After all, in the end, builders, engineers, and teachers who became field commanders and front commanders won the war against professionals whose training cost taxpayers dearly.

The two warring sides were united by only one thing: everyone mastered military science together—in the ranks of the Soviet army. Did some master it better? Did others turn out to be failing students?

Now is the time to figure out what happened.

"When I saw a column heading for Chechnya here in Ingushetia, I clutched my heart: fuel tankers, ammunition vehicles, and APCs were all mixed together. One shot—and everything..." recalls Ruslan Pliev, Chairman of the Ingush Parliament, a former professional soldier and regiment commander who was the first to enter Kabul, about the beginning of Grachev's victorious operation. "I ask a soldier with a bird-like neck, holding a grenade launcher: 'What's that you have?' — 'A pipe.' — 'And did they show you how to shoot this pipe?' — 'You put it under your arm...' — 'On your shoulder, you fool, on your shoulder...'"

I remember, having found myself in this war for the first time (it was January '95), I myself was struck by the hellish chaos and confusion, noticeable even to an unprofessional eye.

I travelled from Mozdok to Grozny as part of a large motorcade. Our KamAZ was the last in line. Not far from Grozny, in the foothills, where the remains of a Russian plane lay in the valley, the engine stalled. The column moved on, leaving us alone. "Have you been driving long?" I asked the driver, a Yakut boy. "Three months..."

I remember a strange feeling of abandonment: dusk was already falling, only one Kalashnikov for all of us, the colonel had forgotten to provide an APC for cover... Brrr...

Then—we got lucky.

But I felt this abandonment of our soldiers and officers every time I found myself in Chechnya.

I also remember how, in February of the previous year, in Novogroznenskoye, where I was waiting for Aslan Maskhadov to arrive, field commander N. told me how he went to rescue Raduyev, near Pervomaysk:

"Yours were standing there... Ours were coming from there... Then yours retreated... And ours..."

He suddenly faltered and said:

"'Yours,' 'ours'... But before, we were all 'ours'..."

War divided us, but even in this division, something remained indivisible. And I heard stories more than once—from both sides—about how former comrades in arms clashed in battle and ceased fighting. Where would we go from each other, if only because of our shared past.

And that's why, during my last Grozny assignment, when I asked Chechen field commanders how they assessed the actions of the Russian army, I didn't feel I was talking to representatives of an enemy army. No, I was talking to people who, just like all of us, were stunned by what the once unified army had become.

Ruslan Kutayev, former Vice Prime Minister, and now advisor to Aslan Maskhadov, was not a field commander.

"I wasn't lucky. I was given a different task."

"What kind?"

"You remember that the Russian leadership created the appearance that the entire people supported Zavgayev, Hadjiev, Avturkhanov. Even so-called parties were created. In this regard, in autumn '95, a meeting of Maskhadov, Udugov, Khalimov, and Kutayev took place over two days in one of the mountain villages. I was tasked with: entering the CNS round table, breaking up its participants from within, and leaving nothing around them. This task was successfully accomplished. And when a congress of parties and movements of the Chechen Republic took place in April '96, all participants declared that they were with the Chechen people fighting against Russian troops, and that Zavgayev was merely a semblance of a Chechen..."

"So you played the role of Stierlitz?"

"Something like that..."

Nevertheless, as a representative of the republic's highest leadership, Ruslan Kutayev was aware of all military matters:

"Rokhlin would never in his life have believed how many people fought against his corps. He would certainly have argued that it didn't correspond to reality. After all, only twenty-two people defended the tram depot near the October District Department of Internal Affairs for three days—they were transported across the Sunzha. Twenty-two people! And throughout the entire war, no more than five hundred fighters actively engaged in close combat against his corps."