A homeless presidential correspondent. Grodno N

When Alexei, the signalman of the old shift, and I, the next day after our arrival, went around the posts, counting the TA-57 inductor telephones, I heard frequent and chaotic shooting. They fired from 7.62 caliber Kalashnikov assault rifles. I asked Alexei what kind of shooting. The answer was shocking. Aleksey, without attaching any importance to this shooting, replied: "A Chechen wedding." "And often do weddings take place?" I clarified.
- Yes, almost a day later.
- And who shoots? Why are they not taking action?
- So the Chechen cops accompanying the wedding and shoot. Imagine for a moment, you are going somewhere in Moscow or Kemerovo to work, and suddenly there is shooting, armed men accompany someone's wedding. The shock, take my word for it, passes in three days. You just get used to this shooting and don't notice it anymore.
You already know what my colleagues in the fire department had to do in Chechnya. I'll tell you about my duties and those of Sergei Doroganov. Communication, it is also in Africa, communication. Our task was precisely to ensure that this very connection was. We were responsible for two types of communication: radio and wired communication. Both did not cause any particular problems, but still, there were moments when it was necessary to resolve issues with its organization, as such, or with its restoration. I have already mentioned wedding corteges. So, every now and then after this kind of wedding ceremonies, for some reason the wired connection disappeared. Everything was explained quite simply, stray tracer bullets burned through the field cable, which we used as an "air". I had to take a coil, and, as during the First World War and the Civil War, go along the line in search of a cliff. True, a cover group was always sent to restore contact with us, the presence of which gave a sense of confidence and allowed us to calmly deal with our issues. Although, as soon as I climbed the pole to eliminate the cliff, I immediately understood that safety was relative. If a rather extensive panorama was opened to me from the pillar, then where is the guarantee that they could not notice me just as easily.
Not everything was cloudless in the use of radio communications. As a rule, autonomous subdivisions that were under operational control of the VOVD arrived in the Chechen Republic already with their own radio stations. On the one hand, this is good, there is no need to think about where to get radio stations to provide them, on the other hand, the effect of their use depended on the technical characteristics of these radio stations. If the radio stations worked in the same frequency range as those used in the VOVD, the problem was solved by reconfiguring them, if in a different range, you had to shrug. Of course, this begs another question. Why should the commanders of these units themselves decide on the issues of interaction between units that arrived from different regions of the country?
There was another, in my opinion, unresolved issue. Ensuring the secrecy of negotiations with the help of radio stations. Yes, of course, imported Motorolas could be programmed as you like, but on the same network, at the same radio stations, Chechen policemen also got in touch, and even their boss did not always trust them. As a result, for about three weeks, at night on our frequencies, militants or their close associates threatened us with violence and all that, trying to break our psyche. However, when the employees, at my insistent request, stopped responding to messages of this kind, the threats ceased.
In addition to the issues of maintaining communications in combat readiness, Sergei and I were involved in carrying out measures to check the passport regime (the so-called sweep), and of course, like everyone else, to carry out guard duty.
A little lyrical digression. Literally on the second day of my stay in Achkhoy-Martan, on the roof of the building where our cockpit was located, I saw an amateur radio antenna for HF communications. So here it turns out, radio amateurs lived, I thought. And indeed, on the wall to the right of our workplace, there was a sheet with a list of amateur radio call signs belonging to radio amateurs in the city of Voronezh (before the Kuzbass policemen, policemen from the Voronezh region served here). I remembered with annoyance that the transceiver that Selyunin had promised me had never been received. Selyunin himself was on vacation, but apparently he forgot to give instructions to his deputy. It's a pity of course, but service is service. In the same place, another sheet was also pasted. On this sheet, similar to the official form of Ichkeria, in green font, a text resembling an order was printed. Below is an excerpt from this text, something that especially caught my eye:

"For the destruction of the enemy, a Mujahideen or a sympathizer is entitled to:
for an ordinary conscript - $ 250.
for an riot policeman or a contract soldier - 500 dollars.
for an officer - 1000 dollars.
Installation of a landmine - $ 300.
Blown up armored personnel carrier - 3000 dollars.
Downed helicopter - $15,000.
Downed plane - $30,000.
According to the decision of the Supreme Military Majlis-Shura of Ichkeria, awards are announced for the capture and delivery of captured Russian officers to the command of the Mujahideen:
OMON, SOBR, Ministry of Internal Affairs and units of internal troops: militia - $ 100, private - 20 rams, lieutenant-captain - 50 rams, major - colonel - 100 rams, general - 40 bulls.
GRU and AFB: lieutenant-captain - 40 sheep, major-colonel - 80 sheep, general - 40 bulls.
Military personnel of combined arms units: private - 15 sheep, lieutenant - captain - 35 sheep, major - colonel - 60 sheep, general - 40 bulls.
At present, it is necessary to have more captured Russian officers to be exchanged for the Mujahideen who fell into the hands of the Russian occupiers."

