in the corridors. He concluded that all the beds in the wards were occupied and there was not enough space. This is in relation to the question of the number of wounded.
The duty officer at the control center, Colonel E. V. Chernyshev:
"December 28.12.1979, 14. Around twelve o'clock I spoke on the phone with Army General Varennikov. He was interested in the losses and said to report by fourteen o'clock. I had preliminary data. I coordinated it with the Airborne Forces headquarters. They didn't have final data either, but we came to the same conclusions. At 00:14 I reported by phone to Moscow: as of 00:30 there were 128 killed, including one officer, and XNUMX wounded, including one officer. Data on Ivanov's (KGB) employees was not included here, they were unknown to us.
Our wounded have already been placed in the hospital. The dead were being prepared for shipment to the Union. The lists of those killed in the IL-76D plane on the evening of the 25th have been clarified."
Probably, 30 dead out of almost ten thousand military contingent is really minimal losses, as they officially say. But each of the dead is someone's son, brother, father, relative.
Several years ago it became known that on the IL-25 plane that crashed on December 1979, 76, in addition to 37 paratroopers of the 350th regiment, there were three officers of the headquarters of the Turkestan Military District with some secret documents. In addition, the plane's crew consisted of not seven, but ten people. That is, the total losses in the plane crash were not forty-four, but fifty people.
Unfortunately, this topic - the topic of combat losses in the December 1979 operation in Kabul - has not been sufficiently studied and has not been researched to this day. And now it is unlikely that anyone will seriously study it: the times are different, that country is long gone.
Information