Step right
“Death to the enemies!” Reads the inscription above the entrance to the fifth floor of the House of Trade Unions.
“Death to the enemy!” - displayed with a black marker on my army green helmet.
“Death to the enemies!” We shout in chorus several times a day in response to the duty officer “Glory to the nation!”.
We are the “Right Sector”
Your name is Field
To get into the ranks of the "Right Sector" was much easier than I imagined. 1 February, a couple of weeks after the first clashes on the Grushevsky street, I change my hair, say goodbye to my beard, put on simpler clothes and walk up to the Right Sector tent on Maydan Nezalezhnosti.
- Sign up on the fifth floor can be. Ask the guards to be held, - good-naturedly advises the young sentinel, basking near a homemade stove of two metal barrels.
Strict security of the House of Trade Unions is also located to the recruits.
- Let's go, let's go, reinforcements, - is called to show me the way a man of years for 40. - And then to the right, and not in self-defense?
A short climb allows me not to answer the question. However, today I’ll ask him a few more times.
- More recruits? - now it is already surprised the fifth hour of the floor. - Guys, look: rod and rod. Catch up on the corridor, over there the kid came in front of you, went to the interview.
The interview is conducted by a tall young guy, who looks around 25 - as it turns out later, one of the senior officers of the PS. Black trousers, camouflage jacket, long Cossack oselededezh, protruding from under tucked balaclava.
- Why did you decide to join the "Right Sector"? - he asks the main question, without asking any documents, or even names.
- After the lawlessness that occurred on Grushevsky, I consider you the only organization able to protect the Maidan in the fight against the regime. I want to help with this, - I reply to him with the phrase he has learned at home. The boy who came with me says something about the traditions of the Cossacks and national pride. Commander, our answers are obviously satisfied.
“I must warn you that you are joining a combat organization.” You may have to deal with law enforcement agencies for your actions, be responsible before the court, you may face deprivation of liberty, health and even life, ”he says, apparently, the disclaimer has repeatedly repeated, showing a bandaged hand for persuasiveness: on Grushevskogo stung.
They ask us about special skills. Translators and programmers are very necessary - PS is preparing for the “release”. I want to learn about the life of ordinary soldiers, so I don’t rush to “thieves” positions - I imagine myself to be a simple employee of a supermarket from Kherson.
- Martial arts, firearms weapon?
“I shoot a hunting one, but there is no gun, no permission.”
- Already good.
- And what is there to shoot? I thought the cops had weapons ...
- It will be necessary, and we will have it, - the commander darkens.
Having dealt with the skills, he directs us to one of the units (to the right along the corridor, the third door on the other side). There we are met by the squad leader - even younger than the previous one.
- The radical (the names and pseudonyms of all the characters, except public figures, are changed. - “Reporter”), - he introduces himself. - Come up with a pseudo.
From now on my name is Field. The radical writes to itself in a notebook my “real” name, which I invented on the go, age and contact details, promising to destroy the records at the first danger.
- Welcome to the "Right Sector", fighters!
Registration took us a little over an hour. The night is approaching, and I ask for "to a friend for things," promising to return in the morning to finally be quartered. The boy who came with me asks for permission to spend the night at home.
- And today I want to be in time for my birthday. I just turned 18. The arrival in the "Right Sector" - the main gift, until the age of majority did not take.
- Ok, leave the location of the detachment allowed. Tomorrow you will receive passes; no entry is allowed on the fifth floor.
"Right Sector" took responsibility for the beginning of the January clashes on Grushevskogo and believes that the victory in them was won thanks to him
Pioneer camp for overgrown
- “Right Sector”, rise !!! - the loud cry of the floor attendant is much better than the alarm clock. - Wake up !!! Wake up !!!
The fifth floor is at eight in the morning. The detachment commanders come to the aid of the duty officer, not hesitating to wake the fighters asleep in the corridor with light kicks. To assemble a simple bed (I have a sleeping place and a sleeping bag), wash up, have a cup of coffee - it takes about ten minutes. Then the construction and morning exercises - "rohanka."
In the "Right Sector" I have a few days. Our squad "Zasika" is located in the double office of the Federation of Trade Unions and its surroundings. The smaller room has been living for a week as a cold Radical, in a larger one - several fighters. For the first couple of days, I’m trying to make it stop, and I’m afraid to catch the eye of my former colleague, and now PS press secretary, Artyom Skoropadsky, so that he doesn’t recognize and betray. But the place is small, and had to move into the corridor.
