Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets (21 page)

I don’t believe that Akhromeyev killed himself. A combat veteran couldn’t have hanged himself with a piece of string…with the ribbon from a cake box…like some prison inmate. That’s how they do it in jail cells—sitting down, with their knees bent. In solitary. It’s not part of the military tradition. Officers look down on nooses. It wasn’t a suicide, it was murder. He was killed by the same people who killed the Soviet Union. They were afraid of him—Akhromeyev had a lot of clout in the army, he could have organized resistance. The people weren’t disoriented yet, they weren’t as disengaged as they are now. Everyone still lived the same way and read the same newspapers. It wasn’t like today, when the grass is always greener on the other side.

But then…I saw it myself…young guys putting ladders up to the Central Committee of the Communist Party building on Staraya Square. No one was guarding it anymore. Tall fire ladders. They climbed up…and with hammers and chisels, they started removing the gold letters “CC CPSU.” Other guys on the ground sawed them up and gave away the pieces as mementos. They took apart the barricades. Pieces of barbed wire also became souvenirs.

Those are my memories of the fall of communism…

EXCERPTS FROM THE CASE FILES OF THE INVESTIGATION

On 24 August 1991, at 21:50, in bureau office No. 19A in Corpus 1 of the Moscow Kremlin, the security officer on duty, Koroteyev, discovered the body of Marshal of the Soviet Union Akhromeyev, Sergey Fedorovich (born 1923), at that time, an advisor to the President of the USSR.

The corpse was discovered in a sitting position under the windowsill of the office. It was leaning against the wooden grate covering the radiator. The corpse wore the uniform of the Marshal of the Soviet Union. No harm had been done to the uniform. Around the corpse’s neck, there was a slipknot made of synthetic twine folded over twice. The noose went around the entire circumference of the neck. The upper end of the noose was attached to a handle on the window frame with scotch tape. No injuries other than those associated with the hanging were found on the corpse…

—

Examination of the contents of the desk revealed five notes left on top of it in a visible place. All of the notes were handwritten. They were found in a neat pile. The inventory that follows was recorded in the order in which the notes were stacked…

Akhromeyev requested the first note be given to his family. In it, he informed them that he had decided to commit suicide. “My primary duty has always been war and serving the citizenry. You came second. Today, for the first time, I am putting my duty to you first. I implore you to live through these days with courage. Support one another. Do not give enemies cause to gloat…”

The second note was addressed to Marshal of the Soviet Union S. Sokolov. It contained a request that Sokolov and army general Lobov assist in the funeral preparations and that they not abandon the members of Akhromeyev’s family in these difficult times.

The third note contained a request to pay back a debt to the Kremlin cafeteria and included a fifty-ruble bill.

The fourth note was not addressed to anyone in particular: “I cannot go on living while my Fatherland is dying and everything I heretofore considered to be the meaning of my life is being destroyed. My age and my life’s accomplishments give me the right to die. I fought until the end.”

The final note was found separately. “I am no specialist in suicide. The first attempt (at 9:40) was unsuccessful, the cord snapped. I am gathering my strength for a second attempt…”

Graphological analysis determined that all of the notes were written in Akhromeyev’s hand…

—

His youngest daughter, Natalia, with whose family Akhromeyev spent his final night, said: “Even before August, we’d often ask my father if a military coup d’état was possible here. Many people were unhappy with the course that Gorbachev’s perestroika had taken—they didn’t like all his babble, his weakness, the one-sided concessions he’d made in Soviet-American disarmament talks. They were deeply unsatisfied with the deteriorating economic situation. But my father didn’t like these conversations, he was confident: ‘There’s not going to be any coup. If the army wanted a coup, it would all be over in two hours. Here in Russia, you’re not going to get anything done by force. Getting rid of an incompetent leader isn’t our biggest problem. The question is what happens next.’ ”

On August 23, Akhromeyev had not stayed late at the office. The family ate dinner together. They bought a big watermelon and spent a long time around the table. According to his daughter, Akhromeyev spoke openly. He confessed that he was anticipating arrest. No one in the Kremlin was talking to him anymore. “I understand,” he said, “that it will make things difficult for you. There’s going to be a lot of mud-slinging directed at our family. But I could not have done things any differently.” His daughter asked him if he regretted coming to Moscow. Akhromeyev replied, “If I hadn’t come, I would have never forgiven myself.”

Before going to bed, Akhromeyev promised his granddaughter that he would take her to the park with the swing set the following day. He worried about who was going to pick up his wife, who was due to arrive from Sochi the following morning. He asked to be notified as soon as she landed and ordered a car for her from the Kremlin garage.

His daughter called him at 9:35 in the morning. He sounded normal…Knowing her father’s character, his daughter does not believe that her father’s death was a suicide…

EXCERPTS FROM THE FINAL REPORTS

…I swore allegiance to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics…and I spent my entire life serving my country. What am I supposed to do now? Whom should I serve? Thus, while I live and breathe, I will continue to fight for the Soviet Union…

Vzglyad,
television show, 1990

—

Now they’re casting it all in a dark light…Denying everything that happened in our country after the October Revolution. Yes, when Stalin was in power, there was Stalinism. Yes, there were repressions, violence against the people, I don’t deny any of it. All of that happened. Nonetheless, it needs to be investigated and assessed fairly and objectively. For instance, there is no need to convince me of these things, I was alive for them. I personally witnessed how people worked back then, with what conviction…Our task is not to smooth things over or conceal them. There is nothing to hide. Considering what happened in our country and what everyone already knows, how could anyone even think of playing hide and seek? When it comes down to it, we won the war against fascism, we didn’t lose it. We have the Victory.

