One Soldier's War In Chechnya

by Arkady Babchenko

  ‘We decided to use this column as bait to draw the Chechens down from the hill,’ says Shabalin. ‘Otherwise we’d never winkle them out of there. Selmentausen is the sort of place where we’ll never be able to enforce our authority. It’s not far from the Georgian border, with mountain ridges on all sides.

  The place has some very handy routes for evacuating the wounded and bringing in munitions without being noticed.’

  His group moved out at daybreak, long before the column itself. According to the plan, the unit was supposed to outmanoeuvre the rebels and set up a counter-ambush. Looking at the map, there was only one place where they could do this.

  During the first half of the day, everything went as planned. The column moved out at the designated time and the unit was already on its way to the designated area. In turn, the rebels took the bait and began to prepare an ambush. It seemed that the column and the Chechens and the paratroops would all meet in the right place at the right time. But it wasn’t to be.

  The thing about warfare is that fighting doesn’t usually start just because someone gives the command. For every action there are a thousand opposite reactions, like snow that falls at the wrong time, or something devised by the enemy. You can dig fortifications and mine the undergrowth for months; you can shell positions and pore over maps and cook up intricate plans, but all to no avail. Because as soon as you stop in the most inconvenient place at the most inappropriate time, like if you need to drop your trousers behind a bush, then some bearded bastard will shoot at you.

  Shabalin’s group went ahead of the unit. They left the departure point twenty minutes before the bulk of the forces. The Chechens didn’t see them and let them right through. But the paratroops missed the Chechens too and kept moving.

  They stumbled into the rebels from the flank and everything happened very fast. Private Kuzin, who was at the front of the group, raised his arm, bent at the elbow, signalling that there were Chechens ahead, and then flapped it downwards a few times, meaning ‘Lots of them’. And that’s when the shooting started.

  ‘We ran smack bang into them,’ Shabalin recalls. ‘They hadn’t expected us to come so early and they were getting ready to meet the unit that was due there twenty minutes later. Meanwhile, their commander was positioning his fighters. Kuzin picked him off with the first shot from his silenced rifle and winged another. Of course we’d expected to encounter them, but in the event it happened in such an awkward place, between two hills, as exposed as your palm. The path there was in the shape of a G and we came out round the bend. There wasn’t even any grass for shelter.’

  The Chechen commander had managed to position his men well. They pinned down the group with just three weapons from the high ground, while the rest started to shoot up the recon from some nameless hill to the right. Another small group of Chechens cut off their withdrawal route and had taken up positions beyond the precipice. The paratroops had walked into a trap.

  The fire was so heavy that they could barely raise their heads. Nor could they withdraw - they couldn’t leave the two point-men, Sagdeyev and Kuzin.

  Sagdeyev was badly hit in the first exchange of fire. His jaw got smashed, his right hand was torn apart and his waist had been shot up. There was no way he would shoot himself out of that one.

  ‘He lay right on the path, on his back, and every one of those bastards felt he had to fire a burst at him,’ says Shabalin.

  After the fire fight, when they took his kit off him, they found eleven holes in Sagdeyev. One of the bullets had struck an F-1 grenade that was hanging on his belt, but didn’t penetrate its casing.

  They too pinned the Chechens down with fire as best they could, but it couldn’t go on like that for long, so the captain called up artillery support by radio. The first shells landed too far away, and as he corrected the guns Shabalin began to draw the Chechens towards him. The rebels decided to retreat from the artillery fire and moved closer to the Russian recon, and the paratroops prepared for hand-to-hand combat.

  ‘They came so close that they even started commenting on the messages they heard on my radio. We’d hear our guys say, “Hold on, we’re just coming”, and the Chechens would shout back, “Why don’t you hurry up then, we’ll give you a taste of action at close quarters!” There were perhaps fifteen metres separating us.’

  Wounded Sagdeyev was still lying out in the open. The rebels were telling them to surrender, but Kuzin shouted back that Russians don’t surrender and threw some grenades.

