WHO IS HE, THE LEADER OF THE UPRISING?
On the evening of April 26, 1985, when almost all the Mujahideen who were in the camp of “Saint Khaled ibn Walid” in the town of Zangali (Badaber) gathered on the parade ground to perform prayers, Soviet prisoners of war went into their last battle.
Shortly before the uprising, at night, a large amount of weapons was brought into the camp as a transshipment base - twenty-eight trucks with rockets for rocket launchers and grenades for grenade launchers, as well as Kalashnikov assault rifles, machine guns, and pistols. As Ghulam Rasul Karluk, who taught artillery in Badaber, testifies, “the Russians helped us unload them.”
A significant part of the incoming weapons was soon to go to the Panjshir Gorge - to the Mujahideen detachments under the command of Ahmad Shah Massoud.
Nikolai Shevchenko (“Abdurakhmon”) in captivity. Drawing for the film “The Secret of the Badaber Camp. Afghan trap"
As the former leader of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan (IOA) Rabbani later recalled, the uprising was started by a tall guy who managed to disarm the guard who brought the evening stew. He opened the cells and released other prisoners.
“There was one stubborn person among the Russians - Viktor, originally from Ukraine,” Rabbani said. “One evening, when everyone had gone to prayer, he killed our guard and took possession of his machine gun. Several people followed his example. Then they climbed to the roof of the warehouses where RPG shells were stored and began shooting at our brothers from there. Everyone fled from the parade ground. We asked them to lay down their arms and surrender...
The night passed in anxiety. Morning came, Victor and his accomplices did not give up. They killed more than one Mujahideen, many of our brothers were wounded. The Shuravi even fired from a mortar. We again asked them through a megaphone not to shoot - this could lead to disaster: the ammunition in the warehouses would explode...
But that didn't help either. Shooting from both sides continued. One of the shells hit the warehouse. A powerful explosion occurred and the premises began to burn. All the Russians died."
Rabbani also complained that the story of the rebel Russians had soured his relations with the Pakistanis.
It is assumed that one of the organizers of the uprising was a native of Zaporozhye, Viktor Vasilyevich Dukhovchenko, who worked as a diesel engine operator at the Bagram KEC.
This is what the same Rabbani said on camera: “Yes, there were prisoners from different provinces of Afghanistan - from Khost, from the northern provinces, from Kabul. The Ukrainian, who was the leader among the other prisoners, especially showed himself. If they had any questions, he contacted us and solved them...
The others didn't cause any problems. And only a young Ukrainian guy, the guards told me, sometimes behaves suspiciously. That's how it turned out in the end. He created problems for us.”
Who is this extraordinary person, leader?
From documents of the Ministry of State Security of Afghanistan: “According to agents, 12 Soviet and 40 Afghan prisoners of war, captured during the fighting in Panjshir and Karabagh in 1982-1984, are secretly kept in the underground prison of the Badaber camp in Pakistan. The detention of prisoners of war is carefully hidden from the Pakistani authorities. Soviet prisoners of war have the following Muslim nicknames: Abdul Rahman, Rahimhuda, Ibrahim, Fazlihuda, Kasim, Muhammad Aziz Sr., Muhammad Aziz Jr., Kanand, Rustam, Muhammad Islam, Islameddin, Yunus, aka Victor.
A prisoner named Kanand, an Uzbek by nationality, could not withstand the beatings in February of this year. Mr. went crazy. All of these persons are kept in underground cells, and communication between them is strictly prohibited. For the slightest violation of the regime, the prison commandant Abdurakhman severely beats with a whip. February 1985"
Initially it was believed that the leader of the uprising was Viktor Vasilyevich Dukhovchenko (“Yunus”). Born on March 21, 1954 in the city of Zaporozhye. He graduated from eight classes of secondary school in the city of Zaporozhye and vocational school No. 14 in the city of Zaporozhye.
Memorial to the heroes of Badaber. Opened in the Stavropol village of Sengileevskoye on the basis of the Russian Knights club. The monument depicts Viktor Dukhovchenko. May 2013. Photo provided by Nikolay Zhmailo
He served in the Armed Forces of the USSR. After finishing his service, he worked at the Zaporozhye Electric Locomotive Repair Plant, as a driver in children's hospital No. 3 in the city of Zaporozhye, and as a diver at the rescue service station on the Dnieper.
On August 15, 1984, Dukhovchenko was voluntarily sent through the Zaporozhye Regional Military Commissariat to work for hire in the Soviet troops located in the Republic of Afghanistan.
Victor worked as a boiler room operator at the 573rd logistics warehouse of the 249th apartment maintenance unit. He was captured on New Year's Eve 1985 by Moslavi Sadashi's group near the city of Sedukan, Parvan province.
Red Star military correspondent Alexander Oliynik: “Feedback from his friend and fellow countryman, warrant officer Sergei Chepurnov, stories from Dukhovchenko’s mother, Vera Pavlovna, whom I met, allow me to say that Victor is a man of unyielding character, courageous, and physically resilient. It was Victor who, most likely, could become one of the active participants in the uprising, says Lieutenant Colonel E. Veselov, who for a long time was involved in the liberation of our prisoners from Dushman dungeons.”
However, Victor spent several months in Badaber, and therefore could not have time to master the language (even if he began to do this from the moment he arrived in Afghanistan at the end of the summer of 1984) and gain authority in the eyes of the camp administration.
Later, Nikolai Ivanovich Shevchenko, born in 1956, from the Sumy region, began to be called the leader of the uprising. According to testimony and reports from Afghan agents - “Abdul Rahman”, “Abdurahmon”.
Nikolai Shevchenko graduated from eight classes of secondary school in the village of Bratenitsa, Velikopisarevsky district, vocational school No. 35 in the village of Khoten, Sumy district, Sumy region, with a degree in tractor driver, and driver courses at DOSAAF in the urban village of Velikaya Pisarevka. He worked as a tractor driver on the Lenin collective farm in his native village of Dmitrovka.
From November 1974 to November 1976 he served in military service: driver in the 283rd Guards Artillery Regiment of the 35th Motorized Rifle Division (Olympicsdorf, Group of Soviet Forces in the GDR), military rank "corporal".
On a voluntary basis, through the Kiev city military registration and enlistment office in January 1981, he was sent for hire to the DRA. He worked as a driver and salesman at a military store of the 5th Guards Motorized Rifle Division (city of Shindand, Herat province). He repeatedly made trips by car, delivering industrial and food products to military units and military camps throughout Afghanistan (Kandahar, Shindand, Herat and others).
Shevchenko was captured on September 10, 1982 near the city of Herat. Among the prisoners of Badaber, he was not only the oldest, but also stood out for his prudence, life experience, and some special maturity. He was also distinguished by a heightened sense of self-esteem. Even the guards tried to behave with him without being rude.
Unbroken! Nikolai Shevchenko in the Badaber (Zangali) camp. Pakistan. Photo from August-September 1983
“Among twenty-year-old boys, he, thirty, seemed almost an old man,” Sergei German wrote about him in the book “Once Upon a Time in Badaber.” “He was tall and broad-boned. Gray eyes looked incredulously and ferociously from under the eyebrows.
Wide cheekbones and a thick beard made his appearance even more gloomy. He gave the impression of a stern and cruel man.
His habits resembled the behavior of a battered, battered and dangerous man. This is how old, experienced prisoners, taiga hunters or well-trained saboteurs behave.”
But Rabbani was talking about a “young guy”?..
However, both Dukhovchenko and Shevchenko were over thirty. Besides, captivity - especially like this! - makes him very old... However, one must take into account the psychological factor: at the time of the interview, Rabbani was already an old man, therefore he perceived the events in Badaber through the prism of his past years. So the leader of the uprising was a “young guy” for him.
As for who was the leader of the uprising, there could well have been two of them - which, by the way, will be clear from the further story. Both are from Ukraine. Rabbani remembered the name of one of them - Victor. Although he could talk about Nikolai, seeing him before his eyes.
“THAT’S WHEN HE CAME, THEN IT STARTED!”
