EntranceNorth Caucasus through the centuries. Naima Neflyasheva
Dagestan continues to be the main supplier of news for Russian media. And Dagestan conscripts continue to be a headache for officers. Sometimes it comes to mass hand-to-hand combat and the capture of entire military units by enraged Caucasians. We talked with our old friend, Dagestan expert and political scientist Magomed Osmanov, about the reason for this acute social army phenomenon and how to deal with it.
Abandoned Youth
– Magomed, what is the cause of army conflicts?
– Here we need to dig a little – both past years and the latest. Dagestan is a country of warriors and abreks. Since ancient times, war has been considered the most worthy pastime in our country. It's in our genetic code. We fought with the Persians for many years – and quite successfully. The raiding system, imposing tribute to wealthy lowland neighbors - the same Georgians - was considered a very prestigious occupation in the mountains. And then Russia came to us. After the pacification of the Caucasus, the raiding system was buried and many highlanders saw a lot of advantages in existing under the wing of the White Tsar. Russia has thought out a complex system of governance in a multinational republic that minimally infringes on the rights of the mountaineers. And then citizen Perestroika came to visit us all. And after it Chechnya flared up. During the Chechen wars, Russia forgot about Dagestan. She had no time for him. All forces were thrown into the fight against the bloodiest, meanest and most criminal state in the world - free Ichkeria. Chechen militants, in turn, dreamed of filling the ranks of their field detachments with militants from Dagestan. Of course, such a resource is disappearing! And in our republic at that time, severe unemployment was rampant. Strictly speaking, it is still high now, but then it was simply massive and landslide. The militants from Chechnya promised (and actually gave) the recruits a lot of money, and only for the young fighter’s course in the camp. Like, you’ll train with us for three months, and that’s it – take the money, go home, you don’t owe anything to anyone. In reality, it wasn't like that, of course. For militants, as you know, entry is a ruble, exit is fifteen, or rather, only on the battlefield.
– How did the parents of the recruits look at it? In the mountains, a son won’t take a step without his father’s knowledge.
– Well, first of all, everything is not so clear. Parents are sometimes happy to look after their son and teach him to be smart, but in conditions of degraded socio-economic life they are forced to work around the clock in order to bring an extra penny into the house. They leave for work - the son is still sleeping. When they arrive, he’s already asleep. Or, on the contrary, hanging out on the street with friends, smoking weed, waiting for the parents to fall asleep so that they can eat less of their brains. And then, the recruiters also blew into their ears that their parents, of course, are good and love you, but they are already hopelessly behind this life, and now the time has come for a just faith, jihad against the infidels, and as the final reward - Guria and other delights of life. And the young man leaves for a parallel world. On top of everything else, seasoned militants came for leave from rebellious Chechnya - sort of Robin Hoods from the forest, bearded, shot at, in new foreign cars, crunching wads of dollars. We called them “combat toughs.” But the youth fell for these cool guys and stared at them with their enthusiastic eyes. And often ran away into the forests. Many returned home as two hundred. Some never returned at all. But they drank a lot of the feds’ blood.
Feeling abandoned by Russia, not only the young people, but the whole of Dagestan sympathized with the daring and unexpectedly rich Chechens. In Chechnya, the cult of the abrek, the daring warrior, was revived with incredible speed. In addition, a lot of money was pumped into this Caucasian “black hole” - by the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, the West - by everyone and everything. The Ichkerian militants showed by their example to the local youth: you will be like us, you will be independent and rich! Moreover, with the help of their Arab sponsors, they benefited a couple of villages in Dagestan itself - in the Dargin Karamakhi and Chabanmakhi. There, everyone who accepted Wahhabism received a Kamaz as a gift. We called them “Kamazists-Wahhabists.” This was a huge propaganda success. The militants boasted of their fearlessness and cruelty, poisoning our youth.
It must be admitted that the local authorities condoned this with all their might. Then in Makhachkala, at every crossroads, at every clothing market, videotapes were sold, where militants cut the throats of captured Russian soldiers who were still alive. The special services working in the republic did not stop this vile trade. Before our eyes, Dagestan was irrevocably plunging into the abyss of separatism and the dark Middle Ages. It was in such an atmosphere that the youth of that time were brought up. Which is what we are still figuring out. It got to the point that they stopped recruiting Dagestani conscripts into the army altogether, seeing in each of them a potential Wahhabi defector. The military reasoned simply: we will train him, arm him, and then the regiment will be thrown into Chechnya, and the Dagestani, along with the machine gun, will go to the separatists. This had its own logic. And our tectonic youth were left idle in this tectonic time. Realizing the danger of the situation, the Kremlin took unprecedented measures - they entered into separate negotiations with the hated Basayev and finally dragged him to Dagestan. They say they simply took his children hostage - how else could they come to an agreement with such a monster? And he entered there. He didn’t come as a guest - he came to dictate his terms, with his “Islamic Peacekeeping Brigade”. In fact, it was an aggressive expeditionary force. In addition to the stick, there was also a carrot for the youth - more than 500 young guys from the Botlikh district received an advance payment of $150. True, only 17 people came for the rest. They began to suspect that this would not end well, and played it safe.
