The balanced and well-researched film was released in 2013, to the 20th anniversary of the “Bloody October”, when most of the direct participants of the events were still alive.

In his author’s project “White House, Black Smoke”, NTV columnist Vladimir Chernyshyov is trying to find the true causes of what happened in October 1993. The film crew managed to collect versions of what happened from almost all participants in the events and build from this mosaic a picture of the turmoil into which society plunged after the collapse of the USSR.

Backup at Rumble.
The transcript of the film is further down.

Related materials from our past publications

• “The Yanks Gave the Order: Fire!” – Witness Testimony of Iona Andronov, a Defender of the “White house”
• Newspaper “Pravda” commemorating the 30th anniversary of the “Black October” of 1993
• The Bloody October of 1993. Retrospect. The Last Interview with Ruslan Hasbulatov
• Shooting of the “White House” in October of ’93 in the recollections of the contemporaries
• Yeltsin declared communism defeated. Forgetting to clarify that there were still Communists left in his own country. June 20, 1992
• Sergey Shahray: the first and main reason for the collapse of the USSR was the destruction of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU)
• If you think the collapse of the Soviet Union was good for the people, you should think again
• Mama-Motherland – A song by Oleg Gazmanov and Alexander Marshal, with lament by Mihail Zhvanetsky
• Soviet Union – Kersari Music Video

The People Will Curse Yeltsin

Towards the end of the documentary, fragments of Yeltsin’s address from October 4, 1993 are given.

The complete text of Yeltsin’s address from October 4, 1993 can be found on the site of the Historian Magazine. A recording on the YouTube channel of Yeltsin Centre (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GERxlYw5d2k) only shows a part of the speech.

The epochal document is unique in that not a single word of the address corresponds to reality, there is not a single grain of truth in it. But Yeltsin successfully applied the Western principle of blaming your opponent for what you have done yourself. On October 4, 1993 a fascist-capitalist counter-revolution that had been in progress in Russia ever since August of 1991, was concluded.

On the afternoon of October 4, 1993, when the shooting in Moscow began to subside, Boris Yeltsin addressed the nation with an explanation of what had happened. According to him, “communist revanchists” and “fascist leaders” were to blame for everything.

Motherland Remembers Decree 1400

Dear fellow citizens!

I appeal to you in a difficult moment.

Shots are being fired and blood is pouring in the Russian capital. Militants brought from all over the country, incited by the leadership of the White House, are sowing death and destruction.

I know that this has been a sleepless night for many of you. I know that you have understood everything.

This disturbing and tragic night has taught us a lot. We were not preparing for war. We hoped that we could come to an agreement to keep the peace in the capital.

Those who went against a peaceful city and unleashed a bloodbath are criminals. But this is not only the crime of individual bandits and rioters. Everything that happened and is still happening in Moscow is a pre–planned armed coup. It is organised by communist revanchists, fascist leaders, and some former deputies and representatives of the Soviets.

Under the guise of negotiations, they amassed forces, assembled bandit detachments of mercenaries accustomed to murder and arbitrariness. An insignificant bunch of politicians tried to impose their will on the whole country with weapons. The means by which they wanted to rule Russia are shown to the whole world. This is a cynical lie, a bribe. These are cobblestones, sharpened iron bars, machine guns and machine guns.

Those who wave red flags have once again stained Russia with blood.

They hoped for surprise, that their arrogance and unparalleled cruelty would sow fear and confusion.

They hoped that the military would stand aside and calmly watch as they dealt with unarmed Muscovites, as they re-established a bloody dictatorship in our country.

They hoped that the citizens of Russia would believe their lies. They hoped for a quick victory.

They miscalculated, and the people will curse the criminals.

There is no forgiveness for them and those who gave them orders, because they raised their hands against peaceful people, against Moscow, against Russia, against children, women and the elderly.

Armed rebellion is doomed. Troops are entering Moscow to restore order, tranquility and peace.

Their task is to liberate and unblock facilities seized by criminal elements, and disarm illegal armed groups.

I ask you, dear Muscovites, to morally support the morale of Russian soldiers and officers. This is our people’s army and militia. And today they have one task – to protect our children, to protect our mothers and fathers, to stop and neutralise the rioters and murderers. <…>

I appeal to all political forces in Russia. For the sake of those whose lives have already been cut short, for the sake of those whose innocent blood has already been shed, I ask you to forget about what seemed important yesterday – about internal disagreements.

All those who value peace and tranquility, the honour and dignity of our country, and all those who are against war should be together.