“Ruhanka” is a set of exercises consisting of a run to the European Square and back and simple gymnastics near the tent of the Right Sector (at the bottom of the stairs leading to the October Palace). Tolerant even for me, the guy is not particularly athletic. In addition to charging during the day, there are usually two workouts: hand-to-hand combat and maneuvers with heavy shields. That, in principle, is all concern on a peaceful day.
There is another regular duty: internal - at the entrance to the fifth floor, near the elevator and near the headquarters and external - near the PS tent. The latter is a real chance to experience people's love on yourself, especially on a day off. The fact is that the tent receives help from citizens: money, food, clothing, helmets, cigarettes, gasoline and foam plastic for Molotov cocktails, etc., and so on. Carry bags, if not bags. On the very first Sunday of my duty, for 15 minutes of the national assembly, the “Right Sector” was given about 2 thousand UAH.
- Boys, you are heroes! Take some tea with cakes, and in the evening we will bring you a cake - two middle-aged women are circling near our stove.
- In the evening, another shift will be. But carry it anyway, we pay for generosity with stretched courtesy. For example, we allow to be photographed with us on the background of a banner, patiently listen to advice from the “sofa fighters” - people's love requires sacrifice.
During the training with shields, we demonstrate the spectacle in exchange for the resulting bread. To stare at how a squad in 15 – 20 seconds builds an almost impenetrable (in theory) “turtle”, awkwardly marches in it and withstands the attack of the alleged enemy, gathers in the evenings a couple of hundreds of onlookers.
- Detachment "Zasika", build a "turtle" !!! Close the shields! Hold on!
- We are “Golden Eagle”, to you all ... surrender, - this is another squad that came to help us with the training.
Right there, stones, logs, firecrackers are flying into the “turtle” (carefully, eyes!). We are punched at a running start, they are bathed on the shields with batons, snatched from the front building (lying, you won’t take it - the Right Sector doesn’t give up!). We stand. Applause, the curtain.
- Boys, why all this? We are for a peaceful protest. Lord God for that ... - a little brisk old woman unexpectedly jumps out between the "attackers" and the "defenders". Everyone's laughter drowns out her last words, a pair of fighters carefully takes the granny away from the parade ground.
Then we rummage on YouTube in search of training videos. We show them to newcomers and guys from other units with a mandatory description of the details.
- Here, it is dark, it is not visible, but here I stood, see how it is us!
- And my petard exploded right under my foot!
- Yeah, and remember, he grabbed you for a shield and began to pull out, but I hold, I will not let ...
Indeed, more than others, the Right Sector loves only the Right Sector. During the month of the truce between the January and February clashes, the sense of self-importance of the fighters grew every day.
“But if we had not, no one would have repealed these draconian laws.”
- Yes, we climbed up under the grenades, and sat down in Self-defense in the bushes, came to all the ready ...
It says the youth, who are on the fifth floor about three quarters. In our squad, for example, only two are older than 30 years: the small, eternally cold Fur coat (near 40) and the merry fellow Volya (for 50) are simple workers from the central Ukrainian regions.
In the smoking room you can catch the people and more interesting. For example, veterans of the UNA-UNSO (included in the PS, but was stationed separately at that time), who cheered up and put on the front camouflage camouflage. Twisting the mustache, they retell the old fighting adventures:
- ... The people of Dudaev somehow set a box of German beer for them - they don’t drink muslims. So the guys changed into Russian uniforms and with this box went to their tank company. They found some suckers there and they say: little brothers, lend us a tank for an hour or two - we must drive them to the village, and we will treat you with beer. They agreed, and ours climbed into the tank and, without even leaving, direct fire on the Russian artillery battery ... And they started a panic on the radio: “Czechs” are coming, “Czechs”! In general, the Russian artillery of the Russian tank company also laid the whole. Dudaev then set a box of beer for them.
- Of course, they returned to Ukraine, but here nobody needs anybody. They began to drink with longing. We, in Cherkassy, I remember, went into one gendel, and there either garbage or gangsters are sitting there. And the song is ordered all the time, you know, "Gentlemen, Officers." We explained to them in an amicable way that this song touches our aesthetic feelings, and they began to bychit. Well, Seryoga blew off the tower, pulled out a grenade from his pocket, pulled the check into them ...