As a result, the highlanders offered fierce resistance to Basayev. And together with the federal troops they asked to “leave the premises.” By the way, the security officers then let him leave - they religiously respected the agreements and kept their promises. And I think that was a mistake. It was necessary to bring down this nonhuman there, in Dagestan. They released his children, hoping “for understanding,” but then he did bad things: he blew up two planes in Domodedovo, took Nazran...
During his voyage to Dagestan, an interesting incident occurred - one of the young Dagestanis he recruited shot seven militants. And he himself died. He was given the Hero Star. This example became a landmark for our youth - Dagestan turned away from the war in Chechnya. The situation was then saved.
And the children of “Satan” (as Basayev was called in Russia) died during the bombing of his village - from an accurate hit by a bomb. All six.
– New time – new songs. Now your youth are actively being lured into ISIS (an organization banned in Russia). Many agree...
– The reasons are the same: unemployment, a complete vacuum of ideology (as in all of Russia), the absence of an all-Russian national idea attractive to Dagestanis, a feeling of abandonment of the republic to the mercy of fate and complete isolation from Russia, the abrek and mercenary complexes that have not been overcome among mountain youth, plus our inescapable and limitless Caucasian greed. The militants knew how to catch the local highlanders. This is a song, not life: you’ve been at war for 3-4 months, and you’re already a master of a new car. You can drive along local highways, spread your fingers like a fan, show off in front of the girls, show off dust in your eyes. In the mountains, show-offs - especially those who are young - are still more valuable than money.
– The other side of such “majorism” is a bullet in the forehead or a shrapnel between the eyes.
“But everyone believes that the insurance certificate was issued to them directly from Allah.” Like, a bullet will catch up with anyone, but I’m under a spell. But since ISIS in Syria was pinned down and partially disposed of, many began to return.
“We have broken everyone here, we are breaking and will continue to break!”
- Okay, it’s clear with ISIS. Why do Dagestanis, from the first days of their military service, come into conflict with their colleagues?
– Firstly, in our mountains, young people mature earlier – both psychologically and physiologically. A mountain youth at 18 is like a Russian at 25. It turns out that a boy from Russia goes to serve in the army, and from Dagestan he is almost a man. Moreover, often with a solid base of a martial artist and the complex of an abrek who came down from his mountains for lowland prey. Well, like, where are my sheep? Having arrived in the troops, he feels that here he is actually the eldest. In addition, for some reason Russian young men at this age are all complexed. Either from late maturation, or life itself has been pressing them since childhood. Plus female education. In Russia, wherever you spit, damned women rule everywhere: in kindergarten, school, in the family, in government, often at work. Not everyone can withstand this womanish pressure. And looking at the pressured ones, the Caucasian wants to be the first not only in fact, but also in rank. After all, how does any highlander work? He longs to be the master of the situation wherever he is. Even if a highlander finds himself among penguins at the North Pole or among monkeys in Africa, he will still want to be the “chief of the pole” or the “lion king of the savannahs and jungles.” And penguins, macaques and other “sheep” will anneal the lezginka at the click of his fingers. It’s not for nothing that we say: “If you make one of two Dagestanis a boss, then there will be three bosses.”
This applies to young people even more. And if the soldier is also physically strong (and in Dagestan there is a cult of strength, all our young soldiers walk around with their ears broken on the carpet), he also tries to crush the officers - in order to be the absolute master of the unit. And it blows into the platoon commander’s ears: “Do you want order in your unit, even in your absence? Make me and my fellow countrymen sergeants! No one can restore order in the unit better than us, the “Nazis”! I’ll line everyone up here.” And many officers, enraged by their “favorite personnel,” swallow this profit along with the float. And they fall into the “Dagestan trap”.
By the way, this behavior of Caucasians in the army was shown very well in the sensational film “Fan” in its time. There, Caucasian karatekas cajole the officers and bully the company personnel. And then they write intoxicating letters home: the officers dance to our tune, we break all the soldiers... Or even more scathingly: they post on the Internet a photo where one puny Dagestani is filmed in front of soldiers with “Caucasus” or “Dagestan” written on their backs. True, for some reason he doesn’t show the support group of Caucasian jocks in the frame. This is generally greyhound beyond the boundaries of good and evil. Such Internet revelations should immediately become the property of the military prosecutor's office. And here the article and the debate are clearly flawed. And all this is a direct consequence of the officer’s naivety (which is very bad), or indifference to the fate of the soldiers (which is generally unacceptable), or a complete lack of discipline in the unit in principle (which is also no good). After such photos, some need to be turned upside down, officers (and especially political officers) must ensure their appearance on the carpet before the prosecutor with their heads and shoulder straps torn off. The French say: the best remedy for dandruff is the guillotine. So, the best remedy for dandruff, which replaces the brains of the organizers of such photo sessions, is a technical knockout. But it’s still better to kick these Augean stables out of bad heads at the prevention stage.