You understand, such reading did not deliver pleasant emotions. Well, in order not to tease the snipers, we still removed the stars from shoulder straps. As they say, be careful and God protects.
In less than two weeks of our service, we witnessed a celebration at the traffic police of the Chelyabinsk region. It turns out that the guys celebrated the "Equator", in other words, half the time spent on a business trip. "Equator" is akin to the soldiers' holiday "One Hundred Days Before the Order". The most cheerful guys, like soldiers, even shave their heads to zero. Joy is understandable, half more and home. The hero of the evening, I think, was an excellent guitarist and performer, my namesake, sorry, forgot his last name. He sang songs, you will listen. He sang at the Philharmonic before the traffic police, but a small salary and ... By the way, the guys from the Chelyabinsk traffic police rewrote the verses of the famous song "Airport" in their own way. It turned out very badly. I rewrote the words, but I let someone rewrite them myself, and there was no trace of them.
A little about our smaller brothers. On the territory of the town, two or three dogs have taken root, outbred, in the language of cynologists or breeders, mestizos. Their ability to determine: their own - someone else's was amazing. There were many examples of this. So, dogs unmistakably among the general mass of people in camouflage, they singled out precisely the Chechens. These dogs let us pet them, although they had seen it for the first time, and immediately rushed barking at the Chechen policemen, although they were dressed in the same uniform as ours. The dogs also got it from civilian Chechen workers, who periodically performed some work in the town. Version one. A specific smell emanating from people of Chechen nationality or from the area where they live.
On the territory of the town, in addition to dogs, two more residents "registered" who have no direct relation to the VOVD, or rather, first one, and then another joined him. They were just another example of the horrors of war. These people were in slavery for ten years (the first in Chechnya, the second, already liberated by our detachment, in Ingushetia), and, living in bestial conditions, completely lost their human appearance. These people, for a roof over their heads, a bed and bread, performed various chores (mainly cleaning the territory). The years spent in slavery, obviously, taught them to do without a roof over their heads and a bed, having treated themselves to alcohol, they could easily spend the night right on the ground, choosing some place. I don’t know who they were before slavery, but our commander’s offer to go to Siberia for free (liberated from Ingushetia, was from the Novosibirsk region), they flatly refused. Maybe there was, what a sin on their souls, they paid for it in full.
Day after day, week after week, the first month of the trip flew by. The situation in Achkhoy-Martan and the region was relatively calm, there were no large-scale actions of militants, and few people paid attention to local ones (two, three automatic bursts). We, Sergei, have already taken part in the events to check the passport regime more than once. In my opinion, they were most likely indicative, if you like, of a protocol nature. Such events were held, most likely, for the press, rather than to identify militants. Maybe I'm wrong. But judge for yourself. All law enforcement agencies that take part in it, including Chechen policemen, know in advance about the next "cleansing operation" (and you already know how their commander treated them). At the appointed hour, a column is formed from representatives of almost all law enforcement agencies, and off we go. In motion, the column stretched for almost a kilometer. In this situation, I personally would not guarantee that those who should be afraid of the purges did not know about it. I remember one of these "cleansings". We held the official part, everything started to spin, and someone from the local leadership offered to go fishing. How fishing is carried out was excellently shown in the film "Deadly Force", I mean, the beginning of fishing. After fishing to no avail, on two small lakes, in the same way as in the film, we went to the river, where there was a mill and a small dam. The workers of the mill - two Chechens of a fairly respectable age - warned that the fish had long been knocked out, and there was nothing to do there. However, despite the warning, the guys went to try their luck, while I went with the Chechens to their lodge. We got acquainted, drank for acquaintance, began to talk. From the conversation, I realized that many Chechens regret the times of the Soviet Union, curse the war, and blame the Wahhabis for starting the war with Russia. Whether they were sincere at that moment, I don’t know, it seemed to me that they were. Of course, among the Chechens, as well as among others, there are different people. Below I will give an example. There were not rare cases when we drove to Khanaklu in the cars of the Administration of Achkhoy-Martan with Chechen drivers. So, on one of these trips, while waiting for the meeting to end at the command, we drove one of the cars to a residential town and bought various food there. Upon arrival, having laid out their food in the open luggage compartment of the Niva, they invited the Chechen drivers to treat themselves (and there was a Muslim post). Someone flatly refused, it’s impossible, and someone covered himself with the phrase that Allah does not see food from the sky in the Niva. As they say, draw your own conclusions.
There was also an example of Russian-Chechen "solidarity". Once, one policeman, sort of jokingly, in a conversation offered me to buy a Chechen girl for 500 rubles!!! Not for an hour or a night, as you may have thought. He offered to buy her as a slave, pay, they say, money, and take her away, only secretly, so that the locals do not know. Then, I did not betray the meaning of this proposal, then I already thought, but there is no smoke without fire. By the way, this policeman apparently got caught on something, they took away his machine gun and put him in a "zindan", a guardhouse in our opinion.
Although, in fairness, I note that there were other, real cleansing operations, with real results (the arrest of militants and the discovery of weapons caches). A very narrow circle of people knew about the time and place of such sweeps, and the direct participants learned about it 15 minutes before the start. I guessed this because he himself took part in the escort of militants to Khankala (as a social burden and assisting the escorts when he went to Khankala to resolve his official issues).
November 10 was approaching - Police Day, they were waiting for provocations from the militants, the commanders did not tire of reminding them of vigilance and discipline. Thank God, everything worked out.
In the morning, a solemn formation was announced, everyone who was supposed to speak, someone was encouraged, once again reminded of vigilance and discipline. We did not have time to disperse to our locations, they announced the next collection for building. It turns out that the military commandant of Achkhoi-Martan arrived with congratulations, made a congratulatory speech, then presented the personnel of the VOVD with a young boar with the inscription "Khattab" on the sides, after which he left. After this event, VOVD began to say that the commandant slipped a pig on the holiday to the cops. “Khattab” decided not to inject right away. They built a corral for him and fed him, almost until the New Year.
After dinner, Igor (guitarist) from the Chelyabinsk traffic police invited me and Igor (guitarist) to his place by the political officer of the VOVD. The political officer turned to us with a request to perform in honor of the holiday in front of the Chechen policemen, after which we went to the local school, where a solemn meeting took place, and then a concert. The first time I went out of town. armed not with a machine gun, but with a guitar, however, and the latter. I felt the adrenaline rush 100 percent.
Of course, other holidays were also celebrated, for example, the day of the motorist, the day of the investigator, etc. But these holidays were not common, and were celebrated by a narrow circle, directly by those who were related to them. True, because I have a guitar, I was also invited to events related to the celebration of professional holidays, sometimes even with my partner Sergey.
After November 10, the Chelyabinsk residents were going home. They came to Achkhoy-Martan on their own, i.e. in their patrol cars, they went home in the same way. No one came to replace the Chelyabinsk residents, so our town was a little empty, literally and figuratively. Firstly, the territory occupied by the cars of Chelyabinsk citizens, as well as the room where they slept, was vacated, and secondly, there was no one else to perform the song composed by this detachment. Among our traffic cops, I don’t remember the performers, and the rest of the song did not fit because of a professional accent.
I was approached by policemen-drivers with a request to remake this song for them, but I didn’t like their idea, but I realized that I needed a song that would be a memory of a business trip in this republic. And she showed up the following week. It so happened that he woke up in the middle of the night, and the lines formed by themselves.

