OFFICER GIVES ACCOUNT OF MILITARY LIFE IN DRA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP96R01136R002605120020-2
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 8, 2010
• Sequence Number: 20
• Publication Date: September 5, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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III. 19Sep85 USSR I?ERNAT.I.0NAL AFFA.I?
SOUTH ASIA Q P
'OFFICER GIVES ACCOUNT OF MILITARY LIFE IN DRA
PM060941 Moscow KRASNAYA ZVEZDA in Russian 5 Sep 85 Second Edition p 2
'[Lieutenant Colonel G.A. Goncharuk article under the rubric "Our Soviet Way of Life":
"There Is No Such Thing as Other People's Misfortunes" -- first paragraph is editorial
introduction]
[Excerpts] Whenever he has to fill in a form, Lieutenant Colonel Grigoriy Alekseyevich
Goncharuk enters "1941" in the "year of birth" section. He was born in October, while
.our native soil was being trampled by the fascist occupiers. His father was far away
.from the family, having donned the soldier's. greatcoat in July. Years have passed and
.Grigoriy Goncharuk, the frontline soldier's son, has linked his fate forever with the
Soviet Army. He served as chief of the political section of a motor vehicle unit as
part of the limited contingent of Soviet Forces in Afghanistan. He has been awarded the
order "For Services to the Motherland in the USSR Armed Forces," third class.
"There is no such thing as other people's sorrow" -- this is what my comrade Colonel
Yevgeniy Yefremovich Litovchenko, with whom I became friends while serving together in
.Afghanistan, liked to repeat. And he would invariably add: "This is an inborn trait
in our character."
These words were not just a bombastic sentence for Col Litovchenko. His father was one
of 10 brothers. They all served at the fronts of the Great Patriotic War. Those who
survived returned to their home. They made their way back from Germany and
Czechoslovakia, having marched across "half of Europe" and "half of the world," visiting
.Manchuria's volcanoes along the way.
Time passed, and the surname Litovchenko appeared again in the personnel lists of units
and ships of the Soviet Armed Forces. The frontline soldiers were replaced by their
.sons. There were occasions when they refined their military skills in the course of
joint exercises and maneuvers with servicemen from the fraternal armies of Warsaw Pact
countries. Just as it happened with the Soviet soldiers who liberated Europe's peoples
from fascism, the sense of international duty flowed into specific deeds. It was in no
'way accidental that Officer A. Litovchenko assisted Vietnamese servicemen in mastering
new equipment at the request of the Vietnamese people, who had been subjected to
rapacious attacks by the American aggressors. Nor was it an accident that 10 years
later his cousin, Ye. Litovchenko, led motor vehicle convoys with grain and medicines to
Afghan villages through ambushes by dushman gangs. This means that Col Litovchenko was
:speaking forthrightly; internationalism is a hereditary feature in their family. For
its members, as for all Soviet people, internationalism has become a conscious feeling
calling for action.
u
.The innermost sources of this noble feeling are rooted in the very nature of the
socialist system and its highly humane essence. The ideas of proletarian international-
ism have been born aloft on our Leninist party's banner from the day of its birth.
These are the ideas in which generations of Soviet people and Soviet servicemen,
patriots and internationalists, have been educated. Their boundless loyalty to
international duty was manifested with renewed strength during the Great Patriotic War.
For over a year, Soviet forces fought fierce battles beyond the motherland's borders.
Over 1 million of our valiant servicemen gave their lives for the liberation of enslaved
peoples. This should never be forgotten!
The postwar period can also provide much convincing evidence of the Soviet people's
inviolable loyalty to international duty. Part of it is the selfless assistance to
fraternal socialist countries in building a new life and repulsing hostile actions by
imperialism and domestic counterrevolution. Another part of it. is the utmost support
for the Vietnamese people's heroic struggle, for the peoples in many liberated countries,
and much more.
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III. 19 Sep 85 U S? I N T E R N A T I O N A L A ?A I R S B 1
CHINA
TASS NOTES CHINESE PARTY CONFERENCE OPENING
LD180650 Moscow TASS in English 0645 GMT 18 Sep 85
[Text] Beijing, September 18 TASS -- An all-China conference of the Communist Party of
China has opened in the House of People's Assemblies here today. As reported by XINHUA
agency, it was opened by General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee Hu Yaobang. The
premier of the CPR State Council Zhao Ziyang presented draft proposals of the CPC Central
Committee concerning the main directions of the CPR's Seventh Five-Year Plan.