– What if the “penguin bosses” run into a Russian karate soldier?
“Then the next number of the Marlezon ballet begins - plan “B” is turned on. By the way, he is also well shown in “Fan”. The abreks, sensing a real threat, immediately offer a worthy opponent to conclude an “unbreakable alliance” against the rest of the personnel: “Come on, Vasya, join us - we’ll build everyone else in the unit!” And Vasya (not out of great intelligence, of course) joins them. And the selfless team begins to bend everyone else together. And messages are sent to Dagestan via the Internet: “The whole part is in our hands. We have broken everyone here, we are breaking and will continue to break!” And then, in the process of endless breakdown, some kind of emergency happens, and the mountaineers unanimously point to Vasya - it’s his fault, he incited us!
- But let's get back to our sheep. In the sense of problems with Dagestan conscripts. It’s clear who is to blame. Question number two - what to do? Should we not call them at all?
- In no case. Otherwise, they will continue to rush around our mountains and villages with their tails in the air, and it will all end with some kind of ISIS. We need to work with them – both here in Dagestan and in the army itself.
- Action plan, please...
- No problem. Army leadership just needs to understand a few things. First. Conscripts from Dagestan are a special risk group that requires special treatment. Second. From the first days of service, mountaineers must understand that any mockery of soldiers is fraught with criminal prosecution. Anyone who doesn’t understand this should buy a ticket to the disciplinary battalion. Thirdly (I’m already tired of talking about this) - if someone does not understand something, he should be thrown out of the army, like a kitten through a window, and not transferred from unit to unit, as is now customary. If he messes up, let him fly to his village ahead of his own squeal. Look what happened in the Far East, in Belogorye. Dagestani Abdulkhalidov did not get along in one unit (he was unable to assert himself), he was transferred to another - instead of being thrown out of the army. And in another, he shot three soldiers and an officer at a shooting range. And he went to the local teahouse to drink coffee - with a feeling of accomplishment. He was shot, of course, but who will return the soldiers to their mothers? If they had removed it on time, everyone would have been alive. Fourthly, it’s time to introduce military police in order to neutralize people like Abdulkhalidov in time.
"Gai-gui-Makhachkala" on Kunashir Island
- But we seem to have commandant companies for this...
– ...where clerks and laborers work. For some reason this institute is completely discredited among the troops. In the internal troops, the functions of military police are partially performed by maroon berets. But there are two or three of them in the company, no more, and they also need to serve, and not endlessly bring rude conscripts to their senses. The strictest control must be established over all military units where Dagestanis serve, right up to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. The experience of the Dagestanis capturing an entire machine-gun and artillery brigade on the island of Kunashir several years ago should have taught us something. By the way, in Kunashir the officers exemplarily “swallowed all the bait” that the Dagestanis threw at them. At first they fell for the songs of the Caucasian sirens (“no one can restore order in the unit better than the Nazis”), then the mountaineers easily fed them the legend that the Koran does not allow them to wash dishes and scrub army outhouses, plowing all the other soldiers to this task. After which they began to go AWOL and fight with local guys at local discos. Got away with it again. Then it went on and on. Even an attempt to take away the local police officer’s time card did not bring the unit’s officers out of their lethargic sleep. The quintessence of this bacchanalia was the visit of a local Chechen, who served in the same unit, to his fellow intellectually disabled people raging in the barracks. I still can’t understand where the division’s vaunted commandant company was during all this chaos? At the sight of a drunken, ragged “stranger” on the territory of the unit, an epiphany descended on the officers. In addition, this person clearly sent the unit on duty to an address widely known among the people. With a bullet in its body, the living target galloped towards the checkpoint. He was then hospitalized. And then a riot broke out. The brutal Dagestanis captured a pyramid with weapons in the unit. Here in Dagestan, such dashing creativity of the masses is called “Gai-Gui-Makhachkala”. The situation was saved only by the local riot police. The detachment commander, at his own peril and risk, burst into the territory of the unit and went through this entire gang with an asphalt roller of justice.
And before that, “Gai-Gui” took place in the Far Eastern aviation unit, which was seized by embittered Chechens who did not share power with the officers. The situation was resolved by the future president of Ichkeria - then aviation major general Dzhokhar Dudayev. There were plenty of them in the Far East - these “gai” and “guys”. But no one drew any conclusions.
"Slavic gazavat"
– Unfortunately, after all these riots, a wave of anti-Caucasian boomerang swept through many Far Eastern parts. The local mountaineers remembered everything – even things that had never happened. Soldiers and officers organized “boar races” and pursuit races for the abreks. Now the Dagestanis have fully learned what “happiness in abundance and the sky in diamonds” means.