In fact, the only evidence from our side belongs to the Uzbek Nosirzhon Rustamov. He served in Afghanistan, was captured by the Mujahideen and ended up in Badaber. Did not take part in the uprising. He was released and handed over to Uzbek authorities from Pakistan only in 1992.
Looking at the photo shown to him by director Radik Kudoyarov, Rustamov confidently identified Nikolai Shevchenko in “Abdurahmon”: “When he came, that’s when it began! Came from Iran (was captured on the border with Iran - Ed.). Kamazist. Chauffeur. The jaws are wide. Exactly! And the eyes are so... scary eyes.”
There are two versions about how the events of April 26 developed. This is what Rustamov told in 2006 to former KGB officer of the Tajik SSR, Colonel Muzzafar Khudoyarov.
Colonel Khudoyarov feared that Rustamov would not agree to a frank conversation. However, Nosirzhon turned out to be a good-natured, smiling person. However, the conversation with him could end before it even began. Because when asked whether he was in the Badaber camp, Rustamov answered negatively.
The head of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan and the future President of Afghanistan Rabbani - it was he who gave the order to begin shelling the Badaber arsenal, captured by the rebels
As it turned out, he visited camps in Zangali, Peshawar and near Jalalabad. But the name “Badaber” meant nothing to him. Khudoyarov nevertheless asked if he knew anything about the uprising of Soviet prisoners in Pakistan? And then Rustamov suddenly began to talk about the uprising in Zangali in 1985.
Later it turned out that Zangali (or Dzhangali) is the name of the area where the Badaber camp was located. But for some reason locals more often call this place Zangali.
“In the camp, besides me and the prisoners chained, there were 11 more Soviet soldiers who converted to Islam (forcibly - Ed.). They were kept not in the basement, but in the upper barracks. Among those eleven were Russians, Ukrainians and one Tatar. They had a freer mode of movement. These guys said they would not return to the Soviet Union. But I had no idea at the time that this was their tactic. In order to take possession of a weapon when the opportunity arises and break free.
The leader among these 11 prisoners was a Ukrainian with the Islamic name "Abdurahmon". Strong build and tall. Possibly a paratrooper or special forces soldier, because he was excellent at hand-to-hand combat techniques. Sometimes the Afghans staged wrestling competitions. “Abdurahmon” always emerged victorious in them.
The reason for the uprising was the outrage committed by two Mujahideen against a Soviet soldier named “Abdullo.” I think that “Abdullo” was a Tatar.
Taking advantage of Friday prayers, when almost all the Mujahideen were in the mosque, “Abdurahmon” disarmed the guard of the ammunition depot. He and his comrades quickly pulled machine guns, machine guns and ammunition onto the roof of the building.
First, the rebels fired a burst into the air to attract the attention of the Mujahideen and present their demands to them. The first thing they ordered was to punish the Mujahideen who abused the Russian soldier. Otherwise, they threatened to blow up the ammunition depot, which would lead to the destruction of the entire camp.
At that moment, the chained prisoners and I were still in the basement. The Mujahideen hastily took us away from the arsenal. They threw us into a trench and put a machine gun to each person’s head. They kept it like that until it was all over,” recalls Rustamov.
However, in Radik Kudoyarov’s film “The Secret of the Badaber Camp. Afghan Trap" (filmed in 2006-2008) Rustamov names a different number of captives - fourteen Soviet and three Afghan.
There, from a different angle, he talks about the event that preceded the uprising - the abuse of the fitter “Abdullo”, who, being a good specialist, was used only in the profile of his activity and had greater freedom of movement.
It turns out that one day “Abdullo” quietly slipped out of the camp and headed to the Soviet embassy in Pakistan. He was almost there when the police stopped him in Islamabad and took him back.
“We were hidden in another place,” Rustamov says to the camera. “The Pakistani police arrived and checked everything, but found no prisoners. They asked: “Well, where are these prisoners you were talking about? There’s no one.” And then the Mujahideen tell them: “This is not Russian, this is Babrak Karmal’s man. He just wanted to get away from us. Here, take it for your troubles...” Thus, the Pakistanis actually sold “Abdullo” to the Mujahideen, took the money and left.
As soon as the Pakistanis left, we were brought back. And they told us: “Look, if any of you decide to do anything like this again, the punishment will be like this...” And “Abdullo” was raped. After that, he returned to us, sat and cried next to us.
Among us was “Abdurahmon” - a tall, healthy guy. He said, “Let's start a rebellion! Things won't go any further like this. Tomorrow this could happen to any of us. There is no faith in this.”
The only one who survived from the Soviet prisoners of Badaber was Uzbek Nosirzhon Rustamov. Fergana, 2006
This is the guy who started it all. Before this, no one had even thought about an uprising. He said: “If you don’t have the courage, I’ll start it myself. What day should we schedule it for? Let’s do it next Friday, when the weapons will be taken out of the warehouse for cleaning.” “Islomudin” (i.e. Mikhail Varvaryan - Ed.) was among us then..."
And then the unexpected happened - instead of cleaning weapons, the Mujahideen announced, there would be a football match. There is a version that one of the prisoners warned the dushmans. So I had to act according to the situation.
“Abdurakhmon” and another Russian said that one had a stomach ache, the other had a leg, and they would not play. They stayed and others went to play. During the football match we were sitting in the basement, there were six of us: “Islomudin”, me and another of our prisoners - a Kazakh. In captivity his name was “Kenet” (or Uzbek, aka “Kanand”, “Kanat” - Ed.). His head was bad. He was crazy - he sat in one place all the time. There were also three prisoners with us - Afghans from the army of Babrak Karmal.
We had a great view of the stadium through the window. Our guys won 3:0. This irritated the Mujahideen greatly. And they began to shout: “Shuravi - you donkeys!” A fight ensued.
The weapons warehouse was guarded by an old man. He was sitting next to the door. “Abdurahmon” approached him and asked for a light. The old man reached for matches. And then “Abdurahmon” knocked out the guard, took off his machine gun and shot at the warehouse lock. They broke into the warehouse, took weapons and climbed onto the roof. They started shooting in the air and shouted to the other prisoners: “Come on, run here!”
SECOND VERSION OF THE UPRISING
Now the second version from the same Rustamov. It is cited in his publications by Evgeniy Kirichenko (newspapers “Trud”, “Top Secret”).
Usually two dushmans were on guard: one was on duty at the gate, the other was on the roof of the warehouse with weapons. But at that moment there was only one left. And suddenly the electricity in the mosque went out - the gasoline generator on the first floor, where the “shuravis” were kept, stopped working.
The guard came down from the roof. He approached the generator and was immediately stunned by “Abdurahmon,” who took possession of his machine gun. Then he started the generator and gave current to the mosque so that the “spirits” would not guess what was happening in the camp.
"Abdurahmon" knocked down the lock from the arsenal doors. The rebels began to drag weapons and boxes of ammunition onto the roof. The leader of the uprising warned that whoever runs, he will personally shoot. Afghan army officers were released from their cells.
Among the rebels, only “Abdullo” was not present. In the morning he was called to the head of the camp. “Islomudin,” who was helping to carry boxes of ammunition onto the roof, chose an opportune moment and slipped away to the Mujahideen: “The Russians have risen!”
At this time, “Abdurakhmon” began shooting from the DShK, aiming over the mosque and demanding to release “Abdullo.”
- Tra-ta-ta, “Abdullo”! — Nosirzhon Rustamov reproduces the machine gun bursts and screams. - Tra-ta-ta, “Abdullo”!
“Aburakhmon” shouted for a long time, and “Abdullo” was released. Returning to his people, he sat down on the roof to fill the magazine with cartridges.
Meanwhile, having made their way into the fortress from the rear, the “spirits” pulled out Rustamov and two other Afghans who were in the basement and drove them into a field where a deep hole had been prepared. The traitor “Islomudin” also ended up there. The Kazakh “Kanat”, who had lost his mind, remained in the basement, where he was crushed by a collapsed beam.
Witness to the uprising in Badaber Ghulyam Rasul Karluk (center), in 1985 - commander of the camp’s training company
“We sat in the pit and listened to the sounds of shots,” says Rustamov. “I sat in silence, and “Islomudin” whined that he would be shot.