  ‘They worked out that I was the group commander and started shooting right at me,’ says Shabalin. ‘I remember they were firing from the under-barrel grenade launchers, but every time I was saved by this rut in front of my head - the shells hit it and glanced off. It was a pretty serious situation - we couldn’t stay there getting shot up for long, but nor could we move out. If we had, the Chechens would have killed both Sagdeyev and Kuzin. I told Lais to get ready to make a dash for it.’

  A moment later, Alexander Lais performed a heroic feat.

  Did he realize this would mean his death? Probably. There’s no way he couldn’t have known. There are no feats like this that aren’t carried out consciously. But he didn’t think about death. He was just doing his duty. There was no time to feel afraid, and there was less than a second’s worth of life left, only as much time as a sniper needs to move his finger in the bushes.

  And then Lais got up on his knees and began to cover his commander.

  ‘I didn’t know what was going on,’ Shabalin continues. ‘Lais was to my right and I told him to get ready to make a dash for it, and before I knew it he was half kneeling, half lying and firing long bursts. Then he sat up for a moment and slumped down again, turned to me and said: “I’ve been hit.” I remember blood on his lips and telling him: “Hang on while we get you out of here.” Then he started to fire again, loosed off another four bursts I suppose.’

  Eventually a medic pulled Sasha out of the line of fire and started to bandage him.

  A bullet had hit him in the throat. He stayed conscious for a while after that and Shabalin began to think the injuries weren’t so serious and he’d make it. The doctor tugged at Shabalin’s sleeve and told him he couldn’t stem the blood -Sasha had internal bleeding. He died quickly.

  ‘The Chechens came so close we prepared to fight hand-to-hand. If I’d had hair on my neck it would have stood on end, not with fear but with a sort of fury, mixed with fear, of course,’ says Shabalin.

  It didn’t come to it in the end. After they’d collected their dead and wounded, the rebels pulled back. No-one bothered to give chase: we had our own wounded to evacuate, as well as the body of machine-gunner Alexander Lais.

  As I write these lines I catch myself thinking that I can’t call him Alexander. To me he’s just Sasha. We might have met somewhere on the roads of Chechnya. Maybe he was on one of those carriers escorting the column of journalists I was in. We might have lit cigarettes off one another, and I would have called him brother and used the familiar form of Russian speech, just like we all do there. And that’s why Alexander can only be Sasha to me.

  The rebels left suddenly, as if ordered, and the fighting ended as unexpectedly as it had begun. Two men lay on the path: Sagdeyev, miraculously still alive, and dead Lais who paid for this courage with his life. Some of his fellow soldiers who were next to him when he was shooting said that he managed to kill the sniper that had wounded him. Later, after the battle, it was announced that the paratroops had killed five rebels. At least that’s how many fresh graves appeared at the edge of the village the next morning.

  Excerpt from a list of commendations:

  For exemplary performance of his duty, exceptional courage and heroism, and for services to the state and the people, performed during the counter-terrorist operation on the territory of the North Caucasus in hazardous conditions, Private Lais, Alexander Viktorovich merits the Gold Star of Hero of the Russian Federation.

  Today Vladimir Shabalin is calm as he remembers
that fight. Only his hands give away his agitation: he cannot keep them still and constantly wrings his blue paratrooper’s beret.

  ‘Could that have been a stray bullet? No. He knew he shouldn’t stand up like that. And basically there’s no point in discussing what should or shouldn’t have happened. He didn’t have to cover me, but he got up and did it anyway, just like that. Even if he hadn’t done it, the group wouldn’t have been destroyed: the second in command was still there alive and the other soldiers were at the ready. It’s not like we all idolize the commander and protect him as our only hope. Everything was organized quite normally. The soldier simply acted as he saw fit - that’s the kind of guy he was. None of them showed any cowardice: Kuzin fought them off as long as he could, threw all seven of his grenades although he could have just kept his head down and even surrendered; my radioman, the medic and the deputy commander, all of them fought. And so did Lais.’