Near Novosibirsk, artillery captain Alexey Levy publicly, right on the parade ground, marked out four natives of the republic. They even wrote a statement against him to the prosecutor's office. Then, however, they took it back - their snouts themselves were full of fluff, don’t play around. But the Russian revolt, senseless and merciless, swept through the mountaineers. They weren’t bored and it didn’t seem a little like they weren’t “yakhshis and comme il faut,” of course. But this wave of righteous anger was even more difficult to stop than in Kunashir.
Know-how
– Besides, there is no need to rush to trust the Dagestanis with weapons. They still have to earn it. And future officers need to be taught to work with the Caucasian contingent in military schools so that they do not end up in the position of officers in Kunashir. This is a whole science, by the way. You also need to take a closer look at the creative experience of “stopping” the process of decomposition of the mountaineers on the ground. In some parts of the internal troops, for example, the process of “getting rid of dandruff in the heads” was approached creatively. Local maroon berets organize a “Dagestan carousel” for particularly insolent photo shoot organizers.
– What kind of know-how is this?
– Purely as part of combat training and for the benefit of the cause, an “amateur photographer” in full equipment goes on the mat against several experienced fighters. Even if he is a master of sports in wrestling, after five minutes of such a “carousel” around the gym, the picture of the world in his head changes radically. They say it works very convincingly. And the most important thing is that everyone is alive and well, everything is within the framework of the regulations.
New "Wild Division"?
– And finally, the most important thing. We cannot discount the fact that Caucasians, for the most part, are very good warriors. And it’s a sin not to use this resource and potential. After all, the “Wild Division” was one of the most combat-ready units at the front during World War I. During mounted attacks, the mountaineer horsemen terrified their enemies with their guttural screams and terrifying appearance alone. The Dagestanis also want to have their own “Wild Division” - like Kadyrov. Ramzan has it, handsome Said-Magomed Kakiev has it (they are in Lebanon), but are we red-haired? Look how successfully the Chechens fought and are fighting – in Ossetia, Donbass, and Syria. The military police in Aleppo were recruited almost entirely from Chechens. But we are no worse! A lot of Dagestanis fought in Afghanistan, many returned with awards. My nephew, for example, served on a BTS - an armored tractor with heavy anti-mine coils. I was shell-shocked several times. Awarded the Order of the Red Star.
And serving in the “Wild Division” is the dream of any highlander. All the charms in one bottle: you realize yourself as a man and get a lot of money for it. Only the battalions must be composed of fighters of the same nationality - then there will be no bickering and hazing.
And the new owner of Dagestan, Vladimir Vasiliev, will have to resolve this issue. As the others. “It wasn’t me who came to you, it was Russia who came to you,” he said. So, Vladimir Abdualievich, young (and not so young) Dagestanis also want to come to Russia. And as part of his Dagestan “Wild Division”, defend its interests on distant borders - like our neighbor Ramzan.
But this is a topic for another discussion.
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Caucasians in the army
One of the modern problems of our society is Caucasians in the army. Conscripts from the southern regions of our Motherland are completely resistant to discipline and education. They remain isolated, hostile, and radically disposed towards representatives of other nationalities.
It is no secret that modern Russian society is divided into several camps according to ethnic views. Some Russians believe that the cohabitation of peoples with different cultures and religions is quite acceptable, subject to generally accepted norms of behavior in society. Many are wary of neighbors who speak a different language or profess a different faith. And the views of the many thousands of neo-Nazis of various stripes, who do not accept people with a different culture and a different religious view, living in the country are completely radical.
Parting with family, changing the usual routine and stressful situations, all conscripts without exception go through this. But on what basis do ethnic conflicts arise in the army?The history of ethnic conflicts in the army
The wave of national hostility experienced a particular aggravation in the late 80s. The country's Ministry of Defense deliberately hid statistics on conflicts (cases of hazing) specifically with national overtones that took place in the army. According to informed sources, there was particular harshness among Caucasians in the army At the end of the USSR period, the Dagestan, Ingush, Chechen and Armenian diasporas were distinguished. In units where dozens, hundreds of conscripts of the same age from the southern regions united, an unspoken “supreme power” was established - the southerners unitedly suppressed, ousted, beat and staged bloody showdowns with any representative of a different ethnic group, regardless of religion. It was then that the expression appeared that “ chumps in the army“It’s uncontrollable evil.”
It is known that even Azerbaijani conscripts were often tortured and beaten by fellow Muslims - Dagestanis and Chechens. Thus, the issue of Islamization of informal “deniers” from the southern latitudes disappeared - these were community in the army, communities determined by a certain highlander code.