PRC AMBASSADOR ATTENDS MOSCOW SOIREE 16 SEP
OW181423 Moscow in Mandarian to China 1600 GMT 16 Sep 85
[Text] A soiree was held on 16 September in the House of Friendship With Peoples of
Foreign Countries in Moscow for verteran servicemen who took part in the liberation of
northeast China and Korea in August 1945 and activists of the Soviet-Chinese Friendship
Society, the Soviet-Korean Friendship Society, and the Soviet-Mongolian Friendship
Society.
The soiree was jointly sponsored by the Union of Soviet Societies for Friendship and
Cultural Relations With Foreign Countries, the Soviet-Chinese Friendship Society, the
Soviet-Korean Friendship Society, the Soviet-Mongolian Friendship Society, the USSR
Veterans Association, anf the Far East Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Bernov, deputy chairman of the Union of Soviet Societies for Friendship and Cultural
Relations With Foreign Countries, delivered an opening address at the soiree.
(Titorenko), Director of the Far East Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences,
delivered a report on the 40th anniversary of the triumph over Japanese militarism.
Others speaking at the soiree were veteran servicemen; Li Zewang, Chinese ambassador to
the Soviet Union; Kwon Hui-kyong, DPRK Ambassador to the Soviet Union; and Gurbadam,
Mongolian charge d'affaires ad iterim to the Soviet Union.
The participants watched programs of performances by Soviet artists.
FRENCH FOREIGN MINISTER CONCLUDES VISIT TO PRC
LD061039 Moscow TASS in English 1033 GMT 6 Sep 85
[Text] Beijing, September 6 TASS -- French External Relations Minister Roland Dumas has
ended his visit to China, during which he met Deng Xiaoping, chairman of the Central
Advisory Commission of the Communist Party of China, and Zhao Ziyang, premier of the
State Council, and also had talks with Wu Xuequian, minister of foreign affairs of
China. During the talks the sides exchanged opinions on the problems of East-West and
North-South relations. The Chinese press reports that the two sides "have identical or
close views of basic international problems."
Roland Dumas said at a press conference in Beijing that the Chinese side supported
France's Eureka project. The external relations minister also said that China expected
to benefit by that project, in particular, to get more extensive technology supplies
and technical know-how from Western Europe. According to him, the Chinese side did
not raise at the talks the question of French nuclear weapon tests in the Pacific or the
mining of the Rainbow Warrior ship in New Zealand.
It was stated that the French side was prepared to give China assistance in its modern-
ization program, especially in such fields as atomic power engineering, space research,
transport and communications.
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III. 19 Sep 85 D 2 USSR INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS
SOUTH ASIA
Loyalty to internationalism is manifested in specific deeds. This is particularly
obvious for us who have served as part of the limited contingent of Soviet Forces in
Afghanistan. Let us say, for example, that our drivers have transported equipment for
the Kheyr Khaneh electric power station and electric lights are now burning in the
Afghans' homes -- this is nothing but performance of international duty.
With their selfless assistance, the soldiers and officers in the motor vehicle unit
where I served from the very first days of my stay in the DRA gained the local popula-
tion's respect and gratitude. The hundreds of thousands of national economic cargoes
which they have transported from the border with the Soviet Union along the difficult
desert roads and mountain highways to Kabul and other DRA cities and provinces constitute
a weighty contribution to Afghanistan's economic development, the enhancement of its
people's prosperity, and its struggle against the counterrevolution.
The Soviet soldiers will dream for a long time to come of those roads where, in addition
to steep climbs up hills and descents into valleys, they also came across the vicious
treachery of hidden enemies. Our servicemen counter the enemies' schemes and the
danger for which they are always on the alert with staunchness, courage, and reciprocal
assistance.
...The KAMAZ driven by Junior Sergeant V. Ryashentsev was swept off the road by the
stream of the mountain torrent which came out of nowhere. The unconscious driver,
dragged out of the cab by a stream of stones and dirt, was being swept toward the abyss.
Private V. Piksin immediately threw himself into the torrent. At the very edge of the
precipice he caught the junior sergeant and, fighting the elements, brought him out.
