Real soldier.

- There were cartridges for two or three hours of battle. And that's not a fact. If they climb with such pressure, then they won’t last even an hour ...

These thoughts swirled in Sergeant Stepantsov's mind as he looked at the four who remained by his side. Soloveichik, Okunev, Grishin and Nemirovsky.

Four out of twelve. Three were lost, five wounded still managed to be sent to the camp until the Mujahideen closed the ring.

And now, only five remained at the height, including the sergeant.

And it all started, as always, unexpectedly.

Okunev alerted the platoon when he spotted a large detachment of Mujahideen below.

200 people, no less. Apparently, the reinforcements were moving towards Herat, where for months, with varying success, there were battles between the Afghan government troops and various field commanders.

And now it's been a day since he defended the road and the checkpoint itself.

The Mujahideen tried with all their might to break through, but Stepantsov and the remaining fighters did not let them through.

The whole slope and the whole green hollow between the rocks were strewn with the bodies of the dead and wounded, but the soldiers fought to the death.

- Why are they so torn here? said the sergeant to Okunev. - They could go through the mountains if they have to get over the pass.

Why exactly here the enemy with such pressure and desperation is trying to pass - it was not clear.

The sergeant at the very beginning reported on the radio and the turntables should have arrived long ago.

The commanders promised that they would fly out now and spoke, persuaded, ordered to hold on, defend the height, not to let the gang through in any case ...

And now, two hours have passed and there are no cartridges left. Only three grenades.

Dushmans felt it. They stood up to their full height, and among them Stepantsov suddenly saw the figure of the commander. He looked up at the skyscraper. There was a feeling that he sees Stepantsov and looks into his eyes.

Then the dushman commander smiled, waved his hand, the Afghans slowly, as if for prey, in full height began to climb up the hill.

And then, in the distance, helicopters chirped in the sky.

Three turntables, that's not five soldiers. In ten minutes, the gang was finished, and their commander was captured by paratroopers who jumped off the sides.

Stepantsov looked point-blank at the Afghan, and the field commander, who was sitting on the grass with his hands tied behind his back with an officer's belt, also looked point-blank at the sergeant and his four fighters.

- Are you only five? he suddenly asked in Russian.

“It was twelve,” Stepantsov answered unexpectedly for himself.

Dushman turned away. As he was being led to the helicopter, he glanced at the sergeant again and muttered something to himself.

- Probably some kind of curse, or swear words ... - thought Stepantsov.

Stepantsov later found out that the Mujahideen had a hopeless situation, and it was not for nothing that they began to break past his post. The mountain paths were blocked by landslides, except that they had no way past him.

And the officer who flew in with the turntables knew Pashto and translated Dushman words for him, which the sergeant took for a curse.

It turns out that the enemy commander said that he was a real soldier and wished him to return home, to his homeland, safe and sound.

And so it happened.

Two months later, they were all in the Union.

Afghanistan is over for them.

The scouts returned with a shabby man with a thick black beard.

The territories of Afghanistan changed hands.

Now to us, then to the government troops, which was not the same thing.

Then to scattered gangs of Mujahideen.

All of our, even untrained rookies that arrived with the next replenishment, quickly realized the real price of the "international duty" and for them there were only three values ​​left: their own lives, brotherhood in arms and the honor of the country.

All three sides tried not to leave behind anything that could serve the enemy at least some kind of shelter, shelter, or have some other benefit.

If it was impossible to take something out and save it, it was destroyed without the slightest regret.

And so, after almost three months of fighting, our units were able to displace the dushmans from part of the Panjer Gorge and return to positions from which in the spring of 1985 they had to retreat under the blows of the troops of Ahmad Shah Massoud.

And in the middle of the night in the tent of Captain Zvyagintsev, the radio suddenly woke up.

At first, Zvyagintsev thought that he did not understand something and asked him to repeat it from the very beginning.

And then, after listening attentively all the time, he chuckled and gave a short order:

- Return to the camp. One leg here, the other there. Fast.

He no longer fell asleep and waited for the scouts, who in the middle of the night stunned him with their message.

The scouts returned in the morning in the company of a utterly shabby man, overgrown with a thick black beard.

The man's eyes were bandaged with a scarf.

He can't come into the world right now. Blind immediately. And don't stare at him like that. He is not an albino. Just lived in the dark for a long time.

When the peasant was washed and shaved, and he was completely weak, a boy appeared in front of Zvyagintsev.

Appears to be 20 years old, skin as white as snow.

In general, it contrasted surprisingly among tall and sun-tanned guys.

The captain began interrogation.

And everything turned out exactly as they explained to him in the middle of the night on the radio.

The guy's name was Fedor Tarasyuk and he was simply forgotten.

He guarded the products in the underground part of one of the old, uninhabited duvals that were adapted for warehouses.

And when these old ruins were blown up from above during the retreat, they did not remember about him.

And Fyodor was left in pitch darkness, covered with water, among the supplies of water and dry rations.

All these three months that he spent underground, he tried to somehow dig out, but he did not succeed.

Iron cans would serve good tool, but dry rations contained only biscuits and biscuits.

Realizing that he himself could not get out, he decided to simply wait for "his own", sensibly judging that by the summer these positions would be recaptured by us unambiguously.

And he adapted a large empty flask from under the water to the ceiling of the dungeon, as such an earpiece - an amplifier that made it possible to hear if someone above spoke Russian.

And that night, Fyodor heard Russian voices and beat on the flask.

They paid attention to the knock and dug it out by the middle of the night.

- How did you not go crazy there? - Zvyagintsev asked with surprise.

- What for? I haven't eaten everything there yet. - Tarasyuk answered and unexpectedly smiled broadly.

The tent shuddered and shook with the captain's laughter.

40 SOVIET SOLDIERS AGAINST 200 fighters.

The history of American cooperation with the Afghan Mujahideen has been detailed by historians in dozens of films, books and articles. Experts explain that the entire scale of "friendly" assistance from across the ocean to distant Afghanistan cannot be fully calculated so far.

Many books have been written about the exploits of the Soviet troops in Afghanistan. However, the study of the weapons of the Afghan war, as well as the main characters - the Soviet military sometimes reveals completely unexpected details.

Not "Stinger" alone

The history of American cooperation with the Afghan Mujahideen has been detailed by historians in dozens of films, books and articles. Experts explain that the entire scale of "friendly" assistance from across the ocean to distant Afghanistan cannot be fully calculated so far. But if a lot of serious analytical work has been written about the supply of Stinger MANPADS, then the supply of other types of weapons was covered only slightly. In addition to money and ammunition, imported in huge quantities, the main symbol of American weapons thought, the M-16 rifle, also fell into the hands of the Mujahideen. However, the “American dream” did not find such a massive application in the Afghan mountains. Veterans of the war in Afghanistan note that the use of a rifle was limited whole line circumstances.

“The first problems associated with the reliability of this rifle and the scheme as a whole were revealed during the Vietnam War,” says Special Forces veteran Sergei Tarasov. - American soldiers then they massively complained about problems with the quality of shooting at the slightest hit of dirt. With the Afghans, these rifles played exactly the same joke.
main feature exploitation of weapons by the Afghan Mujahideen was the disgusting quality of care for weapons. It is for this reason that the main tool for combat operations has always been the Kalashnikov assault rifle. The American rifles supplied to the Afghan Mujahideen through Pakistan were mostly found in cave caches, and their use was a one-time event, organized only for reporting purposes. However, when studying the numerous archival photographs of Soviet soldiers with captured American rifles found in numerous hastily constructed caches, it becomes clear that Western assistance to the Afghan Mujahideen was much greater than is commonly believed.

Separate photographs of the Soviet military in Afghanistan also show another weapon that is extremely curious and uncharacteristic of the Afghan landscape. For example, the German MP-5 submachine guns manufactured by Heckler & Koch. And although there is no talk of deliveries of batches of several tens of thousands of units, the very fact of the presence of German specialized weapons in Afghanistan is of interest.
No less exotic in the hands of the Soviet special forces was the British universal Blowpipe portable anti-aircraft missile system, which stood out sharply against the background of the familiar Stingers. However, the British MANPADS, unlike its American "relative", brought the army aviation the least number of problems: the effectiveness of the guidance system and the complex as a whole depended heavily on the skill and training of the shooter. Special Forces veterans note that it was not easy even for trained professionals to manage the complex with a total mass of under nine kilograms.

Unknown heroes

The battle of the 9th company of the 345th Guards Separate Airborne Regiment at Hill 3234 and the operation "Storm-333" are, without exaggeration, one of the most famous Afghan operations. In both cases, specially trained people had to act in conditions of numerical superiority and fire resistance of the enemy. However, the Soviet military in Afghanistan had to fight not in numbers, but in skill more than once.
Three years before the battle at height 3234, on May 25, 1985, the guardsmen of the 4th motorized rifle company of the 149th motorized rifle regiment took an unequal battle with the Mujahideen of the Islamic Party of Afghanistan, who were supported by the Pakistani Black Stork special forces. During the military operation in the Pechdara Gorge, the company was ambushed and surrounded, but for 12 hours 43 soldiers fought off 200 militants. In the episode of the Afghan war, practically unknown until recently, there is another dramatic detail. Covering his own, junior sergeant Vasily Kuznetsov died. Surrounded, having used up ammunition and received several wounds, Kuznetsov, along with his last grenade, destroyed five militants.

In the early summer of 1980, another example of the courage of a Soviet soldier took place near the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan. During the clash near the city of Asadab, only 90 fighters of the 66th Motorized Rifle Brigade fought to the death against 250 militants. The battle near the village of Khara, according to historians, is also notable for the fact that this particular case is considered the most similar to how Soviet soldiers fought during the Great Patriotic War.
“The difficulty of intense combat lies in the fact that ammunition is spent rather quickly. Given the depth of the group’s exit, the specifics of the tasks and the strength of the enemy, such battles rarely end well, ”said Roman Gladkikh, a special forces veteran, in an interview with the Zvezda TV channel.
The main difference between the battle and the rest was the way the group exited the encirclement. Having shot all the ammunition, the fighters rushed to the enemy hand-to-hand. For the entire Afghan campaign, historians count only three such episodes. According to experts, the enemy lost up to 130 people killed and wounded, and the surviving soldiers of the motorized rifle brigade, without a single cartridge, retreated to their own along the river.

caravan hunters

No less interesting in the context of the Afghan war are the activities to search for and destroy caravans with weapons, money and other valuable "gifts" that were supplied by foreign "friends" of the Afghan Mujahideen. However, unlike the GRU special forces, whose tasks included not only searching for caravans and hunting for especially valuable samples of Western weapons, the fighters of the 3rd battalion of the 317th parachute regiment were engaged in the destruction of sabotage groups trying to enter Afghanistan through neighboring Pakistan. The leadership of such operations was carried out by the commander of the 7th company, senior lieutenant Sergei Pivovarov.