But due to the relatively strict order in the armed forces of the USSR, widespread parochial communities were of a focal, spontaneous nature. There were protracted conflicts on ships where they served in military service for a period of 3 years (service life in the USSR Navy was reduced to 2 years only in 1990). Also in remote garrisons and areas with a predominance of the local population, representing the “titular” nation of conscripts in the unit - in Dagestan, the Chechen-Ingush Republic, in Armenia.
Since the beginning of 1992, when the formation of a separate, exclusively Russian army began, such communities began to be identified less and less often, since the Ministry of Defense developed a special plan for conscription and military service for representatives of the southern republics - they were allowed to perform military service directly in the region of residence. An exception was made only for Dagestan, from where up to 3 thousand conscripts were and are being called up to the Northern Fleet annually.
Measures to counteract such manifestations
I would like to add that now such behavior is unacceptable in the modern armed forces of the Russian Federation. Thorough checks are carried out, daily physical examinations of military personnel are carried out, and strict judicial punishments are carried out, including convictions for hazing. There is an unspoken directive to limit the number of conscripts for military service from some southern regions in general.
In Dagestan, Karachay-Cherkessia, and Ingushetia, educational work is carried out among young people of military age. They explain that ethnic conflicts and hostile attitudes towards colleagues disgrace these nationalities.
If you want to be truly respected by both your colleagues and commanders, behave like a human being, demonstrate your intelligence, honor and decency, then and a “chock” in the army you won't be named. A real, worthy man should not behave in a way that is close to bestial or gregarious behavior.
This is the right approach, considering that without a military ID, a good job cannot be found in these republics.
Lawlessness of Caucasians in the army video. program on NTV.
Zhirinovsky - ethnic conflicts are easily resolved - how? Look.
The almost total sanding of Russians, which began after the death of Stalin in 1953 and sharply accelerated after Khrushchev’s “exposure of the cult of personality” in 1956, led to their demoralization and depassionarization and ultimately culminated in the self-treacherous Russian Holocaust of 1991. All these processes took place before my eyes; I was especially impressed by the mass intercourse of Russian girls with dark-skinned southerners at the World Festival of Youth and Students in Moscow in 1957, and as a reaction to the spreading epidemic of selfishness, my text “Charter of Morality” (1965) should be considered, because for which they began to consider me a “fascist” and expelled me from the ranks of the CPSU and from politics. But I just see further than others and sound the alarm. At one time, the ancient Jews, led by Moses from Egyptian captivity, also, after the departure of their stern Leader, gave in to the selfish temptation of the Golden Calf of consumerism and would also have perished, like the Russians now, if Moses had not returned and carried out the Great Purge in the Jewish camp and returned would the people take the true path of God's chosenness (Exodus 32). It’s bitter to admit, but today’s rare Russian youths are able to stand up for themselves. But the Caucasians and partly the Mongols (Kalmyks, Buryats) have retained their readiness for self-sacrifice, without which the people are generally unviable, and cannot help but dominate the sanded and therefore scattered Russian soldiers in the Russian army. Therefore, many Caucasian young men perceive conscription as a gift - they go into the army with the confidence that they will not disappear, but will experience the joys of domination (not to mention good allowances and tributes from their Russian colleagues). It is not officers or priests who will save Russian youth from their current pitiful fate, but only (as has always been the case everywhere in history) a few united organizational members of the “long will,” aimed at establishing order in the country and at global expansion (analogous to the “New Moses”). - The original was taken from pohabij_oplueff to the army - for a bribe
Bribes in military registration and enlistment offices are commonplace. But there is a nuance: if throughout Russia the families of conscripts collect money to make an offering to the military commissar in order to “excuse” their child from military service, then in the Caucasus it’s the other way around. Relatives take the bribe to the military registration and enlistment office to send the conscript to the army. But they don’t hire them to serve! This is not the first year. No, at home, in the Caucasus, some young people still do military service. And they remain for the emergency - remember, during the Five-Day War with Georgia there were such battalions “East” and “West”? Worthy warriors served in them. But Caucasians are not invited to serve in the units stationed throughout Russia. Why? Reading the news: Recruits from the regions of the North Caucasus will not be drafted into the Russian army in 2012 due to the fight against hazing and fraternity, a senior representative of the Russian Ministry of Defense told reporters on Monday (from here). Yes, I served in the army in the late eighties, and I can confirm that a few Chechens or Dagestanis in a unit is a headache for officers and physical pain - from regular beatings - for a significant part of the soldiers. “Countrymen” behave more often recklessly than loyally. If a highlander respects his officer, there will be order. But if not, they can break him so hard that the stars fly out of his shoulder straps. I know what I’m talking about, I’ve seen this more than once in a construction battalion near Moscow. It is very difficult to serve with the Chechens and Dagestanis. But even those Caucasians who are not taken into the army to pay their debt to their Motherland are our. Citizens of Russia. But defending the Fatherland is not a citizen’s privilege. This is his sacred duty. In fact, there are a lot of options. If you want to be guaranteed to avoid hazing, you can create special units of highlanders with highlander officers at the head - and send them either to Siberia or to the Far East. The guys will go and won’t refuse. You can... yes, a lot more can be invented using Russian historical experience. It’s just that the Ministry of Defense either can’t do this or doesn’t want to. They say that the recruitment of recruits from the Caucasus will be resumed next year. This is not the first time they have been saying something like this. They promise. But they won’t resume it. Forgetting at the same time that the habit of paying military duty to their Motherland - Russia among the mountain peoples may atrophy as unnecessary. I don’t want to croak about the possible consequences of such atrophy...