Young people listen with wide open mouths. Such stories here is a sort of part of the meager entertainment program, a way to kill free time, which remains between the workouts and the duty. To the only chessboard three turns: one of the amateurs, the other of the masters, the third of the players in checkers. Books across the floor — part of the patriotic literature was provided by Trident (a nationalist organization belonging to the PS), part was taken from the library of the Ukrainian House on parole. The cards were soon banned, although they were playing squats and pushups. A separate company regularly meets to play "mafia." Here, their funny nuances: on the "mafia" everyone shouts, as a rule, "Gang get out!", And on the "police" - "Down with the garbage!" And "ACAB!" (From the English All Cops Are Bastards - "all bastards "). The creek stands on the whole floor, and at night the attendants unceremoniously disperse the players - just like counselors in a pioneer camp during a quiet hour.
More sophisticated cultural events also occur. Periodically, someone brings tickets to events in the Ukrainian House, but there are few people who want to go to concerts of opera performers and poets. A full house is going to its own concerts of the Right Sector, for example, when musicians from the group “Socir Perun” or writer and showman Antin Muharsky, who is also Orest Lyuty, come to visit.
- I am glad that now a new generation of young conscious people has grown up, ready to take up arms. Maybe you can break this vicious circle in which we found ourselves, starting the national liberation struggle at the end of 1980's. If it were not for you, these “three bogatyrs” would have been trampled a long time ago, - Muharsky said such a preamble before the start of the speech.
“To be honest, I became a nationalist thanks to his songs,” the Radical whispers in my ear.
Moskal, Vichny Barbarian, Vichny Ham
Brod rosiyyskoe earths!
Worse zaarbat znischit temple -
All tse vm_yut moskalі!
...
Brother-Rosіyanin, zrozumіy,
Blessed heaven and earth:
In sobi moskalya kill,
Kill sobi moskalya !!!
- this is already in unison with the protesters sings Orest Luty.
White Paradise Builders
Of course, “Muscovites”, or Russians, are among the “Right Sector”. Nationality here, on the one hand, is not accepted to ask, but on the other - many are proud of the conditional multinational composition. It is said that among the demonstrators even a faithful Jew lived absolutely calmly at one time, although it was hard to believe in it.
- Hey, little one, and you're not a Jew, by any chance? - hangs in the smoking room over the young boy Mars, football ultras from Dnepropetrovsk.
“No, that you, that you, I am a full-blooded Ukrainian,” the young man replies with bravado, clinging to the wall just in case.
- Yes, I'm kidding, joking, relax. Give a smoke better - you, Jew, stocks, I guess.
In fact, the friendly atmosphere reigning on the fifth floor, something akin to Gogol's "partnership" - does not provide for such conflicts. Even a formal appeal in the "Right Sector" is "friend." But there is always room for ideological disputes.
Commitment to the national-patriotic ideology, of course, is a kind of "default option" among the fighters, but everyone really has his own. The “Right Sector” is a practically informal association of several radical organizations, and besides, the majority of activists generally come from the street. Therefore, views range from romantic nationalism and “loyalty to the glorious Cossack traditions” to overt neo-fascism.
The appearance of the first victims among the protesters on the Grushevsky street only inspired the Right Sector.
In the morning, near the sinks in the toilet, I bump into a pumped-up 25 guy with a huge swastika tattooed on his back. Bending over the mirror, he carefully shaves his head with a disposable razor. This is one of the fighters of a small detachment of the Donetsk Ultras - D88 (88 is a numerical designation for the abbreviation HH, or Heil Hitler!). Celtic crosses, Dr. boots Martens, Thor Steinar jackets, knives on a belt - in general, real warriors of the white race.
- We will build a white paradise! Sieg Heil! Sieg Heil! - jokingly welcome their players in the "mafia".
“What do you understand,” says the youngest of D88. - Hitler was right, did you read Mein Kampf in general?
“Hitler was right in many things,” one of the fighters of my squad, 24, a year-old postgraduate historian from a southern regional center, already admits. - But he was an imperialist, he wanted to enslave other peoples. I am for nationalism in a single Ukraine, we don’t need someone else’s. Although hard methods are needed. My will, I would have shot so ten million in our country, and just shot five million more in the camps! Clear the Ukrainian nation is necessary, and then a whole bunch of hohlyatskogo cattle divorced.