At first, the prey of Pivovarov's group were only loners, "suicides" who tried to break through the Shebiyan Pass in pitch darkness. However, in 1982, the paratroopers caught their luck by the tail: in the course of a well-organized ambush, Pivovarov's group immediately removed a whole platoon of Mujahideen. However, the real glory will come to Pivovarov later: during one of the nightly ambushes near the Arghandab River, the group will take drug couriers “alive” with almost two tons of Afghan opium and foreign-made machine guns.
Veterans of the war in Afghanistan note that most of the exploits of Soviet soldiers in this country will never be written. Not because the tasks performed by the special forces were top secret, but because for every known and more than once described feat there were ten or even twelve “ordinary”, but absolutely impossible battles according to all the laws. In total, during the war in Afghanistan for heroism, skill and valor, only the Gold Star of the Hero of the USSR, including posthumous titles, was received by 86 people. At least 200,000 more people were awarded orders and medals for performing combat missions.

THE FIGHT AT THE KISHLAK OF COGNAC: HOW THE “AFGHAN WARRIORS” DESTROYED THE “SPIRITS” IN AN UNEQUAL BATTLE

The battle of Soviet soldiers in the area of ​​this village in May 1985 went down in history for ten years. afghan war with the participation of the USSR army as one of the most significant battles of this campaign - a company of our motorized riflemen entered into a confrontation with the many times superior forces of the special forces of the Mujahideen. Having lost more than half of the personnel in a fierce twelve-hour battle, our heroic unit managed to destroy more than a hundred "spirits".

The flaws of the "Kunar operation"

The fourth company of the second motorized rifle battalion of the 149th Guards SME was involved in one of the largest military operations in the history of the war in Afghanistan (with the participation of our troops). The operation was called "Kunar" - in the region of the province of Kunar, according to intelligence, it was concentrated a large number of"spiritual" warehouses with ammunition and weapons. The advance of the company to the area of ​​the village of Konyak was the third and final stage of the operation. Motorized riflemen also participated in the first two, and were very exhausted, every day, without a significant respite, liquidating "cache", bypassing continuous minefields in conditions of suffocating heat. But the fighters were given another task, and it had to be completed. Initially, the company was given an erroneous introductory - supposedly the "cache" at Cognac is guarded by small forces of dushmans. The officers of the battalion proposed the optimal route for the movement of our formation in terms of safety. But the high command insisted on its choice of path. Two guides from among the local military were advanced with the company, whom ours did not trust (as it turned out later, not in vain).

Strange wiring behavior

The fourth company, reinforced by a grenade launcher platoon, advanced on a given route, consisted of 63 people. The dominant heights in the course of movement were to be occupied by cover groups. The guides urged the fighters to go in open places, assuring them that there were no mines. But motorized riflemen tried to move closer to the rocks, under their shelter - they did not listen to the guides. Subsequently, this tactic saved the lives of many soldiers and officers, not only of the fourth company, but of the entire battalion. In fact, the guides were mishandled and paid, they deliberately led the company to ambush the "black storks" unit - the special forces of the Mujahideen. On the way, Senior Lieutenant Tranin noticed a convenient place where "spirits" could sit down, and sent a reconnaissance group there.

The feat of junior sergeant Kuznetsov

Two motorized riflemen led by junior sergeant Vasily Kuznetsov walked in the head patrol of the company. Vasily managed to notice the ambush of the "spirits" and give the company a conventional sign, raising his AK-47 up. Severely wounded and bleeding, Kuznetsov fell right in front of the Dushman positions. He managed to collect all the grenades he had, to snatch the pin from one of them. When the Mujahideen ran up to him and wanted to pick him up, they were blown away by a powerful explosion. The scouts Akchebash and Frantsev also died from the bullets of the "spirits". In fact, intelligence at the cost of their lives did not allow the dushmans to carry out a surprise attack on the company.

Alone and without support

Motorized riflemen took up positions in shelters and accepted the battle. Both guides tried to run to the "spirits", but ours shot them. Dushmans fired heavily from various types of weapons - they had machine guns, carbines, light and heavy machine guns, and even anti-aircraft guns. mining rig, mortar and recoilless rifle. The “spirits” expected that the motorized riflemen would run in fear under such dense fire and then they would kill everyone to the last. But the Soviet soldiers were not going to run away. There were not so many cartridges, and therefore it was necessary to shoot back, mainly in short bursts. When more than five hours had passed since the beginning of the clash, the dushmans, believing that our forces were exhausted, under the cover of hurricane fire, went on the assault. But the "spirits" were thrown with grenades, shot from machine guns and machine guns. The attacks continued again and again. Mujahideen snipers did not allow the main forces of the battalion to come to the aid of the fourth company. Our fighters also could not count on the support of artillery and aviation. The high command on the radio repeatedly asked what was happening and did nothing concrete. The company commander, Captain Alexander Peryatinets, together with two sergeants, Erovenkov and Gareev, steadfastly kept the defense apart from the main group of the company, militants approached them. The sergeants were killed by snipers, and Peryatinets, knowing that the soldiers would not abandon him, and the fire of the “spirits” did not allow him to escape from the siege, decided to destroy the radio station, the map and commit suicide. It would still be impossible to approach the captain because of the dense fire of the dushmans.

Retreat to your

With the onset of darkness, motorized riflemen began to withdraw, bringing out and carrying out the wounded. Then they returned for the bodies of their dead comrades, which the Mujahideen did not expect at all. However, they did not attack. ... According to intelligence, the losses of the "spirits" in that battle amounted to about two hundred people killed and wounded, and the superiority of the Mujahideen was tenfold, the Dushmans also had an advantage in armament.

Why Kuznetsov was never given the Hero

Junior Sergeant Vasily Kuznetsov was posthumously nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, but was awarded only the Order of Lenin: after 23 soldiers and officers of the motorized rifle battalion died in that battle and 18 more were wounded, a criminal case was opened. Someone from the top decided that in this situation it is better to reissue the award sheet. Army General V. A. Varennikov in his book “The Unique” claims that the wrong route, which led the motorized riflemen into an ambush, was chosen by the command of the battalion itself directly on the march. Although the surviving officers of the 4th company say otherwise: the order to advance in a given direction was given in advance, they simply carried it out.