I am addressing the heads of the regions of Russia, republics, territories, regions, and autonomous regions.

Is the blood shed not enough to sort things out and finally take a clear and principled position for the sake of Russia’s unity?

I appeal to the citizens of Russia. The armed fascist-communist rebellion in Moscow will be suppressed in the shortest timeframe.

The Russian state has the necessary forces for this.

I consider it my duty to address Muscovites as well.

There have been fewer of us in the last day and night. Innocent civilians fell victim to bandits. Let’s bow our heads for the dead.

At the call of your heart, many of you spent this night in the center of Moscow, on the far and near approaches to the Kremlin. Tens of thousands of people risked their lives. Your will, your civic courage and fortitude have proved to be the most effective weapon.

I bow low to you.

From the the documentary “White House, Black Smoke”:

According to the official statistics, against 62 machine guns of the security detail of the Supreme Soviet, and a total of 900 firearms that were in the building, during the day of October 4, the Kremlin musters:

• 80 armoured personnel carriers,
• 10 tanks,
• 60 airborne amphibious infantry fighting vehicles,
• 20 assault infantry fighting vehicles,
• 15 combat reconnaissance patrol vehicles,
• 60 additional armoured vehicles of the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Internal Affairs,
  more than 40,000 servicemen.

• The army units, not counting the troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, used 32,000 machine gun bullets.

Inside the White House, there were found 157 shot casings.

The team of investigator Proshkin was able to establish for sure that none of the victims was killed by weapons located in the White House.
Weapons of the military units used on October 3 and 4, were prohibited to be taken for expertise.

Transcript of “White House, Black Smoke”

