Riot day
October 3 celebrates its professional holiday as OMON fighters - the “Mobile Special Purpose Squad”, as after the police were renamed the police, they began to call the “Special Purpose Police Militia”. Exactly 27 years ago, 3 in October 1988, as early as in the Soviet Union, the 19 of the first OMON units was created. Fourteen of them were based in the territory of the RSFSR. The need to create special police units that would be able to participate in curbing riots and fight organized crime, began to be felt very strongly in the years of perestroika. The political situation in some regions of the USSR was rapidly heating up, and the criminogenic situation worsened. In many cities of the country, youth criminal gangs actively manifested themselves, “racketeering” raised its head, in some union republics inter-ethnic relations became aggravated. In this situation, the leadership of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs decided to create special units to strengthen the fight against crime, group and mass offenses.
How riot police were created and developed
Of course, the need for well-trained and operational police units that were not engaged in carrying out the daily patrol service, but who were able to fulfill the role of the operational reserve, existed before the restructuring. As early as 1946, a special company was formed, whose duties included guarding the world leaders who arrived to attend the Yalta Conference. After the end of the conference, the company was transferred to Moscow, and here, on its basis, they began to create a Reserve regiment of war veterans. They selected the best-trained and enduring, who were constantly improved in physical and combat training. They placed a reserve regiment in Ivanteevka near Moscow. In 1948, on the basis of the reserve regiment, a stationary training center was created for the personnel of the Moscow police, and in 1954, the Reserve regiment was renamed the Operational regiment of the police. In 1958, the cavalry division was attached to the operational regiment, and in 1981, the operational regiment was renamed the 2 regiment of the patrol and patrol service of the police. The regiment was in charge of maintaining public order at public events, including the Moscow Festival of Youth and Students, at the XXII Olympic Games 1980 of the year. October 23 1987 in Moscow - in accordance with the order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR No. 0119, on the basis of the 2 regiment of the patrol and inspection service of the police of the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of Moscow, a special police unit was created, which selected the most trained and physically developed officers. 3 October 1988 g. The special police unit of the Main Department of Internal Affairs of Moscow was renamed the Moscow OMON.
In the "second capital" of Russia, St. Petersburg (then - Leningrad) story Riot police developed in a similar way. Another 12 February 1948 was a separate operational regiment of the police, consisting of the 4 police divisions, training division and cavalry squadron, attached to the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of the Leningrad Oblast Executive Committee. In 1951, cars were delivered to the regiment, in connection with which it was transformed and divided into 2 operational divisions, automobile division and convoy division. The operational regiment of the Leningrad militia was tasked with protecting public order during mass events, guarding government agencies, escorting detainees, and carrying patrol and inspection service on the streets of Leningrad. In 1965, the structure of the regiment was reorganized again. In 1980, a fifth division was added to the regiment responsible for guarding state and party institutions and foreign consulates located in Leningrad. By the way, it was the fighters of the operational regiment of the Leningrad police who participated in the detention of the famous Ovechkin criminals who captured the 8 of March 1988 by the Tu-154 plane. Vladimir Nesterov, Viktor Prokhorov and Sergey Zavgorodniy were awarded the Order of the Red Star for participation in this operation. A special police unit at the Leningrad GUVD was formed on the basis of the operational police regiment and soon became one of the country's largest OMON units. Currently, the St. Petersburg riot police includes 5 operational battalions, a motorized battalion (it includes a special motorized company on boats), engineering and staff units.
For service in the riot police, they tried to recruit experienced police officers as well as yesterday's “demobels” who had served in the airborne troops, marines, and border troops with combat experience. Among the first "riot police" were many war veterans in Afghanistan. Aleksey Mozolev, the first commander of the Irkutsk riot police, recalls the specifics of recruiting a detachment at the initial stage of its existence: “Our riot police were among the first six in the entire Soviet Union. Recruited first from the city, and then from other units. Those who in the divisions of their own already worked in the rapid response teams went, with each district department there were such detachments of 6 — 8 people. It was a special, separate platoon of patrolmen, prepared a little better than ordinary policemen and performing part of the functions that are now assigned to the riot police ”(Schepin A. Irkutsk riot police: formation at the break of epochs // http://www.irk.ru/news/ articles / 20131014 / subdivision /). In Irkutsk, the backbone of the special militia forces was formed by the police of the 6 platoon of a separate battalion of patrol and patrol service - the 30 man, who generally had better preparation than the other patrol officers. But among the first riot police were immigrants not only from the faculty, but also from a wide variety of police units — criminal investigators, district police officers, and even investigators. Who knew that soon these people would have to not only fight crime, but also to participate in almost all large and small armed conflicts that began to tear apart the Soviet Union from 1988-1989, and after the collapse of the USSR - many post-Soviet states. At the beginning of their existence, OMON detachments operated in the 12 cities of the three republics of the USSR, then they were created in almost all major cities of the Russian Federation. Since the beginning of the armed conflicts in the North Caucasus, almost all the personnel of the Russian riot police went through missions to the “hot spots”.
In 2011, after the Russian police were renamed the police, the question arose about the need to change the name of the Special Forces Police. In accordance with the logic of the ongoing transformations, the riot police was to be renamed into OPON - Special Purpose Police Unit. In the spring of 2011, the Moscow OMON combined with the Special Forces Detachment (Special Forces Forces, former SOBR) into the Special Forces Center for Rapid Response Forces and aviation Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. In St. Petersburg, later - and in a number of other regions of the country, special forces units were renamed as special units of the Special Purpose Centers (UN Special Assistance Center). However, given that both the fighters themselves and society are accustomed to the names "OMON", "OMON", it was ultimately decided to keep the abbreviation "OMON", with only a slightly different decoding. Now OMON stands for Mobile Special Forces. ” Officially, information on the number of personnel and the number of OMON units operating in the country are classified. But it is known that from 1988 - the year of the creation of special police units, and until the 2010s. there was a gradual increase in both the number and number of OMON units. So, in 1988, 19 OMON detachments operated in the Soviet Union, in 2003 - 98 OMON detachments, and in 2007 - 121 OMON detachments, approximately 20 thousand soldiers. In 2014, according to a number of sources, the number of riot police increased to 40 thousand people, and the number of riot police - up to 160. The high number and creation of new detachments are due to the need to effectively combat crime and the threat of terrorist acts - both in cities and towns, and in transport. The Office of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation in transport also has its own special purpose units.