It turns out that Rustamov voiced two versions of the beginning of the uprising: one connects the performance with the second football match between prisoners and mujahideen, the other with Friday prayers.
When does Nosirjon tell the truth?..
Congressman Charlie Wilson among the "spirits." Organized the financing of a secret CIA operation that supplied weapons to the Mujahideen.
NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE REBELLIONS
Let's rewind the tape back. Having learned about what was happening, the duty officer at the training center, Khaist Gol, raised the alarm and took all possible measures to prevent the prisoners of war from escaping. By order of Rabbani, the camp was surrounded by Mujahideen detachments in a dense ring. The Pakistani military watched on the sidelines.
Ghulam Rasul Karluk, in 1985 - commander of a training company in the Badaber camp: “Since I had good, friendly relations with them (ha! - Ed.), I wanted to solve the problem through peaceful dialogue. We tried to persuade them to give up, and I asked: “Why did they do this?” They answered that they were “99% ready for death and 1% ready for life.” “And here we are in captivity, life is very difficult for us. And we will either die or be freed."
According to Karluk, the rebels demanded the arrival of “engineer Ayub,” a major functionary of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan, or the head of the IOA Rabbani himself.
Word to Rustamov, who tells the camera: “Rabbani arrived and asked:“ What happened? Why did you grab the weapon? Come on, give it up." - “No, we won’t give up!” - was the answer. He was called to come closer. Rabbani's bodyguards warned that he might be shot. But he replied: “No, I’ll come!”
Nikolai Shevchenko (in the second row - on the right) together with colleagues in the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany (GSVG)
Rabbani alone, contrary to the warnings of his bodyguards, came close to the rebels. He asked: “Well, what happened?” “Abdullo” appeared on the roof. He asked: “Why didn’t your commanders punish me with whipping and shoot me if I was so guilty - why did they do this to me?” Rabbani asked him: “Which commander did this? Do you know the name? Do you recognize him? “I’ll find out,” answered “Abdullo.”
Rabbani called this commander and asked why he did this? Why didn't you punish him differently? This is contrary to Islamic laws... And he turned to the rebels: “What do you want me to do - for you to lay down your arms? As you say, so I will do.” “If you are telling the truth, then shoot him,” came the answer. “Let this be his punishment.”
And Rabbani shot this commander. I didn’t have time for the second one... Because immediately the Mujahideen started shooting at the roof. The rebels returned fire. After the shootout, the prisoners stated the following: “Rabbani, your soldiers started shooting, not us! Now, until you call representatives of the Soviet embassy, we will not lay down our arms.”
EXPLOSION OF BADABER ARSENAL
The battle gave way to negotiations, but the rebels stood their ground: they demanded the arrival of Soviet diplomats, representatives of the Pakistani authorities and international public organizations.
During the assault, Rabbani, according to him, almost died from a mine explosion or a grenade launcher, while his bodyguard received serious shrapnel wounds. According to some reports, he died.
The shelling of Badaber began with heavy cannon artillery, after which the weapons and ammunition depot was blown into the air. The rebels, of course, foresaw this scenario, but still deliberately went to their death. And this alone gives them the right to be called heroes.
There are different versions about the causes of this explosion. According to some sources, this was due to an artillery strike. The subsequent series of explosions destroyed the Badaber camp. According to other sources, the rebels themselves blew up the warehouse when the outcome of the battle became clear.
According to Rabbani, the warehouse exploded due to an RPG hit. Here are his words: “One of the Mujahideen, without a team, probably accidentally, fired and hit the arsenal. People were on the roof, and he ended up in the lower part of the building. Everything there exploded and there was nothing left of the house. Those people whom the Russians captured and many of those who were in the cordon also died... About twenty people died on our side in the end.”
Even from the army photograph of Nikolai Shevchenko it is clear that he is not a young man, but a real man!
Obviously, the former president of Afghanistan was protecting himself - which, however, is understandable!
Ghulam Rasul Karluk has a different version. He believes that the rebels, realizing the hopelessness of the situation, themselves undermined the arsenal.
Rustamov, on camera, describes what was happening like this: “Rabbani left somewhere, and some time later a gun appeared. He (Rabbani) gave the order to shoot. When the gun fired, the shell hit the warehouse, causing a powerful explosion. Everything flew up into the air - no people, no buildings, nothing remained. Everything was leveled to the ground, and black smoke poured out. And there was literally an earthquake in our basement.”
From the testimony of “Zomir”: “The dushmans brought up several BM-13 rocket launchers, and during the battle one rocket hit an ammunition depot, causing a powerful explosion” (the source is not documented).
DOCUMENT (SECRET)
At 18:00 local time, a group of Soviet and Afghan prisoners of war, consisting of about 24 people, held for three years in a special prison of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan at the military training center for Afghan rebels in the Badaber region (24 km south of Peshawar), made an armed uprising in order to free themselves from captivity. Choosing a convenient moment, when out of 70 guards only two remained (the rest had gone to prayer), the prisoners of war attacked the guards of the prison and the ILA weapons and ammunition warehouse located on its territory. They took possession of weapons, took up defensive positions and demanded that B. Rabbani, who arrived at the scene of events, meet with representatives of the Soviet and Afghan embassies in Pakistan or a UN representative.
Negotiations with B. Rabbani were conducted using public address systems and by telephone. The scene of the incident was blocked by detachments of Afghan rebels and Pakistani Malish, as well as infantry, tank and artillery units of the 11th Pakistan Army Corps. After short negotiations with the rebels, IOA leader B. Rabbani, in agreement with Pakistani troops, gave the order to storm the prison, in which Pakistani units also took part along with detachments of Afghan counter-revolutionaries. Artillery, tanks and combat helicopters were used against the defenders. The resistance of the rebels ceased by the end of April 27 as a result of the explosion of ammunition located in the warehouse.
All Soviet and Afghan prisoners of war who took part in the armed uprising died. As a result of the explosion and fire, a number of objects were destroyed, including the prison office, in which, according to available data, documents with lists of prisoners were kept. During the operation to seize the prison, up to 100 Afghan rebels were killed. There were also casualties among the Pakistanis […]
Unfortunately, it was not possible to find out the exact names of the participants in the armed uprising, due to the destruction of the lists of prisoners during the explosion of an ammunition depot and fire, as well as the measures taken by the Pakistani authorities and the leadership of the Afghan counter-revolution to isolate witnesses to the events in Badaber...
Sources of information: headquarters of the 40th Army, USSR Embassy in Pakistan, GRU General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces, May 1985.
We specifically quoted the summary document, and the uncirculated report of Colonel Yu. Tarasov to the chief military adviser in Afghanistan, Army General G.I. Salamanov, dated May 25, 1985. It contains embellished, sometimes fantastic information. So, for example, it was alleged that the rebels removed six sentries, killed six foreign advisers, thirteen representatives of the Pakistani authorities and twenty-eight officers of the Pakistani Armed Forces. That three Grad MLRS, approximately two million (!) rockets and shells of various types, about forty artillery pieces, mortars and machine guns were destroyed.
All these obviously unrealistic passages in the final message to Moscow were removed, as well as the fact that “among the Soviet military personnel, one, nicknamed Muhammad Islam, defected to the rebels at the time of the uprising.”
Viktor Dukhovchenko’s wife Vera Andreevna came to the Stavropol region to lay flowers at the memorial to the heroes of Badaber. Photo provided by the head of the Russian Knights club Nikolai Zhmailo
From the testimony of an active member of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan (IOA), Muhammad Nasser: “...On the morning of April 27, after Rabbani was convinced that the rebels would not surrender, he gave the command for the artillery to open fire. The prisoners also fired desperately from all types of weapons. Rabbani began to contact the command of the army corps, asking for more help. The Badaber area was surrounded by Pakistani vehicles. They filled all the streets where the camp and training center for the Mujahideen of our party were located.