Achkhoy-Martan, you didn't call us,
And we did not rush to you,

And here we are all gathered.
But from above the order was given to us,
And here we are all gathered.

Achkhoy-Martan is a region of Chechnya.
Bamut, Katyr, Samashki.
Achkhoy-Martan, explosion all around,
Shooting and stretching.
Achkhoy - Martan, explosion all around,
Shooting and stretching.

Achkhoy-Martan is a piece of Chechnya.
Here life is like on a volcano.

And remember your name.
At any moment it can explode
And remember your name.

Achkhoy-Martan. God give us
Come home alive.
And if, what is not to shame,
The greatness of Russia
And if, what is not to shame,
The greatness of Russia

Achkhoy-Martan. Well, goodbye.
We have paid our military debt.
And now it's time for us to go home
Everyone was waiting for us at home.
And now it's time for us to go home
Everyone was waiting for us at home.

Burnt-out T-62 of internal troops after fighting in Grozny during the second Chechen campaign (two photographs of the same tank taken at different times). As you can see in the pictures, the tank turret was reinforced with tracks to enhance protection. Judging by the mangled fragments of the MTO roof, the tank's engine exploded

During the second Chechen campaign, a significant amount of armored vehicles was again sent to the rebellious republic. For example, infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers - 2324 pieces. The tanks were represented by the T-72AV, T-72B and B1, T-72BM models. The 138th motorized rifle brigade of the Leningrad Military District included a certain number of T-80BVs. It is difficult to say how many of the 370 tanks in Chechnya were T-62s and T-62Ms, but old vehicles were used at all stages of the counterterrorist operation.

The most famous military unit armed with T-62 tanks (modifications "M"), in the second Chechen campaign was the tank regiment of Yuri Budanov, an officer who became a hostage of a dirty political game.