Perhaps no single unit of the Russian police / police has become so often a hero of political publications like riot police. This is due to the fact that it is the riot police (in Moscow - together with the operational regiments of the police) carries out the task of protecting public order at public events, including demonstrations of a political nature. Riot policemen ensure the safety of those who have gathered, or - in the event that the latter violates the laws of the Russian Federation, they are engaged in curbing illegal actions. Naturally, when riot police enter the case, participants in unauthorized rallies and pickets and demonstrations that look like riots do not like this very much. But to blame riot policemen that they can sometimes be rude and use physical force is not worth it. They are in the service, and their service is to maintain law and order. And like any service, the service of the riot police requires subordination. Having received the order, the riot policeman executes it. The average Russian man in the street sees the riot police in the cordon at rallies or demonstrations and thinks that the strong guys are no longer engaged in anything except as "dispersing the protesting people." He is unaware that the riot police guard day and night, public order, participate in counter-terrorism operations, provide for the detention of highly dangerous criminals, prevent riots and fights, prevent terrorist acts, neutralize explosives. And, besides all of the above, they are regularly improved in combat, tactical, and physical training. Of course, riot police can perform functions for dispersing demonstrations and rallies that are not very pleasant and understandable to many people, but here there should be more questions not for them, but for the authorities - if the meetings are really dedicated to the expression of adequate requirements, but not sanctioned purposefully. Or to the protesters - if the rallies are provocative and anti-state in nature.
Last Union soldiers: Vilnius riot police
Political speculation around the riot police began almost immediately after its creation - primarily in the Baltic republics, in which at the end of the 1980s. intensified nationalist and separatist sentiment. Vilnius and Riga riot police ... Today it is undeservedly "forgotten" heroes of the past. And 20-25 years ago, the names of these militia units rattled on the entire former Soviet Union. In 1988, a special police unit was established in Vilnius, the capital of the Lithuanian SSR. One of the reasons for its creation was precisely the risk of mass demonstrations by nationalists in the Lithuanian SSR. I must say that the tasks assigned Vilnius riot police defended with honor. The special police unit in Vilnius was under the operational control of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Lithuanian SSR. The size of the squadron to 1991 was 150 fighters, who were selected from among the employees of the internal affairs bodies, who had work experience and had good physical shape and combat training. Approximately half of the detachment was made up of Lithuanians, the rest of the riot police were Russians, Belarusians, and Poles. The commander of the Vilnius riot police at the time of the events discussed below was police major Boleslav Leonovich Makutinovich. He was born in 1957 in the town of Shvenchenis of the Lithuanian SSR, in 1976-1978. He passed military service in the Soviet Army, after which he joined the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. 1988 to 1991 Boleslav Makutynovich held alternately the positions of: deputy commander of the special police unit for political affairs, chief of staff of the special police unit, commander of the special police unit of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Lithuanian SSR. In 1990, the Vilnius riot police performed tasks for the protection of public order at mass events, including demonstrations and rallies of the Lithuanian nationalist opposition. In 1990, nationalist organizations that acted under anti-Soviet and separatist slogans became more active in Lithuania. They carried out their activities with the direct support of Western intelligence agencies interested in destabilizing the situation in the Union republics and rejecting the Baltic from the Soviet Union. At the beginning of 1991, part of the Vilnius OMON fighters who had fallen under the influence of nationalist propaganda left the unit, but two or three riot policemen remained loyal to the oath. Meanwhile, the local Lithuanian party and republican leadership could no longer be trusted - this also applied to the leadership of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Lithuanian SSR, which was also influenced by nationalist forces. In this regard, it was decided to reassign the Vilnius OMON directly to the leadership of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. After the resubmission, the division received a new name - the riot police of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs in the Lithuanian SSR (military unit 3404).
In the night from 11 to 12 in January 1991 Vilnius riot police seized the base of the detachment, securing the territory of its deployment from the possible penetration of the nationalists. Following this, the OMON fighters took several measures that were widely publicized outside Lithuania. Several state objects were seized, Lithuanian police and customs officers were disarmed at the posts established by the nationalist leadership of Lithuania. In response, the leaders of the Lithuanian nationalists called on their supporters to storm the Vilnius OMON base. On the night of July 31 1991 there was a strange incident on the border of Lithuania and the Byelorussian SSR. During the night, unknown persons attacked a customs point in the town of Medininkai and killed eight people, among whom were Lithuanian police officers and the Department of Regional Defense, created by nationalists with the support of Western intelligence agencies. Lithuanian authorities blamed the fighters of the Vilnius riot police in the incident. After in August 1991 The attempt of the State Emergency Committee to save the Soviet Union failed, the Interior Ministry presented an ultimatum to the command of the Vilnius OMON. From the commanders and soldiers of the detachment they demanded either to remain in Lithuania on the condition that the detachment was disarmed, or to be evacuated to Russia, where the detachment was to be disbanded. The democratic leadership of Russia reacted with suspicion to the Vilnius OMON fighters, as the latter did not hide their loyalty to the Soviet oath. However, the majority of the riot police did not have any other choice but to go to Russia. A strict anti-Russian regime was established in Lithuania and it was simply not safe to stay there. Around 60, Vilnius riot policemen flew airplanes to Russia. Upon arrival in the territory of the Russian Federation, Vilnius riot policemen stationed on the territory of the base of the division to them. Dzerzhinsky, and a little later issued in the composition of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia. However, in January 1992 almost all of the Vilnius OMON fighters from the Interior Ministry were dismissed. For a long time, the detachment fighters were threatened with criminal prosecution in Lithuania, and only after 24, after the events of 1991, 4 in June, 2015, the District Court of Vilnius, in absentia, acquitted Vilnius riot police commander Boleslav Makutynovich and chief of staff of the detachment Vladimir Razvodov, who had previously been accused of committing crimes against humanity and war crimes in 1991. According to the court order, responsibility for the 1991 events. was assigned to the leadership of the Soviet Union. The court also ruled that it is possible to judge for war crimes and crimes against humanity only if they were committed during hostilities or occupation. Shortly before the court’s verdict, the Russian Federation refused to extradite Makutinovich and Razvodov to Lithuania, currently residing in Russia. The court found that Makutynovich and Divorces were not involved in the seizure of the TV tower in Vilnius and the shooting of the Medininkai customs post. By the way, on charges of participating in the execution of the customs post at 2011.
Riga OMON: from the Baltic to Tyumen
Riga riot police received even greater fame than its Lithuanian counterparts. A special police unit was created in Riga - the capital of the Latvian SSR, October 3 1988 - in accordance with the order of the Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR Alexander Vlasov to create special police units. The first squad leader was Edgar Ivanovich Lymar. Initially, the size of the detachment was determined in 148 positions, including 20 - officers. Recruited in the detachment of the police officers of the patrol and patrol service, the most prepared in terms of physical and combat training, to perform the tasks of curbing riots and group crimes. In addition, a number of officers from other police units, including former "Afghans" - war veterans in Afghanistan, joined the squad. Among them was the future commander of the detachment, Cheslav Mlynnik, who headed the division in February 1991. Cheslav Gennadyevich Mlynnik was born on July 28 1960 in the village of Lugomovichi, Grodno Region, Belorussian SSR. His youth was shaped like many children from working families — a secondary school, working as a mechanic at a branch of the RAF plant in Jelgava, then recruiting into the Soviet Army. The physically developed Mlynnik was sent to serve in the Airborne Forces, from December 25 1979 he was part of the 103 Vitebsk Airborne Division in Afghanistan, took part in the fighting, during which showed high moral and combat qualities. After demobilization, Mlynnik was asked to join the internal affairs agencies. He worked in the Bausk District Department of the Interior of the Latvian SSR, in 1984 he graduated in absentia from the Riga Secondary Special School of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, and in 1988 he graduated from the Minsk Higher School of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. In the bodies of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Mlynnik held the posts of driver, district inspector, operative of the criminal investigation department and operative of the operational department of the corrective labor institution. In 1988, the town of Mlynnik, as a paratrooper and combatant, was sent to serve in the Riga OMON. The personnel in the unit of the Riga riot police got close-knit, patriotic, loyal to the Soviet oath.