Soon a Pakistani helicopter appeared over the fortress. The rebels fired at him from ZPU and DShK. Then another helicopter arrived. The fire on the fortress intensified, including from guns. One of the helicopters dropped a bomb. As a result, a strong explosion occurred at the ammunition depot. Everything exploded and burned for a long time. All the rebels died. The Mujahideen lost about a hundred people, and there were casualties among Pakistani military and civilians. Six military advisers from the United States also died” (source not documented).
SECOND WITNESS TO THE UPRISING
Former DRA army officer Gol Mohammad (or Mohammed) spent eleven months in Badaber prison. It was he who was in the cell with Rustamov and identified him in the photograph that journalist Yevgeny Kirichenko brought him to Kabul. Rustamov, in turn, identified Gol Mohammad as a “Babrakovite” officer who was sitting in the same cell with him.
The former DRA army officer believes that if it were not for the feat of the Shuravi prisoners, he would have been thrown to the dogs. The Mujahideen killed Afghans who fought on the side of government troops with bestial cruelty.
“There were 11 Russians. Two - the youngest - were imprisoned in the same cell with the Afghans, and the remaining nine were in the next one. They were all given Muslim names. But I can say that one of them was named Victor, he was from Ukraine, the second was Rustam from Uzbekistan, the third was a Kazakh named Kanat, and the fourth from Russia was called Alexander. The fifth prisoner bore the Afghan name Islamuddin.
Soviet and Afghan prisoners of war were kept in separate rooms, and the largest room of the prison was dedicated to an ammunition depot.
When the uprising began, we were outside the prison. And they saw how the Russians, having disarmed the guard, began to carry boxes of ammunition onto the roof and take up a perimeter defense. At this time, one of them fled to the Mujahideen. They blocked the exit from the fortress, and a battle began that lasted until the morning. The rebels were offered to surrender, but they blew themselves up along with their arsenal when it became clear that there was no point in resisting further.
Two of the Soviet prisoners - Rustam and Viktor - survived because at the time of the uprising they were in another cell, and the Mujahideen took them out of the fortress so that they would not join the rebels.”
Gol Mohammad claims that these two, along with the captured Afghans, were nevertheless later shot behind the fortress wall, and the life of the one who ran over to the Mujahideen was spared.
Something clearly doesn't add up here. And the Uzbek “Rustam” (i.e. Rustamov) survived, and the rebels freed all their comrades. Three people did not participate in the uprising - Rustamov and Varvaryan, as well as “Kenet,” who had lost his mind.
According to Gol Mohammad, the leader of the uprising was “Fayzullo”. In the photo album that Evgeny Kirichenko brought, he pointed to a photo of Sergei Bokanov, who disappeared in Parvan province in April 1981. However, he was not on the list submitted to the Russian Foreign Ministry by the Pakistani side in 1992.
One of the Russians, seriously wounded in the leg, as Gol Mohammad said, began to persuade Faizullo to accept Rabbani’s conditions. Then “Fayzullo” shot him in front of everyone.
At the decisive moment, “Fayzullo” called the Afghans to him and announced to them that they could leave. He gave them a few minutes so that they could move to a safe distance...
The first Soviet journalist to write about Gol Mohammad on the pages of Red Star was Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Oliynik. Despite all efforts, the author was unable to find the former captive in Kabul. But the Afghan Ministry of State Security preserved a detailed story by Gol Mohammad about the uprising in the Badaber camp.
According to Oliynik, the Afghan officer spent three and a half years in Badaber. Here are some excerpts from the recorded eyewitness testimony.
Freedom House representative Lyudmila Zemelis-Thorn with Badaber prisoners: Nikolai Shevchenko, Vladimir Shipeev and Mikhail Varvaryan. August-September 1983
“In early March 1985, Soviet prisoners at a secret meeting decided to organize a mass escape from the fortress prison,” testifies Gol Mohammad. “At first, we, captured Afghans, were not privy to this secret. I first learned about this from Victor, my friend, who taught Russian in short moments of meetings. All the captive Afghans loved him for his honesty and kindness. According to Victor, Soviet soldiers led by Abdul Rahman took part in the discussion of the escape plan.
Victor relayed his conversation with me to Abdul Rahman and said that I was ready to take part in the escape and that I could show the way in a car and take everyone to the Afghan border. Soon I met with Abdul Rahman and confirmed my agreement and named the names of those Afghans who could be relied upon. The officer warned that the escape should take place at the end of April.
On the morning of April 25, a column of trucks with ammunition arrived at the warehouses. Together with the Russians, we unloaded them all day. Some of the boxes with missiles were unloaded directly into the prison yard. On the evening of April 26, imitating preparation for prayer, at the command of Abdul Rahman, Soviet prisoners and Afghans removed their guards. Moreover, Abdul disarmed and killed the first sentry. Soon shooting began, several times turning into terrible hand-to-hand combat. Soviet soldiers and those Afghans who did not have time to escape repelled the first attack and took up defense on the roofs of warehouses and watchtowers.
I miraculously managed to escape in the chaos after the explosion of ammunition depots, where my Russian brothers also died. I think that from the photographs I will be able to identify the dead Soviet friends... October 16, 1985.”
The Red Star military correspondent clarifies that, according to the stories of the Afghan Ministry of State Security, Gol Mohammad was provided with photographs of about twenty OKSV servicemen from among those missing in those areas of Afghanistan that were controlled by the IOA rebels. He identified only two Badaber prisoners from photographs - “among them is not our officer whom we know under the nickname Abdul Rahman.”
At that time there was no information about Nikolai Shevchenko in the context of the uprising in Badaber. And Oliynik himself clarifies that Gol Mohammad was shown photographs of our military who disappeared in areas controlled by the Islamic Society of Afghanistan. Meanwhile, the province of Herat, where Shevchenko was captured, was the zone of influence of the field commander Ismail Khan, better known as Turan Ismail (“Captain Ismail”).
Further, Oliynik reports a very important thing: “Another one among those whom Gol Mohammad identified from photographs was Muhammad Islam. The same prisoner who chickened out at the height of the uprising decided to save his own skin at the cost of betrayal. I don’t know all the details, I don’t want to be his judge. While there is no documentary and absolutely accurate evidence of this betrayal, I cannot give his real name.”
Who is this man? The question is still open...
Revenge of the KGB
According to journalists Kaplan and Burki S, Soviet intelligence services carried out a number of retaliation operations. On May 11, 1985, the Ambassador of the Soviet Union to Pakistan, Vitaly Smirnov, stated that the USSR would not leave this matter unanswered.
“Islamabad bears full responsibility for what happened in Badaber,” Smirnov warned Pakistani President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq.
In 1987, Soviet raids into Pakistan killed 234 Mujahideen and Pakistani soldiers. On April 10, 1988, a massive ammunition depot exploded in Ojhri Camp, located between Islamabad and Rawalpindi, killing between 1,000 and 1,300 people. Investigators came to the conclusion that sabotage had been committed. Some time later, on August 17, 1988, President Zia-ul-Haq's plane crashed. Pakistani intelligence services also directly linked this incident to the activities of the KGB as punishment for Badaber. Despite all this, these events did not receive public publicity in the USSR itself.
The whole world, except the population of the USSR, learned about the events of April 26-27, 1985, which occurred near Pakistani Peshwar. But Western media are confident that the KGB took revenge in the most cruel way for the deaths of Soviet prisoners of war who rebelled in the secret prison in Badaber.
Badaber are undercover militants.
The fortified area of Badaber was built by the Americans at the beginning of the Cold War as the Peshewar branch of the Pakistani CIA station.
During the Afghan war, a humanitarian aid center was located in the village of Badaber, which was supposedly supposed to prevent starvation among refugees. But in reality, it served as a cover for the militant school of the counter-revolutionary Afghan party of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan, where Soviet prisoners of war who were considered missing in their homeland were secretly kept.
The surviving prisoner of Badaber is Uzbek Nosirzhon Rustamov. Fergana, 2006
The escape.
30 years ago, on April 26, 1985, when the entire Soviet Union was preparing for the upcoming 40th anniversary of Victory Day, at approximately 18:00 shots were heard in the Badaber fortress. Taking advantage of the fact that almost the entire camp guard had gone to perform evening prayers, a group of Soviet prisoners of war, having eliminated two sentries at the artillery depots, armed themselves, freed the prisoners and tried to escape.