THE MAN WHO REPEATED MARESEV'S FEAT

AIR FORCE COLONEL, LOSSING BOTH LEGS IN AFGHANISTAN, RETURNED AT THE helm OF THE AIRCRAFT AND EVEN JUMPS WITH A PARACHUTE ... Contrary to the forecasts of doctors, he returned from the other world and again stood in the army. And then he, the last Hero of the Soviet Union, Valery Burkov, having become an adviser to President Boris Yeltsin, defended the rights of soldiers crippled by war on the podium of the UN General Assembly ... ... Father usually left at dawn and, in order not to wake Valery, spoke in a whisper about something to his mother . And he, still a child, was no longer sleeping and, covering his eyes with heavy eyelashes, dreamed of the time when, just like that, putting on a luxurious cap with a blue band, he would say with a smile: “Well, I flew ... Wait!” We all come from childhood. But what we dream about does not always come true. Everyone has their own destiny, their own path. Rarely, he is strewn with roses, more often with thorns ... But it’s not in vain that they say: “If you don’t know grief, you won’t know joy” ... Little Valery was still far from real trials when he, a barefoot boy, with bated breath expected his father, a military man, from flying pilot ... And after many, many years, the time will come when the Hero of the Soviet Union Valery Burkov, the "Afghan" pilot, will speak from the rostrum of the UN General Assembly, and on his initiative, the International Day of Persons with Disabilities will be celebrated all over the world on December 3 ... But all this and many more will come later. In the meantime, the test of strength is life in military garrisons. "Today here, tomorrow there." Father's service is the main thing. This son learned to understand from childhood. For Valery, his father has always been an indisputable authority. He was laconic, even short in a military way. “He managed to give me something with which I could boldly go through life.” Father liked to repeat: “Learn to look at yourself from the outside and evaluate who you really are ... what you are really capable of. And also learn to dream… Without a dream, a person is not interesting either to himself or to those around him…” “Following my father's advice was not easy. Sometimes I really wanted not to notice my shortcomings, to indulge myself ... Especially at the time when I studied at the Chelyabinsk Higher Military Aviation School for Navigators. “We were young, reckless! I wanted something sublime, unearthly, and sometimes the most ordinary, mundane, - says Valery Burkov with a smile. And after a pause, sadly adds: - Yes, it was a wonderful time! Whole life ahead. No one knew what awaits anyone ... "I look at this slender, fit man with gray hair at the temples and see how his face is getting younger and his eyes sparkle mischievously, and a sparkling smile attracts the eye - pleasant memories change a person. “I was very lucky with my classmates. We had the most friendly course, group, department. They say that it was the best course in the history of the school. All the guys are like a match: smart, strong-willed and, most importantly, real friends ... They called me an “experimenter”. For the fact that he loved to fly, be sure to be imaginative, creative. Oh, and I often get for such experiments! But on the other hand, one of the first instructor entrusted me with teaching his own cadets to fly ... Yes, how quickly time flies. We recently celebrated 25 years from the date of issue, but we are still friends. Almost all of our group ended up in Moscow. Guys high altitudes achieved, but remained the same open, young at heart ... ” ... By graduation from the school, grandmother Valeria, who lived in the Altai Territory, sent her grandson a big parting letter. He still remembers it almost by heart. The word “conscience” was repeated in it as many times as there are proverbs and sayings in the Russian language on this topic that is relevant at all times ... “Live according to your conscience” ... - Valery Burkov learned this for life ... And then there was Afghanistan. Father was sent there first. Before parting, they talked all night. Two officers. Two pilots. Father and son. And in parting, the father, as always, briefly asked: “Will you come?” And the son, without a moment's hesitation, replied: "I will come." He was sure that they would definitely meet. There, at war. It simply couldn't be otherwise. “You can treat that war in different ways. Especially now, when many secrets have become clear ... But then I knew that every officer should be there. It was a matter of honor." Valery submitted report after report to his superiors with a request to send him to Afghanistan. But, apparently, his time has not yet come. The young officer was refused, referring to the fact that he is now more needed in his homeland. Father died in 82. They never had a chance to see each other again ... But the 26-year-old senior lieutenant Valery Burkov nevertheless achieved his goal. When another assignment came to the unit, he asked for a lower position and left for Afghanistan as an advanced aircraft controller. Who does not know what it is, I will say: these people in aviation are considered almost suicide bombers. In order to avoid losses, they must detect enemy positions ahead of the infantry and, by radio, indicate the coordinates on which the attack aircraft “work”. To say it was dangerous is an understatement. And I had to learn this “craft” literally on the go. Aircraft controllers were not specially trained anywhere, they were recruited from pilots, and even the most necessary equipment for those leaving on a mission was collected literally “from the world by thread” ... But it was not in vain that Valery was once, back in school, called an “experimenter”. He also managed to develop and implement his innovative proposals there, in the conditions of war, trying to protect the lives of soldiers as much as possible. Twice Valery Burkov was given ahead of schedule another military ranks... “Many people thought that I went to Afghanistan to avenge my father ... No, I just promised him to come ...” This has been the case from time immemorial: someone knocked out his armor in order to stay away from the war, and someone considered it shameful to sit in the rear . Neither father nor son could stay away from the Afghan war in which their country was drawn. They felt it was their duty to protect her. ... That day, April 23, 1984, Valery Burkov remembered to the smallest detail. Altitude 3300 meters in the Pandzhera mountains. Here, a year and a half ago, dad died - that's what Valery always called his father ... The battle was over. Somewhere below, in the valley, the broken fortifications of the Mujahideen were still smoking and automatic bursts could be heard. But he, the advanced aircraft controller Valery Burkov, had already completed his task and could finally rest. He took the heavy radio off his back, sat down on a smooth rock and lit a cigarette. The air already smelled of spring. Nature was awakening to new life. “I arrived, dad ... As I promised ...” - Valery remembers that he only managed to utter these words to himself. And then there was an explosion ... What was it? Rupture of a random mine or a grenade thrown at him? Valery never found out about this ... What happened half an hour later is difficult to fit into the narrow framework of a newspaper essay. Is it possible to briefly describe how, bleeding, seriously wounded in both legs, arm and face, Valery Burkov will escape from this hell? he can be saved. And he, Burkov, was from a breed of strong-willed people, and therefore, with all his might and contrary to all forecasts, he survived. survived clinical death and amputation of both legs… Hospitals and doctors, compassionate sisters and nannies changed. It was patched, stitched, reshaped… And this went on for exactly twelve months… “When I saw myself without legs, I thought: “So what? The head is in order, everything else is in place ... And I also remembered: Maresyev! He even flew without legs ... Why can't I learn to walk? Valery never picked up crutches. I didn't want to get used to them. He acted more cunningly - he learned to walk, holding on to the stroller ... And he never made himself an indulgence! I remember my first dentures for a long time. Bleeding his knees and clenching his teeth to the point of pain, he descended the stairs, overcoming step by step. And it was the first victory! And then Valery decided to complicate the task. And he went to St. Petersburg to the Institute of Prosthetics alone, without an escort. He will always remember this trip… He spent almost a day on his feet without taking off his prostheses. There were moments when there was no strength to even take a step ... Valery almost lost consciousness from unbearable pain. But he remembered: then, in Afghanistan, it was more difficult. So is it really going to break now, can't stand it? No, it won't! And he stubbornly, step by step, moved forward, knowing that he would not give up. Valery owed this confidence primarily to his father. It was he who, as a child, taught his son to strictly ask, first of all, from himself. But he could always dream. Only dreams at different stages of life were different. Depending on life circumstances. Exactly one year later, to the day, after being wounded, the long-awaited order of the Minister of Defense was signed that he, Major Burkov, remained in the army. How he dreamed about it while still in the hospital! And now it came true! But no one, except Valery himself, believed in this ... As well as the fact that he would get back on his feet and serve in the army for another 13 years, graduate from the Yu.A. Gagarin. While studying at the academy, he will meet a girl ... She will seem to him the most beautiful in the world. Seeing her for the first time, Valery will say to himself: “How long I have been waiting for her! But he could not have waited ... ”And he would immediately drive away this terrible thought. He calls her only Irishka. Although they have been married for eighteen years. Their son Andrei was 5 years old when the Star of the Hero found his father ... Now he is 17, he studies at the famous Baumanovsky. ... Almost 70 years have passed since the title of Hero of the Soviet Union was approved in 1934. Over the years, about 13 thousand people have become heroes in our country ... The last to be awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union by decree of the President of the USSR M. Gorbachev "For heroism and courage shown in the performance of tasks of international assistance to the Republic of Afghanistan, civic prowess, selfless actions", was a warrior-"Afghan" Valery Burkov. His feat was akin to what our soldiers did in the Great Patriotic War. After all, even in war there is always a choice: either to hide behind the backs of others, trying to survive at any cost, or to complete the task, trying not to think about yourself. This is the nature, the essence of achievement. What a pity that this concept is gradually disappearing from our life, in which everything is subject to cold calculation, and sacrificing oneself is not at all fashionable today ... Valery Burkov did not just walk ahead himself. There, in Afghanistan, in a short time he showed himself in such a way that he was entrusted with leading a group of aircraft controllers - the Combat Command Group, where he already had to answer for the lives of others. This is also why he so painfully searched for, and finally found, ways to avoid unnecessary losses. And later, lying in a hospital bed after a severe injury, he will remember Maresyev more than once, his life will become an example for Valery Burkov, and he will also have the strength to cope with himself, overcome pain and other people's distrust. And this, in my opinion, is no less a feat - to prove, first of all, to yourself that it is worth appreciating every moment of this life, so short and so beautiful. Returning, in fact, from the next world, he understood the value of life much better than many. Because death is the only thing that can no longer be changed… Years have passed. A different country has become, many people have radically changed their views and thoughts. And he, Valery Anatolyevich Burkov, remained the same romantic, able to dream ... All these years in different quality he dealt exclusively with the problems of other people, the same as himself, the soldiers of Russia crippled in the war. When he served in the Air Force General Staff, in the evenings, after work, he visited disabled "Afghans" and talked with them. Then he made lists, analyzed, studied the problem from the inside, searched for required documents. For almost a year I went to various high authorities, knocked on all the doors, and then, one might say, miraculously, this “work” ended up on the table of the President of the Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin ... So Valery Anatolyevich became an adviser to the president and already came to grips with familiar problems. As part of delegations and at the invitation, he visited the UN Assembly three times, in many countries of the world ... How did a military officer feel in the role of an official? Valery Anatolyevich does not hide his feelings: “It was probably easier in Afghanistan ... There were other, clearer rules of the game, there was no such distrust, indifference to people ... But any business, if you give yourself completely to it, makes a person wiser, stronger. I deal with people's problems even now, being president of the Center for Social Problems at the Academy of Security, Defense and Law Enforcement Problems, where I am vice president. There is always enough work in the social sphere, whether civilian or military. There are too many unprotected and disadvantaged people in our country ... ”But still, he considers his activities in the Heroes Club, where he works in the field of spiritual and patriotic education, to be the center of the application of his forces. In his opinion, the most important thing now is to reach out to the young, to give them worthy guidelines in life, which they are deprived of for various reasons. He already has experience in holding cultural events. Much remains to be done by Valery Burkov and his associates. He has them, and, fortunately, there are many of them. I know that the Hero of the Soviet Union, the former Afghan pilot Valery Burkov has been writing and performing his own songs for a long time. He has a simply magnificent "Afghan cycle" - songs that take the soul of anyone who has ever heard them. There are others, lyrical, written in different periods of his life. I think that they will still find their audience. Like the unfinished book of reflections - the look of a person who has something to say. Because he knows how not only to dream, but also to realize his dreams ...

How in Afghanistan "Cascade" defeated the guards of Bin Laden.

The Black Stork unit was organized by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar from the most select thugs who underwent extensive training under the guidance of American and Pakistani instructors. Each "stork" simultaneously acted as a radio operator, sniper, miner, etc. In addition, the soldiers of this special unit, created to conduct sabotage operations, owned almost all types of small arms and were distinguished by bestial cruelty: they tortured Soviet prisoners of war no worse than the Gestapo.

Although the Black Storks proudly claimed that they had never been defeated by the Soviet troops, this was only partly true. And it concerned only the first years of the war. The fact is that our combat units were not trained for guerrilla warfare, but for large-scale military operations. Therefore, at first they suffered tangible losses.
I had to learn by doing. And both soldiers and officers. But not without tragic incidents. For example, the major, who bore the strange nickname Zero Eight, raised combat helicopters into the sky and completely destroyed the column of our allies, the fighters of Babrak Karmal, on the march. Later I learned that "zero-eight" is the density of oak. At the same time, the special forces soldiers were much better prepared and looked simply brilliant against the background of such “oak” majors.
By the way, before the Afghan war, only officers served in this unit. The decision to recruit conscripts and sergeants into the ranks of special forces was made by the Soviet command already during the conflict.
A group of Soviet special forces fell into an ambush, skillfully placed by "storks", while performing the most common task.