When the Latvian Sejm declared Latvia's independence from the USSR, the riot police realized that it was time to act. In January, the 1991 of the Riga OMON occupied the buildings of the Press and Telegraph House and the Ministry of the Interior of Latvia. On January 15, riot police disarmed the Vecmilgravis police station, on January 16 took 42 machine gun, 215 pistols, 5 machine guns, 4 sniper rifles, 2 grenade launcher and ammunition in the building of the Riga faculty of the Minsk Higher School of the MIA of the USSR. In response to the actions of the Riga Special Police Force, which ceased to obey the Latvian Ministry of Internal Affairs, Latvian Interior Minister Alois Vaznis sent a telegram to the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs stating that he orders subordinate officers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Latvia to open fire on OMON fighters who are closer to 50 meters of Latvia’s Interior Ministry objects . The USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs sent this telegram to the command of the Riga OMON. Indeed, the situation in the Latvian capital was tense. On the night of January with 19 on 20, a riot police post in the Press House was shelled. Riot policemen managed to stop the minibus, in which there were Latvian warriors. All of them were taken to the riot base in Vecmilgravis. The detainees decided to transport to the building of the prosecutor's office, but during a trip to the riot police they opened fire. As a result of the ensuing battle, riot police without losses were able to seize the building of the Latvian Interior Ministry. In addition, riot police attacked the customs posts, which were established by Latvian separatists on the land borders of the republic - ostensibly to protect the domestic market of the republic from the expansion of Soviet goods. According to official data, only in the summer of 1991 was 23 attacked Latvian customs posts, not only at the land borders of the republic, but also at the Riga airport and at the Riga railway station. Riga riot police are accused of attacking Lithuanian customs in Medininkai.
After the August events of 1991 in Moscow ended in the defeat of the State Emergency Committee, it was decided to withdraw the Riga Special Police Force from Latvia and redeploy it to Tyumen. The detachment's documentation was destroyed before departure, and on September 1, 1991 military transport aircraft delivered 124 OMON fighters, families of some fighters, weapons, vehicles and other property to Tyumen. Valery Brovkin, a retired police colonel, recalls: “The decision to redeploy was taken at the highest level. On 12 airplanes of the military transport aviation Il-76 126 people with equipment and property began to be transported in stages to Tyumen. Many were very worried, because they flew into the unknown. September 1 1991 arrived at Roshchino Airport. As I remember, it was morning, it was raining in the city, the children were going to school ”(Quoted from: Fateev D. The first OMON of new Russia // http://www.tumentoday.ru/). The last defenders of the Soviet government in Latvia were placed on the territory of the Young Dzerzhinsky pioneer camp in Upper Bor. However, it was not safe even to be so far from the Latvian border - the democratic government of Russia did not rule out the possibility of issuing riot police to Latvia. October 8 1991 was arrested in Surgut by the deputy commander of the Riga Special Police Force Captain Sergei Parfenov. He was deported to Latvia. After that, USSR people's deputy from Tyumen S.V. Vasilyev demanded from the Prosecutor's Office of the RSFSR and the USSR guarantees of non-refoulement of riot police to the authorities of Latvia. On the basis of the Riga riot police redeployed to Tyumen, the Tyumen riot police was created and began to develop - one of the best units of a similar profile in the Russian Federation. Being on the territory of Russia, the former commander of the Riga OMON Cheslav Mlynnik began to take an active part in the social and political life of the country. He established links with the Nashi movement, created by the famous TV journalist Alexander Nevzorov. As for the colleagues of Mlynnik, many of them went to fight in the “hot spots” in the post-Soviet space - in Abkhazia, Transnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh. In 1992, Mr. Cheslav Mlynnik led a team of volunteers who went to Abkhazia. A squad of 26 volunteers under the command of Mlynnik made a real feat by capturing a bridge in the Upper Eschers and height. For this, Cheslav Mlynnik was presented to the highest state award of Abkhazia - the Order of Leon. In September - October, 1993. Cheslav Mlynnik and other riot police in Riga took part in the defense of the House of Soviets in Moscow on the side of the Supreme Soviet. In 1994, Mlynnik was arrested for illegally wearing weapons, but in October of the same year they acquitted and released. In 2000, Mr. Cheslav Mlynnik was awarded the military rank of “colonel” by the Defense Ministry of the Russian Federation. Currently, Cheslav Mlynnik continues to be engaged in military-political activities in the interests of the Russian Federation. According to some Russian media reports, he took part in 2008 fighting in South Ossetia. Some of the riot police in Riga continued to serve in the Tyumen riot police. Sergeant Oleg Sidorchik, among other riot police who arrived in 1991 in Tyumen from Riga, for twenty years has gone from being a fighter to the commander of the Tyumen riot police and was promoted to colonel. Before him, the detachment was commanded by Colonel Valeriy Brovkin, who also came from the Riga Special Police Force.
Eternal memory to the fallen heroes
Unlike the riot police of the Baltic capitals, the history of special-purpose militia groups in the cities and regions of the Russian Federation had practically no relation to “big politics”. But they had to be filled with grief and nerves in counterterrorism operations in the North Caucasus. The black mourning page of the Russian riot police was the death of the Permian riot police at Jani-Vedeno’s 29 March 2000. 28 March 2000 received an order to conduct a “sweep” operation in the village of Tsentoroi, and early in the morning of March 29 a column in 50 was launched to carry out these activities police officers and military personnel - 42 OMON fighters from Perm and Berezniki and 8 troops of the Taman Division Commandant Company. The convoy moved in three vehicles: the BTR-80, the Ural-4320, the ZIL-131. For the technical reasons, the column of Jani-Vedeno was forced to stop near the village. At that moment, the riot police commander, Major Simonov, went to check the house near the column stop and found two armed men there. In response to the Major’s order to drop their weapons, they shot the policeman dead. At the same time, the attack on the column began. The attack was carried out by a detachment of militants and foreign mercenaries under the command of Abu Kuteib, a native of Saudi Arabia, who was killed in 2004 in Ingushetia. The riot police and the commandant’s company were surrounded by superior militant forces and fired until ammunition ran out. Subsequently, it turned out that twelve people (seven riot policemen from Berezniki, four officers of the Perm police and a fighter of the commandant’s company) were captured by the militants and executed the next day - in response to the refusal of the command to extradite the murdered Chechen militant for murder girls of the Russian Army Colonel Yuri Budanov. As a result of the attack, she was killed in battle, and Perm policemen and 36 troops of the commandant’s company were killed in 7 captivity. Only on March 31, the federal forces unit managed to reach the height defended by riot police. The soldiers of the reconnaissance group discovered the 31 of the deceased and one seriously injured riot policeman Alexander Prokopov in both legs. Every year, March 29 in the Perm region are organized mourning events in honor of the fallen soldiers of the Perm riot police. It is possible that the Perm OMON fighters and soldiers of the curfew company prevented a possible attack of militants on Vedeno by their death. The investigation revealed that the attack on the convoy was the result of a tragic accident and a fatal set of circumstances - from a car breakdown to being at that time and in the same place of a large detachment of militants.