The 160th Guards Tank Regiment of the Siberian Military District traveled to the Caucasus by rail for more than a week. Leaving part of the forces for the protection of communications, they crossed the administrative border with the criminal-rebellious enclave one of the first. Following the motorized rifle units, they crushed the firing points of the militants. Kirovo, Komarovo, Goragorsk. When they crossed the Tersky Range, more serious battles began - the first ATGMs whistled near Kerlayurt. Further in Achkhoi-Martan, the militants again snapped at guided missiles, as a result, one BMP-1 burned down, and a T-62 was shot down. The artillery of the regiment - self-propelled howitzers 2S1 made 8 volleys of Sh1 shells with arrow-shaped submunitions and after that the Chechens requested negotiations.

In Old Achkhoi, the militants, having driven out civilians, turned the houses into bunkers. I had to level the village. We didn’t have time to drive three kilometers to the settlement, when ATGMs began to fly, just catch it! And caught! By some miracle no one died. There is no active armor on the old sixty-twos, and the blocks of passive “Ilyich armor” that came from Afghanistan protect only the front of the tower.

But there would be no happiness, but misfortune helped. In addition to active armor, the outdated T-62 does not have an automatic loader. Free space inside - a barn. And if the hatches are also open, there is no way to create excess pressure. In general, the ATGMs of the tower burned through, even the breech cumulative jets were pierced, and the tanks were ready. Crews jumped and let's shoot ourselves. We determined with the help of optics where the ATGMs are flying from. From the maximum range - somewhere from 3.900 meters the bastard hits. It stands on the Niva road, and fifty meters away is a tripod, on which the militants are just placing another ATGM.

- Will you get it, Vasilich? shouts Budanov to his deputy, Lieutenant Colonel Andrei Bilenko. After all, it’s not easy to see the “ATGMs” through a tank sight. And he, already in the tower, covered the Niva with a rocket with a second shot. And three days later, radio interception: The captain was buried. This specialist had such a nickname since the last campaign, when he burned a lot of our armor. Then they stood under the old Achkhoy for another 10 days, but the ATGMs no longer flew.

Not without Siberians and under the old Alkhan-Yurt - in another sensational battle. 1000 shells were then fired by their tank company attached to the infantry storming the village in the area of the intersection with the bridge.

There, in the houses that became pillboxes, militants stood to death.

It was great in early December, they fought in the capital of Chechen Wahhabism - Urus-Martan. The regiment, probably for the first time, as they entered Chechnya, gathered under a single command. Prior to this, all the tanks and artillery were reinforced all the time. The city was surrounded by forces of two regiments and a brigade. The Trans-Baikal people were cut into a sector in the west. Come up. From Urus-Martan and ATGMs, flamethrowers, and ZUShki shoot. The tanks went on direct fire, fired a volley ... Then the infantry went on the attack, the tanks behind it. Only resistance again, stop the infantry, behind the houses, the tanks are leveling further and further. So in the evening, having reached the river, they occupied a third of Uras-Martan, only later learning that their attack was just a distraction planned.

Near Dubayurt, at the northern entrance to the Argun Gorge, the regiment "dug in" and went on the defensive. Most of the troops besieged Grozny, and the offensive into the mountains was postponed. The Transbaikalians, together with a dowry of a motorized rifle company, were supposed to lock the Wolf Gate, as they called this place since that war, preventing the militants, leaving the gorge, from hitting the troops surrounding Grozny in the back.

Then, for half a year, the tank regiment, which had been continuously fighting in the most important areas, was withdrawn by Shamanov to the reserve of the Western Group. And then he was thrown into battle again. For three weeks, with a truly Siberian scope, the T-62 and Shilka of Colonel Budanov crushed Gelaev's bandits in Komsomolskoye. Dozens of "spirits" were buried under the rubble of buildings by Lieutenant Colonel Artur Arzumyan and Captain Sergei Khomutov before their T-62 tower was burned by a cumulative jet. In a week, both will recover from their wounds and will be back in the ranks. The tanks destroyed the militants, sometimes shooting point-blank at the front doors of the houses where the bandits were hiding.

In total, in Komsomolskoye, three “sixty-twos” were burned by militants from RPGs. But all the cars remained on the move. Many were wounded from sniper bullets and shrapnel. Fortunately no one died.