- What will make you different from commies? - the general favorite Bulbash enters the dispute. The young merry fellow, who made everyone understand his native language, he came from somewhere in Grodno to support, in his words, the new stage of the “national liberation struggle”. - The main thing is the struggle against Katsapa imperialism, with Putin, who wants to recreate his Great Russia.
- True, Bulbash, you say. But never mind, we’ll manage with us now, then we’ll pick you up, drop Luka from the throne, and then we'll deal with Putin. Free the prison of nations!
The “liberation of the prison of nations” is also ambiguous. Some fighters talk about the freedom of the oppressed peoples of the Caucasus, Siberia and Central Asia, some - about the "dirty chocks" that need to be brought down.
For these disputes are days, evenings and nights. Although at night for many there are things and more interesting - patrols.
At night, all the cats - titushki
- No, guys, whatever you want, but I'm tired of sitting idle. There the people from the neighboring detachment go to the titushki to catch, I'm with them - this is the very first evening on the fifth floor I hear from one of our guys.
To 10 – 11 evenings in the corridor, several groups of four to five people in full uniform gather and go for a walk around the territory of Maidan. In the hands, in contrast to training, the “arguments” are processed pieces of reinforcement, steel pipes, or, lucky enough, baseball bats. Now PS - counterintelligence and the moral police at the same time.
- Titushek, titushki lead! "Right Sector", wear masks! - distributed on the floor in half an hour. On the stairs with twisted arms they drag an abutting peasant with a bag on his head.
- Guys, what about you, what about you? - he only mutters.
- Shut up bitch! Guys, let me give it to u ... off my foot. Nnn! Who it? Where did you find him?
- quit! - someone from command interferes with a situation. - Take him to the toilet. Nobody comes here anymore, let the interrogation hold!
After interrogation, sometimes someone has to wash the toilet from the blood. At night, up to a dozen detainees are brought in, more often three or four. Reasons are the simplest:
- It seemed suspicious, they were asked to show documents, in response, he began to “bychit and swing rights”.
- Stood and scolded "Right Sector".
- He said that from the "Right Sector", and the very documents from the shock.
When the reasons are no longer to be found, the fishing begins. The guy from the next squad shows me some souvenir 200-hryvnia bills.
- We find a suspicious client, I approach him, I say: they say, self-defense forces have run over me, I need help, I am ready to pay. Showing money. If he agrees, then the titushka means, and we knit it.
On the muzhik detained on one of the nights with the certificate of the assistant to the people's deputy from the Communist Party of Ukraine and all of the clubs hidden under the jacket. There is no limit to the enthusiasm of the "Right Sector".
- Here it is, lead here! Nnn, bitch, get it! What b ... d kommyatskaya, Maidan wanted to attack? Nnn!
- Boys, boys, and let me go, can I have him? - A girl of years 18, a couple of hours ago, running around the floor and showing all the photos of cats on the screen of the phone, is also eager for execution.
- To quit, everyone left, I said !!! - once again yelling one of the commanders. “You will tear him apart before the interrogation begins!”
Formally, night patrols by the leadership of the PS are not approved, but they are not condemned either. Only occasionally you can hear something like “stop, and then better than the“ Berkut ”. But it is a rarity. But the competition, announced to us as a friendly "near-free" combat organization C14, is met with a bang. “The competition for the best amateur video about how dangerous it is to be a titushka. The video work should illustrate the possible consequences of working with a criminal power. The prize fund is 3 UAH thousands, ”reads an ad on the page of PS VKontakte.
When the Radical recovers, we also pull him into the patrol. I join the same group.
Frosty Maydanovskim evening put forward in the direction of Grushevskogo. You can patrol only the territory inside the barricades, although in the first days after the clashes, the aunts were searched all over Kiev. First we descend to the Globe, where we proudly walk past frightened guards and expensive shop windows. A moment so magnificent that we even decide to take a picture.
- Damn, how expensive everything is! Look, soup for 25 UAH! - the guy from Lviv region is perplexed. - Damn, and who only pays for these sushi for a half hundred ?!
We are cautiously approaching the barricade near the Dynamo stadium, where, from our side, the police officers are broadcasting a documentary about the corruption of Interior Minister Vitaly Zakharchenko, and from theirs - the Ninth Company, Fedor Bondarchuk.
- Good evening, we are the "Right Sector". How to post? Suspicious elements, order offenders? - Radically greet the Radical with the self-defense guards of the barricades.