Thousands of Russian OMON troops passed through the fighting in the Chechen Republic, Dagestan, and Ingushetia. Some of them will remain forever in the memory of their relatives, friends and fellow young. Back in 1995, during the First Chechen War, police major Valery Anatolyevich Tinkov (1957-1995) died. A graduate of the Moscow Aviation Technical School, he served an emergency service in the air defense forces, then got a job at an aviation technical base in Domodedovo. However, in 1983, Valery Anatolyevich entered the service in the bodies of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. He started his service as a policeman, then became an inspector of the criminal investigation department, an operative officer. In 1986, he moved to the Personnel Department of the Main Directorate of Internal Affairs of the Moscow Region, and in 1992, he became the deputy commander of the OMON police department of the Moscow Region. 1 March 1993 Tinkov became commander of the riot police department of the Moscow region. In April, 1995, Major Tinkov, departed for Chechnya, where he commanded a consolidated detachment of riot police outside Moscow. In the battle for the village of Samashki, he attacked the fighters of the assault group and destroyed the grenade launcher and the machine-gunner of the enemy. And he was wounded in the face and arm, but continued to fight. For this, Valeriy Anatolyevich was presented to the Order of Courage. On May 1, a column under the command of Tinkoff came under attack by militants. Major Tinkov organized the defense of the column and to the last repelled the attacks of the enemy. Fearless commander mortally wounded in the head sniper.
Already in the "Second Chechen" killed the commander of the Yakut OMON police lieutenant colonel Alexander Alexandrovich Ryzhikov (1960-2000). Alexander Aleksandrovich got to the internal affairs bodies after military service in the Navy of the USSR - in 1983. In 1989, he became the commander of a special-purpose platoon as part of a company of the police patrol service, and in 1993-1996. He served as chief of staff of the Special Police Force at the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). In 1996, the city of Alexander Ryzhikov was appointed commander of the Special Purpose Police Unit. Starting from 1995, Alexander Ryzhikov twice a year went on business trips to Chechnya and Dagestan. Winter trip 1999-2000 was the last for him. 7 January 2000 was reported to the commandant's office of the Shali district that militants were holding 50 hostages in one of the shops of the former pipe plant in the village of Germenchuk. For the release of the hostages, the operational-investigative group of the Shali Department of Internal Affairs moved forward, the protection of which was entrusted to the fighters of the Ulyanovsk Special Intelligence Unit and the Yakut OMON. Yakut riot police commanded Alexander Ryzhikov. However, riot policemen were ambushed by militants near the factory walls. Ryzhikov organized defense. The battle lasted a long time. The riot police and SOBR fighters managed, under heavy fire, to remove more than fifty wounded and deceased colleagues from the battlefield. Ryzhikov personally took 12 people from the battlefield. Then he personally destroyed the enemy’s machine gun crew, but, covering the fighters' waste, was fatally wounded in the head. Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Ryzhikov was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Russian Federation.
Militia officer Aleksandr Anatolyevich Seleznev (1974-1999) was only 25 years old when he died during a counter-terrorist operation in Dagestan. The commander of the operational platoon of the special police unit at the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Yaroslavl Region, Ensign Seleznev was on a business trip in Dagestan. On the night of September 10 1999, riot militiamen seized the height on the outskirts of the village of Karamakhi, and the next night the militants launched a counterattack. Ensign Seleznev diverted the attention of the militants, opened machine-gun fire at them and, thus, made it possible to take out injured co-workers and the bodies of the dead from the shelling. Alexander Seleznev himself was mortally wounded. 30 December 1999 was awarded posthumously the title of Hero of Russia. Another Yaroslavets, commander of the operational platoon section, police officer ensign Igor Evgenievich Serov (1970-1999) died in the same bloody September days of 1999 as his countryman and colleague Alexander Seleznev. There was a battle on the outskirts of the village of Chabanmakhi. Ensign Serov equipped the position at the destroyed house and suddenly noticed how the gunman threw a grenade in the direction of the machine-gun crew of Igor’s colleagues. Serov managed to shoot the attacker and, rescuing his comrades from the explosion, covered his body with a grenade. Igor Serov was posthumously awarded the title Hero of Russia. Police officer Sergei Vladimirovich Snitkin (1970-1999) also died during the liberation of the villages of Chabanmakhi and Karamakhi. Like co-workers, he was awarded the title Hero of Russia.
There are among the riot police and those who are fortunate enough to stay alive, having accomplished a feat worthy of the Hero's star. Police Senior Sergeant Vyacheslav Vorobyov - 31 year. And he accomplished the feat six years ago - 12 February 2009. During a regular business trip to the Caucasus, a fighter from the Belgorod Special Police Force had to take part in eliminating a militant group that occupied a private house in the city of Nazran. Senior sergeant Vorobyov penetrated the territory of the household and called upon the fire of the militants, allowing the assault group to regroup and take good firing positions. Sparrows received severe contusion and 16 penetrating gunshot wounds. Despite this, the senior sergeant continued the battle and corrected the fire of his colleagues. For accomplishment, Vyacheslav Vorobyev was awarded a high award - the star of the Hero of the Russian Federation. At present, Vyacheslav is struggling with the consequences of his injuries and expects that he will soon be completely on his feet. 17 January 2014, Vyacheslav Vorobyov, became one of the honorary torchbearers of the XXII Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, breaking the 200-meter distance in a wheelchair in his hometown Belgorod. Let us hope that the heroic riot police will be able to stand on their feet, solve health problems, and it is possible - and continue to serve their country in one of the power structures, maybe - in the riot police.
Of course, the heroes we mentioned above are far from the only ones among the Russian riot police. Not less respect worthy of the recently recruited fighters of the Ukrainian militia special forces "Berkut" who were employed in the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. As is known, it was the “Berkutovtsy” who until the last time kept the defense in Kiev, becoming the symbol of Antimaydan. 24 March The Minister of the Interior of the Russian Federation Vladimir Kolokoltsev visited Crimea on 2014. He said that the detachment "Berkut" will retain its glorious name as part of the units of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. Kolokoltsev expressed admiration for the courage that the staff of the Berkut unit showed in Kiev during the suppression of riots. The Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, Sergei Shoigu, personally handed over to all the fighters of the Crimean special forces "Berkut" medals of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation "For the return of the Crimea."