As the IOA leader, ex-President of Afghanistan Burhanuddin Rabbani later recalled, the signal for the uprising was the actions of one of the Soviet soldiers. The guy was able to disarm the guard who brought the stew.
After that, he released the prisoners who took possession of the weapons left by the prison guards. Further versions diverge. According to some sources, they tried to break through to the gate to escape. According to others, their goal was a radio tower through which they wanted to contact the USSR Embassy. The fact of holding Soviet prisoners of war on Pakistani territory would be significant evidence of the latter's intervention in Afghan affairs.
B. Rabbani, leader of the IOA (Islamic Society of Afghanistan), future President of Afghanistan (1992-2001)
Storming the prison.
One way or another, the rebels managed to capture the arsenal and take positions advantageous for destroying the security units.
Soviet soldiers were armed with heavy machine guns, M-62 mortars, and hand-held anti-tank grenade launchers.
The entire personnel of the base was alerted - about 3,000 people, along with instructors from the USA, Pakistan and Egypt. But all their attempts to storm the rebel positions were defeated.
At 23.00, the leader of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan, Burhanuddin Rabbani, raised the Mujahideen regiment of Khalid ibn Walid, surrounded the fortress and offered the rebels to surrender in exchange for their lives. The rebels put forward a response demand - contact with representatives of the embassies of the USSR, DRA, the Red Cross and the UN. Hearing a refusal, Rabbani gave the order to storm the prison.
Fatal salvo.
The fierce battle that lasted all night and the losses among the Mujahideen showed that the Russians were not going to give up. Moreover, the leader of the IOA, Burhanuddin Rabbani, himself almost lost his life under grenade fire. It was decided to throw all available forces at the rebels. Salvo attacks on Grad, tanks and even the Pakistani Air Force followed.
And what happened next, apparently, will forever remain a mystery. According to declassified radio intelligence data from the 40th Army, which intercepted a report from one of the Pakistani pilots, a bomb attack was carried out on the rebels, which hit a military warehouse with ammunition, modern missiles and shells stored there.
This is how one of the prisoners of Badaber, Rustamov Nosirzhon Ummatkulovich, later described it:
“Rabbani left somewhere, and some time later a gun appeared. He gave the order to shoot. When the gun fired, the shell hit the warehouse and caused a powerful explosion. Everything went up in the air. No people, no buildings - nothing remained. Everything was leveled to the ground and black smoke poured out.”
There were no survivors. Those who did not die during the explosion were finished off by the attackers. True, if you believe the intercepted message from the American consulate in Peshawar to the US State Department: “Three Soviet soldiers managed to survive after the uprising was suppressed.”
Mujahideen casualties were 100 Mujahideen, 90 Pakistani soldiers, including 28 officers, 13 members of the Pakistani authorities and 6 American instructors. The explosion also destroyed the prison archive, where information about the prisoners was kept.
To prevent a repetition of the incident, a few days after the uprising, an order was issued by the leader of the Islamic Party of Afghanistan, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar: “do not take Russians prisoner.”
Reaction.
Despite the fact that Pakistan took all necessary measures to hide the incident - silence on pain of death, a ban on entry into the territory for unauthorized persons, information about Soviet prisoners of war and the brutal suppression of the uprising penetrated into the press. The Pershawar magazine Sapphire was the first to write about this, but the issue was confiscated and destroyed. Soon after this, the Pakistani Muslim Newspaper published this news, which was immediately picked up by the leading media.
The Old and New Worlds interpreted what happened differently. Europeans wrote about the unequal battle of Russian prisoners of war for their freedom, while the Voice of America reported on a powerful explosion that killed a dozen Russian prisoners and the same number of Afghan government soldiers. To dot the i’s, the US State Department on April 28, 1985 published “complete” information with the following content?: “The territory of the humanitarian camp with an area of approximately one square mile was buried in a dense layer of shell fragments, rockets and mines, as well as human remains. The explosion was so strong that local residents found shrapnel at a distance of four miles from the camp, where 14 Russian paratroopers were also kept, of whom two remained alive after the suppression of the uprising.”
But the fact of the uprising was confirmed by the representative of the International Red Cross, David Delanrantz, who visited the Soviet embassy in Islambad on May 9, 1985. However, the USSR limited itself to a note of protest from the foreign policy department, which placed full responsibility for what happened on the government of Pakistan and called for conclusions to be drawn about what the state’s participation in aggression against the DRA and the USSR could lead to. The matter did not go further than this statement. In the end, Soviet prisoners of war “could not be” on the territory of Afghanistan.
Revenge of the KGB.
But there was also an unofficial reaction from the USSR. According to journalists Kaplan and Burki S, Soviet intelligence services carried out a number of retaliation operations. On May 11, 1985, the Ambassador of the Soviet Union to Pakistan, Vitaly Smirnov, stated that the USSR would not leave this matter unanswered.
“Islamabad bears full responsibility for what happened in Badaber,” Smirnov warned Pakistani President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq.
In 1987, Soviet raids into Pakistan killed 234 Mujahideen and Pakistani soldiers. On April 10, 1988, a massive ammunition depot exploded in Ojhri Camp, located between Islamabad and Rawalpindi, killing between 1,000 and 1,300 people. Investigators came to the conclusion that sabotage had been committed. Some time later, on August 17, 1988, President Zia-ul-Haq's plane crashed. Pakistani intelligence services also directly linked this incident to the activities of the KGB as punishment for Badaber. Despite all this, these events did not receive public publicity in the USSR itself.
Nikolay Shevchenko
As of 2010, the names of some of the participants in the uprising are known:
1. Belekchi Ivan Evgenievich, private, was supposedly in the Badaber camp. In captivity he lost his mind. Name in captivity: Kinet.
2. Varvaryan Mikhail Aramovich, private, born August 21, 1960. Missing in Baghlan province. Name in captivity: Islamutdin. Supposedly played a very controversial role during the uprising.
3. Vasiliev P.P., sergeant, born in 1960 in Chuvashia.
4. Vaskov Igor Nikolaevich, private, born in 1963 in the Kostroma region. Missing on July 23, 1983 in Kabul province, captured by the Harakat group; died in Badaber.
5. Dudkin Nikolai Iosifovich, corporal, born in 1961 in the Altai Territory. Missing on June 9, 1982 in Kabul province; died in Badaber.
6. Viktor Vasilievich Dukhovchenko, motor mechanic, was born on March 21, 1954 in the Zaporozhye region in Ukraine. Disappeared on January 1, 1985 in the province of Parvan, captured by the Moslavi Sadashi group, Sedukan, died in Badaber.
7. Zverkovich Alexander Nikolaevich, private. Born in 1964 in the Vitebsk region of Belarus. He went missing on March 7, 1983 in the province of Parvan, died in Badaber.
8. Kashlakov G. A., junior lieutenant. Born in 1958 in the Rostov region.
9. Kiryushkin G.V., junior lieutenant, born in 1964 in the Moscow region.
10. Korshenko Sergey Vasilievich, junior sergeant. Born on June 26, 1964 in Bila Tserkva in Ukraine. He went missing on February 12, 1984 in the province of Badakhshan, died in Badaber.
11. Levchishin Sergey Nikolaevich, private. Born in 1964 in the Samara region. Disappeared on February 3, 1984 in Baghlan province; died in Badaber.
12. Matveev Alexander Alekseevich, corporal. Died in Badaber. Name in captivity: Abdullah.
13. Pavlyutenkov, private, born in 1962 in the Stavropol Territory.
14. Rakhimkulov R.R., private. Born in 1961 in Bashkiria.
15. Rustamov Nosirzhon Ummatkulovich, prisoner of the Badaber camp, witness of the uprising. As of March 2006, he lives in Uzbekistan.