- We received information that some gang defeated a caravan of fuel tankers 40 kilometers from Kabul. According to army intelligence, this convoy was carrying a secret cargo - new Chinese rocket launchers and possibly chemical weapon. And gasoline was just a cover.
Our group needed to find the surviving soldiers, cargo and deliver them to Kabul. The size of a regular full-time special forces group is ten people. And the smaller the group, the easier it is to work. But this time it was decided to unite the two groups under the command of Senior Lieutenant Boris Kovalev and reinforce them with experienced fighters. Therefore, the trainee senior lieutenant Jan Kuskis, as well as two warrant officers Sergei Chaika and Viktor Stroganov, went on a free search.
We set out during the day, light, in the heat. They did not take helmets or body armor. It was believed that the commando was ashamed to put on all this ammunition. Silly, of course, but this unwritten rule has always been strictly followed. We didn’t even take enough food with us, as we planned to return before dark.
Each of the fighters carried a 5.45 mm AKS-74 assault rifle, while the officers preferred the 7.62 mm AKM. In addition, the group was armed with 4 PKM - modernized Kalashnikov machine guns. This is very powerful weapon fired the same cartridges as sniper rifle Dragunov - 7.62 mm by 54 mm. Although the caliber is the same as that of the AKM, the cartridge case is longer, and therefore the charge of gunpowder is more powerful. In addition to machine guns and machine guns, each of us took with us about a dozen defensive grenades "efok" - F-1, with a fragmentation spread of 200 meters. We despised the offensive RGD-5 for its low power and jammed the fish with them.
The consolidated group walked along the hills parallel to the Kabul-Ghazni highway, which very much resembles the Chilik-Chundzha highway in the Almaty region.
The gentle and long climbs exhausted us much more than the steepest rocks. It seemed like they would never end. It was very difficult to walk. The rays of the high-mountain sun roasted our backs, and the earth, hot as a frying pan, breathed into our faces with unbearable burning heat.
Around 19 pm, the commander of the joint group, Kovalev, decided to “sit down” for the night. The fighters occupied the top of the Kazazhora hill and began to build loopholes from basalt stone - round cells half a meter high.
Andrey Dmitrienko recalls:
- In each such fortification there were 5-6 people. I was in the same cell with Alexei Afanasiev, Tolkyn Bektanov and two Andreis - Moiseev and Shkolenov. The group commander Kovalev, senior lieutenant Kushkis and the radiotelegraph operator Kalyagin were located about two hundred and fifty meters from the main group.
When it got dark, we decided to light a cigarette, and then from the neighboring skyscrapers we were suddenly hit by five DShKs - large-caliber Degtyarev-Shpagin machine guns. This machine gun, eloquently nicknamed the “king of the mountains” in Afghanistan, was sold by the USSR to China in the seventies. During the Afghan conflict, the functionaries of the Celestial Empire did not lose their heads and resold this powerful weapon to dushmans. Now we had to test the terrible power of five large-caliber "kings" in our own skin.
Heavy bullets of 12.7 mm caliber crushed fragile basalt into dust. Looking out into the loophole, I saw how a crowd of dushmans was rolling towards our position from below. There were two hundred of them. Everyone was scribbling with Kalashnikovs and yelling. In addition to the dagger fire of the DShK, the attackers were covered by the machine guns of their coreligionists hiding in shelters.
We immediately noticed that the spirits were not behaving in the same way as always, but too professionally. While some were making a swift dash forward, others were beating us with machine guns so that they didn't let us raise our heads. In the darkness, we could only see the silhouettes of the rapidly advancing Mujahideen, which strongly looked like disembodied ghosts. And the sight was terrifying. But even the fuzzy contours of the fleeing enemies were lost every now and then.
Having made another throw, the spooks instantly fell to the ground and pulled dark hoods of black American “Alaskas” or dark green camouflage jackets over their heads. Because of this, they completely merged with the rocky soil and hid for a while. After that, the attackers and coverrs changed roles. The fire didn't stop even for a second.
This was very strange, given that most of the Mujahideen were usually armed with Chinese and Egyptian-made Kalashnikovs. The fact is that the Egyptian and Chinese fakes AKM and AK-47 could not withstand long-term shooting, as they were made of low-quality steel. Their barrels, when heated, expanded, and the bullets flew very weakly. Having fired two or three horns, such machine guns simply began to “spit”.
Letting the "spirits" a hundred meters, we hit back. After our queues mowed down several dozen attackers, the dushmans crawled back. However, it was too early to rejoice: there were still too many enemies, and we obviously did not have enough ammunition. I want to especially note the completely idiotic order of the USSR Ministry of Defense, according to which no more than 650 rounds of ammunition were issued to a fighter for one combat exit. Looking ahead, I’ll say that after returning, we severely beat the foreman who gave us ammunition. To no longer carry out such stupid orders. And it helped!
It is interesting that the "spirits" almost did not shoot at the cell of the group commander Kovalev, where he was with senior lieutenant Kushkis and radiotelegrapher Kalyagin. The enemy concentrated all his forces on us. Maybe the Mujahideen decided that the three fighters would not go anywhere anyway? Such neglect played a cruel joke on our enemies. At that moment, when our fire from a lack of ammunition was catastrophically weakened and we could no longer hold back the onslaught of the advancing "spirits", Kovalev, Kushkis and Kalyagin unexpectedly hit them in the rear.
Hearing the explosions of grenades and the crackle of automatic bursts, at first we even thought that reinforcements had approached us.
But then the group commander rolled into our cell, along with an intern and a radio operator. During the breakthrough, they destroyed about a dozen "spirits".
In response, angry Mujahideen, not limited to the murderous fire of five DShKs, began to hit the cells with hand grenade launchers. From direct hits, the layered stone shattered into pieces. Many fighters were wounded by fragments of grenades and stones. Since we did not take dressing bags with us, we had to bandage the wounds with torn vests.
Unfortunately, at that time we did not have night sights, and only Sergei Chaika had infrared binoculars. Having looked out for a grenade launcher, he shouted to me: “Reptile for seven hours! Piss him off!" And I sent a short line there. How many people I laid down then, I don’t know exactly. But probably around 30.
This fight was not the first for me, and I already had to kill people. But in war, killing is not considered murder - it's just a way to survive yourself. Here you need to quickly react to everything and shoot very accurately.
When I left for Afghanistan, my grandfather was a machine gunner, a veteran of the Great Patriotic War, said to me: “Never look at the enemy, but immediately shoot at him. Consider later."
Before the departure, the political workers told us that the Mujahideen had cut off the ears, noses and other organs of our dead soldiers, they had gouged out their eyes.
After my arrival in Kabul, I discovered that ours also cut off the ears of the dead "spirits". A bad example is contagious, and soon I was doing the same. But my passion for collecting was interrupted by a special officer who caught me on the 57th ear. All dried exhibits, of course, had to be thrown away.
Realizing that our group would not have enough strength or ammunition, the radiotelegrapher Afanasiev began to call Kabul. I lay next to him and heard with my own ears the answer of the garrison duty officer. This officer, when asked to send reinforcements, replied indifferently: "Get out yourself."
Only now I understand why the special forces soldiers were called disposable.
Here the heroism of Afanasiev was fully manifested, who turned off the radio and yelled loudly: “Guys, hold on, help is already coming!”
This news inspired everyone except me, since I alone knew the terrible truth.
We had very few cartridges left, the group was forced to rearrange the fire translators to single shots. All our fighters shot perfectly, so many of the Mujahideen were hit by single fire. Realizing that they couldn’t take us head-on, the “spirits” resorted to a trick. They began to shout that we had mistakenly attacked our allies, the fighters of the tsarandoy - the Afghan militia.
Knowing that dushmans fight very badly in the light of day, Ensign Sergei Chaika began to play for time in the hope of surviving until morning and waiting for reinforcements. To this end, he offered the enemy negotiations. Dushmans agreed.
Chaika himself set out as truce truants with Matvienko, Baryshkin and Rakhimov. Having let them in about 50 meters, the "spirits" suddenly opened fire. Alexander Matvienko was killed by the first round, and Misha Baryshkin was seriously injured. I still remember how he, lying on the ground, convulsively twitches and shouts: “Guys, help! We're bleeding!"
All the fighters, as if on command, opened barrage fire. Thanks to this, Chaika and Rakhimov miraculously managed to return. Unfortunately, we failed to save Baryshkin. He was lying about a hundred and fifty meters from our positions, on open space. He soon quieted down.
The night battle reached its climax at 4 o'clock in the morning, when the "spirits" resolutely launched another attack. They did not spare the cartridges and loudly yelled: “Shuravi, taslim!” - an analogue of the fascist "Rus, give up!"
I was shaking from the cold and nervous tension, but most of all I was oppressed by the complete uncertainty. And I was very afraid. He was afraid of imminent death and possible torture, afraid of the unknown. Anyone who says that the war is not scary - either was not there, or is lying.
We have used up almost all the ammunition. Nobody saved the last cartridge for themselves. His role with the special forces is played by the last grenade. This is much more reliable and you can drag a few more enemies with you.
I still had seven rounds of ammunition left, a couple of grenades and a knife, when we began to negotiate among ourselves about who would finish off the wounded. They decided that those whom the lot would point to would stab them with knives. The remaining ammo is only for the enemy. It sounds terrible, but it was impossible to leave comrades alive. The Mujahideen would have brutally tortured them before they died.
As we cast lots, we heard the sound of helicopter propellers. To celebrate, I threw the last grenades at the dushmans. And then, like a cold, a terrible thought came over me: what if helicopters pass by?
But they did not pass by. It turned out that the helicopter pilots of the "stray" Alexandria regiment, based near Kandahar, flew to our rescue. This regiment served as penal officers who had numerous problems in the service. When our company stood next to these helicopter pilots, we drank vodka with them more than once. But although discipline was lame on both legs, they were not afraid of anything. Several transport Mi-8s and combat Mi-24s, better known as "crocodiles", hit the dushmans with machine guns and drove them away from our positions. Having quickly loaded two dead and 17 wounded comrades into helicopters, we jumped ourselves and left the enemy to bite his elbows.
Subsequently, the intelligence center of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan received information that in that battle our group had destroyed 372 trained militants. It also turned out that they were commanded by a young and little-known then Osama bin Laden. The agents testified that after this battle, the future famous terrorist, beside himself with rage, trampled on his own turban and with the last words winged his assistants. This defeat fell on the "storks" as an indelible stain of shame.
A week of mourning was declared in all Afghan villages controlled by the "spirits", and the leaders of the Mujahideen vowed to destroy our entire 459th company.
It is a pity that none of us put a bullet in bin Laden: the world would now be much calmer and the twin towers in New York would now stand in their place. True, he hardly ran on the attack along with the "storks". He was probably hiding behind some kind of tubercle.
After this fight, we drank without drying out for two whole weeks. And no one said a single word of reproach to us. The group commander, senior lieutenant Boris Kovalev, probationary senior lieutenant Jan Kushkis, ensign Sergei Chaika, radiotelegraph operator Kalyagin, and Alexander Matvienko and Mikhail Baryshkin, who died heroically, were awarded the Order of the Red Star. For some reason, the rest of the fighters were not awarded. They have already received awards for other operations.

And one soldier in the tank.

Igolchenko Sergey Viktorovich - senior tank driver of one of the units of the Ground Forces as part of the 40th Army of the Red Banner Turkestan Military District (limited contingent of Soviet troops in the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan), private.

Born on July 4, 1966 in the village of Berezovka, Buturlinovsky District, Voronezh Region (now within the city of Buturlinovka) into a peasant family. Russian. He graduated from the 8th grade of the Berezovskaya eight-year school and a vocational school. He worked at the Berezovsky collective farm.
IN Soviet army since November 1985. He served as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. The senior mechanic-driver of the tank, member of the Komsomol, private Sergey Igolchenko, whose combat vehicle was blown up by enemy mines and land mines six times during the period of participation in hostilities, was wounded twice, shell-shocked six times, but remained in service each time.
As Sergei Igolchenko himself recalled: “... one of the lessons of Afghanistan: the tank crew is on the armor while moving. Except, of course, the driver. Correctly said: a bullet is a fool. It can catch on, or it can whistle past. Another thing is a mine or a landmine. Turn out to be the crew during the explosion inside the tank - you will not envy the guys. And so, it will only shake, but it will be thrown to the ground. The mechanic has nowhere to go, his place is in the womb of the machine. Undermining for him is a disaster ... "
By decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of March 3, 1988, for the courage and heroism shown in providing international assistance to the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan, Private Igolchenko Sergey Viktorovich was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union with the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal (No. 11569).
In 1987, the brave tanker soldier was transferred to the reserve and returned to his homeland. He worked as a bricklayer in a construction team, and in subsequent years - as a master of industrial training at Vocational School No. 39 in the city of Buturlinovka, Voronezh Region ...
He was awarded the Order of Lenin, the Gold Star medal.

