Why the army did not become the last stronghold of the Soviet statehood?
These days marks the anniversary of the August putsch of the State Emergency Committee, the details of these events are very well described in many sources, and some of our fellow citizens are mostly those who were older even in those days who were directly involved in those events.
In addition, virtually all the inhabitants of the once great country of the Soviets turned out to be direct and indifferent eyewitnesses to her death.
However, if the political component of the coup in stories The new Russia today is literally laid out on the shelves, then the details of the actions of the army and other security agencies who took part in the coup are not sufficiently covered.
So, for example, it is not entirely clear how such a thing could happen, that one of the strongest armies in the world was not able to seize and retain power in the capital of the country, even for a very short time.
And this is despite the fact that in a multimillion metropolis, against this very army, directly from weapons in their hands only a few hundred people were actually ready to speak.
So, for example, from N. Leonov’s book “The Way of the Cross of Russia 1991-2000” it is known that: “The number of the so-called defenders of the White House in history will remain forever a very approximate value. In the building itself, there were about 400 people who had a large number of small arms, including machine guns and machine guns. Near the building on improvised barricades gathered, according to various estimates, from 5 to 50 thousands of people.
It was these figures that were called by the investigating authorities by various persons who were interrogated in connection with the events of those days. “Democrats”, as a rule, exaggerated the number of advocates, and persons from the State Emergency Committee tended to underestimate. The KGB officers sent in those days to estimate the number of White House defenders to prepare for possible military actions identified it in 15-20 thousand people. ”Http://www.russia-talk.org/cd-history/1991-2000 /leonov1.htm
From the history of the USSR it is known that only for the period from 1953 to 1969 The Soviet army took part in the suppression of at least the three largest armed rebellions in the countries of the socialist camp. And if in East Germany in 1953. and in Czechoslovakia in 1968. Since the Soviet troops were given little resistance, in Hungary, on the contrary, large-scale military operations were carried out using all types of heavy weapons, including combat Aviation.
At the same time, all military operations by the Soviet command were prepared very carefully and all of them were carried out at the highest professional level, taking into account the fact that the troops had to operate in the conditions of large European cities. As a result, all armed insurrections were completely suppressed, with minimal reciprocal losses.
Thus, in August 1991g. in the ranks of the Soviet Army, many generals and colonels were still in the service, participants in hostilities to suppress insurgency in the urban setting of Europe, plus a large number of officers and warrant officers who had the richest combat experience of the Afghan war also served in the Soviet power structures. This category of Soviet citizens had something to defend, since they were completely dependent on the state, and on the political system in which they were kept.
However, as further events of August XNUMH showed. It turns out that the Soviet military didn’t know how to perform at all, or as they say “to do” military coups, they were simply not trained in peacetime in the Soviet Army.
A specific feature of the Moscow military district since Stalin’s times was that the Moscow Region was the seat of the most privileged and combat-ready army and Ministry of Internal Affairs units at that time — the well-known Taman motorized rifle and Kantemirovskaya tank divisions, but of course the famous division of the internal troops named after Felix Dzerzhinsky, as well as many other separate units and formations.
It is well known that these two of the three units were used in the 1953 year to neutralize the forces of the NKVD, during the arrest of L. Beria and in the 1957 year, in the period of the struggle with the so-called “anti-party group”. After many years, they found a deal in August 1991 of the year.
At the end of the 80-ies, especially after the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, the Soviet command began to actively involve in the establishment of order mainly in the national suburbs, along with the internal troops also part of the airborne forces. Marines, like a fire brigade in 1990-1991. they moved from one region of the union to another; they did not stand aside from the Moscow events.
What were the forces and means that were involved in the August putsch? It is known that by the middle of the day 19 of August, more than 300 tanks were deployed to Moscow as part of the units and formations involved in the putsch, about 270 infantry fighting vehicles, 150 armored personnel carriers and 430 vehicles.
The total strength of all troops did not exceed 4600 people. These were the following units: the Dzerzhinsky division of the Ministry of the Interior, the 106-I Tula division of the airborne division and the local troops, the Taman motorized rifle division and the Kantemirovskaya tank division.
Thus, it turns out that the GKChP conspirators could not scrape together for a putsch on the territory of a multi-million Moscow even one full-blooded motorized rifle division, these troops barely had enough to take control of at least some of the most important facilities of the capital.
“The troops who were alarmed and hurriedly deployed to Moscow immediately felt the lack of political leadership, which was expressed in the vagueness of the goals set, in indecisive, often changing orders. Formally, it was necessary to take under guard Central Telegraph, TASS, the television center in Ostankino, radio stations, CHP, water-pressure stations, bridges and access roads to them.
But this set of objects testified to the mechanical transfer of the experience of past revolutions. The army entered the city, not understanding from whom it was necessary to protect the objects assigned to it, because no one threatened them.
Around the world, putschists, of course, if they are true putschists, are active, offensive. They take by storm or destroy their political opponents, their strongholds, their combat forces and means. ”
(N. Leonov “The Cross of Russia 1991-2000”).