Thanks to the Budennov operation, there was a reason for the introduction of a very strange "truce". During it, on June 19, in Grozny, under the auspices of the OSCE, the first round of negotiations began between the delegations of the Russian Federation (A.I. Volsky, A.S. Kulikov, N.I. Semenov) and illegal armed formations (Shirvani Basaev, Sultan Gelishanov, Usman Imaev, Aslan Maskhadov), which lasted until June 22. The parties agreed to extend the moratorium on hostilities for an indefinite period. The second round of talks was held from 27 to 30 June in Grozny under the auspices of the OSCE. An agreement in principle was reached on the exchange of prisoners according to the “all for all” scheme, the disarmament of militant groups, the withdrawal of federal troops and the holding of free elections. The “peace” that followed was even stranger. On June 30, by decree of B.N. Yeltsin was dismissed by the head of the Ministry of Nationalities and Regional Policy of the Russian Federation N.D. Egorov, Minister of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation V.F. Erin, director of the Federal Grid Company of the Russian Federation SV. Stepashin and the head of the administration of the Stavropol Territory E.S. Kuznetsov. The federal troops were ordered to leave almost all the strategic points occupied by them by that time. The army was ordered not to take any offensive actions and to shoot back only in the most extreme cases. On July 1, negotiations in Grozny determined the date of the elections in Chechnya: November 5, 1995. On July 3, Yeltsin signed Decree No. 663 on the permanent deployment of federal troops in Chechnya. On the same day, at a meeting with A. Volsky, D. Dudayev rejected the “zero” option, according to which the current and former leadership of Chechnya resign before the elections scheduled for November 5, and a coalition government is formed as a temporary governing body. On July 5, by decree of Yeltsin A.S. Kulikov was appointed Minister of the Interior, and V.A. Mikhailov - Minister for Nationalities and Regional Policy. On July 24, the third round of negotiations under the auspices of the OSCE began in Grozny. On the night of July 29-30, an agreement was signed on a block of military issues, providing for:

An immediate cessation of hostilities;

The creation of a Special Monitoring Commission, co-chaired by the newly appointed commander of the Joint Grouping of Federal Forces, Deputy Commander of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, Lieutenant General A.A. Romanov and Chief of the General Staff of the CRI Armed Forces A. Maskhadov;

Exchange of prisoners of war and other forcibly detained persons on the principle of "all for all";

Disarmament of "illegal armed formations" and phased withdrawal of federal troops;

Suppression of terrorist acts and sabotage.

On August 1, A. Maskhadov issued an order "On the fulfillment of tasks for the voluntary surrender of weapons, military equipment and weapons by the armed formations of the CRI Armed Forces and the phased withdrawal of federal troops from the territory of the CRI", which ordered "to cease fire and conduct combat operations from 00:00 on August 2". In August 1995, when the situation in Chechnya was dubbed "unstable" by the "independent" media, Dudayev's men killed an average of 2 servicemen of the Russian army per day (not counting wounds and injuries). On August 18–19, federal forces blockaded the village of Achkhoy-Martan; however, the situation was "settled" at the talks in Grozny. On August 21, a Chechen detachment under the command of Alaudi Khamzatov entered the city of Argun (12 km from Grozny) and seized the building of the district police department. During the next day, federal forces bombarded Argun. The Chechen detachment left the city, and federal armored vehicles entered Argun. When, finally, the Kremlin was convinced that Dudayev's army had regrouped, replenished its ranks and fortified itself in the points left by the federal troops, on August 24, 1995, a statement was made that Russian troops would not be withdrawn from Chechnya until "complete disarmament of bandit formations." The militants said that this was “a new declaration of war,” and the civil war that once began with a criminal uprising in southern Russia, after a short respite, broke out with renewed vigor.

On September 20, an attempt was made on the life of the representative of the President of the Russian Federation in Chechnya, Oleg Lobov, on the way from Grozny to the Severny airport. At the end of September, Achkhoy-Martan and Sernovodsk were blocked by federal units. The reason is the presence of Chechen fighters in these villages. The Chechen side claimed that self-defense units were stationed in the villages, which, according to an agreement concluded in August, could be located there. The Russian side insisted that Chechen police detachments should be stationed in these villages. On October 6, 1995, an attempt was made on the life of the commander of the federal grouping of troops in Chechnya, Lieutenant General A.A. Romanova. All those who were in the car that exploded on a radio-controlled mine died. Romanov himself was taken to the hospital. Burdenko with severe brain and chest injuries

In response to this, a state of emergency was introduced in Grozny. Lieutenant-General A.A. Shkirko. On October 8, Russian planes bombed the village of Roshni-Chu, where D. Dudayev often visited. Several fighters and one of the commanders were killed. On October 9, the Russian side suspended its participation in the negotiations, and the troops were ordered to resume operations to disarm Chechen fighters. On October 11, the Chechen side suspended the implementation of agreements with Russia on a block of military issues. On October 14-15, federal aviation attacked the villages of Dargo and Belgatoy, Kharsenoy.