  Alexander Lais was posthumously awarded the Gold Star of Hero of the Russian Federation, but that’s all the state did. For some reason, no-one from the president’s administration took the trouble to track down Alexander’s parents and give them the medal. Only two years later did the paratroops and journalists from the Forgotten Regiment TV programme bring Sasha’s mother over from Germany to the unit and present her with the Gold Star.

  Vladimir Shabalin met with her too.

  ‘I saw this film Scorched by Kandahar,’ he says. ‘There’s a bit when a wounded officer takes home the body of a soldier who saved him, and the relatives ask, “Why are you alive and our boy is dead?” So I was really afraid that I’d hear the same. But we got on well and are still in touch. I probably became one of the family to them. Seems I now have to live two lives...’

  Suddenly he throws his blue beret down on the bench and looks straight into my eyes:

  ‘You know, he’s not the first soldier I’ve lost in this war. And that fight wasn’t the worst I’ve been in either. But even so, it was different that time. Guys died in battle and they didn’t have a choice, but this... it was self-sacrifice. Today, though, I think he shouldn’t have done it. It would probably have been better if that sniper had got me. Don’t think I have a death wish. I very much value my life. But I just don’t like this life the way it is. I have nothing under my belt: no home, no money, no health. Just three combat tours and four stars on my shoulders. And I have no future. My whole life is right there, on my epaulettes. So what now?’

  Shabalin doesn’t like to remember that he probably owes his life to someone. On 7 August he doesn’t mark an anniversary, but rather a day that commemorates a soldier he didn’t manage to keep safe. It’s a day of mourning for him, and each year he brings the photo here to the memorial and stands beside the glass of vodka and bread for a long time as he looks at the faces.

  Postscript: After his death, a brother was bom to Alexander Lais. The family also called him Alexander and had him christened by the priest of the paratroop corps, Father Mikhail. And Captain Vladimir Shabalin became his godfather.

  23/ Hello Sister

  'Put the woman in the truck with the humanitarian aid,’ barked Colonel Kotenochkin, looking pensively at the female medic who was riding in the convoy with us. He frowned in annoyance, spat, and climbed onto the lead carrier.

  When I first went to war in June 1996 as a nineteen-year-old conscript, we drove out of Mozdok in a small column with two escort carriers and Ural trucks loaded with humanitarian aid. The attack on this convoy and my first taste of action is detailed earlier.

  I was feeling lousy, plagued by fear, sadness, loneliness and the inevitability of something imminent, something unknown and terrible. Since I had entered the draft office as a conscript, my situation had gone from bad to worse. First, there was the constant lack of sleep and starvation that reduced us to eating toothpaste during training in the Urals. Then came the period of frenzied beatings by the older conscripts in Mozdok, when my blood was spattered up the storeroom walls and my knocked-out teeth scattered on the floor. And now, this terrifying journey into the unknown, where things would only deteriorate further.

  Cowed to an impossible, hopeless state, with eyes that just begged for someone to spare me any more suffering and finish me off, I was being thrown around on top of the carrier, clutching my rifle in my hands. As instructed, I was watching to the front and right, but couldn’t help also glancing behind me at the truck where the woman was riding in her flak jacket.

  No-one got any peace because of her. Everybody made a point of ignoring her, while all the time she was subconsciously egging them on. The soldiers moved with manly abandon, their caps tipped back jauntily on their heads, and cockiness in their eyes. Boots, dirty puttees and exhaustion were forgotten in a moment, as basic instincts made us fluff up our feathers and dig the earth with our hooves in the presence of this female.

  I had very mixed feelings towards her. I wanted to be strong, and yet weak at the same time. Strong so that she would admire my manliness and courage, and how I was fearlessly going to war, regardless of the hardships. I daydreamed about how the column would get ambushed and the commander would get killed, but I would save everybody, take over and single-handedly cover our withdrawal under the withering fire of superior enemy forces. I’d get wounded, of course, and she would lean over me, crying as she bandaged me, and I would hug her and wipe away her tears. And then as I’d light up a cigarette and I say something like: ‘Don’t cry, honey, I’m here.’

