Five questions to the Ministry of Defense

The Ukrainian will not understand me now. In the representation of the Ukrainian layman, journalist or politics, his country is waging a war with the Russian state and the army for several months, and nothing new in this sense is happening. From the very beginning, Ukrainian media are warting in the Donbass precisely as the War of Ukraine with Russia, Ukrainians have long believed in Russian aggression and that their army is opposed by the Russian armed forces. On this assumption, all official Ukrainian rhetoric is being built since spring. And since the very spring itself it was the usual that the Ukrainian official rhetoric about the war with Russia has not been supported at all by any evidence. The Chechen battalion "Vostok", about which Ukrainians spoke so much in May, turned out to be the SBU special forces of the SBU of the times of Yanukovych under the command of Alexander Khodakovsky of the same name; Russian technology, which, according to the Ukrainian media reports, from May or April crosses the Russian-Ukrainian border almost daily, each time was either Ukrainian trophy or some more; The shelling of Ukrainian positions from the Russian territory was proved by newspaper reports such as “We heard a roar, and the Ukrainian colonel told me that it was shooting from the Russian side”-in general, during these months it was possible to get used to the fact that Ukrainians regularly talk about Russian aggression and never accompany their words with any convincing evidence.

It was the law of a boy who shouted the Wolves. On such an information background, one could fear that when (or if) Russia really attacks Ukraine, the news about this will be lost among previous news of the same type. Maybe something like this has happened right now?

On August 18, Vladimir Putin, by his decree , awarded the Order of Suvorov by the 76th Chernigov Division of the Airborne Forces, based in the Pskov region. The awarding of the military unit by the combat order is the Soviet (if not - Stalinist) tradition and phenomenon, for post -Soviet Russia almost unprecedented. Why were the paratroopers awarded? It can be assumed that the Crimea, especially since the Minister of Defense Sergei Shoigu, attaching the award to the banner of the division, said about the Crimea, mentioning it in a series of other hot spots from Karabakh to Kosovo, that is, according to the official version, the division was awarded in aggregate, immediately for everything, but it is worth noting that from the point of view of the general information background, the time was chosen at least the most successful. The temptation to compare the awarding of the division and events in the east of Ukraine is too great.

The cheerful paratrooper is checking somewhere in the Rostov region, and then it does not publish anything else.

The disappearance from the theater of military operations of the popular media hero of this war Igor Strelkov was accompanied by persistent conversations that it was his resignation for some reason that became the condition for the separatists of serious military assistance for Moscow. This may be a coincidence, but really precisely after the resignation and disappearance of Strelkov, the forces of the "people's republics" went on the offensive. Who is this: the same volunteers as before, or someone else? In mid -August, first in the Ukrainian media , then in the Russian blogosphere, ominous collections of links to VKontakte profiles of Russian soldiers began to appear. The cheerful paratrooper checks somewhere in the Rostov region, writes statuses about the battle of the fraternity and honor or even about the “dill” and “Bandera”, which he will show, and then he doesn’t publish anything else, and comments from friends who write that they remember and mourn on his page.

In most cases, only screenshots remain from such pages, it is impossible to see them in real time, profiles and records in regional and specialized groups are quickly removed. The phones that are indicated in messages about the organization of the funeral are turned off. Moderators of groups, referring to relatives of soldiers, forbid users to write about them and block those who still write. That is, the awarding of the landing division by the combat order occurs against the backdrop of numerous rumors about the death of many paratroopers sent from Pskov somewhere near Rostov, as well as against the backdrop of reports from the new Donbass cemeteries, where in numbered graves there are either Russian volunteers, or someone else-the phrase of “soldiers number three” may mean anything.

The arrival of the Minister of Defense in Pskov itself looks ominous. Sergei Shoigu is accompanied by Olga Golodets, Deputy Prime Minister on Social Affairs. Formally, Golodets came to hold a meeting on domestic tourism issues, but a social deputy prime minister is a funeral, medicine, and social benefits. It is clear that the arrival of the Gloroda itself does not prove anything and that he could be planned long before the situation with the paratroopers, but in combination with all the other circumstances, the appearance in Pskov Olga Golodets can be interpreted quite clearly.

It was not difficult to collect the Pskov rumors of these days - the city is small, the news, spreading in details of varying degrees of reliability, spread quickly. The paratroopers in question - according to the same rumors, are not conscripts, but contractors, and their status at the time of transfer to the Rostov region, as they say, could be anything, up to the option "forced to terminate the contract ahead of schedule, issued a passport and in the same uniforms, they were already sent formally as a civilian volunteer." What the paratroopers are busy on the Rostov business trip is called “walking abroad”, that is, based in the Rostov region, fighters allegedly go to Ukrainian territory through unprotected sections of the border, participate there in battles, and then returning back, as if there was nothing (the Dagestan newspaper “Chernivik” describes ). I tried through the Pskov acquaintances to go out to the paratroopers remaining in Pskov, or at least their wives, but their wives (according to friends) answered that they would not want to become traitors and would not say anything, but as for losses, the loss is forced, “for the good”. Several times I heard that the provision of material assistance is made dependent on the subscription of non -disclosure, which the command takes from the wives and parents of the dead paratroopers. They also say that at the memorial stands in parts of the 76th division (that is, where only a soldier can go, outsiders are not allowed) hang new photos of the dead without explanation, where and under what circumstances this soldier or officer died. They talk about funeral service in the "military" temple of Alexander Nevsky. They say that on Monday the city must pass either the first or the next funeral. They say that the bodies of nonresident paratroopers are sent from Pskov to their native cities.