AND ONE WARRIOR IN THE TANK
He was sitting in the tank all alone and ... resting. The entire crew, plus the battalion commander and two sappers taken by the "passengers" for armor, went on reconnaissance on foot. Huge boulders, maybe accidentally scattered across the road by someone, were an insurmountable obstacle. We tried to storm them from acceleration - it did not work out.
So, the group disappeared ahead, and he was left in the car for the owner. The dream came true.
Sergei Igolchenko, while still in the training unit, hoped to become a commander of a tank crew. But no one asked about his dreams. Identified in the gunners. I had to become the best gunner. among the cadets. And again, a nuisance: they just didn’t want to let go of school. Well, the commander turned out to be democratic. I agreed with the arguments of the subordinate: indeed, in Afghanistan, he is more needed. And already there, after a few months, he had the opportunity to change his military specialty. The company needed a driver, but there were no free specialists.
I must say, there are requirements for driver-mechanics - as for test pilots, who, according to a front-line saying, must fly freely on everything that flies, and with some effort - on what cannot fly. So, Igolchenko did his tests well, with some even, as the senior technician of the company said, art. And the fact that during his service, Private Igolchenko was blown up by mines and land mines six times, burned, was shell-shocked, in no way detracts from his professionalism. By Afghan standards, such a number of "accidents" does not even pull for a hole in a technical ticket.
... The group retreated about three hundred meters, when a flash of a shot flashed on the right slope. Immediately, a large-caliber machine gun fired, rifles clapped randomly.
He “plugged” one of the recoilless guns with the very first shot: it turned out that he didn’t seem to have weaned from his former military specialty. Then I had to act for the tank commander.
- Recharge!
But there was no one to charge. Overcoming the sudden pain in the knee joint, he moved to the place of the loader. Now back to the target. Another firing point destroyed. And on the armor, bullets, fragments of stones and shells whipped with blunt, screeching blows. And he commanded himself again: Charge!
And ran the command again. Without ceasing to think, how is it, ahead, guys, the battalion commander? On the one hand, it would be necessary to go to them, on the other hand, the tank must not be left. But the commander, even without subordinates, is not only to give commands. Must make decisions. Risky? Yes. But also the only true ones. And the commander Igolchenko gave the order to ordinary Igolchenko to return to the regular place of the driver.
The boulders, of course, did not part on the second attempt. Just moved forward a little. But even this "concession" was enough for the tank, with a strained roar of the engine, to squeeze between them and the rocky slope of the mountain.
...Soon the crew was in place. Igolchenko turned the car, working with a machine gun on the course. Sappers fired from machine guns from the tower. But then a caterpillar was damaged by a shot from a grenade launcher. Well, "driver" is a two-word term. Their order is not random. If a mechanic fails to immediately change a damaged track in the midst of a battle, then as a driver he will be left without work. In this case, professional suitability is a matter of life and death.
- Well, you are a hero, however! - the senior technician of the company kept saying, examining the tank after the battle.
And ... as he looked into the water.

Updated May 17, 2018. Created 03 Oct 2016

Afghanistan has always been a bleeding point on the map. First, England in the 19th century claimed influence over this territory, and then America turned on its resources in order to resist the USSR in the 20th century.

The first operation of the border guards

To clean up the territory from the rebels in 1980, Soviet troops conducted a large-scale operation "Mountains-80". About 200 kilometers - this is the territory of the region, where secular border guards, with the support of the Afghan special services of the KhAD (AGSA) and the Afghan police (tsarandoy), entered with a swift march. The head of the operation, the chief of staff of the Central Asian border district, Colonel Valery Kharichev, was able to foresee everything. The victory was on the side of the Soviet troops, who were able to capture the main rebel Wakhoba and establish a control zone 150 kilometers wide. New border cordons were established. During 1981-1986, more than 800 successful operations were carried out by border guards. Major Alexander Bogdanov received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union posthumously. In mid-May 1984, he was surrounded and in hand-to-hand combat, having received three severe wounds, was killed by the Mujahideen.

Death of Valery Ukhabov

Lieutenant Colonel Valery Ukhabov was ordered to occupy a small foothold in the rear of the enemy's large defensive line. The whole night a small detachment of border guards held back the superior forces of the enemy. But by morning, the forces began to melt. There were no reinforcements. The scout sent with a report fell into the hands of the "spirits". He was killed. His body was laid out on the rocks. Valery Ukhabov, realizing that there was nowhere to retreat, made a desperate attempt to break out of the encirclement. She succeeded. But during the breakthrough, Lieutenant Colonel Ukhabov was mortally wounded and died when he was carried on a canvas cape by the soldiers he saved.

Salang Pass

The main road of life passed through the pass with a height of 3878 meters, along which the Soviet troops received fuel, ammunition, transported the wounded and the dead. One fact speaks of how dangerous this route was: for each passage of the pass, the driver was awarded the medal "For Military Merit". Mujahideen constantly ambushed here. It was especially dangerous to serve as a driver on a fuel truck, when the whole car instantly exploded from any bullet. In November 1986 there was a terrible tragedy: 176 soldiers suffocated here from exhaust fumes.

Private Maltsev rescued Afghan children in Salanga

Sergei Maltsev drove out of the tunnel when suddenly a heavy vehicle drove out towards his car. It was full of bags, and about 20 adults and children were sitting on top. Sergey sharply turned the steering wheel - the car crashed into a rock at full speed. He died. But peaceful Afghans survived. At the site of the tragedy, local residents erected a monument to the Soviet soldier, which has survived to this day and has been carefully cared for for several generations.

The paratrooper was given the first Hero of the Soviet Union posthumously

Alexander Mironenko was serving in the parachute regiment when they were ordered to conduct reconnaissance of the area and provide cover for helicopters carrying the wounded. When they landed, their group of three soldiers, led by Mironenko, rushed down. The second support group followed them, but the gap between the fighters widened every minute. Suddenly, the order to withdraw came. But it was already too late. Mironenko was surrounded and, together with three of his comrades, fired back to the last bullet. When the paratroopers found them, they saw a terrible picture: the soldiers were stripped naked, they were wounded in the legs, all their bodies were stabbed with knives.

And looked death in the face

Vasily Vasilyevich was extremely lucky. Once in the mountains, Shcherbakov's Mi-8 helicopter came under fire from dushmans. In a narrow gorge, a fast maneuverable vehicle became a hostage of narrow rocks. You can't turn back - to the left and to the right are the cramped gray walls of one terrible stone grave. There is only one way out - to row the propeller forward and wait for a bullet in the "berry bush". And the "spirits" have already saluted all types of weapons to the Soviet suicide bombers. But they were able to escape. The helicopter, miraculously flying to its airfield, resembled a beetroot grater. Ten holes were counted in the gear compartment alone.

Once, flying over the mountains, Shcherbakov's crew felt a strong blow to the tail boom. The follower flew up, but saw nothing. Only after landing, Shcherbakov discovered that only a few "threads" remained in one of the tail rotor control cables. As soon as they break off - and remember your name.

Somehow examining the narrow gorge, Shcherbakov felt someone's gaze. And - measurement. A few meters from the helicopter, on a narrow ledge of rock, a dushman stood and calmly aimed at Shcherbakov's head. It was so close. That Vasily Vasilyevich physically felt the cold muzzle of the machine gun resting on his temple. He was waiting for a merciless, inevitable shot. And the helicopter was climbing too slowly. Why this strange mountaineer in a turban never fired remains a mystery. Shcherbakov survived. He received the star of the Hero of the Soviet Union for saving the crew of his comrade.

Shcherbakov saved his comrade

In Afghanistan, Mi-8 helicopters became a lifesaver for many Soviet soldiers, coming to their aid at the very last minute. Dushmans in Afghanistan have not seen helicopter pilots fiercely. They cut the wrecked car of Captain Kopchikov with knives at the moment when the crew of the wrecked helicopter was firing back and was already preparing for death. But they were saved. Major Vasily Shcherbakov on his Mi-8 helicopter made several covering attacks on the brutal "spirits". And then he landed and literally pulled out the wounded captain Kopchikov. There were many such cases in the war, and behind each of them stands an unparalleled heroism, which today, over the years, has begun to be forgotten.

Heroes are not forgotten

Unfortunately, during perestroika, the names of real war heroes began to be deliberately forgotten. There are slanderous publications in the press about the atrocities of Soviet soldiers. But time has put everything in its place today. Heroes are always heroes.

A nineteen-year-old boy from the Ural town of Talitsa, Yuri Islamov, repeated in Afghanistan the feat of his fellow countryman, scout Nikolai Kuznetsov. On October 31, 1987, senior sergeant Islamov, ensuring the withdrawal of his surrounded comrades, blew himself up and a group of dushmans with a grenade. On February 15, on the day of the 25th anniversary of the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan, Hero of the Soviet Union Yury Islamov was commemorated in Yekaterinburg.

The price of victory

For seven months of service in Afghanistan, Islamov took part in ten successful military exits. The eleventh was the last, tragic ...

On the evening of October 23, a group of senior lieutenant Onishchuk, which included Yuri, was supposed to arrive by Mi-8 helicopter in the area where a caravan with weapons was expected to be delivered to the dushmans from behind the cordon. However, the helicopter, taking off into the air, immediately went to land. There was a problem and the repair was delayed. The group was unable to take off either on 24 or 25 October. Then Onischuk turned to the battalion commander with a request to advance in armored vehicles.

The group successfully reached the caravan trail and took up a position on the hill. Three days patiently waiting for transport, but he did not appear. By order, after three days, the special forces were to return to the location of the unit. But Onischuk convinces the battalion commander to stay for another day. And just on the fourth day, a caravan of three trucks appears on the road. Onischuk decides to attack the first vehicle, a three-axle Mercedes. First, the special forces put the Mujahideen in an all-terrain vehicle, and then destroyed the cover group.

It happened on the evening of October 30, from 20.00 to 21.30. But the "spirits" did not want to give up so easily. From the village of Duri, which was nearby, they began to fire at the group. Moreover, they tried to recapture the Mercedes. Then at 22.30 Onishchuk called on the radio for fire support helicopters - two Mi-24s. They dealt a powerful blow to the dushmans and the village of Duri. It seemed that all the "spirits" were killed.

In theory, at that moment our soldiers should have been taken out on "turntables" to the location of the unit. But the command underestimated the situation, the more night approached, and the decision was postponed until morning.

Around 1 am on October 31, under cover of darkness, Onishchuk with several soldiers made his way to the "Mercedes" and took away part of the trophies. The catch turned out to be rich - recoilless rifles, heavy machine guns, mortars, ammunition.

The special forces decided to make the next trip to the wrecked all-terrain vehicle at dawn. At about 5.45, as soon as Onischuk and the soldiers approached the Mercedes, the dushmans opened heavy fire on them. It turned out that the bandits were hiding very close. At night, they tracked down the special forces and realized that they would return for the rest of the trophies. And they set up an ambush. Moreover, by the morning to this place, the commander of the DIRA front - the Movement of the Islamic Revolution of Afghanistan - Mullah Madad, under whose arms there were two and a half thousand militants, managed to pull over a hundred Mujahideen. He was furious that under his nose, near his fortified area, Soviet soldiers behave so freely. And ordered to destroy them.