  But at the same time I wanted to rest my head on her lap and cry so that this woman - who might well be the last I’d ever meet in my life - would also shed tears over me too, understanding how bad it is to die when you’re only nineteen, when you’ve barely let go of your mother’s apron strings and haven't yet seen anything of life. You’d inhaled its heady aroma as it beckoned you with promises of a world of new experiences, which were still forbidden fruit but definitely within reach -all it needed was a little time.

  After we arrived at Achkhoi-Martan, she and I went our separate ways and I didn’t see her for a few weeks. She was a nurse and the medical corps wasn’t exactly one of my main concerns at the time. For me it was trenches, dug-outs, the kitchen, the constant need to steal water, the torment of lighting a stove in the freezing wet mornings, and messy night-time firelights when you didn’t have a clue what was going on and all you could see were streams of tracer in the sky. After a few days and weeks of that, death became simple and didn’t frighten us any more. Weapons lost their magical aura and became just another instrument for performing a task.

  I only saw that woman one more time.

  It was about five in the morning and just getting light. The sun hadn’t yet risen and a cool morning mist was crawling across the depression, making me shiver. I was on guard, with my back pressed against the wall of the trench and huddled into my jacket. My eyes were closed; all senses apart from my hearing were shut down. Night vision sights were no use, and to stare into the darkness for three or four hours was a waste of time anyway. So I entrusted myself to my hearing, which grew razor sharp from the nervous tension. I wasn’t particularly worried because there was a minefield just over the top, and if something happened I couldn’t fail to hear it.

  My left shoulder had gone numb and I shifted around, straightened my wonky flak jacket and opened my eyes. In front of me, about fifty metres away, two people were walking right through the minefield. They moved absolutely soundlessly, as if they were floating on the mist, above the mined ground where death lurked at every step. It was the nurse and a young doctor from the medical battalion. They were walking as if they were all alone in Chechnya, and all that surrounded them was peace. He was telling her something as he wiped his glasses and she was listening, holding his hand. They emanated peace and love, and they were far removed from the war, the minefield, and me watching, holding my breath, afraid to scare them with a careless movement that might destroy this surreal picture. In their blissful ignorance they wandered clean through, and not one s
ingle tripwire or mine exploded. They reached the positions of the recon company, he did a few pull-ups on a horizontal bar someone had set up there, she smiled and took his hand, and they went into a trench and disappeared. Like they’d never been there. The mist just kept creeping across the depression and under my jacket, making me shrink deeper into it.

  Years have passed since then, and I never saw her or the doctor again. I don’t know their names or what happened to them, whether they died in the Grozny meat-grinder or, if they made it, what became of them after that.

  But in the summer sometimes, not too often, I dream of two people walking silently across a minefield in the mist, and that feeling of duality returns - I’m afraid to startle or bother them, and yet I’m confident that nothing on earth can shatter their idyll.

  When they pulled our battalion down from the mountains in March there were already three new medics: two women and a young man. We weren’t so interested in the man - after three months of living in a completely male company we’d had quite enough of our own unshaven mugs. But we showed great interest in the other two, Olga and Rita, who tended our various injuries and ailments at Argun. You’ll recall how I took a liking to Olga, when she used to change the dressing on my ulcer-covered thighs. My feet had started to rot from the unsanitary living conditions, the cold, the hunger, and the constant nervous exertion. She didn’t say much; she bandaged me quickly and very deftly, and always asked if my condition had improved since the last dressing, if I was in pain and if the bandage was too tight. My mood always brightened after she did my dressing. We had become brutalized in the long months of fighting, fused into a single entity with the war; we had forgotten about our past lives and our own world. The presence of a woman revived us, and reminded us that apart from fighting there was also love, home, warmth. Just by being there, Olga had returned us to the world of the living. Whenever I talked to her, I was even more drawn to the idea of going home. I wanted to live, drink vodka in Taganka Park and chat up girls. I liked her for pulling me back from the filth of war to normal life.