Against the backdrop of increasingly frequent incidents with a pronounced ethnic overtones throughout the country, in early July a statement was made by the military commissariat of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug about the growth of Wahhabi sentiments among conscripts from the North Caucasus. While acknowledging numerous problems with conscripts from the region, the military said the troops had received tacit instructions to limit conscription from some national republics. “Our Version” looked into how acute the national issue is in the army.
One of the few decisions for which the army is grateful to the previous Minister of Defense Anatoly Serdyukov is the refusal of conscripts from the North Caucasus. The military department tries to avoid commenting on the fact of the ban on their service, since the Constitution does not allow officially ending conscription in any subject of the Federation. However, the de facto conscription campaign in the Caucasus for the last few years has only been imitated: registration of conscripts in military registration and enlistment offices is carried out, commissions operate, but only a few manage to get into the troops. So, last fall, for example, only 179 people were drafted from the most populous southern republic - Dagestan.
The mountaineers openly refused to obey the officers
Meanwhile, in recent years the problem with the shortage of conscripts has sharply worsened. Today, even in permanent readiness units, the shortage of soldiers is up to one third. The new leadership of the Ministry of Defense is feverishly looking for ways to correct the situation. One of the options is the resumption of mass conscription from the republics of the North Caucasus. A huge conscription resource is truly concentrated there. Until 2010, 15–20 thousand people were drafted into the army annually from Dagestan alone. However, the necessity of the presence of these conscripts in the troops was then strongly doubted. Such a strong concentration of Caucasians in the troops led to an incredible aggravation of the crime situation; the army was agitated by a number of hazing incidents. The mountaineers openly refused to obey the officers and actually kept entire garrisons in fear.
As Alexander Perendzhiev, an expert at the Association of Military Political Scientists, told Our Version, it is fundamentally wrong to restrict the right of Caucasians to serve in the army, especially in a situation where the country has a huge shortage of conscription resources, and they even want to attract women and foreigners to serve. According to the expert, it is unacceptable to create a precedent when people are not drafted based on their nationality.
Apparently, the new Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu partly agrees with this. At the end of last year, the leadership of Dagestan reported that they had managed to reach an agreement with the Ministry of Defense that the number of conscripts from the republic would be sharply increased. According to some reports, it was planned to conscript about 5 thousand people this spring. A trend towards an increase in the number of Dagestani conscripts in the Russian army is indeed visible, but on a much smaller scale. This year the republic received an order for 800 people.
In other North Caucasian republics the situation is even worse: about 400 people are being drafted from Ingushetia, and the last large-scale draft in Chechnya was carried out more than 20 years ago. Most likely, the military has not yet fully decided on this issue. For comparison: from neighboring Russian regions the number of conscripts is an order of magnitude greater - from the Krasnodar Territory this year more than 5 thousand people are preparing to be sent to the army, from Stavropol - more than 2 thousand.
Dzhigits are eager to join the troops
It should be noted that the leadership of the Caucasian republics is concerned about the opportunity to serve for their conscripts, although not only and not so much out of patriotic motives. For example, after the actual end of conscription in the republic, Dagestan youth began to have problems finding employment in law enforcement agencies (where almost every young horseman strives to get into) and where they are not hired without military experience.
On this topic
Serving in the US military for transgender people will become more difficult after the directive of US President Donald Trump comes into force. In accordance with it, people who have changed their gender will have to serve in the gender registered at birth.
As a result, today there is a unique desire of young people from the Caucasus to join the army. For the last few years, there has been a tendency for people to pay a bribe of 20-150 thousand rubles for conscription in Dagestan. Some conscripts move to other regions and register there so that they can be called up at the place of new registration.
In order to achieve an additional quota for conscripts, local military commissars promise that they will send only the best to the army, most of whom will have a higher education, and also intend to introduce a guarantee system into the work of military commissions, in which diaspora leaders will be personally responsible for each soldier .
Meanwhile, the leadership of the North Caucasian republics self-critically admits that their youth are unsuitable for military service: a considerable part of the hot-blooded Caucasian guys are poorly managed. Moreover, the situation is aggravated by modern realities in society: if earlier the elders in the family taught the younger generation that in the army it is necessary to unquestioningly obey commanders, now the main emphasis in the instructions is the need to first of all observe religious canons.