A fierce battle ensued. Unequal fight. Senior Lieutenant Onishchuk realized that he had to urgently retreat to the hill, but how to do this under a hail of bullets? He leaves Islamov and private Khrolenko at the "Mercedes" for cover, and he himself, with the rest of the fighters, begins to make his way to the saving rocks. But almost immediately, three soldiers are injured, but continue to shoot back. Meanwhile, Islamov and Khrolenko notice that the ring of bandits is shrinking. It seems that their guttural cries of "Allah Akbar" are already heard from all sides. Some daredevils in turbans rush to the attack, but run into long bursts of "Kalash". And then our fighters are covered with a shot from a grenade launcher. Khrolenko dies, and Yuri is wounded. But, bleeding, he continues to scribble from the machine gun.

We ran out of ammo. Yuri began to beat with short bursts. Finally, the machine stopped completely. Dushmans decided: everything, now the fighter is in their hands. They approached with apprehension, stopped, looking at the swarthy, covered in blood and dust, soldier. But Yuri was still alive. Overcoming the pain, he put his hand under him and felt for the grenade. Imperceptibly pulled out the ring with his teeth and again hid the "lemon" under the hem of his pea jacket. I waited for the bandits to come quite close. Now he saw one of them, well-dressed and well-armed, stop a few paces away. Probably the commander of the Mujahideen. “It’s time,” Yuri decided, and pulled out his hand with a grenade from under him ...

19 years old and all my life

The Urals became Yuri's second home. And he was born in Kyrgyzstan. His father is Verik Ergashevich Islamov, a forester of the Arslanbobsky reserve, spread out on the spurs of the Tien Shan. Thanks to his father and grandfather, Yura began to learn about nature from early childhood. At the age of ten, he could already accurately shoot from his father's hunting rifle, "read" the tracks of animals, recognize them by the voices of birds. Yura's mother, Lyubov Ignatievna Koryakina, is a Ural girl from the city of Talitsa, Sverdlovsk Region.

After the end of the fourth grade, the parents seriously thought about the future of their son. In order to get an education, Yuri must go to a good school.

There was only one way out - to send him to the Urals, to his grandmother Agrippina Nikanorovna. Yuri went to the fifth grade already in Talitsa.

It was here that Yura turned from a shy boy into a confident and purposeful young man, he became interested in sports. And, which is not quite typical for a southerner, skiing!

Those who achieve high results in skiing are more industrious than they are able, - says Islamov's coach Alexander Alekseevich Babinov. - Yuri was just very hardworking and stubborn. Physical data - strength, growth - he did not stand out. But endurance - yes, it was.

Few people knew that Yuri kept a kind of diary. But he made notes not about what happened to him, but about what needs to be done, what to achieve. So, once he wrote down: "I undertake to grow by 8 centimeters over the summer." I shared my goal with my grandmother. She just laughed in response. However, later she was amazed at the stubbornness of her grandson: having tied weights to his feet, he hung on the horizontal bar for hours.

Yuri, it seemed, was scheduled not only every day, but his whole life. Here are more lines from his diary: "After school - to enter the Forestry Institute. Then go to my parents. Help them. Protect the forest ..."

Talitsky district is a protected area. Here Yuri first saw centuries-old pine forests. In those years, a school forestry worked at the local forestry. In one of the letters to his parents, Yuri told with admiration that he had planted dozens of pines, firs and even several cedars with his own hands!

Once in a chest of drawers, Yuri found front-line photographs of his grandfather, Ignatius Nikandrovich Koryakin. Unfortunately, the grandfather did not live to see his grandson appear in his house. Right there, in the chest of drawers, Yura found evidence that his grandfather was awarded the Order of the Red Star, medals "For Courage" and "Defense of Moscow", as well as Thanksgiving letters Supreme Commander. From them it followed that the squad leader senior sergeant Koryakin fought bravely, defending Moscow, in battles near the Western Bug River, on the banks of the Vistula, and participated in the battle for Berlin.

The young man deliberately prepared himself for military service. And soon he realized that he was faced with a choice: on the one hand, he wanted to become a forester, and on the other, military service beckoned.

And it was not just a boyish whim. This thought gripped Yuri more and more. Moreover, he already knew for sure that he wanted to serve not just anywhere, but in the Airborne Forces.

In the eighth grade, Yuri, along with his classmates, was summoned to the military registration and enlistment office to pass the registration commission. And then Islamov, a pre-conscript, heard a terrible verdict: "Not fit for service!" This conclusion was made by the doctors, having discovered that he had flat feet.

Probably someone else would be okay with it. But Yuri was not like that. He decided to correct the mistake made by nature: he tore off the heels from the old shoes and nailed them from the inside, right to the insoles, of the new ones. It was uncomfortable to walk, sometimes he rubbed his legs in the blood, but he endured. I attached the same heels to the inside of the sneakers.

It is true what they say: perseverance and work will grind everything. Over time, Yuri managed to form the correct feet, in short, by the age of eighteen, and he eliminated this shortcoming that prevented him from going to the army!

In 1985, Yuri successfully graduated from high school and entered the forest engineering department of the Forestry Engineering Institute. Studying at the university was easy for Islamov. The first session, as well as the second, he passed without any problems. At the same time, he did not forget about sports.

In the winter of 1986, Islamov entered the DOSAAF aviation sports club. Yuri successfully graduated from the DOSAAF school, having received the third category of a skydiver.

And in the fall, Islamov was drafted into the army. He got into the Airborne Forces! And where! From the Urals, he was sent to training not far from his native Kyrgyzstan - in neighboring Uzbekistan, in the city of Chirchik, where special forces soldiers were trained. After graduating, Islamov, as an excellent student in combat and political training, was awarded the rank of junior sergeant and offered to remain an instructor in the training unit. But he refused. I asked the unit commander to be sent to Afghanistan.

Editorial

Unfortunately, today there are those who claim that the war in Afghanistan was in vain, and the heroism of our soldiers and officers, their sacrifices were meaningless. Society is still trying to deprive the past. And the most innocuous explanation for this may be that these people do not know the history of their country. In the conditions of confrontation between the two systems, the leadership of the USSR could not allow the Americans to enter Afghanistan, with which the USSR had too large a border. Our army defended the southern borders of the Fatherland, and Pakistan, which had nuclear weapons, also objectively fell under control.

The USSR in Afghanistan trained and educated a whole generation of Afghan intelligentsia: doctors, engineers, teachers, in fact, created the economy of this country by building 142 large facilities in the republic: schools, kindergartens, hospitals, power plants, gas pipelines, dams, three airports, a polytechnic institute and much more. Many locals still remember with gratitude the years that some call "Soviet occupation".

For our country, the Afghan war, in addition to geopolitical, had one more importance, which is usually not talked about: in fact, it delayed for decades the influx of Afghan heroin, which today kills twice as many Russians in a year as died in all 10 years of the war, thereby saving the lives of a generation - hundreds of thousands of young people.

Portraits of the heroes of the Afghan war from the set of postcards "On the Afghan roads" (1989)
Yaroslav Goroshko
Captain Yaroslav Pavlovich Goroshko was born in 1957 in the village of Borshchevka, Lanovets district, Ternopil region. He graduated from the Khmelnytsky Higher Artillery Command School. Twice - from 1981 to 1983 and from 1987 to 1988 - was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He was awarded two orders of the Red Star and the medal "For Courage". In 1988 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

At present, there are different points of view on whether the Soviet Army fought in Afghanistan in vain or not in vain. If you approach this issue in a detached way and from a purely political point of view, then, probably, in vain. In vain, because the limited contingent of the Soviet Army in this case acted as an interventionist who entered this country in order to support one of the parties during the civil war that was taking place there.
It is clear that by doing this, the then top Soviet political leadership wanted to quickly solve the problem of protecting the southern borders of their country from the spread of all sorts of problems and misfortunes that were generated by the situation of instability inside Afghanistan and the frank unwillingness of any of the opposing Afghan sides seriously engage in the process of gaining full power for themselves throughout the territory of their state. Yes, the Soviet leadership made a big mistake. Instead of continuing to provide military-technical assistance to its indecisive Afghan allies and further strengthening its southern borders, it chose to send its troops there and thereby actually took on the entire burden of responsibility for all the problems that had accumulated there over all previous years. sluggish civil war.
But, as they say, making decisions of this kind is not the responsibility of the military, but of politicians. Moreover, the political formalities that made it possible for Soviet troops to enter the territory of a foreign country were observed. As for everything else, it is the business of the professional military of any self-respecting country not to discuss orders, but to carry them out.
The servicemen of the Soviet Army from the limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan behaved in exactly this way, showing selflessness and heroism. Yes, in the end they were defeated and forced to leave. But this was not their defeat, but the defeat of the then top Soviet leadership, which wanted to solve political problems through the hands of the military, which went far beyond their capabilities.
Therefore, let's once again remember the fallen and living heroes of this war and speak of them with the warmest words!
Vyacheslav Alexandrov
Junior Sergeant Vyacheslav Aleksandrovich Alexandrov was born in 1968 in the village of Izobilnoye, Sol-Iletsk District, Orenburg Region.
In the spring of 1986 he was drafted into the Armed Forces of the USSR. Since October of the same year, he served in the Airborne Forces unit as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan.