- And yours, b ... d, what the matter? - A strong man in soiled soot from his burnt camouflage tires “runs into” on the move. As it turns out later - the head of the guard.
- We are patrolling the Maidan, are looking for aunts.
- You, b ... d, surrendered Maidan. Who promised to free travel on Grushevskogo, eh? P ... blow from here before it's too late. After midnight, no one except our hundreds of Self-Defense will enter this zone.
The Right Sector, together with the Afghans, indeed a few days earlier made a statement about its readiness to release the barricades on the Grushevsky street if the detainees were released during the January clashes. Not everyone likes this.
- Yes, what is the use of Grushevskogo? Immediately, everyone will be swept away from the top in 10 minutes, I have already fought here. And we have about fifty boys in prisons sitting! - unsuccessfully trying to explain the Radical.
At the other barricade we are met more friendly.
- Oh, "Right Sector"! And how to call you if the cops begin to attack? We are here only eight people on duty, scattered the same as kittens!
Talking about offensive and defense tactics, our main goal — the search for titushki — somehow goes to the background. Having froze slightly, we go to the Ukrainian house to drink tea and get stuck in the library or in the cinema for almost an hour.
Already at the exit, Radical pulls out a laser flashlight (“to beat the cops in the eyes”) and, fooling around, begins to shine with a green beam either through the windows of the Dnepr Hotel or the UNIAN building, then through the barricades. Another laser pointer soon responds to the barricades. Together with the Radical they “probe” the windows of the Cabinet of Ministers, then they cross in the sky and arrange unimaginable dances. We laugh heartily.
“Star Wars, a Jedi duel, honestly,” the Radical pours in.
Already near the House of Trade Unions, it turns out that another group from our detachment has already brought a titushka to the floor. Some were captured by patrols from non-PS ultra-right units C14 and Narnia. The Radical cannot forgive this.
- And let's go to the "Bill", there is always some sort of drunk drunk hanging out. Maybe we catch someone.
But there we are waiting for failure. Slowly, in principle, the Radical, seeing drunk, begins to shame them for violating Prohibition, while the rank and file itch.
- Boys, well, what are you, well, drank a little. We are ours, from self-defense, from the Chernigov tent.
- P ... n, I also self-defense. They drink in the middle of the night in public view, and then they will say about the Maidan that this is a bunch of drunkards. No, well, if absolutely unbearable, you hide in your tent and drink! - Mutters Radical, forcing the next "vacationer" to remove the bottle.
By the way, in the “Right Sector” nobody drinks in principle, although there are only a few real stretchers. Just such rules. A couple of times I saw one of the commanders, having quarreled with someone, grabbed things and said that he would go for a drink, but he would not return to the territory of Maidan and spend the night. Ultra-neurasthenic Mars, having learned that the girl had changed him, first broke his fists against the walls of the toilet, and then, “namutiv” the cognac bag, left to drink it at his end of the corridor. That's all precedents.
This evening, we still meet in the binding. On our remark about alcohol, the company met near the same “Bill” begins to “bychit”. Nerves are at the limit, and we lively "twist" the most arrogant. The rest take out knives and traumata.
- Hey, “Right Sector”, are you completely swollen ?! We are our own, Ultras Dynamo!
- So what are you ?!
- What are you ?!
The conflict can be resolved amicably. Annoyed, we still circle around Khreshchatyk - everything is calm. On the radicals grumble for softness.
- Where in the subway? Who are they? - in the underpass under the Maidan, we are stopped by another Self-Defense Detachment. - It was yours that said, after 23: 00, we patrol the transition, 17-i hundred. Go away!
- Hundreds of what you really are, it's easy for us to pass!
“You'll pass over the top, the radicals are fucking.”
We have to obey - they are more. But we are not angry at Self-Defense for the first time, and conflicts between PS and hundreds occur regularly.
- No, you saw what their shape, what equipment. We are like rags near them. They got hold of party money, they ate their muzzles, now they are thumping from idleness.
- Yeah, and the turmoil will begin, the first will run.
They say that the PS command regularly goes to Andrew Parubiy’s Self-Defense meetings for lack of discipline and clashes with hundreds. Several times during my stay on the fifth floor we were alerted - to go deal with someone from Freedom or other units. A couple of times we barricaded ourselves on the floor, waiting for the self-defense attack. Nerves during a truce at the limit of all, but, as a rule, conflicts can be resolved peacefully.