Today, riot policemen continue to serve in all parts of Russia - both on the streets and squares of the Russian capital, and in the mountains of the North Caucasus, and in the industrial cities of the Urals and Siberia. The need for such units as riot police for modern Russia is obvious, especially in the context of the social and political challenges of our time - terrorism, extremism, organized crime, youth aggressive subcultures. It remains to wish the riot militia successful service and, most importantly, that it passed without loss.
How riot police were created and developed
Of course, the need for well-trained and operational police units that were not engaged in carrying out the daily patrol service, but who were able to fulfill the role of the operational reserve, existed before the restructuring. As early as 1946, a special company was formed, whose duties included guarding the world leaders who arrived to attend the Yalta Conference. After the end of the conference, the company was transferred to Moscow, and here, on its basis, they began to create a Reserve regiment of war veterans. They selected the best-trained and enduring, who were constantly improved in physical and combat training. They placed a reserve regiment in Ivanteevka near Moscow. In 1948, on the basis of the reserve regiment, a stationary training center was created for the personnel of the Moscow police, and in 1954, the Reserve regiment was renamed the Operational regiment of the police. In 1958, the cavalry division was attached to the operational regiment, and in 1981, the operational regiment was renamed the 2 regiment of the patrol and patrol service of the police. The regiment was in charge of maintaining public order at public events, including the Moscow Festival of Youth and Students, at the XXII Olympic Games 1980 of the year. October 23 1987 in Moscow - in accordance with the order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR No. 0119, on the basis of the 2 regiment of the patrol and inspection service of the police of the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of Moscow, a special police unit was created, which selected the most trained and physically developed officers. 3 October 1988 g. The special police unit of the Main Department of Internal Affairs of Moscow was renamed the Moscow OMON.
In the "second capital" of Russia, St. Petersburg (then - Leningrad) story Riot police developed in a similar way. Another 12 February 1948 was a separate operational regiment of the police, consisting of the 4 police divisions, training division and cavalry squadron, attached to the Central Internal Affairs Directorate of the Leningrad Oblast Executive Committee. In 1951, cars were delivered to the regiment, in connection with which it was transformed and divided into 2 operational divisions, automobile division and convoy division. The operational regiment of the Leningrad militia was tasked with protecting public order during mass events, guarding government agencies, escorting detainees, and carrying patrol and inspection service on the streets of Leningrad. In 1965, the structure of the regiment was reorganized again. In 1980, a fifth division was added to the regiment responsible for guarding state and party institutions and foreign consulates located in Leningrad. By the way, it was the fighters of the operational regiment of the Leningrad police who participated in the detention of the famous Ovechkin criminals who captured the 8 of March 1988 by the Tu-154 plane. Vladimir Nesterov, Viktor Prokhorov and Sergey Zavgorodniy were awarded the Order of the Red Star for participation in this operation. A special police unit at the Leningrad GUVD was formed on the basis of the operational police regiment and soon became one of the country's largest OMON units. Currently, the St. Petersburg riot police includes 5 operational battalions, a motorized battalion (it includes a special motorized company on boats), engineering and staff units.
For service in the riot police, they tried to recruit experienced police officers as well as yesterday's “demobels” who had served in the airborne troops, marines, and border troops with combat experience. Among the first "riot police" were many war veterans in Afghanistan. Aleksey Mozolev, the first commander of the Irkutsk riot police, recalls the specifics of recruiting a detachment at the initial stage of its existence: “Our riot police were among the first six in the entire Soviet Union. Recruited first from the city, and then from other units. Those who in the divisions of their own already worked in the rapid response teams went, with each district department there were such detachments of 6 — 8 people. It was a special, separate platoon of patrolmen, prepared a little better than ordinary policemen and performing part of the functions that are now assigned to the riot police ”(Schepin A. Irkutsk riot police: formation at the break of epochs // http://www.irk.ru/news/ articles / 20131014 / subdivision /). In Irkutsk, the backbone of the special militia forces was formed by the police of the 6 platoon of a separate battalion of patrol and patrol service - the 30 man, who generally had better preparation than the other patrol officers. But among the first riot police were immigrants not only from the faculty, but also from a wide variety of police units — criminal investigators, district police officers, and even investigators. Who knew that soon these people would have to not only fight crime, but also to participate in almost all large and small armed conflicts that began to tear apart the Soviet Union from 1988-1989, and after the collapse of the USSR - many post-Soviet states. At the beginning of their existence, OMON detachments operated in the 12 cities of the three republics of the USSR, then they were created in almost all major cities of the Russian Federation. Since the beginning of the armed conflicts in the North Caucasus, almost all the personnel of the Russian riot police went through missions to the “hot spots”.
In 2011, after the Russian police were renamed the police, the question arose about the need to change the name of the Special Forces Police. In accordance with the logic of the ongoing transformations, the riot police was to be renamed into OPON - Special Purpose Police Unit. In the spring of 2011, the Moscow OMON combined with the Special Forces Detachment (Special Forces Forces, former SOBR) into the Special Forces Center for Rapid Response Forces and aviation Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. In St. Petersburg, later - and in a number of other regions of the country, special forces units were renamed as special units of the Special Purpose Centers (UN Special Assistance Center). However, given that both the fighters themselves and society are accustomed to the names "OMON", "OMON", it was ultimately decided to keep the abbreviation "OMON", with only a slightly different decoding. Now OMON stands for Mobile Special Forces. ” Officially, information on the number of personnel and the number of OMON units operating in the country are classified. But it is known that from 1988 - the year of the creation of special police units, and until the 2010s. there was a gradual increase in both the number and number of OMON units. So, in 1988, 19 OMON detachments operated in the Soviet Union, in 2003 - 98 OMON detachments, and in 2007 - 121 OMON detachments, approximately 20 thousand soldiers. In 2014, according to a number of sources, the number of riot police increased to 40 thousand people, and the number of riot police - up to 160. The high number and creation of new detachments are due to the need to effectively combat crime and the threat of terrorist acts - both in cities and towns, and in transport. The Office of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation in transport also has its own special purpose units.
Perhaps no single unit of the Russian police / police has become so often a hero of political publications like riot police. This is due to the fact that it is the riot police (in Moscow - together with the operational regiments of the police) carries out the task of protecting public order at public events, including demonstrations of a political nature. Riot policemen ensure the safety of those who have gathered, or - in the event that the latter violates the laws of the Russian Federation, they are engaged in curbing illegal actions. Naturally, when riot police enter the case, participants in unauthorized rallies and pickets and demonstrations that look like riots do not like this very much. But to blame riot policemen that they can sometimes be rude and use physical force is not worth it. They are in the service, and their service is to maintain law and order. And like any service, the service of the riot police requires subordination. Having received the order, the riot policeman executes it. The average Russian man in the street sees the riot police in the cordon at rallies or demonstrations and thinks that the strong guys are no longer engaged in anything except as "dispersing the protesting people." He is unaware that the riot police guard day and night, public order, participate in counter-terrorism operations, provide for the detention of highly dangerous criminals, prevent riots and fights, prevent terrorist acts, neutralize explosives. And, besides all of the above, they are regularly improved in combat, tactical, and physical training. Of course, riot police can perform functions for dispersing demonstrations and rallies that are not very pleasant and understandable to many people, but here there should be more questions not for them, but for the authorities - if the meetings are really dedicated to the expression of adequate requirements, but not sanctioned purposefully. Or to the protesters - if the rallies are provocative and anti-state in nature.