So it was during the infamous military coup in Chile, 11 September 1973goda. It was not an ordinary garrison-type rebellion, but a well-planned military operation, in the center of which was a combined attack using aviation, artillery and infantry. The rebels were immediately occupied by all government and government agencies. The officers, who refused to support the coup, were immediately shot.
The rebels acted clearly, according to a predetermined plan, at about 10 in the morning, their troops appeared on the square immediately began shelling the presidential palace of La Moneda, in which President Allende was located and only about forty of his defenders.
Then, on the radio, the rebels handed the order of the junta number 2, which invited all the defenders of La Moneda to surrender, otherwise the palace would be taken by storm at 11 o'clock in the afternoon. The president refused. Soon, the rebels surrounded the palace and then opened massive fire on virtually all the windows, entrances and exits of the building.
At about 12 hours of the day, the presidential palace of La Moneda was attacked from the air planes of the Chilean Air Force by NURSami. A total of seventeen to nineteen volleys of missiles were made. The palace was burning. At 14 hours, the rebels occupied the lower floor of La Moneda, and by 15 hours, the old power in Chile was over.
As you can see, the Chileans used their military equipment during the coup strictly for their intended purpose, and not as a platform for the performance of some democratic leader.
Nowhere did the army have such a significant tradition of political participation as in Latin America. No wonder they say here: "If the army does not control itself, then it decides who controls."
It was the army in Latin America that was often viewed and regarded as the only force capable of ensuring order and stability, preventing chaos and anarchy.
It is on this continent that the army is always aware of itself as the supreme carrier and spokesman of common national interests. And therefore, if the constitutional power is not able to ensure stability and order in the country, then the army always comes to the rescue. As a national institution, it is able to intervene in political life and always defend the "unity of the nation."
But if the Latin American experience clearly was not suitable for the USSR, then it would be safe for our neighbors, the Poles, to learn how to properly and effectively introduce elementary order in our own country.
However, the Soviet leaders clearly forgot all this Polish experience, and in December 1981 the internal political situation in People’s Poland at that time was much more complicated and dangerous than in August 1991 in the USSR, and yet the introduction of the state of emergency was V. Yaruzelsky carried out flawlessly and with great effect.
It is known that the Poles in the introduction of state of emergency throughout the country involved up to 70 thousand soldiers, 30 thousand police officers, 1750 tanks, 1900 armored personnel carriers, 9 thousand trucks and cars, several squadrons of helicopters and transport aircraft. All these forces were concentrated in major cities and industrial centers.
With the start of the operation, all telephone communications in the country were turned off, borders and petrol stations were closed, passes were entered for departure from any settlement, curfews were established and correspondence was censored. Ten days later all over the country the strikes were over, all demonstrations were dispersed, the effectiveness of the planned measures was evident, and as a result about 4 thousand strikers were arrested. http://maxpark.com/community/politic/content/2077722
"In Moscow, nothing of the kind happened. The troops entered and stood up. It came to oddities: in 13.50, one battalion of the 106 division of the Airborne Forces, with which General A. Lebed arrived, approached the White House, where Yeltsin was heading. He deployed the tanks astern to the building, and the barrels of the guns looked gloomily into the space towards an unknown enemy. A. Lebed seemed to be carrying out an order to protect state institutions, and the surrounding people perceived these tanks as those that had gone over to the opponents of the State Emergency Committee.
It is impossible not to smile, reading the memories of operetta witnesses, with the tragic reflection of the events of those days. The troops moved through the streets, accompanied by traffic police cars, as if it was a question of breeding parade calculations.
B. Yeltsin, who was driving that morning from the state dacha in Arkhangelsk to the White House on Krasnopresnenskaya Embankment in his car with a flashing light accompanied by guards, overtook combat vehicles that readily gave way to him. From time to time his heart was compressed from fear that he was about to be arrested, and the officers only took the cap and ate their eyes, rushing past them.
Muscovites generally died of surprise, looking like tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and armored vehicles meekly stopped in front of the red traffic lights, letting in ordinary urban traffic.
All this was like some kind of theater of the absurdity. "(N. Leonov" The Russian Way of the Cross 1991-2000 ").
The only positive thing was that, in spite of the enormous amount of military equipment that was introduced into the capital, the military did not suppress or maim the residents and guests of the huge metropolis. True, unfortunately, there were no casualties, but fortunately they turned out to be insignificant, only three dead and five wounded.
There was such a thing, when, being under a degree, some revolutionaries posed for foreign photos, tried to lie down under the tank tracks, of course, they didn’t know that the tank driver could not stand the nerves and quite accidentally he can get off the mountain brake by his leg, dressed in rough kirzacs, and then all, the heroic death for democracy in the form of a human body into a cake on Moscow asphalt would be provided to someone for sure.
As a result, the extremely clumsy and illiterate actions of the putschists showed that the Soviet leaders-members of the Emergency Committee did not properly take advantage of the last stronghold of statehood that was once the pride of the Soviet country and its Armed Forces.
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