You can’t argue with the facts - cases of open disobedience to the orders of commanders and opposition of national customs to military regulations are far from isolated. True Muslims refuse to participate in household work, dumping the hard work on their fellow workers. Sometimes it reaches the point of absurdity: Caucasians refuse to shave their beards, undergo examination at a psychoneurological dispensary and examination by a surgeon. All these whims lead to the erosion of discipline, aggravation of contradictions and become the cause of conflicts. In addition to this, some have a craving for the dangerous ideas of radical Islamism (Wahhabism).
What affects the hotheads of the southerners?
As the commander of one of the military units of the Southern Military District told Our Version, commanders at all levels prefer not to accept people from the North Caucasus into their units and, under any pretext, try to get rid of their presence in the units. The officer notes that today, when conscription service has been reduced to a year, commanders literally do not have time to understand the worldview of each soldier.
It must be said that in the Soviet army the situation with Caucasians was not completely cloudless. The main way to fight the compatriots was to distribute the highlanders evenly across all parts of the large army; their “critical concentration” was not allowed. But the main instrument of influence on southern hotheads was public associations, such as the Komsomol, and strict control over sentiment among military personnel.
Unfortunately, optimal levers for ideological and propaganda work in the Russian Armed Forces have not yet been invented. The situation became even more complicated with the collapse of the institute of political workers and was aggravated by the abolition of the guardhouse.
POINT OF VIEW
Alexander PErendzhiev, expert of the Association of Military Political Scientists:
– The emerging critical situation with representatives of the Caucasus shows the weakness of the military command system, especially its educational component. Essentially, the Armed Forces lack mechanisms that can influence this category of military personnel. No matter how offensive it is to admit it, today the state ideology and the system of military-patriotic education cannot counteract the very ideas of Wahhabism, which are actively spreading among Muslim youth. There is a feeling that the army is giving in to this problem rather than trying to solve it. Perhaps the leadership of the Ministry of Defense does not even know how to do this. I myself commanded a construction company, in which 60 immigrants from the North Caucasus served. Of course, managing such personnel was difficult, but possible. In my opinion, conscripts from these republics have not changed, they have become neither better nor worse, but the methods of working with them have been forgotten. For example, previously Muslims were drafted mainly into construction or railway units, where they served without weapons. Officers were purposefully trained to work with problematic national minorities. And today, to work with Caucasians, it is also necessary to select the most prepared, strong-willed, knowledgeable of national characteristics and better trained officers and sergeants. At the same time, it does not hurt to closely interact with Muslim religious organizations - for example, contact was previously established with the Council of Muftis of Russia.
Many soldiers and officers testify: it is very difficult to serve together with Caucasians. Mountaineers, as a rule, do not obey orders and mock anyone who cannot stand up for themselves. The military department prefers to remain silent about the “Caucasian yoke” in the Russian Armed Forces until the next emergency.
The Chelyabinsk court recently sentenced private Zainalabid Gimbatov, a serviceman of military unit 69806 (Ural Military District). The private is accused of hazing with fellow soldiers. In addition, the native of the Caucasus is charged with Article 282 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, part 2, paragraph “a” (“Inciting hatred or enmity, as well as humiliation of human dignity, committed with the use of violence”).
The military investigation department for the Chelyabinsk garrison established the following. In February 2011, Gimbatov arrived at the medical isolation ward of his unit. At the checkpoint, Gimbatov said that he was going to visit his colleagues. Several soldiers from his company were indeed being treated in the medical battalion. The serviceman named their names and ranks and was allowed into the detention center.
Gimbatov went into the isolation ward where the sick soldiers were lying. The private immediately felt superior to them. Firstly, because he was absolutely healthy, and secondly, because he was from Dagestan. Gimbatov guessed that the “Dags” in his unit were secretly disliked, and decided to get even for it. Gimbatov's gaze scanned the beds and settled on three soldiers of Slavic appearance.
The private ordered the sick soldiers to stand up. They initially refused, but the Dagestani used force. The soldiers reluctantly obeyed. Then Gimbatov took out his mobile phone and turned on one of the melodies, a combat lezginka. On the recording, the melody of a Caucasian dance alternated with machine gun shots, the howling of wolves and the roar of cannonade. Perhaps the hot-blooded Caucasian felt proud while listening to her, but a Russian person will not listen to such things. Moreover, the entry began with the words: “In the name of Allah! Dedicated to the warriors of jihad in the Caucasus.”
Gimbatov ordered the sick soldiers to dance. The soldiers refused. Then the Dagestani began to beat them. The sick servicemen obeyed and began to clumsily imitate a Caucasian dance. Gimbatov, sitting on a stool, watched the soldiers. He insulted them in every possible way, and if the soldiers lost their rhythm or moved incorrectly, he beat them.