- Come better with us in the "white campaign" today! Fun! - Mars offers, when the next morning I retell the details of his patrol to him. - Here I am the other day two hachey near the metro ot ... l for a sweet soul. I grabbed the flip-flop by the hair, she shouted: “What are you doing, are you doing this?”, And I told her: “Keep quiet, you bitch ... with your eyes!”
I can only politely refuse.
The atmosphere is heating up
For such uncomplicated entertainment days are flying. The absence of any kind of active actions and communication with the leadership gradually demoralizes the detachments. The efforts of “Trizub” (namely, this organization has assumed almost the entire leadership of the “Right Sector”) to support at least some semblance of army discipline seem to be in vain. Attendants on posts do not find out, the schedule is not respected. An attempt to fight the partisans during night patrols also flies under the tail. The command forbids leaving the fifth floor after the end of the day, but patrols now simply began to leave earlier. Discontent among fighters is growing.
“Here, before the Trident pulled the blanket over itself, it was easier to finish the titushki,” two ultras from somewhere in the southern regions complain to each other in the corridor. - Right now you will not hit him once again.
- Nafig generally need to raise them here. Some interrogations, a consequence. They took him over the barricades and they riveted it well.
With me, D88 violates the strict rule that you must ask permission of the commander before you go before the lined squad.
- Fuck you on x ..., - throws one of the ultras in response to our remark about the violation of discipline.
Anger is growing among all. The squabble begins for the bullet-proof vests arriving in a limited number - the fighters compare them according to their protective characteristics, trying to “pull out” the protection more precisely. At the training for hand-to-hand combat, the instructor explains:
- Remember: "Golden Eagle" we only beat on the neck, the rest of the places they have are protected by ammunition. "Argument" you can break the mount on the helmet, beat with a fist immediately into the Adam's apple.
“You can kill as well,” either asks, or someone resent out of order.
- Yes, you can. As for me, there is nothing to stand on ceremony with the "golden eagles", there they are dear. The main thing - forget about this blow after everything is over.
The heck of a two someone here will forget. From nothing to do, we modernize the weapon: we reinforce the bits with nails, weigh the pipes, a couple of guys, having got an anvil from Afghans, forged short blades from rebar.
Prepare and more serious weapons. I do not know who responded to the call of the PS leader Dmitry Yarosh to bring a “firearm” to the Maidan — I never found such a weapon, but there was a pyrotechnic laboratory on the fifth floor.
It was before the explosion, during which one arm was torn off by one of the fighters, and the second one damaged the eye. Then the "Right Sector" declared a terrorist act against itself: they say, under the guise of medicines, a bomb was passed to the floor, which exploded when they printed out the package. The next day, the police reported on the investigation of the fact of careless handling of explosives.
The leader of the "Right Sector" Dmitry Yarosh calls himself a "commander, not a politician," but he has enough populism in his speeches
This morning I was not on the floor, but when I returned, I found complete chaos there. For several hours the command was repulsed from journalists, the posts were not changed, the soldiers did not say anything. Then they repeated the official version of the attack. However, in the evening on the floor rumors spread that some reagents exploded in the pyrotechnic laboratory.
She was located directly opposite the only active toilet that served as a part-time smoking room. Chemistry students working in the laboratory were always scolded for the stench in the corridor of their experiments with sulfur, bertolet salt, and God knows what. According to eyewitnesses, the explosion occurred there.
“I jumped out into the corridor, and from there the kid flies out, already without a hand, blood gushing, and yelling:“ Finish me, finish it! ”Well, we twisted it, then the ambulance pulled herself up,” one of the medical aid station workers said during the break.
Some people dressed as “civilians” come to the command on the fifth floor. From scraps of quiet conversation, I hear only a proposal to evacuate the laboratory to a basement. The next night it is transported, we are instructed to carry sealed bags and boxes to the minibus.
It turns out that for the last two weeks, the high command has been busy working with the regions. Every now and then on the page of Substation VKontakte there was a message about the appointment of the head of the organization in a particular area. The recruits coming from the west told how, on the ground, the Right Sector undermines Self-Defense, seizes local administrations.
The agitmaterial is also leaving Kiev for the regions: a print of at least 10 with thousands of copies of an interview with Yarosh “Ukrainian Truth”.