Last Union soldiers: Vilnius riot police
Political speculation around the riot police began almost immediately after its creation - primarily in the Baltic republics, in which at the end of the 1980s. intensified nationalist and separatist sentiment. Vilnius and Riga riot police ... Today it is undeservedly "forgotten" heroes of the past. And 20-25 years ago, the names of these militia units rattled on the entire former Soviet Union. In 1988, a special police unit was established in Vilnius, the capital of the Lithuanian SSR. One of the reasons for its creation was precisely the risk of mass demonstrations by nationalists in the Lithuanian SSR. I must say that the tasks assigned Vilnius riot police defended with honor. The special police unit in Vilnius was under the operational control of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Lithuanian SSR. The size of the squadron to 1991 was 150 fighters, who were selected from among the employees of the internal affairs bodies, who had work experience and had good physical shape and combat training. Approximately half of the detachment was made up of Lithuanians, the rest of the riot police were Russians, Belarusians, and Poles. The commander of the Vilnius riot police at the time of the events discussed below was police major Boleslav Leonovich Makutinovich. He was born in 1957 in the town of Shvenchenis of the Lithuanian SSR, in 1976-1978. He passed military service in the Soviet Army, after which he joined the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. 1988 to 1991 Boleslav Makutynovich held alternately the positions of: deputy commander of the special police unit for political affairs, chief of staff of the special police unit, commander of the special police unit of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Lithuanian SSR. In 1990, the Vilnius riot police performed tasks for the protection of public order at mass events, including demonstrations and rallies of the Lithuanian nationalist opposition. In 1990, nationalist organizations that acted under anti-Soviet and separatist slogans became more active in Lithuania. They carried out their activities with the direct support of Western intelligence agencies interested in destabilizing the situation in the Union republics and rejecting the Baltic from the Soviet Union. At the beginning of 1991, part of the Vilnius OMON fighters who had fallen under the influence of nationalist propaganda left the unit, but two or three riot policemen remained loyal to the oath. Meanwhile, the local Lithuanian party and republican leadership could no longer be trusted - this also applied to the leadership of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Lithuanian SSR, which was also influenced by nationalist forces. In this regard, it was decided to reassign the Vilnius OMON directly to the leadership of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. After the resubmission, the division received a new name - the riot police of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs in the Lithuanian SSR (military unit 3404).
In the night from 11 to 12 in January 1991 Vilnius riot police seized the base of the detachment, securing the territory of its deployment from the possible penetration of the nationalists. Following this, the OMON fighters took several measures that were widely publicized outside Lithuania. Several state objects were seized, Lithuanian police and customs officers were disarmed at the posts established by the nationalist leadership of Lithuania. In response, the leaders of the Lithuanian nationalists called on their supporters to storm the Vilnius OMON base. On the night of July 31 1991 there was a strange incident on the border of Lithuania and the Byelorussian SSR. During the night, unknown persons attacked a customs point in the town of Medininkai and killed eight people, among whom were Lithuanian police officers and the Department of Regional Defense, created by nationalists with the support of Western intelligence agencies. Lithuanian authorities blamed the fighters of the Vilnius riot police in the incident. After in August 1991 The attempt of the State Emergency Committee to save the Soviet Union failed, the Interior Ministry presented an ultimatum to the command of the Vilnius OMON. From the commanders and soldiers of the detachment they demanded either to remain in Lithuania on the condition that the detachment was disarmed, or to be evacuated to Russia, where the detachment was to be disbanded. The democratic leadership of Russia reacted with suspicion to the Vilnius OMON fighters, as the latter did not hide their loyalty to the Soviet oath. However, the majority of the riot police did not have any other choice but to go to Russia. A strict anti-Russian regime was established in Lithuania and it was simply not safe to stay there. Around 60, Vilnius riot policemen flew airplanes to Russia. Upon arrival in the territory of the Russian Federation, Vilnius riot policemen stationed on the territory of the base of the division to them. Dzerzhinsky, and a little later issued in the composition of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia. However, in January 1992 almost all of the Vilnius OMON fighters from the Interior Ministry were dismissed. For a long time, the detachment fighters were threatened with criminal prosecution in Lithuania, and only after 24, after the events of 1991, 4 in June, 2015, the District Court of Vilnius, in absentia, acquitted Vilnius riot police commander Boleslav Makutynovich and chief of staff of the detachment Vladimir Razvodov, who had previously been accused of committing crimes against humanity and war crimes in 1991. According to the court order, responsibility for the 1991 events. was assigned to the leadership of the Soviet Union. The court also ruled that it is possible to judge for war crimes and crimes against humanity only if they were committed during hostilities or occupation. Shortly before the court’s verdict, the Russian Federation refused to extradite Makutinovich and Razvodov to Lithuania, currently residing in Russia. The court found that Makutynovich and Divorces were not involved in the seizure of the TV tower in Vilnius and the shooting of the Medininkai customs post. By the way, on charges of participating in the execution of the customs post at 2011.
Riga OMON: from the Baltic to Tyumen
Riga riot police received even greater fame than its Lithuanian counterparts. A special police unit was created in Riga - the capital of the Latvian SSR, October 3 1988 - in accordance with the order of the Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR Alexander Vlasov to create special police units. The first squad leader was Edgar Ivanovich Lymar. Initially, the size of the detachment was determined in 148 positions, including 20 - officers. Recruited in the detachment of the police officers of the patrol and patrol service, the most prepared in terms of physical and combat training, to perform the tasks of curbing riots and group crimes. In addition, a number of officers from other police units, including former "Afghans" - war veterans in Afghanistan, joined the squad. Among them was the future commander of the detachment, Cheslav Mlynnik, who headed the division in February 1991. Cheslav Gennadyevich Mlynnik was born on July 28 1960 in the village of Lugomovichi, Grodno Region, Belorussian SSR. His youth was shaped like many children from working families — a secondary school, working as a mechanic at a branch of the RAF plant in Jelgava, then recruiting into the Soviet Army. The physically developed Mlynnik was sent to serve in the Airborne Forces, from December 25 1979 he was part of the 103 Vitebsk Airborne Division in Afghanistan, took part in the fighting, during which showed high moral and combat qualities. After demobilization, Mlynnik was asked to join the internal affairs agencies. He worked in the Bausk District Department of the Interior of the Latvian SSR, in 1984 he graduated in absentia from the Riga Secondary Special School of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, and in 1988 he graduated from the Minsk Higher School of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR. In the bodies of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Mlynnik held the posts of driver, district inspector, operative of the criminal investigation department and operative of the operational department of the corrective labor institution. In 1988, the town of Mlynnik, as a paratrooper and combatant, was sent to serve in the Riga OMON. The personnel in the unit of the Riga riot police got close-knit, patriotic, loyal to the Soviet oath.