In the morning of October 5, 1993, when the battle in the centre of Moscow is over,
and the watering machines wash away the blood from the asphalt,
the now ex-defender of the Parliament Valery Smirnov,
comes by the subway to the city centre
to pick up his Lada 2109, parked on the eve of the assault
in a yard, neighbouring the smoking White House.
It’s empty and sunny in the yard,
and only one other driver will approach the car standing next to his.
A very unusual driver for Moscow.
Valery Smirnov is still sure that he met one of
the mysterious snipers, the traces of whom have dissolved in history.
The closer I got, the more I noticed that
on the opposite side, walking in the same direction,
was a man who I initially identified as a riot police officer.
Because he was in a bulletproof vest, with a gun, but alone.
And I, just in case, decided to slow down
and see if he was after me, what he was doing there.
This was not a volunteer,
this was not a soldier of the regular units.
Then who was he?
They look at each other for a few seconds,
only to mix with the crowd of Muscovites,
who do not yet realise that everything they see
is not at all what it seems.
NTV Company Presents
WHITE HOUSE, BLACK SMOKE
Boris Nikolayevich was always in high spirits.
We were preparing for the seizure of the Kremlin and all state institutions.
The White House! The Russian House!
Rugged men, at war, on a mission, excited, in a besieged castle.
Indeed, the shots were fired from the roof of this new American embassy.
All the police hid. That’s natural.
Hurray! Hurray!
I always wanted to bring the uprising closer to the factory districts of Moscow.
I didn’t think that in the centre of Moscow I would be under fire from own tanks.
And today we must storm the City Hall and Ostankino!
– Hurray!
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
You called for going to Ostankino (TV centre), they say.
I don’t deny that. I am saying, yes, I called for it.
Men, jump into the cars now, and go towards Ostankino!
[ Ruslan Hasbulatov, in 1993, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of RF ]
I thought, what, have they gone mad?
Cut off all telephone lines!
Throw the officials out on the street!
[ Albert Makashov, Colonel-General, between 21.09.93 and 04.10.93 is the Vice Defence Minister of RF, as per the Supreme Soviet ]
Have you no conscience, they ask.
And why should my conscience torment me?
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
When the time came to arrest Hasbulatov and Rutskoy,
I was so angry, I was ready to shoot them on the spot.
Moreover, Boris Nikolayevich hinted at it.
So what was going on in Moscow? Who was shooting at whom?
Where did the mysterious snipers come from?
Did a mass shooting at Krasnaya Presnya really take place?
And most importantly, where did so much mutual hatred
come from in yesterday’s pioneers,
who had lived for only two years without the peaceful USSR?
WHITE HOUSE, BLACK SMOKE
The 3rd of October, 1993. Sunday.
A sunny day after 10 rainy, cold days.
The streets of Moscow are empty.
In the early 90s, there were almost never traffic jams in the capital.
And few go to the centre on a sunny Sunday.
Because of the announced rallies, the traffic is blocked.
This is what the city centre looks like.
On the Kaluga Square, protesters are gathering near the Oktyabrskaya metro station.
Behind them, on Zhytnaya Street, there are OMON (riot police) units.
There is also a weak block post on the side of Gorky Park, on Sadovoe Kolco (Garden Ring).
Going in a straight line, it’s quite a long distance to the blocked White House.
The rally on the Kaluga Square is organised by Viktor Anpilov of the “Workers’ Russia”,
and the “National Salvation Front” of Ilya Konstantinov.
There was something strange about this event from the very start.
[ Ilya Konstantinov in 1993, the Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the RF, co-chairman of the “National Salvation Front” ]
I saw that the column is turned in the opposite direction, towards the Crimean bridge.
And it started to move.
And moreover, I saw such a strange picture,
that the first OMON units, which were close to the gathered people, split up.
A coincidence? I didn’t think so.
Konstantinov is looking for the organisers of the rally, but
Viktor Anpilov, an unwavering participant of the protest actions, is no longer on the square.
[ Victor Anpilov, in 1993, chairman of the executive committee of the movement “Labour Russia” ]
I always wanted to bring the uprising closer to the factory districts of Moscow.
I immediately called on the people to go to the Ilyich Square,
near the Serp-and-Molot factory, where the workers knew me well.
And I hoped that I would be able to persuade the workers
to support the Supreme Soviet.
Here is the Kaluga Square, and here is the Serp-and-Molot factory.
The distance is more than decent.
And then, what worker masses can there be in the yard on a Sunday?
But Anpilov makes such a strange choice, as if he has a premonition.
Historian Alexander Ostrovsky studied the events of autumn 1993.
He restored their sequence literally minute-by-minute,
and found many strange coincidences and contradictions.
[ Alexandr Ostrovsky, historian, author of the book “1993. Shooting of the “White House” ]
I’m doing calculations, showing
that a special brigade of riot police was gathered
from all over the country,
but they were not deployed.
And I’m showing, that in all places where
where they tried to stop the column, several 100 people acted there.
Fascism will not pass! Fascism will not pass!
Fascism will not pass!
At about 12 o’clock, one of the generals arrived at the General Staff.
He recalls and writes that he is being told that a riot is already beginning in Moscow.
While nothing is happening yet at 12 o’clock.
But the strangeness of these minutes does not end.
Having easily broken through the encirclement on the square,