In mid-October, the federal command demanded that a Chechen detachment stationed in blockaded Achkhoy-Martan surrender 150 small arms. On October 24, an operational group of the commandant's unit of the North Caucasus Military District raided the airport in Sleptsovskaya in Ingushetia, which was allegedly captured by Chechen fighters. On October 25, near the village of Tsa-Vedeno, militants from Shamil Basayev's detachment attacked a convoy of the 506th SME. 18 (17 from the 506th and 1 OMON) servicemen were killed, 7 were wounded, 1 was missing. On October 27, units of the 506th motorized rifle regiment in the Vedeno region were withdrawn from the mountains to the foothills. Thus, in October, after the assassination attempt on the commander of the FS grouping, General Romanov, the peace dialogue was disrupted. Yeltsin began a terrible depression. According to Korzhakov, he cried and drank for two days, saying that the generals had deceived him, that the war with Chechnya was his worst mistake in his life. Experiences affected the health of Boris Nikolaevich. On October 26, he went to the hospital, and began "working with documents" and restored the "strong handshake" only by the end of December.

War again

On December 11, 1995, Shamil Basayev, the hero of the Budyonnovsky maternity hospital, officially broke up the “peace agreement” reached in July of that year, although the fighting on the part of the bandit army did not stop even for a single day after its signing. By this time, in one year of hostilities, from December 1994 to December 1995, the loss of federal forces in Chechnya amounted to 9171 people: 2022 killed and 7149 wounded. Internal troops lost 1764 soldiers, law enforcement agencies - 666 policemen. All the powers of Dzhokhar Dudayev as President of Chechnya completely expired back in October 1995. (The presidential election held in December of the same year was won by Doku Zavgaev, who on December 24 became the head of the Council for the National Revival of Chechnya.)

On December 14, armed formations of Dudayev's troops entered, in order to prevent the holding of elections, in a number of large settlements of Chechnya - Shatoi, Novogroznensky, Achkhoy-Martan, Urus-Martan, Gudermes. R. Gelaev's detachment occupied Urus-Martan without clashes. Armed clashes took place in the area of the settlements of Shatoi, Novogroznensky, Achkhoy-Martan.

In 1995, the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation initiated 72 criminal cases on the sale of military equipment and uniforms to militants. In particular, such cases appeared as the unhindered sale to bandits of small arms (machine guns) produced in 1995, satellite communications equipment, electronic intelligence equipment, which the Russian army did not yet have in service. The FSB has identified 15 criminal gangs in Tula this year that specialized in the theft and sale of weapons. The same groups operated at the defense factories of Izhevsk and other arms production centers. As a result of the military operation of the federal troops near the Chechen village of Goiskoye, the militants seized the latest models of armored personnel carriers of domestic design, which had not yet entered service with the army and had no analogues in the world! These armored personnel carriers were produced at a military plant in Arzamas and were equipped with special devices from one military research institute. According to the documents, the armored vehicles of this series left the factory for "testing in combat conditions." The troops of the united Russian group have never had them in combat operations.