When the Latvian Sejm declared Latvia's independence from the USSR, the riot police realized that it was time to act. In January, the 1991 of the Riga OMON occupied the buildings of the Press and Telegraph House and the Ministry of the Interior of Latvia. On January 15, riot police disarmed the Vecmilgravis police station, on January 16 took 42 machine gun, 215 pistols, 5 machine guns, 4 sniper rifles, 2 grenade launcher and ammunition in the building of the Riga faculty of the Minsk Higher School of the MIA of the USSR. In response to the actions of the Riga Special Police Force, which ceased to obey the Latvian Ministry of Internal Affairs, Latvian Interior Minister Alois Vaznis sent a telegram to the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs stating that he orders subordinate officers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Latvia to open fire on OMON fighters who are closer to 50 meters of Latvia’s Interior Ministry objects . The USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs sent this telegram to the command of the Riga OMON. Indeed, the situation in the Latvian capital was tense. On the night of January with 19 on 20, a riot police post in the Press House was shelled. Riot policemen managed to stop the minibus, in which there were Latvian warriors. All of them were taken to the riot base in Vecmilgravis. The detainees decided to transport to the building of the prosecutor's office, but during a trip to the riot police they opened fire. As a result of the ensuing battle, riot police without losses were able to seize the building of the Latvian Interior Ministry. In addition, riot police attacked the customs posts, which were established by Latvian separatists on the land borders of the republic - ostensibly to protect the domestic market of the republic from the expansion of Soviet goods. According to official data, only in the summer of 1991 was 23 attacked Latvian customs posts, not only at the land borders of the republic, but also at the Riga airport and at the Riga railway station. Riga riot police are accused of attacking Lithuanian customs in Medininkai.
After the August events of 1991 in Moscow ended in the defeat of the State Emergency Committee, it was decided to withdraw the Riga Special Police Force from Latvia and redeploy it to Tyumen. The detachment's documentation was destroyed before departure, and on September 1, 1991 military transport aircraft delivered 124 OMON fighters, families of some fighters, weapons, vehicles and other property to Tyumen. Valery Brovkin, a retired police colonel, recalls: “The decision to redeploy was taken at the highest level. On 12 airplanes of the military transport aviation Il-76 126 people with equipment and property began to be transported in stages to Tyumen. Many were very worried, because they flew into the unknown. September 1 1991 arrived at Roshchino Airport. As I remember, it was morning, it was raining in the city, the children were going to school ”(Quoted from: Fateev D. The first OMON of new Russia // http://www.tumentoday.ru/). The last defenders of the Soviet government in Latvia were placed on the territory of the Young Dzerzhinsky pioneer camp in Upper Bor. However, it was not safe even to be so far from the Latvian border - the democratic government of Russia did not rule out the possibility of issuing riot police to Latvia. October 8 1991 was arrested in Surgut by the deputy commander of the Riga Special Police Force Captain Sergei Parfenov. He was deported to Latvia. After that, USSR people's deputy from Tyumen S.V. Vasilyev demanded from the Prosecutor's Office of the RSFSR and the USSR guarantees of non-refoulement of riot police to the authorities of Latvia. On the basis of the Riga riot police redeployed to Tyumen, the Tyumen riot police was created and began to develop - one of the best units of a similar profile in the Russian Federation. Being on the territory of Russia, the former commander of the Riga OMON Cheslav Mlynnik began to take an active part in the social and political life of the country. He established links with the Nashi movement, created by the famous TV journalist Alexander Nevzorov. As for the colleagues of Mlynnik, many of them went to fight in the “hot spots” in the post-Soviet space - in Abkhazia, Transnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh. In 1992, Mr. Cheslav Mlynnik led a team of volunteers who went to Abkhazia. A squad of 26 volunteers under the command of Mlynnik made a real feat by capturing a bridge in the Upper Eschers and height. For this, Cheslav Mlynnik was presented to the highest state award of Abkhazia - the Order of Leon. In September - October, 1993. Cheslav Mlynnik and other riot police in Riga took part in the defense of the House of Soviets in Moscow on the side of the Supreme Soviet. In 1994, Mlynnik was arrested for illegally wearing weapons, but in October of the same year they acquitted and released. In 2000, Mr. Cheslav Mlynnik was awarded the military rank of “colonel” by the Defense Ministry of the Russian Federation. Currently, Cheslav Mlynnik continues to be engaged in military-political activities in the interests of the Russian Federation. According to some Russian media reports, he took part in 2008 fighting in South Ossetia. Some of the riot police in Riga continued to serve in the Tyumen riot police. Sergeant Oleg Sidorchik, among other riot police who arrived in 1991 in Tyumen from Riga, for twenty years has gone from being a fighter to the commander of the Tyumen riot police and was promoted to colonel. Before him, the detachment was commanded by Colonel Valeriy Brovkin, who also came from the Riga Special Police Force.
Eternal memory to the fallen heroes
Unlike the riot police of the Baltic capitals, the history of special-purpose militia groups in the cities and regions of the Russian Federation had practically no relation to “big politics”. But they had to be filled with grief and nerves in counterterrorism operations in the North Caucasus. The black mourning page of the Russian riot police was the death of the Permian riot police at Jani-Vedeno’s 29 March 2000. 28 March 2000 received an order to conduct a “sweep” operation in the village of Tsentoroi, and early in the morning of March 29 a column in 50 was launched to carry out these activities police officers and military personnel - 42 OMON fighters from Perm and Berezniki and 8 troops of the Taman Division Commandant Company. The convoy moved in three vehicles: the BTR-80, the Ural-4320, the ZIL-131. For the technical reasons, the column of Jani-Vedeno was forced to stop near the village. At that moment, the riot police commander, Major Simonov, went to check the house near the column stop and found two armed men there. In response to the Major’s order to drop their weapons, they shot the policeman dead. At the same time, the attack on the column began. The attack was carried out by a detachment of militants and foreign mercenaries under the command of Abu Kuteib, a native of Saudi Arabia, who was killed in 2004 in Ingushetia. The riot police and the commandant’s company were surrounded by superior militant forces and fired until ammunition ran out. Subsequently, it turned out that twelve people (seven riot policemen from Berezniki, four officers of the Perm police and a fighter of the commandant’s company) were captured by the militants and executed the next day - in response to the refusal of the command to extradite the murdered Chechen militant for murder girls of the Russian Army Colonel Yuri Budanov. As a result of the attack, she was killed in battle, and Perm policemen and 36 troops of the commandant’s company were killed in 7 captivity. Only on March 31, the federal forces unit managed to reach the height defended by riot police. The soldiers of the reconnaissance group discovered the 31 of the deceased and one seriously injured riot policeman Alexander Prokopov in both legs. Every year, March 29 in the Perm region are organized mourning events in honor of the fallen soldiers of the Perm riot police. It is possible that the Perm OMON fighters and soldiers of the curfew company prevented a possible attack of militants on Vedeno by their death. The investigation revealed that the attack on the convoy was the result of a tragic accident and a fatal set of circumstances - from a car breakdown to being at that time and in the same place of a large detachment of militants.