16. Ryazantsev S.E., junior sergeant. Born in 1963 in Gorlovka, Donetsk region, Ukrainian SSR
17. Saburov S.I., junior sergeant. Born in 1960 in Khakassia.
18. Sayfutdinov Ravil Munavarovich, private. Died in Badaber.
19. Samin Nikolai Grigorievich, junior sergeant. Born in 1964 in the Akmola region of Kazakhstan. Died in Badaber.
20. Shevchenko Nikolai Ivanovich, truck driver (civilian). Born in 1956 in the village of Dmitrievka, Sumy region in Ukraine. He went missing on September 10, 1982 in the province of Herat. One of the supposed leaders of the uprising. Name in captivity: Abdurahmon.
21. Shipeev Vladimir Ivanovich, private. Born on September 11, 1963 in Cheboksary. Disappeared on December 1, 1982 in Kabul province. Presumably died in Badaber.
On April 26, 1985, a group of Soviet and Afghan prisoners of war in Badaber, Pakistan, fought against mujahideen forces significantly superior to them. This event was kept silent for a long time, both in the USSR and in the West. There were reasons for this.
Fortress
Today, almost nothing reminds us of the existence of the Badaber fortress, located two dozen kilometers south of Pakistan’s second largest city Peshawar. Only fragments of a dilapidated adobe wall, dilapidated one-story buildings and gates. The fortress was built by American specialists in the early 60s of the 20th century; it officially housed a center for the distribution of humanitarian aid.
Indeed, in appearance, Badaber was no different from dozens of other refugee camps scattered along the Afghan-Pakistan border: army tents, flimsy mud huts and very crowded people. However, under humanitarian cover, a branch of the Pakistani CIA station was actually located here.
With the beginning of the Afghan conflict, a training center for militants of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan (IOA) party was established in Badaber, where, under the guidance of foreign instructors, they learned the basics of waging sabotage and guerrilla warfare, primarily against the Armed Forces of the USSR. The leadership of the center was entrusted to the leader of the IOA, Burhanuddin Rabbani, who became the President of Afghanistan in 1992.
Inside the camp, guarded along the perimeter, there were several one-story houses, a small mosque, a football field, a volleyball court, as well as warehouses with weapons and ammunition. About 300 Mujahideen underwent training here. More than fifty military instructors from the USA, China, Pakistan and Egypt provided them with methodological assistance.
The limit of patience
Badaber was also a prison for prisoners of war. By April 1985, approximately 20 Soviet soldiers and about 40 Afghans were being held here. Prisoners were used as free labor in quarries or unloading weapons and ammunition.
The conditions of the prisoners were unbearable. Fueled by the fanaticism of Islamic preachers, the Mujahideen treated Soviet soldiers extremely cruelly. For the slightest offense, the prison commandant punished prisoners with a lead-tipped whip. Shackled, deprived of normal food and water, drugged and exhausted from exorbitant physical tests, Soviet soldiers were doomed to die here.
There was only hope for escape and the prisoners began to develop a plan. One of the future leaders of the uprising, Nikolai Shevchenko, who had been languishing in prison for almost three years, proposed challenging the camp security commandant to a fist fight. As a prize for winning, the soldier asked for the opportunity to play a football match between the prisoners and the guards. Shevchenko won the fight and the match took place.
Although it was little like playing by the rules - the Mujahideen did not hesitate to stop prisoners of war using prohibited techniques, the main goal was achieved. Soviet soldiers were well acquainted with the location of all camp security posts.
To freedom
From the report of agent “206” of the “Shir” intelligence center of the Afghan Ministry of State Security, we know that the uprising began on April 26 at about 9 pm, when all the garrison personnel were lined up on the parade ground to perform namaz. Soviet soldiers removed the sentries on the tower, near the weapons depots, freed the prisoners, took possession of the weapons captured in the arsenal and took up positions convenient for shooting.
The guards came to their senses only when the entire prison and warehouse area was in the hands of the rebels. On alarm, the entire garrison was gathered together with Western instructors, and in a matter of minutes the rebels were blocked. Regular units of the Pakistani armed forces arrived to help the Mujahideen. However, attempts to quickly regain control of the fortress were unsuccessful: all Pakistani attacks were met with fierce fire from the defenders.
Only late at night, tired of the useless assaults, Rabbani turned to the rebels with a proposal to surrender. Soviet soldiers responded with a categorical refusal and demanded to contact representatives of the UN, the Red Cross or the Soviet embassy in Islamabad. Rabbani promised to think, but it was obvious that he would not take this step. Holding prisoners in Pakistan, which declared neutrality, was a gross violation of international law. And Rabbani clearly did not intend to make this fact public.
The fighting resumed and continued until the morning. One attack followed another. The stock of weapons of Soviet soldiers and their training threatened to prolong the conflict for a long time. Desperate to suppress the rebellion with small forces, the Pakistani command decided to resort to the help of heavy artillery and multiple rocket launchers. They hit us with direct fire. One of the shells hit the arsenal building - a powerful explosion actually leveled the base to the ground. According to eyewitnesses, the Mujahideen gathered the surviving shell-shocked prisoners in one place and finished them off with grenades.
As representatives of the American consulate in Peshawar reported, “the camp’s square mile area was covered with a layer of shell fragments, rockets and mines, and human remains were found by local residents at a distance of up to 4 miles from the explosion site.” Two of the Soviet prisoners, according to the Americans, still managed to survive.
Forgotten feat
There is no exact information on how many Soviet soldiers died during the suppression of the uprising in Badaber. The names of at least seven fighters, as well as several dozen Afghans, have been identified. At the same time, the enemy lost several times more in killed: about 120 Mujahideen, up to 90 soldiers of the regular army of Pakistan and six American instructors.
As a result of the explosion, the Badaber camp was completely destroyed, the Mujahideen arsenals were missing 3 Grad MLRS installations, 2 million rounds of ammunition, about 40 guns, mortars and machine guns, tens of thousands of missiles and shells. The prison office, in which the lists of prisoners were kept, of course, also blew up.
The emergency in Badaber caused a real commotion among the leaders of Afghan gangs. They not only lost more than a hundred fighters, but also lost one of their bases. Soon after this incident, field commander Gulbetdin Hekmatyar issued an order that eloquently read: “Do not take Russians prisoner!”
They say that the leadership of Pakistan in those days froze in anticipation of retribution from the Soviet Union. But it didn't come. The USSR, which tried not to advertise its participation in the Afghan military conflict, did everything to ensure that the incident in Badaber did not receive publicity.
Only one periodical in Pakistan decided to write about the massacre. However, the Pakistani authorities ordered the seizure and destruction of the entire circulation of the newspaper in which this dramatic event was covered. Access to Badaber was denied to both journalists and diplomats, and the Mujahideen and Pakistani military involved in the conflict were prohibited from commenting on what happened. The Pakistani authorities refused to share any information with the Soviet leadership.
The picture of military operations in Badaber began to become clearer only after the collapse of the USSR, when journalists and enthusiasts from various Russian public organizations visiting Pakistan tried to find out from witnesses the details of that battle. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation played their role in this. The US State Department also provided some information.
Recently, alternative versions of what happened have emerged. According to one of them, the Soviet special services were preparing the release of Badaber prisoners: a special KGB group was supposed to recapture the prisoners and go with them to the territory of Afghanistan. However, the task was not completed due to the outbreak of a mutiny.
According to another version, the uprising itself was developed within the KGB. According to former military intelligence officer Alexei Chikishev, shortly before April 26, an unknown person appeared in the camp and proposed a plan for an uprising to the Soviet military personnel. According to the plan, the prisoners were supposed to seize the radio station and go on air with an appeal to the governments of the USSR and Pakistan, as well as to the UN and the Red Cross. However, the Soviet soldiers were unable to reach the radio station, which predetermined the tragic outcome of the operation.
In 1985, a group of Soviet prisoners of war held a militant camp for three days, killing about 200 Mujahideen, Pakistani and American instructors.
February 15 marks the next anniversary of the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan. On this day 22 years ago, the last commander of the Limited Military Contingent, Lieutenant General Boris Gromov, having crossed the border river Amu Darya, told reporters: “There is not a single Soviet soldier left behind me.” Unfortunately, this statement was premature, since both Soviet soldiers who were captured by the Mujahideen and the remains of hundreds of our soldiers who died and were not taken out of a foreign land remained in Afghanistan.