The mockery of their colleagues was silently observed by the other soldiers undergoing treatment in the medical battalion. It seemed that the actions of the arrogant Caucasian and the suffering of their comrades did not concern them.
For bullying sick soldiers, Gimbatov received a year in a disciplinary battalion. Disbat in the army is a cruel thing, but it is unknown whether it will “cure” Gimbatov. Such measures certainly cannot correct the situation as a whole. Because in the Russian armed forces there are hundreds, if not thousands, of such unpunished gimbatas. Against the backdrop of arrogant Caucasians, the universally reviled “hazing” seems like an innocent prank.
The author of one of the online books, who served as a conscript in the mid-90s, wrote about military personnel from the Caucasus as a “problem for the army.” According to the author, Caucasians, in particular natives of Dagestan, join the army in order to integrate into the army hierarchy in any way and establish their own order in military units:
“It all starts with “warming up” the “grandfathers”: vodka, a guitar, a promise to identify informers, keep order. They approach officers in the same way. The Dagestanis quickly manage to understand that it’s a waste to wash floors in the army, and they try in this regard take on the role of commanders in cleaning the barracks, so as not to wash themselves.They also argue for refusing to wash floors in the army by saying that their faith does not allow it, they must perform namaz (prayer) five times a day, this can only be done with clean hands, I never noticed them praying in the army.
If Dagestanis are hampered by officers and regulations, then they try to get to the part where the power of the officers is not very strong. And here they immediately take everything into their own hands. Dagestanis often try to become sergeants and take control of such vitally important facilities in the army as the quarters and canteen. They usually manage to establish their own rules in military units where there is no clear authority of officers."
According to the author, gangster chaos begins here. When the unit commander had a summer vacation, the servicemen from the Caucasus felt like they were the only authorities. Some of the “Dags” were commissioned, having agreed in advance with the medical unit, others simply went on indefinite “AWOL.” Those who remained immediately got used to the situation and realized that anarchy was to their advantage: “Some were destroyed and plundered, there was no bathhouse for three weeks, unauthorized absence was the norm. (...) The Dagestanis got so comfortable that they used the soldiers for their own purposes, forced work in dachas, steal. The officers gave up command of some, and also recklessly used soldiers in construction work."
When the ill-fated unit 52386 was finally disbanded, many soldiers were transferred to military unit 41692. This unit was already “half under the control of the Dagestanis.” Despite the fact that there were at most 15 highlanders. The Dagestanis managed to “build” a unit due to the weakness of the officer’s power: “The Dagestanis imposed a tribute on everyone they could: for example, from every four people ten dollars a day. Whether they steal from objects or go shooting money is their business. The command was unable to take any measures against them. It is worth noting that everyone used this type of extortion, only the Dagestanis knew how to do it in a more organized manner."
Where the entire personnel was staffed by Caucasians, the officers also began to suffer: “Starley Budko said that when he served in a military unit, the entire personnel of which consisted of Dagestanis, the first thing he saw in the morning, opening the door from the office, - this is a mop flying at him."
This was in the 1990s. But this is what is happening in our time.
Not so long ago, the Chelyabinsk military commissar (when he was there) Nikolai Zakharov announced that there would no longer be conscription of Caucasians in his garrison. The military commissar said that this was not his personal decision, but an order of the General Staff of the RF Armed Forces concerning all military districts of the country. Colonel Zakharov then said that the Ministry of Defense was concerned about the dominance of national gangs that terrorize military units. Therefore, in the spring of 2011, all natives of the Caucasus and Transcaucasian republics will not join the Russian army. In the Central Military District of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, Chelyabinsk journalists received the following comment: “There are no and cannot be any oral orders from the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces regarding whether or not to conscript a certain contingent of persons. Perhaps the military commissar at the meeting in Moscow misunderstood something, with an appropriate conversation will be held with him." Subsequently, Colonel Zakharov was relieved of his post as military commissar. And news appeared in the media that was exactly the opposite of the words of the Chelyabinsk colonel. According to a number of media outlets, the Russian military department has decided to sharply increase the recruitment of Dagestanis into the army. The media believed that this decision was caused by a shortage of conscripts from other regions and the Ministry of Defense decided to plug the gap in the last mass recruitment into the army with Dagestanis.
Pravda.Ru has repeatedly written about how natives of the Caucasus behave in military units. Let us recall only the most high-profile incidents that have occurred in recent years.
In the Baltic Fleet, Dagestani conscripts bullied their colleagues in every possible way. According to the case file, in August 2009, sailors Vitaly Shah, Gadzhibakhmud Kurbanov, Arag Eminov, Sirazhutdin Cheriev, Naib Taygibov, Islam Khamurzov, Jamal Temirbulatov beat about 15 colleagues, and then forced them to lie on the ground so that the word KAVKAZ came out of their bodies . Before this crime, the “grandfathers” repeatedly robbed and beat conscripts.