Yarosh periodically snoops around the floor here and there - it is clear that he has a lot of work. But it seems that general demoralization makes it necessary to find time for the fighters - one day we are told that now in the evening before the prayer there will be meetings with the “providnik”. People noticeably inspired.
The meeting takes place in one of the cramped cabinets of trade unionists, where two squads are hardly squeezed into. Yarosh himself, taut, in a field uniform, fits easily into the image of "the commander, not the policy." However, his speech is full of overt populism.
- Friends, you are without a doubt the vanguard of this revolution, the best part of it. Everyone understands this. "Right Sector" has widespread support among the population. Only Russian imperialists and European liberasts criticize us, who do not need the Ukrainian national revolution and the resulting strong national state, he begins under approving fighters of fighters.
“The end is not far off, the Right Sector will play its key role in the current protests, which will be appreciated after the victory. That is why now the most important task is to create a national organization, not only with fighting, but also with a political wing, which would ensure our future presence in power. I think that after the victory, the “Right Sector” should form a powerful vertical power unit of the new Ukrainian state, this is the only way for us to complete the national revolution and restore order in Ukraine. Everything is in your hands, fighters!
Present noticeably liven up. Yarosh also encourages:
- Yes, we don’t like a lot in other organizations and parties that are now participating in the revolution. But splitting the movement is mistaken from a tactical point of view. You shouldn’t go into open conflicts with the same “Freedom” or Self-Defense forces, it makes us weaker. And the “Right Sector” should remain strong: believe me, we will still need strength to deal with these weaklings after a common victory!
For the first time in almost two weeks among the “Right Sector”, I felt really creepy after these words and a flurry of applause they caused.
Farewell of the Slavs
For a long time, posing as a person whose views on violence, xenophobia, and racism are frankly alien, turned out to be not an easy task - by the end of the second week my nerves were shaken. In addition, after the information about the explosion leaked to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Right Sector begins to “paranoid”: everyone understands that there are spies on the floor and they need to be looked for.
It seems there is no big difference between journalists and the police here. With journalists, however, one has to meet more often - the stream of colleagues eager for interviews with Yarosh does not dry out, but they are also given incomplete and distorted information.
- Wait, wait, here's about the Muscovites and Russia, it is better to cross out, - two commanders in the corridor are deducting an interview sent to an interview by some foreign publication. - Replace better with criticism of oligarchs - they love it.
When, after the titushka brought to the floor, the film crew of one of the national channels begins to break, it gets furiously repulsed.
- What are you, it’s impossible to grab people in broad daylight, I'll call your press secretary now! - shouts journalist.
- Girl, we do not have to explain anything to you! Leave the floor immediately - the film crew is almost pushed back into the elevator.
- It is high time that any of these journalists were caught and slapped properly. To others it was not known - it is already then someone shouts out.
In general, it becomes clear: it's time to throw. I already warned the radical that I would have to return to Kherson for work, at least in order to take another vacation. I promise to contact local representatives of the PS and in case of mobilization urgently go to Kiev.
- Field! So sorry you are leaving, the commander told me goodbye. - Hold on and be careful. Come back
The guys from the squad arrange even warmer wires. We embrace and exchange “non-palladium” telephone numbers. Feeling pioneer camp with me again.
Instead of an epilogue
A few days later, shooting begins on the Maidan.
Next time I meet the guys from the squad on Thursday, February 20, in the hospital on the territory of the Mikhailovsky Cathedral. One of my acquaintances was lightly wounded and walking here with a friend.
I learn that they were evacuated from the House of Trade Unions quickly enough, on the front line they were protecting mainly the area near the Right Sector tent. There are no dead and no one was seriously injured - they relocated to the shops on Khreshchatyk.
- Field, come to us! It’s really safer here, ”the boy, who, jokingly arguing back and forth a week and a half ago, said that he didn’t need armor on his back, said looking into my eyes, because he was not going to retreat. His childish face was gray and haggard, but the fanatical light of the struggle remained.
VIEW FROM LEFT RIGHT
The events described in this report took place in the first half of February during a fragile truce between the authorities and protesters. A few days after I left Right Sector, a tragedy occurred in the center of Kiev, killing more than 80 people. I know almost nothing about the further fate of the heroes of the reportage - I only know that after those bloody events they all survived. Words can not convey how glad I am.