Ivan Barsukov
Colonel Ivan Petrovich Barsukov was born in 1948 in Kazgulak, Petrovsky District, Stavropol Territory. In 1969 he graduated from junior lieutenant courses at the Moscow Higher Border Command School named after Mossovet, and in 1987 - from the Frunze Military Academy.
Since 1981, for two years he was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. For his courage and heroism in 1983 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Alexander Golovanov
Colonel Alexander Sergeevich Golovanov was born in 1946 in the village of Dubovskoye, Istra District, Moscow Region. In 1970 he graduated from the Syzran Higher Military Aviation School.
Since January 1988 - as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. On the night of February 2, 1989, in the area of ​​​​the Salang Pass, he died while performing a combat mission. For his courage and heroism, he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Pavel Grachev
Major-General Pavel Sergeevich Grachev was born in 1948 in the village of Rvy in the Leninsky district of the Tula region. In 1969 he graduated from the Ryazan Higher Airborne Command School, and in 1981 from the Frunze Military Academy.
Twice was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. For courage and heroism shown in providing international assistance, he was awarded two Orders of Lenin, the Orders of the Red Banner and the Red Star, and was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Boris Gromov
Colonel-General Boris Vsevolodovich Gromov was born in 1943 in Saratov. In 1965 he graduated from the Leningrad Higher Combined-Arms Command School, in 1984 - from the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the USSR. Voroshilov.
He served three times as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Since 1987 - commander of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He was awarded the Order of Lenin, two Orders of the Red Banner, Orders of the Red Star and Orders for Service to the Motherland, 3rd degree. In 1988 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Sergey Gushchin
Captain Sergei Nikolaevich Gushchin was born in 1960 in the village of Sokoluk, Sokoluk District, Chui Region, Kirghiz SSR. He graduated from the Alma-Ata combined arms command school. He served seven years in the Turkestan military district.
From 1987 to 1989 he was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan.
For courage and heroism he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Sergey Igolchenko
Private Sergei Viktorovich Igolchenko was born in 1966 in the city of Buturlinovka, Voronezh Region.
In the fall of 1985 he was drafted into the Armed Forces of the USSR. He served in a tank unit as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Wounded twice, shell-shocked six times. He was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Yuri Islamov
Junior Sergeant Yuri Verikovich Islamov was born in 1968 in the village of Arslan-Bob, Bazar-Korgon district, Osh region, Kirghiz SSR. In the fall of 1986 he was drafted into the Armed Forces of the USSR.
He served in a special forces unit as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He was awarded the medal "For Courage", For courage and heroism shown in a critical situation during the battle, posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Vladimir Kovalev
Major Vladimir Aleksandrovich Kovalev was born in 1950 in Stavropol. He graduated from the Balashov Higher Military Aviation School.
Since 1987 - as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Made 180 sorties.
On December 21, 1987, while performing a combat mission, he was hit by a Stinger missile. Saving the lives of the crew, he showed courage and heroism. Posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Nikolai Kremenish
Sergeant Nikolai Ivanovich Kremenish was born in 1967 in the city of Ekibastuz, Pavlodar region, Kazakh SSR. In the autumn of 1985 he was drafted into the Armed Forces of the USSR.
He served in a sapper unit as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Awarded with the medal "For Courage". For courage and heroism shown in providing international assistance, he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Nikolay Lukashov
Captain Nikolai Ivanovich Lukashov was born in 1958 in the village of Novo-Moskovka, Tara District, Omsk Region. In 1982 he graduated from the Golitsyn Higher Military-Political Border School.
From 1984 to 1988 he was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He was awarded the Orders of the Red Banner, the Red Star, for service to the Motherland of the 3rd degree, was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Nikolai Maidanov
Captain Nikolai Sainovich Maidanov was born in 1956 in the village of Taskuduk, Dzhambeitinsky District, Ural Region, Kazakh SSR. Graduated from the Saratov Higher Military Aviation School.
Twice - from 1984 to 1965 and from 1987 to 1988 - he was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He was awarded the Orders of the Red Banner, the Red Star, for service to the Motherland of the 3rd degree, in 1987 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Andrey Melnikov
Private Andrei Alexandrovich Melnikov was born in 1968 in the city of Mogilev, Byelorussian SSR. In the fall of 1986 he was drafted into the Armed Forces of the USSR.
From April 1987 he served in the Airborne Forces as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He took part in six military operations.
On January 7, 1988, he was killed in action. For courage and heroism shown in an extreme situation, he was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Yuri Mirolyubov
Sergeant Yuri Nikolaevich Mirolubov was born in 1967 in the village of Ryadovichi, Shablykinsky District, Oryol Region. In the autumn of 1985 he was drafted into the Armed Forces of the USSR.
He served in a special forces unit as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He was awarded the medals "For Courage" and "For Military Merit". He was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Oleg Onischuk
Senior Lieutenant Oleg Petrovich Onischuk was born in 1961 in the village of Putrintsy, Izyaslavsky district, Khmelnitsky region. He graduated from the Kiev Higher All-Arms Command School.
From April 1987, he served in a special forces unit as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. For courage and heroism, he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner and the medal "For Military Merit", posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Vyacheslav Pismenny
Colonel Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Pismenny was born in 1950 in the city of Aktyubinsk, Kazakh SSR. He graduated from the Syzran Higher Military Aviation School and the Air Force Academy. Gagarin.
Twice - from 1980 to 1981 and from 1984 to 1985 - was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Awarded two Orders of the Red Star. In 1986 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Valery Popkov
Captain Valery Filippovich Popkov was born in 1961 in the village of Kilmez, Syumsinsky District, Udmurt Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. Graduated from the Syzran Higher Military Aviation School.
In 1982 he was sent to one of the military units of the limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. For courage and heroism shown in carrying out the task of providing international assistance, in 1989 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Alexander Railyan
Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Maksimovich Railyan was born in 1954 in the village of Moldavanskoye, Crimean District, Krasnodar Territory. Graduated from the Saratov Military Aviation School.
For courage and heroism shown during his service as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan, he was awarded the Order of the Red Star, and in 1988 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Alexander Rutskoy
Colonel Alexander Vladimirovich Rutskoi was born in 1947 in the city of Khmelnitsky. In 1971 he graduated from the Barnaul Higher Aviation School, and in 1980 - from the Air Force Academy. Gagarin.
Twice was part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Awarded the Order of the Red Banner. In 1988 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Victor Sinitsky
Junior Sergeant Viktor Pavlovich Sinitsky was born in 1967 in the village of Verbyazh, Volovets district, Transcarpathian region.
In the autumn of 1985 he was drafted into the Armed Forces of the USSR. He served in an engineering unit as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. He was awarded medals "For Courage" and "For Military Merit". He was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Boris Sokolov
Major Boris Innokentyevich Sokolov was born in 1953 in the city of Ulan-Ude. In 1979 he graduated from the Kazan Higher Military Engineering School, and in 1982 - the Higher Courses of Military Counterintelligence of the KGB of the USSR in Novosibirsk.
For two and a half years he served in a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan as an employee of military counterintelligence. Awarded the Order of the Red Star.
In 1985, for the courage and heroism shown in the provision of international assistance, he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Grigory Khaustov
Colonel Grigory Pavlovich Khaustov was born in 1939 in the village of Uspenskaya, Beloglinsky District, Krasnodar Territory. Graduated from the Kachinsky Higher Military Aviation School.
He served in various positions, fought in Egypt, was a military adviser in Madagascar.
Since 1987 - as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Made 670 sorties. In 1989 he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.


Oleg Yurasov
Major Oleg Aleksandrovich Yurasov was born in 1954 at the Shcherbinka station of the Leninsky district of the Moscow region. Graduated from the Ryazan Higher Airborne Command School.
Since 1987 - as part of a limited contingent of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. Awarded two Orders of the Red Star.
January 23, 1989, three weeks before the end of the withdrawal of Soviet troops, he died in battle. For courage and heroism shown in an extreme situation, he was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

Senior Sergeant Alexander Mironenko was among the first to be awarded the highest combat award in Afghanistan - the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Posthumously.

We served with him in the same 317th airborne regiment, only I was in the 2nd battalion, and he was in a reconnaissance company. The number of the regiment at that time was almost 800 people, so I personally did not know him - I learned about him, however, like all the other paratroopers of the regiment, only two months after his death, on the day when an official message was read before the whole system about conferring the title of Hero to our brother-soldier.

Everyone in our regiment knew the feat that Mironenko accomplished, but only in general terms: that while performing a combat mission, he and two more scouts were surrounded, fired back for a long time, and at the end of the battle, when his comrades died and the cartridges ran out, Mironenko, so as not to to be captured, blew himself up and the approaching enemies with an F-1 grenade. No more details, no details - even the names of the comrades who died with him - and they were also our fellow soldiers - were never mentioned.

… Years passed. Soviet troops were withdrawn from Afghanistan, and later the Soviet Union itself collapsed. At this time, I just started writing the novel "Soldiers of the Afghan War", where I shared my memories of serving in the airborne troops and Afghanistan. About the death of Art. I mentioned Sergeant Mironenko there only briefly, outlining the well-known story in the chapter "Kunar operation", because I knew nothing more.

Twenty-five years have passed since the death of Mironenko. It would seem that nothing foretold that I would have to stir up long-past events, when one day a message from a former countryman and friend Mironenko came to the guest book of my novel, published on the Internet. He asked me if I knew Mironenko and asked me to write everything that I know about him. Since it was about the Hero, I took this request with all responsibility. At first, I collected all the information about Mironenko on the Internet - but there were no memories of his colleagues, and the description of his last fight was clearly fiction. Therefore, in order to make the answer more complete and reliable, I decided to find those who, together with Mironenko, served in the reconnaissance company, and write memoirs about the first Hero of Afghanistan from their words.

I was lucky from the very beginning: several former colleagues of Mironenko lived just in my city - Novosibirsk - and it was not difficult to find them. Meetings have begun. From colleagues, I learned the names of the two soldiers who were part of Mironenko's troika: they were the gunner, corporal Viktor Zadvorny, and the driver, corporal Nikolai Sergeev. Both served in a reconnaissance company in the Mironenko squad and were drafted into the army in November 1978.

But in the course of the conversations, quite unexpectedly, other, very strange, circumstances of Mironenko's last fight began to open up. The most surprising thing was that not everyone in the Mironenko group died at all: one of this trio still managed to survive. He was found in the mountains a day after the battle, alive and unharmed. The survivor was Nikolai Sergeev. Since there were no other eyewitnesses to the death of Mironenko, in the future, the whole feat of Mironenko was described only from his words. After demobilization, Sergeev went to his home in Nizhny Novgorod. I tried to get in touch with him, but unfortunately I was not able to talk to Sergeyev: I was informed that ten years ago (in 1997) he drowned. It was a pity, because he was the only eyewitness to the feat of Mironenko and no one except him could tell all the details of that battle.

But I kept looking and got lucky again. Another eyewitness of those events responded to my ad on the Internet - the deputy platoon commander of the 6th company, Sergeant Alexander Zotov, who was sent to reconnaissance for the duration of that military operation. He saw Mironenko alive one of the last. Here are his memoirs:

"Early in the morning of February 29, 1980, we were brought to the Kabul airfield, given an additional set of ammunition, built and determined a combat mission, which was to" clear "the area in the landing area. They also said that there should not be any serious resistance , since aviation will "work" the entire territory well beforehand, we only need to go down and finish off those who survive.

We got into helicopters and flew. I flew in a helicopter with Mironenko. There were seven of us: my four, where I was the eldest, and Mironenko's troika, in which he was the eldest.

After about an hour of flight, our Mi-8 descended and hovered a meter above the ground. We quickly jumped down. None of us were around. Unexpectedly, Mironenko, without even saying a word to me, immediately ran with his group along the path, which was going down. Realizing that in this situation it would be better to stick together, I led my group after them. But the Mironenko group ran very fast and we were constantly lagging behind. So we ran down almost half a mountain, when an order came over the radio - everyone urgently returned to the landing site and helped the paratroopers who were ambushed, which were already seriously wounded. Mironenko and I, like the older groups, had Zvezdochka walkie-talkies, which worked only for reception. I turned my group around and we went back, and Mironenko's group at that moment was 200 meters from us and continued to move down. I never saw Mironenko alive again."