the crowd rushes to the Garden Ring, the Crimean bridge.
The encirclement is located here.
It looks like the very beginning of the bridge, but in reality,
the bridge already spans for 100 metres.
Here, it’s already quite high above the embankment,
with high parapets on the sides.
So, to escape the collision with the encirclement,
only these stairs to the embankment remain.
But there are several thousand people in the crowd,
and they are pushing from the direction of the square.
As if on purpose, this crowd is lured here,
almost to the middle of the Crimean bridge, for the inevitable collision.
These events are only the visible part of the iceberg.
But the autumn of 1993 is only the conclusion of August of 1991.
And it’s so symbolic that the place of action is still the White House.
With the wave from it spreading across the whole country.
But how did it start?
BEFORE THE BATTLE
January 1992.
The “Shock therapy” of Gaidar’s government.
The prices are set loose, there are lots of goods,
but the inflation catastrophically devalues roubles.
It is the new Russia that had only lived outside of the USSR for 1 month,
but it’s already used to the disasters of the economy.
The collapse of the Union is, after all, a non-stop economic disaster.
A few months before that, in the August of 1991,
the White House is the bastion of resistance of
Russia’s authorities to the Union power, represented by SCSE.
Boris Yeltsin, together with the Parliament,
will defeat SCSE, return the Union President Gorbachev to the Kremlin,
only to take the power away from him.
In those days, the head of the presidential security Korzhakov, vice-president Rutskoy
and the head of the Parliament Hasbulatov together
organise the defence of the White House,
which the SCSE will ultimately not dare to storm.
Accordingly, we declare illegal all decisions and orders of this committee (SCSE).
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
In 1991, we defended this house, and in 1993 we took it.
They defended it twice.
Yeltsin has no reason to save the Union.
Who knows how everything will work out, while he has already tasted the power.
In December 1991, in Belovezha Pusha, the final point in the history of the USSR is set.
Laying all the blame on the the past, the Soviet people still naïvely believe
that the future will be bright
as soon as capitalism replaces the disgusting socialism.
Yeltsin invites to the government a team of young reformers, led by Yegor Gaidar.
[ Andrei Vavilov, in 1993, First Deputy Minister of Finance of the RF ]
First of all, the idea united people.
It did not allow conflicts to grow.
There was an authority, there was a leader.
It was, naturally, Gaidar within the team.
Of course, only the one who does not work, does not make mistakes.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
Boris Nikolaevich calls me and says, well, why can’t you find a common tongue with Gaidar?
I reply, Boris Nikolaevich, I’ve also studied economics, you cannot stage experiments on such a country.
And why do you call them for boys in pink pants?
I say, look at them. They have whole three lines of biography:
Born, studied, married.
And then suddenly, a Deputy Chairman of the Government or a Minister.
Well, it does not happen like this, it does not happen in nature.
But the very first year of free Russia
brings catastrophic disappointments in Yeltsin’s governing.
Savings are devalued, prices are rising, the salary is falling.
We survived such a war, and what is he doing to us, filthy bastard?
Everyone started rummaging through trash canisters [ because of ] the bastard.
As a result, the people enter year 1993 in a non-festive mood.
The great country is no more, the future is ghostly, and the present is sad.
Tell me, uncle, what’s going on here in Moscow?
I told all in detail. Describing everything is as it is.
Who’s that drunkard, where he grew up, how he brought grief upon the country.
I told that this creature was a party secretary,
that such a scoundrel was veneered as a father.
And I also told the fact that the former party worker,
by the order of BBC, became the head of Russia.
The Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR, which supported the Belovezhsky agreements,
now begins to reproach the Kremlin for the wrongly chosen path.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
The savings money have already been taken from the peple.
Here you already have one blow to the gut.
Now they are taking away the national heritage, and give it away to anyone.
Remember, the enterprises were given away for a net price of zero.
[ Sergey Filatov, in 1993, Head of the Administration of the President of the RF, B.Yeltsin. ]
Whatever reform we did, it couldn’t be stopped, nor rolled back, so to speak.
We took a country with an external debt of more than 120 billion dollars.
In parallel, the projects of a new Constitution for the new Russia are being developed.
The commission of deputy Oleg Rumyantsev works in the Supreme Soviet.
According to it, Russia should be a parliamentary republic,
where the President is controlled by the Parliament.
Another project is being prepared in the bowels of the presidential administration,
concentrating the power in the hands of the President.
Two opposite views on the management of the country lead to a political crisis,
and soon it will lead to an open clash,
as a result of which the parliamentary project will become lost history.
Slippery reforms, privatisation scams, and a sharp decline of living standard
are blamed by the Kremlin on interference in doing things right.
The Supreme Soviet more and more resolutely opposes the Kremlin’s course.
In December 1992, it does not allow Yeltsin to appoint Gaidar as Prime Minister.
And in the spring of 1993, Yeltsin is saved from impeachment only by a margin of few votes.
But the Kremlin was ready for this.
General Korzhakov had developed a plan to seize the Parliament.