Although, of course, I have never concealed my negative attitude towards Ukrainian, Russian, Jewish, Tatar, German and any other nationalism and consider this ideology alien to a democratic society. Of course, xenophobia, militarism, racism and neo-fascism are unacceptable for me. All this for two weeks I have seen enough.
I was encouraged to begin work on this report by the rapid growth in the popularity of the Right Sector and other right-wing radicals after the January clashes on the Grushevsky street. Popularity among the participants in the revolution, the purpose of which is to overthrow the undemocratic power. What was the reason, I wondered? In their readiness for decisive action? In new faces? In open criticism of annoying opposition politicians? Maybe a lack of information?
For example, with the phenomenon of street political terror, most Ukrainians met only last year, when "citizens of sports appearance", called titushki, began to attack opposition rallies and beat up activists. I remember the thought sounded that this is a direct result of the stay in power of people with a criminal past.
But for many of my friends, such attacks are a constant risk for many years now. They are committed by those who are called ultra-right militants: football fans, members of radical nationalist organizations and parties, fighters of informal neo-fascist and racist groups. The object of the attack: activists of left, trade union, student, feminist and LGBT organizations, some human rights activists and journalists. For the right, they are ideological opponents - “anti-fascists,” or simply “mongrels.” Ample reason for causing grievous bodily.
Such attacks, unfortunately, are not uncommon. It cannot be said that they were hushed up, but, as a rule, they did not receive wide publicity either. Most of them simply did not notice or treated them as a conflict of marginal subcultures. Few openly endorsed the aggression against the "commies" or "perverts." The situation worsened last year, when, under the slogans of the “fight against fascism,” the authorities launched a campaign against the united opposition, which includes the nationalist party Freedom. The word "anti-fascist" instantly became abusive, in response to any criticism of the nationalists, it was often possible to hear accusations of collaborating with the "wicked owner".
In the current revolution, activists of Freedom, other nationalist organizations, some football fans took part from the very first days. Despite the fact that the early slogans of European integration and democratization of power, most of them were frankly alien. The ultra-right took the responsibility to ensure law and order and immediately tried to oust the demonstrators - “mongrels” from the Euromaidan. These first attempts at political terror within the democratic revolution were suppressed and condemned, but over time the possibilities of the radicals grew.
December 1 crowd, consisting mainly of representatives of right-wing organizations and football ultras, tried to storm the presidential administration. Almost immediately from the stage of Maidan, they were called provocateurs, but could not be stopped. The authorities were able to present victims of the senseless and unsuccessful storming of the veveshnikov as a counterargument to the hard disperse of the first Euromaidan, as well as a reason not to consider the current protests peaceful. Participants in the assault on provocations were offended, but they did not refuse to participate in the revolution and soon created an informal association, which is now known as the Right Sector.
Perhaps the main unifying thesis for the PS was not even nationalism, but the acceptance of violence as an acceptable and effective means of achieving goals. The authorities ignored the demands of a peaceful protest, the attempts to disperse, the threat from the aunts - all this forced the Maidan to hand over a mandate for violence to the radicals. When in January the Right Sector claimed responsibility for the start of the clashes on the Grushevsky street, opposition politicians were called provocateurs, calling for an end to the fighting.
When I got to the Right Sector, I found there much less of those very street militants, whose victims were my acquaintances. They were in a frank minority. But in two weeks I did not meet a single person who allowed the victory of the revolution in a peaceful way. Everyone was eager for blood: “Berkut”, Yanukovich, deputies from the Party of Regions, and sometimes opposition politicians.
After the tragedy that took place on 18 – 20 in February in the center of Kiev, for some reason it seemed to me that the first step of Maidan would be to condemn the possibility of a new bloodshed, to refuse to use force, to disband armed units. That did not happen.
In those days, I had to convince a friend from Moscow that the role of radical nationalists, including the Right Sector, in our revolution was greatly exaggerated. “I saw them, they are few, and they lose support. Our goal is democracy, the overthrow of a corrupt usurper, and not a restriction of the rights of Russian or Russian-speaking citizens, ”I said.
“What, then, are these people among you, who openly say that democracy is not their option. After all, all the propaganda against your revolution was based on them! Why don't you deny them? ”My interlocutor did not let up.
I did not find the answer. I just remembered how many of my friends - protesters in response to the replies of Southeast residents about “Bandera and extremists” on Maidan beat their breasts with a shout “yes, consider me a Bandera and an extremist!”.
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