You understand, such reading did not deliver pleasant emotions. Well, in order not to tease the snipers, we still removed the stars from shoulder straps. As they say, be careful and God protects.
In less than two weeks of our service, we witnessed a celebration at the traffic police of the Chelyabinsk region. It turns out that the guys celebrated the "Equator", in other words, half the time spent on a business trip. "Equator" is akin to the soldiers' holiday "One Hundred Days Before the Order". The most cheerful guys, like soldiers, even shave their heads to zero. Joy is understandable, half more and home. The hero of the evening, I think, was an excellent guitarist and performer, my namesake, sorry, forgot his last name. He sang songs, you will listen. He sang at the Philharmonic before the traffic police, but a small salary and ... By the way, the guys from the Chelyabinsk traffic police rewrote the verses of the famous song "Airport" in their own way. It turned out very badly. I rewrote the words, but I let someone rewrite them myself, and there was no trace of them.
A little about our smaller brothers. On the territory of the town, two or three dogs have taken root, outbred, in the language of cynologists or breeders, mestizos. Their ability to determine: their own - someone else's was amazing. There were many examples of this. So, dogs unmistakably among the general mass of people in camouflage, they singled out precisely the Chechens. These dogs let us pet them, although they had seen it for the first time, and immediately rushed barking at the Chechen policemen, although they were dressed in the same uniform as ours. The dogs also got it from civilian Chechen workers, who periodically performed some work in the town. Version one. A specific smell emanating from people of Chechen nationality or from the area where they live.
On the territory of the town, in addition to dogs, two more residents "registered" who have no direct relation to the VOVD, or rather, first one, and then another joined him. They were just another example of the horrors of war. These people were in slavery for ten years (the first in Chechnya, the second, already liberated by our detachment, in Ingushetia), and, living in bestial conditions, completely lost their human appearance. These people, for a roof over their heads, a bed and bread, performed various chores (mainly cleaning the territory). The years spent in slavery, obviously, taught them to do without a roof over their heads and a bed, having treated themselves to alcohol, they could easily spend the night right on the ground, choosing some place. I don’t know who they were before slavery, but our commander’s offer to go to Siberia for free (liberated from Ingushetia, was from the Novosibirsk region), they flatly refused. Maybe there was, what a sin on their souls, they paid for it in full.
Day after day, week after week, the first month of the trip flew by. The situation in Achkhoy-Martan and the region was relatively calm, there were no large-scale actions of militants, and few people paid attention to local ones (two, three automatic bursts). We, Sergei, have already taken part in the events to check the passport regime more than once. In my opinion, they were most likely indicative, if you like, of a protocol character. Such events were held, most likely, for the press, rather than to identify militants. Maybe I'm wrong. But judge for yourself. All law enforcement agencies that take part in it, including Chechen policemen, know in advance about the next "cleansing operation" (and you already know how their commander treated them). At the appointed hour, a column is formed from representatives of almost all law enforcement agencies, and off we go. In motion, the column stretched for almost a kilometer. In this situation, I personally would not guarantee that those who should be afraid of the purges did not know about it. I remember one of these "cleansings". We held the official part, everything started to spin, and someone from the local leadership offered to go fishing. How fishing is carried out was excellently shown in the film "Deadly Force", I mean, the beginning of fishing. After fishing to no avail, on two small lakes, in the same way as in the film, we went to the river, where there was a mill and a small dam. The workers of the mill - two Chechens of a fairly respectable age - warned that the fish had long been knocked out, and there was nothing to do there. However, despite the warning, the guys went to try their luck, while I went with the Chechens to their lodge. We got acquainted, drank for acquaintance, began to talk. From the conversation, I realized that many Chechens regret the times of the Soviet Union, curse the war, and blame the Wahhabis for starting the war with Russia. Whether they were sincere at that moment, I don’t know, it seemed to me that they were. Of course, among the Chechens, as well as among others, there are different people. Below I will give an example. There were not rare cases when we drove to Khanaklu in the cars of the Administration of Achkhoy-Martan with Chechen drivers. So, on one of these trips, while waiting for the meeting to end at the command, we drove one of the cars to a residential town and bought various food there. Upon arrival, having laid out their food in the open luggage compartment of the Niva, they invited the Chechen drivers to treat themselves (and there was a Muslim post). Someone flatly refused, it’s impossible, and someone covered himself with the phrase that Allah does not see food from the sky in the Niva. As they say, draw your own conclusions.
There was also an example of Russian-Chechen "solidarity". Once, one policeman, sort of jokingly, in a conversation offered me to buy a Chechen girl for 500 rubles!!! Not for an hour or a night, as you may have thought. He offered to buy her as a slave, pay, they say, money, and take her away, only secretly, so that the locals do not know. Then, I did not betray the meaning of this proposal, then I already thought, but there is no smoke without fire. By the way, this policeman apparently got caught on something, they took away his machine gun and put him in a "zindan", a guardhouse in our opinion.
Although, in fairness, I note that there were other, real cleansing operations, with real results (the arrest of militants and the discovery of weapons caches). A very narrow circle of people knew about the time and place of such sweeps, and the direct participants learned about it 15 minutes before the start. I guessed this because he himself took part in the escort of militants to Khankala (as a social burden and assisting the escorts when he went to Khankala to resolve his official issues).
November 10 was approaching - Police Day, they were waiting for provocations from the militants, the commanders did not tire of reminding them of vigilance and discipline. Thank God, everything worked out.
In the morning, a solemn formation was announced, everyone who was supposed to speak, someone was encouraged, once again reminded of vigilance and discipline. We did not have time to disperse to our locations, they announced the next collection for building. It turns out that the military commandant of Achkhoi-Martan arrived with congratulations, made a congratulatory speech, then presented the personnel of the VOVD with a young boar with the inscription "Khattab" on the sides, after which he left. After this event, VOVD began to say that the commandant slipped a pig on the holiday to the cops. “Khattab” decided not to inject right away. They built a corral for him and fed him, almost until the New Year.
After dinner, Igor (guitarist) from the Chelyabinsk traffic police invited me and Igor (guitarist) to his place by the political officer of the VOVD. The political officer turned to us with a request to perform in honor of the holiday in front of the Chechen policemen, after which we went to the local school, where a solemn meeting took place, and then a concert. The first time I went out of town. armed not with a machine gun, but with a guitar, however, and the latter. I felt the adrenaline rush 100 percent.
Of course, other holidays were also celebrated, for example, the day of the motorist, the day of the investigator, etc. But these holidays were not common, and were celebrated by a narrow circle, directly by those who were related to them. True, because I have a guitar, I was also invited to events related to the celebration of professional holidays, sometimes even with my partner Sergey.
After November 10, the Chelyabinsk residents were going home. They came to Achkhoy-Martan on their own, i.e. in their patrol cars, they went home in the same way. No one came to replace the Chelyabinsk residents, so our town was a little empty, literally and figuratively. Firstly, the territory occupied by the cars of Chelyabinsk citizens, as well as the room where they slept, was vacated, and secondly, there was no one else to perform the song composed by this detachment. Among our traffic cops, I don’t remember the performers, and the rest of the song did not fit because of a professional accent.
I was approached by policemen-drivers with a request to remake this song for them, but I didn’t like their idea, but I realized that I needed a song that would be a memory of a business trip in this republic. And she showed up the following week. It so happened that he woke up in the middle of the night, and the lines formed by themselves.