The congress is held in the Grand Kremlin Palace.
There are lavish halls there now, where the presidential inauguration ceremony takes place.
But in the early 90s,
that was an old Soviet Conference Hall with a balcony for the public.
Containers with chemical substances are placed on this balcony.
According to the order of Alexander Korzhakov, in the event of impeachment,
the gas would cover the parterre with the deputies.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
In order to completely disable the Congress, soldiers were assigned to each of the deputies,
who would take them out of the hall,
pack them into the ambulances and take them away.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
Rutskoy never knew this.
That was not a poison, but tear gas.
Chlorine, which is usually used to train with gas masks in the army.
There was no need for the decree of Yeltsin,
Yeltsin said no need to surround the White House.
This was even easier.
To simply smoke out the deputies,
get them on buses, and take them outside of Kremlin territory.
I’m saying again:
Young democracy defends itself as best it can.
Throughout 1993, the opposition is protesting.
On May 1, the first blood is spilled. A riot policeman dies in the clash.
These images strangely coincide with the negotiations
on postponement of Russian debt repayment, and a billion-dollar loan.
The Kremlin seems to be demonstrating to the West that without its financial assistance,
the Communists will once again take power in Russia.
[ Ruslan Hasbulatov, in 1993, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of RF ]
I don’t at all consider Yeltsin a spy, as some write.
That he supposedly had some special agreements with the Americans.
But he definitely got that support.
After all, not by chance, one of the large tranches
that were transferred to Russia, took place on September 30.
It was during the siege.
It was like a moral and financial support of Yeltsin’s course.
[ Alexandr Ostrovsky, historian, author of the book “1993. Shooting of the “White House” ]
The West set itself the task of removing Russia as an industrial power.
The West needs raw materials.
In order to get raw materials, it’s necessary to liquidate the Russian industry.
Then these raw materials, processed in Russia,
will go to the West, whether one wants it or not.
Moreover, they will go to the West at a heavily discounted price.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
I’ve repeatedly reported to Boris Nikolaevich that the administration of the government
employs staff members of the CIA of the USA.
He said to me, are you feeling well?
I said, I’m fine.
Yeltsin decides to use the remnants of his authority
by organising a referendum on the trust in the branches of power.
He gets needed answered,
but the turnout figures are not convincing for those politicised times.
[ Sergey Baburin. In 1993, Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
They understood that this was the Supreme Soviet,
most of which had voted for the destruction of the Soviet Union.
And who knows if the people repented or not.
Therefore, there was no required trust in the parliament,
in all the structures of power at that time in society.
The electorate was in survival mode.
It had no power left for the clashes at the top –
it has it unbearable at the bottom.
The feeling of disaster unites people of different views on the streets of Moscow.
My parents ended up abroad thanks to the will of these three idiots,
who conspired at the Belavezhskaya Pushcha.
I can’t come to them normally.
Other type of money, border customs and everything else.
People are angered at each other. Why do I need such a life?
When the psyche and everything else is maimed every day.
When the standard of living has already fallen by more than 3 times.
But Yeltsin urgently needed to strengthen own power.
And he decided everything for himself.
[ Sergey Filatov, in 1993, Head of the Administration of the President of the RF, B.Yeltsin. ]
I very often heard such conversations:
Boris Yeltsin, what are you doing?
You are the tsar.
You are the president, elected by people.
You can do whatever you want.
In the end, you need to suppress these, suppress those.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
I said, Boris Nikolaevich, you can’t do this.
I offered him.
Say that you got sick.
Or, go take a rest.
Let me talk to the Congress.
[Yeltsin replied,] It’s too late to talk to them.
They don’t let me do anything.
Boris Nikolaevich, who will agree when
dozens of echelons of diesel fuel go abroad?
Aviation kerosene….
When 5 million tons of oil are exchanged for 100 thousand tons of chicken.
Who will agree to this, Boris Nikolaevich?
On September 21, 1993, TV programs are interrupted
to relay the address of President Yeltsin.
He announces the signing of the decree 1400.
Taking into account numerous appeals to me
by the leaders of the subjects of the Russian Federation,
the groups of deputies, members of the Constitutional Convention,
political parties, movements, representatives of the public,
citizens of Russia, I am taking the following steps.
The Supreme Soviet is dissolved.
New elections are scheduled for the new two-house parliament:
the State Duma and the Federation Council.
[ Sergey Filatov, in 1993, Head of the Administration of the President of the RF, B.Yeltsin. ]
When he asked what we would do,
there was complete silence in this circle.
And I sat next to him… I said, Boris Nikolaevich, can I?
With some anger, he hit me with his hand,
saying, “your opinion is known”.
Well, after that, everyone began to speak quickly and loudly,
“yes, yes, it’s needed”
It’s necessary to end these shenanigans,
It’s a disgrace, they don’t let us do anything, and so on.
In general, the question was solved.
If you look dispassionately at that,
previous Constitution from today’s perspective, then everything is clear.
The amendment stated that the President has no right to dissolve the Parliament.