I remember the thirties…People like me came of age in those years. Tens of millions of us. And we consciously built socialism. We were prepared to make any and all necessary sacrifices. I don’t agree with General Volkogonov, who wrote that the only thing that existed in those pre-war years was Stalinism. He is an anticommunist. Today, the word “anticommunist” is no longer considered derogatory. It’s simply that I am a communist and he is an anticommunist. I am an anticapitalist, and he…I don’t know what he is: Does he stand behind capitalism or not? This is no more than a statement of fact. And an ideological disagreement. I am not only criticized but downright berated for calling him a “turncoat.” Until recently, Volkogonov defended the Soviet order and the communist ideals alongside me. Then, suddenly, he made a radical switch. Let him explain why he broke the army oath himself…

Many people today have lost their faith. I would say that the chief one among them is Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin. The Russian president had, after all, once been the secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and a candidate for the Politburo. Now, he openly says that he doesn’t believe in socialism and communism, that he believes that everything the Communists did was wrong. He’s turned into a militant anticommunist. And there are others like him. In fact, there are more than a handful of them. But you’re talking to me…I am, in principle, opposed…I see a threat to our country’s existence, it is as clear as day. The danger is as great as it was in 1941…

N. Zenkovich,
The Twentieth Century: The Top Brass in the Years of Upheaval
(Olma Press, 2005)

—

In the 1970s, the USSR produced twenty times more tanks than the United States.

A question from G. Shakhnazarov, aide to General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR M. Gorbachev (in the 1980s):
Why do we need to manufacture so many weapons?

Answer from the Chief of General Staff S. Akhromeyev:
Because, at the cost of great sacrifices, we’ve built first class factories, just as good as the ones the American’s have. Would you have them stop their work to start manufacturing pots and pans instead?

Yegor Gaidar,
The Fall of the Empire
(The Russian Political Encyclopedia, 2007)

—

On the ninth day of the First Congress of the People’s Deputies of the USSR, flyers were distributed among the deputies claiming that in an interview with a Canadian newspaper, Sakharov had declared, “During the war in Afghanistan, Soviet helicopters shot at Soviet soldiers who had been surrounded by the enemy so that they couldn’t surrender and be taken prisoner…”

The First Secretary of the Cherkassk Municipal Committee of the Komsomol and Afghan war veteran S. Chervonopisky approached the podium. He had no legs, so people helped him to the tribune. He read a message on behalf of Afghan war veterans: “Mr. Sakharov claims that there is evidence that Soviet helicopters shot at Soviet soldiers…We are gravely concerned about the unprecedented defamation of the Soviet Army in the mass media. To the depths of our souls, we are disturbed by this irresponsible, incendiary statement from the famous scientist. We consider it a malevolent attack on our army, an insult to its worthiness and honor. It is yet another attempt to rend the holy unity of the army, the people, and the Party…[
Applause.
] Over 80 percent of those gathered here today are communists. But not once, including in the report from Comrade Gorbachev, has the word ‘communism’ been uttered. Regardless, the three words that we need to fight for with the strength of the whole world behind us are the State, the Motherland, and Communism…”

[
An ovation. All deputies stand except for the democrats and the Metropolitan Alexey.
]

A teacher from Uzbekistan:
Comrade Academician! With this single act, you have canceled out all the good you have ever done. You have insulted the entire army and all of our fallen soldiers. I hereby express the deepest contempt for you…

Marshal Akhromeyev:
What Academician Sakharov said is a lie. Nothing of the sort happened in Afghanistan. I say this holding myself fully accountable for my words. First, I myself served in Afghanistan for two and a half years; second, as the first deputy of the chief of the General Staff and then the chief of General Staff, I have been involved in Afghanistan affairs every day, and thereby am aware of every single directive issued on every single day of combat operations. It never happened!

V. Kolesov,
Perestroika: A Chronicle, 1985–1991
(Lib.ru. Contemporary Literature Publishing House)

—

…Comrade Marshal, how does it make you feel to know that you received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for Afghanistan? Academician Sakharov gave a number: There were one million Afghan casualties…

—Do you think I’m happy I received the Hero’s Star? I followed orders, but all I found was blood…dirt…As I have said on more than one occasion, the military top brass was against that war, well aware that we were getting ourselves involved in combat operations that would take place in difficult, unfamiliar conditions. We feared that the whole Islamic world would rise up against the USSR. That we would lose face in Europe. We were told firmly, “Since when do our generals interfere in politics?” We lost the battle for the Afghan people. But our army is not to blame…

From a television news interview, 1990

—

I am reporting on the degree of my involvement in the criminal actions of the State Committee on the State of Emergency.

On August 6 of this year, in accordance with your orders, I went on leave to the military sanatorium in Sochi, where I remained until August 19. Before my departure and, during my stay at the sanatorium, until the morning of August 19, I knew nothing about the orchestration of a conspiracy plot. No one even hinted at its organization or the identity of its organizers, which is to say that I played no part in neither its preparation nor realization. The morning of August 19, upon hearing the statements of the aforementioned Committee on television, I independently made the decision to fly to Moscow. At 8
P.M.
, I met G. I. Yanaev. I told him that I supported the program as described by the Committee in its address to the people and, as an advisor to the acting President of the USSR, I proposed my participation. G. I. Yanaev approved, but, citing his workload, scheduled our next meeting for 12 o’clock on August 20. He said that the Committee did not have any organized information on the current state of affairs, and that it would be best if I prepared a report…