There are occasions when the motor vehicle transport servicemen have to use their
weapons to ensure the delivery of civilian cargoes to isolated villages. On one such
occasion, for example, the vehicle carrying Lieutenant A. Orlov and driven by Sergeant
A. Khomovskiy, which was bringing up our convoy's rear, came under dushman fire. The
sergeant was wounded, but did not let go of the steering wheel. Even though he was
losing blood, he continued driving the vehicle while Lt Orlov provided covering fire for
the convoy. For this feat the officer and the sergeant were decorated with orders of
the Red Star.
I can proudly say that at times of mortal danger none of our servicemen. are fainthearted.
Each one of them understands very well that at those moments he stands in full view of
the motherland and the Soviet people, to whom we have sworn an oath of loyalty before
the combat banners crowned with immortal glory. Loyalty until the last heartbeat....
:Frontline soldiers recall that, even in the fiercest battles, they experienced no
greater sorrow than when one of their fellow servicemen died. The dushmans' bullets are
in no way different from those that were cast in the Krupp plants. One of them mortally
wounded Private Mkrtych Sirunyan while he was covering the exit of a motor vehicle convoy
carrying civilian cargo which had come under fire. The bandit's bullet struck both the
soldier's heart and the heart of his mother, Laura Sosevna, who lives in Armenia.
On rereading the letter from Mkrtych's mother, which came to the unit after she had
received notification of the sorrow which had befallen her, one cannot but bow his head
before the courage of this woman, a Soviet person in the full sense of the words.
"I can be proud that I brought up such a son," Laura Sosevna's letter says. "I will be
proud of him in the same way as Oleg Koshevoy's and Unan Avetisyan's mothers were proud
of them.
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III. 19 Sep 85 D 3 USSR INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS
SOUTH ASIA
In the 18 years of his life Mkrtych., whom I will always miss, passed his main test with
honor, without losing his spirit. My son's blood was shed on Afghan soil, which I can
no longer consider foreign...."
Private M. Sirunyan was posthumously awarded the Order of the Red Star for his feat.
This award to the soldier is also an award to his mother, a Soviet woman-patriot.
We commanders and political workers received many letters from the parents of soldiers
and sergeants serving in our unit. Most of them contained no lofty words, but more
often that not expressed a concern for their sons which can be understood by everyone.
But between the unpretentious, "homely" lines one invariably perceives that our service-
men's parents profoundly understand the importance and necessity to perform international
duty. Boundless loyalty to this lofty duty has for a long time been an inalienable and
.vivid feature of our Soviet way of life.
Bourgeois propaganda is trying by all means to misrepresent and defame the Soviet
serviceman's mission in the DRA. But, people can tell their friends from the enemies by
deeds and not by words. Only a friendly person can act like, for example, Senior
Lieutenant N. Moroz. Traveling in a motor vehicle convoy, he saw dushmans plundering
Afghan vehicles. The Soviet officer at once hastened to help the victims.
Another example. An Afghan boy came across a homemade mine and it almost exploded in
his hands. Once again a Soviet officer, Mirzoakhmed Alimov, came to help. He drove the
boy to a hospital.
People say that good news travels on wings. And it is the good news about Soviet people
which opens the hearts of the Afghans, for whom the purpose of an act is easier to
understand than cleverly concocted mendacious sentences.
As a rule, quite a few problems and issues needing joint discussion and solution arise
among people living in close proximity. So it is in our relations with the local Afghan
population. These sincere and friendly relations are one of the key load-bearing
components in the structure of Soviet-Afghan friendship.
Once we organized what we used to call an Afghan-Soviet "jirgah" which was attended by
.Soviet officers in addition to representatives of state authority and village elders.
.A businesslike conversation took place, following which there was an improvement in our
medical assistance to the local population and our participation in ensuring an
uninterrupted water supply for the village.
The Soviet soldier in the DRA is primarily a reliable friend, helping the Afghan people
build a new life. Not everybody likes our friendship. Not everybody likes the fact
.that independent Afghanistan has chosen the path of democratic transformations in its
development. This is why there are still explosions on the highways along which our
motor transport servicemen convey civilian cargoes to distant settlements. But the
Soviet soldiers, loyal to international duty, counter intrigues by the Afghan people's
enemies with the staunchness and courage inherited from their fathers and grandfathers.
.Recently I was seen off on my way back home. It was not only my fellow servicemen who
saw me off, the village elders also came to say a good word to the "Shuravi" before he
embarked on the long journey.
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