If the death of the Pskov paratroopers is not true, then the state should convincingly refute it.

I am now retold from acquaintances and half-digit people who also heard something somewhere. In other words, I now retold rumors - in wartime my behavior could be interpreted as a very serious criminal offense. But this is in wartime, and the Russian Federation now, as you know, does not wage war, in Russia, as you know, peacetime. And these rumors, translated by me now, in peacetime, are primarily issues that I am addressing to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation:

-Are the fighters of the 76th Airborne Forces really now participate in operations on the other side of the Russian-Ukrainian border?

-How many acting or former fighters of the 76th Airborne Division died or died in the Rostov region or around the last weeks?

-People whose names are given in the collections of screenshots like this -are there people with such names among the current military personnel of the 76th division or among those who served in it and recently resigned?

-Are the relatives of the dead or dead fighters of the 76th Airborne Forces really receive financial assistance from the state in exchange for a promise to be silent?

-For what was the 76th division awarded the Order of Suvorov?

Today, I think, the most important issues for Russia. If the death of the Pskov paratroopers is not true and invention, then the Russian state should convincingly refute this lie. But this is not true.

And if it is true, then it turns out that the Russian Federation is incomprehensible by whose decision, it is incomprehensible by whose will and it is not clear why it is waging another “local war”. If these rumors are at least reliable in something, then Russia wages a war that makes all words of Russian officials in Ukrainian and which, like any “local war”, does not even provide an honest memory of those who, following the order, die on it. Shameful secrecy, appropriate only if it hides something prohibitively ashamed - this secrecy today expresses the disrespect of the Russian state and to the paratroopers and their families itself, and to the whole society, which in any case has the right to know where and on what basis Russian soldiers are fighting and dying. Unless, of course, they fight and die there. Journalist Ilya Vasyunin phoned , designated in one of the “VKontakte” profiles as the phone of the paratrooper widow. The woman handed the phone to her husband, who said that he was alive, and some hackers hacked his page on the social network. Damn Matrix: Talking about this, you have to make a reservation that if it was true and not a special forces who intimidated this woman, - what, it turns out, we are dealing with a large -scale mystification, in which several dozen pages were hacked with a large -scale mystification? During these months, we, in general, have learned well the level and ability of Ukrainian military propaganda. To write that Strelkov is wounded, they can, for something larger, are unlikely to be capable of. The radical flank of the supporters of Novorossiya has long dumps all the failures of the separatists to the sabotage of the “Party of the World”, which allegedly sat in the Kremlin. Maybe if we are talking about hoaxes, then this is the Kremlin "party of the world", no matter what it means, hacked dozens of VKontakutian profiles and launched a rumor about dead paratroopers? Damn it, the twenty -first century, an information society, and we are still not able to find out whether it is true or not, that Pskov burns the paratroopers. This is at least humiliating.

Soviet scale of the information vacuum around the Russian army.

A separate line would like to make some offensive attack on at least part of my colleagues, Russian journalists. Several dozen employees of the Russian media are working in Moscow, constantly writing about the Ministry of Defense, covering its activities and professionally monitoring the life of the army. These journalists go to briefings to the Ministry of Defense, are proud of their first-headed exclusives on a military theme, ride on military aircraft and ships, write about tank biathlon, accept new fashionable body armor, even as a gift from the Deputy Prime Minister Rogozin, even ask Putin to be acute questions about Serdyukov and Vasilyeva, and they are friends with the generals and they are friends with the generals and they are friends with the generals Colonels, make reports on army and naval everyday life, pose in camouflage. Newspapers, television people, Internet publications-people integrated into the Ministry of Defense, is not comparable than any of us to find out any truth about what is happening around the 76th division. Find out and write; Even if the editor does not allow, even if the Ministry of Defense friends stop calling you after that, even if you are not called for the next exercises in the fall, there are things more important than exercises, friends and editor. Find out and write - on the Colt, on Facebook, anywhere. Your duty is precisely this truth, and not good relations with the Ministry of Defense. Responsibility for terrible rumors and speculations around the Pskov paratroopers is today not only on the Russian state, but also on Russian military journalists who are not cope with professional debt. There would be no place to get there rumors if at least one journalist worked in Russia today who was able to find out the reliability of the information about the Pskov paratroopers. There is still a doubt in the deaths of paratroopers, but what cannot be doubted - on the Soviet scale of the information vacuum around the Russian army. In this vacuum, any tragedy may go unnoticed.

The Ukrainian will not understand me now; In the representation of the average Ukrainian, his country has been fighting for several months with Russia, with the Russian army. But the Russian audience still has other relations with information reality. Even if everything that is being said today about Pskov paratroopers is not true from beginning to end, Russian society now needs evidence of the non -participation of the Russian military in this war. We have the right to know if today someone in the Pskov region is burying today. We have the right to know why Putin awarded the division. The Russian and Soviet tradition of the "unbearable wars" has to doubt the official versions and carefully check even completely fantastic rumors.