According to official data, during the war in Afghanistan, the total losses of the 40th Army, in which about 600 thousand soldiers and officers served over a decade of fighting, amounted to 70 thousand people wounded, killed and captured. After the withdrawal of troops, about 300 people were listed as prisoners of war and missing. Documentary evidence of the heroic death of several of them was only recently declassified.
Ours fought like lions
Excerpt from an analytical note by the intelligence service of the 40th Army, which was only recently declassified: “On April 26, 1985, at 21.00, during evening prayers, a group of Soviet prisoners of war of the Badaber prison (in Pakistan - S.T.) removed six sentries from the artillery warehouses and, having broken the locks in the arsenal, armed herself, dragged ammunition to the twin anti-aircraft gun and the DShK machine gun mounted on the roof. The mortar and RPG grenade launchers were put on combat readiness. Soviet soldiers occupied key points of the fortress: several corner towers and the arsenal building.
The entire personnel of the base was alerted - about 3,000 people, led by instructors from the USA, Pakistan and Egypt. They tried to storm back control of the fortress, but were met with heavy fire and, having suffered heavy losses, were forced to retreat. At 23.00, the leader of the Islamic Society of Afghanistan, Burhanuddin Rabbani, raised the Mujahideen regiment of Khalid ibn Walid, surrounded the fortress and ordered the rebels to surrender, but received a response demand - to call representatives of the embassies of the USSR, DRA, the Red Cross and the UN. A second assault began, which was also repulsed by the rebel Soviet soldiers. By that time, the battle site was blocked by a triple encirclement ring made up of dushmans and military personnel of the Pakistani army, armored vehicles and artillery of the 11th army corps of the Pakistani Armed Forces. Pakistani Air Force combat aircraft were patrolling the air.
The brutal clash continued throughout the night. Assault followed assault, the forces of the rebels were melting away, however, the enemy also suffered significant losses. On April 27, Rabbani again demanded to surrender and was again refused. He ordered the heavy artillery to be brought to direct fire and storm the fortress. Artillery preparation began and then an assault, in which artillery, heavy equipment and a flight of Pakistani Air Force helicopters took part. When the troops broke into the fortress, the remaining wounded Soviet prisoners of war blew up the arsenal, died themselves and destroyed significant enemy forces.”
According to various estimates, from 12 to 15 Soviet servicemen took part in the uprising and died. The Mujahideen of Rabbani and the 11th Army Corps of Pakistan acted against them, the losses of which were: about 100 Mujahideen, 90 members of the Pakistani regular forces, including 28 officers, 13 representatives of the Pakistani authorities, six American instructors, three Grad installations and 40 units of heavy combat weapons. technology.
From the radio intercept report of the headquarters of the 40th Army in Afghanistan for April 30, 1985: “On April 29, the head of the Islamic Party of Afghanistan (IPA) G. Hekmatyar issued an order, which noted that “as a result of an incident in a Mujahideen training camp in the NWFP of Pakistan, and 97 brothers were wounded.” He demanded that the IPA commanders strengthen the security of captured OKSV prisoners. The order gives instructions “in future not to take Russians prisoner,” not to transport them to Pakistan, but to “destroy them at the place of capture.”
Classified and slandered
The Pakistani authorities and the leadership of the Mujahideen tried to hide what happened in Badaber. An issue of the Peshawar magazine Safir, which reported on the uprising in the fort, was confiscated and destroyed. True, the message about the uprising of Soviet prisoners in the Badaber camp was published by the left-wing Pakistani newspaper Muslim. This news was picked up by Western agencies, which, citing their correspondents in Islamabad, reported on the unequal battle waged by Soviet soldiers. The Voice of America radio station also informed listeners about this, but, of course, in its “objective” style: “at one of the Afghan rebel bases in Pakistan, an explosion killed 12 Soviet and 12 Afghan prisoners.” Although the Americans had full information about what happened from the message from the American consulate in Peshawar to the State Department.
What the film “Badaber Fortress” is about and how veterans reacted to it
The uprising in the Badaber camp during the war in Afghanistan formed the basis of the series, which was shown on Channel One on the anniversary of the withdrawal of the contingent from this country and before Defender of the Fatherland Day. “The Badaber Fortress” by Kirill Belevich is a free retelling of a story in which, even after decades, many gaps remain.
At dawn on April 27, 1985, American satellites recorded a powerful flash where they were not expecting it - on the Afghan-Pakistan border. An explosion of such magnitude could only speak of a Soviet presence. In this place there was an American training base for the mujahideen party " Islamic Society of Afghanistan", they captured several Soviet soldiers.
The film "The Fortress of Badaber" was shot in the tradition of daytime television in order to be interesting and understandable even for a housewife. The accents are placed simply and clearly, which does not deprive the plot of a certain elegance. We see the main character - typical(for the American tradition) a “bad guy” character who plays only by its own rules, violates generally accepted norms, but in the end always wins. Charming, honest, in love with his wife, he belongs among the children - informal in communication and open to adventure. Of course, such a character should not fit into the strictly disciplined Soviet army - and he is constantly removed from work, not given orders, and pushed back in line for an apartment. This is how we get to know GRU officer Yuri Nikitin.
The viewer immediately understands that he is a brilliant strategist and an extraordinary personality. There are comrades in the service who criticize him for his overly freedom-loving style of work. They criticize, of course, the “staff rats” who are incapable of anything in a real battle: so the first antagonist is designated - "System".
According to the plot, the management discovered fortress on the border with Pakistan, where Americans train Mujahideen. The "system" prevents the army from striking a secret base until real evidence of American presence. Infiltrate the territory adjacent to the fortress and find evidence of foreign interference, and then record the “evidence” and return home, according to a very nice General Kolesov, maybe only one “his” person. And this is Yuri Nikitin. From his wife, garden, apples and neighbor's children - he is called back from vacation and sent to Afghanistan.
How were things really?
Badaber is a truly huge military base, the camp occupied 500 hectares, it was located on the territory of Pakistan, which officially declared a neutral position. About three hundred Mujahideen were trained here at the same time, who then returned to fight in Afghanistan with the “shuravi”, Soviet soldiers. Training at the militant training center, indeed, took place under the guidance of military instructors from the United States. Soviet prisoners were also brought here. They did hard work, in their free time they were forced to read the Koran, since everyone who ended up in the camp accepted Islam, although not of their own free will, but according to all the rules - the prisoners were circumcised and made sure that they performed namaz. In April 1985, 20 Soviet soldiers and 40 Afghan prisoners were held here illegally (Pakistan could not officially hold prisoners of war).. Both were kept separately and punished for the slightest offense. Some had been in captivity for more than one year. According to the meager evidence that has survived, one prisoner even went crazy from unbearable conditions.
According to the plot of the film Nikitin must cross the border with an Afghan escort - allegedly he is a Russian slave put up for sale.
We must give credit to the filmmakers for attempting to make an action-packed war film. The problem is that too many veterans did not accept it - after all, it was their life, their war, not a western .
Why do both heroes go almost to their death, make their way through mountains, villages, and various dangers to a secret base? The Afghan is for the sake of his daughter (the Mujahideen will come and some “big man” will settle scores with his family if the Russians do not win). Nikitin, in a romantic haze of love for his wife, sees the goal of his journey as saving the world in which She lives. It is clear that there is no talk about socialist ideals, about the freedom of peoples. Although there is no obvious defection from the Motherland. As in Bondarchuk’s “Stalingrad” - they fought for Katya, but here too - Cherche la femme.
“I didn’t finish watching the series, I didn’t like it,” he shares his opinion with a correspondent from Nakanune.RU veteran of the war in Afghanistan Evgeniy Zelenkov, - just like I don’t accept “9th Company” - then I went to the presentation with my daughter, then I apologized to her and never watched this film again. It's the same here. It’s just an ordinary feature film - it’s the author’s imagination, it’s not entirely true. The truth is that there was an uprising. And the fiction is that there was one such person - a superhero, a special agent who alone was able to raise it. It seems to me that this is not the case. The uprising could have happened simply - we also have normal boys. They themselves figured out what to do, and there are no hopeless situations, but It’s not scary to die for your comrades. This is how we were raised».