Achkhoy-Martan, you didn't call us,
And we did not rush to you,

And here we are all gathered.
But from above the order was given to us,
And here we are all gathered.

Achkhoy-Martan is a region of Chechnya.
Bamut, Katyr, Samashki.
Achkhoy-Martan, explosion all around,
Shooting and stretching.
Achkhoy - Martan, explosion all around,
Shooting and stretching.

Achkhoy-Martan is a piece of Chechnya.
Here life is like on a volcano.

And remember your name.
At any moment it can explode
And remember your name.

Achkhoy-Martan. God give us
Come home alive.
And if, what is not to shame,
The greatness of Russia
And if, what is not to shame,
The greatness of Russia

On Monday night, a large detachment of militants entered the regional center of Achkhoy-Martan. The bandits destroyed almost all the federal buildings there. Not counting on the help of the Russian police and troops, the Chechens themselves drove the attackers out of the village.

“We have long been accustomed to skirmishes here,” Hava Imadaeva, an employee of the administration of the Achkhoi-Martan district, told Kommersant. look out the gate to see what's going on. I followed her."
Along the central street of Achkhoy-Martan, from the side of Bamut, military Urals covered with awnings walked one after another. Inside are dozens of armed men in camouflage and caps. Who they are, according to Khava, it was impossible to understand. “Usually we define guests by swearing,” Khava continues. “The feds swear in Russian, the militants in Chechen.

According to the same scheme, Chechen fighters attacked Vedeno, Gudermes, Shali and Nozhai-Yurt. Two or three hundred militants each entered these settlements, passing through checkpoints in an unknown way. They disarmed and killed local policemen and officials, after which they set fire to government buildings and the houses of Chechen activists. The militants, as a rule, managed to escape from the captured cities and villages even before the federal troops arrived there.

At first, according to Khava, the militants simply drove through the streets, spraying everything around with automatic bursts. Then, without meeting any resistance, they got out of the trucks, took up key positions at the exits from the village, installed several stationary mortars on the ground and began to fire at the center of Achkhoy-Martan, where the buildings of all federal structures are located. After firing back, they divided into three foot groups, a hundred people each, and began a systematic cleansing.
The first group attacked the district prosecutor's office, which was guarded by four Chechen policemen. This attack was repelled only an hour later, after the head of the police department, Sharip Kuraev, came to the aid of his subordinates with three dozen fighters. The second group attacked the fire station and the district administration located on Shosseynaya Street. A detachment of Chechen militiamen, headed by Turko Inkhadzhiev, the chief bodyguard of the head of the police department, also advanced towards her.
Turko Inkhadzhiev, as his fellow countrymen say, in order to avoid bloodshed, decided to negotiate with the militants, but was immediately killed by machine gun fire. In the battle for the administration building, another policeman, Shamil Ozdamirov, received a severe wound in the stomach.
The rest of the militants stormed the district military registration and enlistment office, but even there they ran into fierce resistance from the Chechen policemen guarding the building.
The fighting in the village lasted two hours. Almost all of its administration had to defend Achkhoy-Martan: in addition to the chief policeman Kuraev and 220 employees of the permanent Chechen police department, the head of the district Shamil Buraev and both deputies took to the streets with machine guns at the ready. By midnight, apparently realizing that they would not be able to hold out, the officials asked for help by radio from the 503rd regiment of internal troops stationed nearby. An armored column came out from there, but the help of the federals was not required. By one in the morning, the militants suddenly stopped firing, got into their trucks and slowly left in the direction of the village of Orekhovo. Nobody else saw them. It was also not possible to find the wounded or killed by the attackers.
The results of the night attack were disastrous for Achkhoy-Martan. Almost all regional state institutions fell under mortar attacks: the administration, the military enlistment office, the department of public education, the fire department, the school, the court. On Monday, they all began to work, but it will probably not be possible to put new doors and window blocks in the buildings, knocked out by explosions, to patch up the roofs, cut by fragments, apparently, soon.
"We repulsed the attack," says Ruslan Akhtakhanov, deputy head of the administration. "But I still don't understand where the Russian police and the commandant's office were at that time. After all, no one came to our aid."
SERGEY Y-DYUPIN