Thousands of Russian OMON troops passed through the fighting in the Chechen Republic, Dagestan, and Ingushetia. Some of them will remain forever in the memory of their relatives, friends and fellow young. Back in 1995, during the First Chechen War, police major Valery Anatolyevich Tinkov (1957-1995) died. A graduate of the Moscow Aviation Technical School, he served an emergency service in the air defense forces, then got a job at an aviation technical base in Domodedovo. However, in 1983, Valery Anatolyevich entered the service in the bodies of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. He started his service as a policeman, then became an inspector of the criminal investigation department, an operative officer. In 1986, he moved to the Personnel Department of the Main Directorate of Internal Affairs of the Moscow Region, and in 1992, he became the deputy commander of the OMON police department of the Moscow Region. 1 March 1993 Tinkov became commander of the riot police department of the Moscow region. In April, 1995, Major Tinkov, departed for Chechnya, where he commanded a consolidated detachment of riot police outside Moscow. In the battle for the village of Samashki, he attacked the fighters of the assault group and destroyed the grenade launcher and the machine-gunner of the enemy. And he was wounded in the face and arm, but continued to fight. For this, Valeriy Anatolyevich was presented to the Order of Courage. On May 1, a column under the command of Tinkoff came under attack by militants. Major Tinkov organized the defense of the column and to the last repelled the attacks of the enemy. Fearless commander mortally wounded in the head sniper.
Already in the "Second Chechen" killed the commander of the Yakut OMON police lieutenant colonel Alexander Alexandrovich Ryzhikov (1960-2000). Alexander Aleksandrovich got to the internal affairs bodies after military service in the Navy of the USSR - in 1983. In 1989, he became the commander of a special-purpose platoon as part of a company of the police patrol service, and in 1993-1996. He served as chief of staff of the Special Police Force at the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). In 1996, the city of Alexander Ryzhikov was appointed commander of the Special Purpose Police Unit. Starting from 1995, Alexander Ryzhikov twice a year went on business trips to Chechnya and Dagestan. Winter trip 1999-2000 was the last for him. 7 January 2000 was reported to the commandant's office of the Shali district that militants were holding 50 hostages in one of the shops of the former pipe plant in the village of Germenchuk. For the release of the hostages, the operational-investigative group of the Shali Department of Internal Affairs moved forward, the protection of which was entrusted to the fighters of the Ulyanovsk Special Intelligence Unit and the Yakut OMON. Yakut riot police commanded Alexander Ryzhikov. However, riot policemen were ambushed by militants near the factory walls. Ryzhikov organized defense. The battle lasted a long time. The riot police and SOBR fighters managed, under heavy fire, to remove more than fifty wounded and deceased colleagues from the battlefield. Ryzhikov personally took 12 people from the battlefield. Then he personally destroyed the enemy’s machine gun crew, but, covering the fighters' waste, was fatally wounded in the head. Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Ryzhikov was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Russian Federation.
Militia officer Aleksandr Anatolyevich Seleznev (1974-1999) was only 25 years old when he died during a counter-terrorist operation in Dagestan. The commander of the operational platoon of the special police unit at the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Yaroslavl Region, Ensign Seleznev was on a business trip in Dagestan. On the night of September 10 1999, riot militiamen seized the height on the outskirts of the village of Karamakhi, and the next night the militants launched a counterattack. Ensign Seleznev diverted the attention of the militants, opened machine-gun fire at them and, thus, made it possible to take out injured co-workers and the bodies of the dead from the shelling. Alexander Seleznev himself was mortally wounded. 30 December 1999 was awarded posthumously the title of Hero of Russia. Another Yaroslavets, commander of the operational platoon section, police officer ensign Igor Evgenievich Serov (1970-1999) died in the same bloody September days of 1999 as his countryman and colleague Alexander Seleznev. There was a battle on the outskirts of the village of Chabanmakhi. Ensign Serov equipped the position at the destroyed house and suddenly noticed how the gunman threw a grenade in the direction of the machine-gun crew of Igor’s colleagues. Serov managed to shoot the attacker and, rescuing his comrades from the explosion, covered his body with a grenade. Igor Serov was posthumously awarded the title Hero of Russia. Police officer Sergei Vladimirovich Snitkin (1970-1999) also died during the liberation of the villages of Chabanmakhi and Karamakhi. Like co-workers, he was awarded the title Hero of Russia.
There are among the riot police and those who are fortunate enough to stay alive, having accomplished a feat worthy of the Hero's star. Police Senior Sergeant Vyacheslav Vorobyov - 31 year. And he accomplished the feat six years ago - 12 February 2009. During a regular business trip to the Caucasus, a fighter from the Belgorod Special Police Force had to take part in eliminating a militant group that occupied a private house in the city of Nazran. Senior sergeant Vorobyov penetrated the territory of the household and called upon the fire of the militants, allowing the assault group to regroup and take good firing positions. Sparrows received severe contusion and 16 penetrating gunshot wounds. Despite this, the senior sergeant continued the battle and corrected the fire of his colleagues. For accomplishment, Vyacheslav Vorobyev was awarded a high award - the star of the Hero of the Russian Federation. At present, Vyacheslav is struggling with the consequences of his injuries and expects that he will soon be completely on his feet. 17 January 2014, Vyacheslav Vorobyov, became one of the honorary torchbearers of the XXII Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, breaking the 200-meter distance in a wheelchair in his hometown Belgorod. Let us hope that the heroic riot police will be able to stand on their feet, solve health problems, and it is possible - and continue to serve their country in one of the power structures, maybe - in the riot police.
Of course, the heroes we mentioned above are far from the only ones among the Russian riot police. Not less respect worthy of the recently recruited fighters of the Ukrainian militia special forces "Berkut" who were employed in the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. As is known, it was the “Berkutovtsy” who until the last time kept the defense in Kiev, becoming the symbol of Antimaydan. 24 March The Minister of the Interior of the Russian Federation Vladimir Kolokoltsev visited Crimea on 2014. He said that the detachment "Berkut" will retain its glorious name as part of the units of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. Kolokoltsev expressed admiration for the courage that the staff of the Berkut unit showed in Kiev during the suppression of riots. The Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, Sergei Shoigu, personally handed over to all the fighters of the Crimean special forces "Berkut" medals of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation "For the return of the Crimea."
Today, riot policemen continue to serve in all parts of Russia - both on the streets and squares of the Russian capital, and in the mountains of the North Caucasus, and in the industrial cities of the Urals and Siberia. The need for such units as riot police for modern Russia is obvious, especially in the context of the social and political challenges of our time - terrorism, extremism, organized crime, youth aggressive subcultures. It remains to wish the riot militia successful service and, most importantly, that it passed without loss.
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