Nikitin, after two series of adventures, professionally obtains the necessary photographs. The Afghan, his guide, also dies for the sake of the film, but all in vain. The "system" does not accept evidence. Behind the backs of people in uniform on the walls of high offices portrait of Gorbachev- “The Secretary General decides everything.” They are delaying the decision. Meanwhile, Nikitin decides to stay in the prisoner camp and commit a mutiny. He is sure that now the special forces will come to the rescue and his job is only to help his own - from the inside. The message is clear: Mikhail Sergeevich, whose admirers are not left among the audience, does not want to go into conflict with the Americans even after documentary confirmation - he refuses to provide armed assistance to the prisoners. All hope lies in Nikitin alone and in General Kolesov, who also decides to go against the system. He has his own interests. Among the captives of Badaber, he sees an exhausted son - thinner, but alive. Having removed the mourning ribbon from Yura’s portrait, he goes back to Afghanistan to save the prisoners at any cost - even without special forces. This is the conflict of the drama.
In reality, the Soviet military did not know about the location of the base, and there was no information about the prisoners. Not a single Nikitin was sent to obtain evidence of the American presence. Well, they mocked the prisoners. Well looked after, poorly fed. The last straw was the violence against one of them. The guys were going to rebel - this was the only chance to survive or die with weapons in their hands without surrendering.
“We talked, thought, guessed about the American presence. Yes, indeed, there were Americans,” says Evgeniy Zelenkov. - They had instructors, and they are now in Syria. They actually served as instructors (for the Mujahideen), and there were training bases. But it was not a “shock” for everyone, it was understandable in itself, no sensation.”
Nikitin according to the plot negotiates with a CIA agent, pretends that he is ready to be recruited - in order to negotiate a call to his wife and transmit an encrypted code to his people about the time of the uprising. After the meeting with the American side, he brings soft drinks to our prisoners. The episode where Soviet soldiers greedily dig into Coke cans, of course, is questionable from an artistic point of view - for patriotic propaganda, as some critics see the film, it is a failure.
Now the character, who is used to acting alone, is faced with the task of uniting a team of lost people who have lost faith in everything. In American films, this moment is conventionally called “assembling the team.” Here is the GRU guy and reminds the guys that they are all Soviet citizens, that Russians do not give up. To “wake up” them from their hard life, to give them a sense of community, Nikitin starts a game of football. The Mujahideen agree to the match and win. But ours gain unity, strength and accidentally spy on where the weapons warehouses are located in the base.
In reality, of course, there was a leader of the rebels - but who exactly is still unknown. After all, there are many gaps in this story. There were no survivors, and witnesses to the massacre were kept separately from the Russians. The witnesses are Afghan prisoners who were not privy to the details of the plan. Oddly enough, the cinematic football match is not the imagination of the screenwriters. This is how the leader of the rebels began preparations for the operation.
But there were several matches. The Mujahideen were accustomed to sports spectacles, they were very passionate, and the guards lost their vigilance “in the stands.” The owners of the base liked to win on the field - they played dirty and rejoiced like children. Therefore, no one was surprised when one day Nikolai Shevchenko asked to be a “replacement” - he allegedly had an injured leg. During previous matches, Soviet soldiers had already studied the base, knew about the weapons and the number of sentries. After leaving for five minutes, the rebel leader occupied a weapons warehouse, gave a signal to his troops and fired into the air. What happened shocked the Mujahideen, they surrounded the building, but there was nothing they could do - for obvious reasons, the Russians had enough reserves of weapons, and they were not going to surrender.
In the film Nikitin and his comrades Having occupied the fortress, they are waiting for special forces, but he does not come. They wait and go on the radio. The rescuers are silent. They were betrayed. And who? Own leadership, own country. They did something that no one was capable of, and now, surrounded by enemies, they will die unknown. All you had to do was lend a helping hand to your own people.
“If we had known that such a camp existed, we would not only have pulled out special forces there, we could have sent an entire army there,” says the veteran Evgeniy Zelenkov. - Yes, impressive, beautiful, colorful, but it was not true. Maybe it will be interesting for today's boys. But I don’t - I see the director’s mistakes. The series was filmed more for today, and not about that time. Lord, there weren’t even telephones to call from there. What was the connection? No. You notice such nuances - you smile and just switch. A the fact that they were betrayed by the leadership is completely out of the question. No, it was just much better then than recently, then I really knew that they would always come for me and always pull me out".
The base was headed by Burhunuddin Rabbani- future president of Afghanistan. It was he who the rebels asked to call for negotiations. The Russians promised to lay down their arms if Rabbani contacted the Soviet embassy in Islamabad. But the leader of the opposition could not agree to this - he knew there would be an international scandal. There are many reasons - a military base, American instructors, and the illegal detention of Soviet soldiers on the territory of “neutral Pakistan.” Rabbani ordered to take the rebels at gunpoint. The battle has begun. By the morning of April 27, our people rolled out a mortar from the armory building. The Mujahideen brought up heavy artillery, a large cannon was placed on the mountain, Rabbani gave the order - fire. The shell hit the warehouse, everything lit up from the strong impact. Afterwards, a crater with a radius of 80 m was formed - this explosion was visible from space, and satellites recorded it.
The Pakistanis covered their tracks quickly and thoroughly, the village was demolished, the militants disappeared along with the base. The Russians did not survive. Their names were not known until 1992; the prisoners immediately changed them to Islamic ones - therefore even the Afghan prisoners simply did not know the real names of our heroes. The only thing our embassy managed to find out seven years later was that there were 12 of them.
A year later, in 1993, Timur Bekmambetov made a film about these events, it was the director’s debut - “Peshawar Waltz". Until now, Pakistani intelligence services have sparingly shared information about the feat of the rebels from Badaber. All that is known is that 12 Soviet soldiers killed 120 Mujahideen, about 90 soldiers of the regular army of Pakistan and six American instructors in one night. As a result of the battle, the camp was completely destroyed together with a huge arsenal of weapons and three Grad installations.
“By the time some clear information began to appear, I had already served,” says Evgeniy Zelenkov. - I was very worried when I found out about it. There was such a powerful impulse to return, to take revenge. For the boys to get into this mess. Moreover, this is precisely the impulse that many had. The rebels in Badaber were heroes, boys of their country, real defenders of the Motherland. I wasn’t much older than them then.”
Despite the series' flaws, it was filmed with respect for the Soviet era and Soviet soldiers, which is already a rarity for modern TV. A Evgeniy Zelenkov notes that the Russian Armed Forces are still strong in the traditions and foundations of the Red Army, the 100th anniversary of which is celebrated on February 23.
"It was the end of the USSR, but we still had the traditions of the Red Army,- he reminds. - Although special people were appointed who were supposed to destroy army traditions, nothing happened. Because we are there - the older generation. And we pass on the fighting spirit to the army. And I was in Syria, spent a whole six months there - and there were the same serious, normal guys that were in our time".
Nakanune.ru "It's not scary to die for your comrades"
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I do not agree with the final summary of the author of the note in the penultimate paragraph, because...
impossible to talk about respect for the Soviet era, if one of its main features in the film is the betrayal of its soldiers by the Soviet state, then it was necessary to come up with something like that. To invent and weave this vile lie into the heroic fabric of the struggle so that it is perceived as the truth.
The same plot was adopted by Bondarchuk Jr. in his “9th Company”, where the entire narrative is tied to the fact that the internationalist fighters were forgotten by the Motherland, and they had to die.
We are watching, my friends, the element manipulation of information flow
: half-truth And change of context- when it is necessary, contrary to common sense, to persuade someone to a false conclusion. In this case - about the essence of the Soviet system.
And this is already a sign of information-psychological warfare and a real war with history -
after all, we see such a technique in every film: be it “Stalingrad”, be it “Salyut-7”, be it “Upward Movement”.