Everything that happened to the Mironenko troika further was already memories from the words of the only survivor of that group, Sergeev. Here is what Sergeev said from the words of his colleagues:

“Mironenko heard the order to go upstairs on the radio, but still ordered us to go down. We went down and saw a small village consisting of 5-6 duvals (the soldiers called the primitive adobe dwellings of the Afghans the duvals). As soon as we entered it, as for us opened heavy fire. We realized that we were surrounded. Mironenko and Zadvorny ran into one duval and began to shoot back, and I lay down outside and began to cover.

The fight went on for a long time. I hear Zadvorny shouting to Mironenko: "I'm wounded! Bandage it!", and Mironenko shouted back: "I'm also wounded!" The shootout continued. Then the fire from the duval stopped. I look - the Afghans entered this duval, and immediately an explosion was heard.

Realizing that everything was over there, I crawled away and hid behind the stones. Of course, the Afghans saw that there were three of us, but they did not comb the area - apparently they were afraid to stumble upon my fire, and decided to wait until I showed myself when I tried to go back. They climbed up and hid. I saw it and therefore began to wait for the night.

Finally it got dark, and I already wanted to go upstairs, but suddenly, a little further away, by the light of the moon, I saw the shadow of an Afghan and realized that they were still guarding me. At night, the Afghans made an attempt to find out where I was - they drove cattle at me, hoping that I would get scared and start shooting. And so I lay behind the stone until the morning. And when it dawned, I see - 5-6 people who were tracking me, got up and left. After waiting, I went to make my way to my own."

A day later, Sergeyev is found. A helicopter is sent to the place of Mironenko's death. Alexander Zotov recalls:

“A total of 10 people flew, including myself and Sergeev. Soon the village was found. The helicopter descended, landed troops and flew away. Sergeev showed the duval where Mironenko and Zadvorny took the fight. But their bodies were not there. Nothing was found in others They began to look around and found the body of Zadvorny not far away. There were three deep stab wounds on his neck. Then, lower in the bushes, they found the body of Mironenko. One arm was torn off from him, and only the back of the head remained from his head. We went to the duval, brought two wooden beds, wrapped the bodies in blankets, laid them on the beds, and carried them down to the base."

But one of the scouts who was in that village remembered some other details: in addition to knife wounds the legs were shot in the neck. He also noticed that there were few spent cartridges at the battlefield. And most importantly, Mironenko had a wound under his jaw from a 5.45 caliber bullet. A participant in that Kunar operation, a gunner from the reconnaissance company, Corporal Vladimir Kondalov, told me about this.

All this was said in a general conversation, without any further conclusions. However, when analyzing these details, I found that they contradict other basic facts and do not fit into the well-known picture of the battle. Indeed, if Mironenko had a fatal bullet wound to the head, this meant that he died not from a grenade explosion at all, but from a bullet. Moreover, someone of their own shot, since the Afghans did not yet have our captured 5.45 caliber assault rifles (only two months had passed after the troops were brought in, and that Kunar military operation was the first). Of course, if Mironenko had blown up a grenade that had blown off part of his head, then there would have been no point in shooting him in the head after that.

Bayonet knife
from AK-74

Yes, and Viktor Zadvorny, who died along with Mironenko, judging by the description of his injuries, did not die at all from bullets (since wounds in the legs are not fatal) and not from a knife (since the throat is cut with a knife) - he received a mortal blow with a bayonet-knife. The bayonet-knife from the machine gun that every paratrooper had was so blunt that it was impossible to cut anything with it - you can only stab - it was the stab wounds that were on Zadvorny's throat.

And the last thing: a small number of spent cartridges indicates that the battle was short, in any case, the paratroopers did not run out of ammunition - after all, everyone had more than 1000 rounds of ammunition in stores and in a backpack.

Now the story of the death of Mironenko began to take on the form of a real detective story. All my suspicions about the death of Mironenko and Zadvorny fell on Sergeyev, who miraculously survived. Hazing could well have been the motive.

Indeed, Sergeev was younger than Mironenko, and Mironenko, according to the recollections of his colleagues, was a very stern "grandfather". Strong, and also having a sports rank in boxing (candidate for master of sports), Mironenko was a zealous guardian of wild army traditions - hazing - and planted cruelty and "hazing" not only in his platoon, where he was deputy platoon commander, but and in all intelligence.

This is how Vladimir Kondalov recalls one "conversation" with Mironenko (in the reconnaissance company he was called "Mammoth", since Kondalov was the tallest and largest in build):

“We served in different reconnaissance platoons: I served in the first, and Mironenko was a “castle” in the second. Somehow Mironenko and another sergeant took me to a room where there was no one. Mironenko moved forward, squeezed my tunic at the throat : "Mammoth! When are you going to fuck young people?! - and struck me in the jaw with an elbow.

On foreground on the left is Vladimir Kondalov, on the right is Nikolai Sergeyev - the only surviving paratrooper from the group of Alexander Mironenko.
Afghanistan, Kabul, summer 1980.

Yes, due to hazing, Sergeyev could have accumulated resentment against Mironenko, but what motive could Sergeyev have to kill Zadvorny - after all, Zadvorny was of the same call as Sergeyev? I found an explanation in a conversation with Pavel Antonenko, who then served as a driver in a reconnaissance company. He said that Mironenko's relationship with Zadvorny was the best, even more than that - they were real friends, which means that Sergeyev could have the same feelings for one-conscript Zadvorny as for "grandfather" Mironenko. Now it all fits together. Analyzing all the collected material, the following picture of events began to emerge in my mind.

When Mironenko's group moved far away from the landing site, Sergeyev approached Mironenko and shot him from below in the head - the bullet blows the upper part of the skull (bullets with a displaced center have a special characteristic wound - a large lacerated wound forms at the exit from the body). The only thing Zadvorny manages to do is turn around and run, but Sergeyev shoots at the most unprotected place - at the legs (since he was wearing a bulletproof vest on his body and a helmet on his head). Then he comes up to the fallen and still alive Zadvorny and plunges the bayonet-knife into his throat three times. After that, Sergeev hides the weapons and ammunition of the dead, and he himself hides in the mountains for a while. It is found only a day later by the paratroopers of the 357th regiment, who were located at the foot of the mountains.

But that is not all. One more important question remained unresolved - how, after all, to explain the incomprehensible behavior of Mironenko himself immediately after the landing? Indeed, why did Mironenko rush down so irresistibly? - after all, at that moment he had a completely different combat mission.

Colonel-General Viktor Merimsky, who led the entire Kunar operation, wrote in his memoirs “In Pursuit of the Panjshir Lion” that a capture group, a reconnaissance company of the regiment, was first landed in the landing area, which was supposed to take up defense around the landing sites and cover the landing of the main forces 3 th battalion. And since Mironenko was in the reconnaissance company, it means that for his group the first task was to gain a foothold and hold the defense at the place of their landing. And only after the helicopters landed the entire landing, it was necessary for everyone to move down in an organized manner under the leadership of the officers.

Moreover, why did Mironenko, having voluntarily left the landing site and hearing on the radio that fighting had begun upstairs, that there were wounded and that it was urgent to go upstairs and go to the aid of his comrades, despite everything, did not comply with this order?

I could find only one explanation for this - looting. He wanted to find a village and, using absolute impunity, inflict reprisals on its inhabitants: rob, rape or kill - there simply could not be other targets in the mountains, in the war zone. Mironenko ignores all orders, finds a village, but then events began to develop not at all according to his plan ...

April 2008

continued ... Mironenko submachine gun.

material about Mironenko (descriptions of his feat) >>

Simultaneously with Alexander Mironenko, the title of Hero of the Soviet Union was posthumously awarded to another fellow soldier of ours - senior sergeant Nikolai Chepik, who served in a sapper company. Some of the circumstances under which they died were very similar. Chepik, like Mironenko, was a "grandfather" - he was only two months away from home, they were both senior in their groups, the groups consisted of three soldiers, and they died on the very first day of the Kunar operation - February 29, 1980. As officially reported, their groups were surrounded, and at the end of the battle, in order not to be captured, they blew themselves up, only Chepik blew himself up with a MON-100 directional mine. And just like in the story with Mironenko, there are no details of the last fight. Also, the names of the soldiers who died with Chepik were never mentioned.

The little that I managed to learn about the death of Chepik was told to me by a participant in the Kunar operation, sapper Nikolai Zuev. I learned from him that Chepik's group included two paratroopers from a sapper company: this is Private Kerim Kerimov, an Avar, wrestler from Dagestan (recruitment November-78) and Private Alexander Rassokhin (conscription November-79). They all died.

Zuev did not hear that there were eyewitnesses of how Chepik blew himself up, but he described the nature of the injuries established during the identification of the bodies of the dead: both old-timers, Chepik and Kerimov, had their heads crushed with stones (Kerimov had almost nothing left of his head), and young Rassokhin, who had not served for half a year, had his head intact.

It seemed very strange to me: in fact, why was it necessary to break the head of Chepik, who blew himself up with a mine stuffed with two kilograms of TNT? After such an explosion, nothing should have remained from Chepik's body. It also seemed strange that Rassokhin had no head injuries: and how could he have been killed if he was wearing a bulletproof vest? - All these paradoxes, I could find only one explanation.

When the group was in a remote place, Rassokhin shot his offenders-old-timers from a machine gun - and he had to shoot only in the face - there was nowhere else: the body was protected by a bulletproof vest, a helmet was on his head. 5.45 caliber off-center bullets blow their heads to pieces: outwardly it looked like they had been smashed with stones.

But the paratroopers who came to the place of death immediately discovered that it was Rassokhin himself who killed his colleagues. A lynching was arranged right there on the spot: Rassokhin was ordered to take off his bulletproof vest and shot. They shot in the chest, so Rassokhon's head remained intact.

material about Chepik (descriptions of his feat) >>

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Here are two stories. Both are written from the words of eyewitnesses, and I gave my own explanations for some strange facts. So far, the pictures of those events have turned out only in the most general terms, but I would like to know the details. Perhaps there are other eyewitnesses of those events who could shed light on these, in many ways more dark stories their death. But living witnesses can also be cunning so as not to spoil the prevailing bright image of the heroes. Therefore, in an investigation, it is always necessary to rely on physical evidence, and they are. Mironenko and Chepik (and those who died with them) themselves keep the keys to unraveling the mystery of their death - these are bullets and traces of wounds in their bodies.

The version that they were killed by their own colleagues will be confirmed only if Zadvorny has traces of wounds only from a bayonet-knife in his throat, and all the rest have traces of wounds characteristic of 5.45 caliber bullets. If Rassokhin is found to have wounds only in the chest, this will be confirmation that his colleagues shot him.