If he does that, he automatically loses power.
That is, the Parliament was the supreme power in the country.
But in the whirlwind of the early ’90s,
the press did everything to make it look in the public view
like a conflict between the tsar and the boyars.
Moreover, the boyars are all retrograding communists,
dreaming of returning the empty store shelves of the late USSR.
It’s surprising to admit to it today,
but many of us sincerely believed in it back then.
The Supreme Soviet reacts within a couple of hours.
The Congress of People’s Deputies is urgently convened.
Boris Yeltsin is removed from office,
Vice President Rutskoy takes the oath
as an Acting President until the new elections.
…to faithfully perform my duties.
O this day, nothing yet foreshadows a bloody outcome.
When the Chairman Hazbulatov appears in the hall in a bulletproof vest,
it is perceived by everyone as a good joke.
This is not a shirt.
Ah, I see, it’s a bulletproof vest.
Ruslan Imranovich, will the same be handed out to us?
They are lying over there, I specially put it on.
The sympathisers are gathering at the White House,
but there is still hope for a peaceful outcome.
After all, the Constitutional Court confirmed that
the decree on the dissolution violated the main law.
But the Head of the Court, Valery Zorkin, is in a difficult position.
If Yeltsin violated the law,
he is no longer the President, and his actions are that of a rebel?
This mind-boggling construct had to be somehow corrected.
[ Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, in 1993, President of the Republic of Kalmykiya ]
On September 30, 1993, in the building of the Constitutional Court,
the heads of the subjects of the Russian Federation
then adopted option zero,
that is, to withdraw the starting point…
that is, to suspend the decision of the Supreme Soviet
on the impeachment of the president,
and to suspend the Presidential decree on the dissolution of the Parliament.
That is, go back to zero.
The road between the House of Soviets and the Kremlin
becomes a ferry route for the negotiators.
Meanwhile, the police forces get pulled up to the House of Soviets itself.
However, these blocks are easily bypassed by those who wanted to bypass them.
Journalist Alexander Nevzorov, arrived at the White House as one the sympathisers,
and communicating with Rutskoy and Hhazbulatov in the midst of the confrontation,
accidentally discovered the epicentre of the negotiations of the opposing forces.
[ Alexander Nevzorov, in 1993, a TV journalist, author and anchor of the program “600 seconds” ]
I suddenly felt behind my back
such an excited teeny wheezing behind a curtain.
Polonium, yes, Polonium.
Not the Polonium that Sasha Litvinenko had, but the Polonium of Hamlet.
I pulled it away, and there stands
a very pale Zorkin, wheezing, with his fingers joined together.
A wonderful person, by the way, who, at some secret level,
was coming there and trying to somehow reconcile the sides.
Zorkin’s strictly secret mission consisted of him leaving
the White House, getting into a car with a flashing lights, and driving off.
The subversive activity in the ranks of deputies begins.
Such a questionnaire comes from the Kremlin.
I, such-and-such, resign as a deputy, with the payment to me of an annual salary,
and the fixation of the future pension in the amount of 75% of the monthly salary.
I ask you to employ me in the apparatus of the Government
or the Federation Council, and to provide housing in Moscow.
This is an obvious bribery.
Even today the offer is seductive, but in 1993 it was life-changing.
Many started to walk out.
But many remain.
After all, two years before, in 1991,
they had defended the White House and Yeltsin.
Now they are ready to defend it from Yeltsin.
[ Evgeny Savostyanov, in 1993, Head of the Department of the Federal Counterintelligence Service for Moscow and the Moscow region ]
At first, we honestly expected that they would sit for a while and then disperse.
To begin with, there was no blockade to speak of.
There were just a few policemen.
It was drizzling, the policemen were wet.
[ Sergey Filatov, in 1993, Head of the Administration of the President of the RF, B.Yeltsin. ]
When it all started, the decree was published,
the country lived in peace.
All the theatres are open,
the cinemas are open, people are walking peacefully.
Rostropovich came to give a concert on the Red Square.
I said to Boris Yeltsin, are you in the right this time, too?
The then head of the Moscow KGB, Yevgeny Savastianov,
knew about the difficult moods among the personnel,
but he knew how to handle it.
[ Evgeny Savostyanov, in 1993, Head of the Department of the Federal Counterintelligence Service for Moscow and the Moscow region ]
Indeed, we had a lot of employees
who really sympathised with the Supreme Soviet,
who literally hated Yeltsin.
I said, the events are getting serious,
everyone can have a different attitude to them.
I don’t want you to go over yourself.
Those who don’t want to follow my orders,
can take a break, a vacation,
I give my word that I won’t punish or avenge for it later.
Meanwhile, members of the Russian National Unity (RNU) under the leadership of
Alexander Barkashov appear at the White House.
They eagerly pose before the cameras,
raising hands with bandages that resemble swastika.
They scare off the elderly communists with a fascist greeting,
and Orthodox monarchists with runic symbols.
The head of the RNU, Alexander Barkashov interrupts his silence only 20 years later.
He knows how ambiguous the situation was in 1993,
and what kind of forces were ready to support the overthrow of Yeltsin.
[ Alexandr Barkashov, in 1993, leader of the Russian National Unity movement ]
We were preparing for the seizure of the Kremlin and all state institutions,
which need to be controlled in such moments.
And we had a large part of the army on our side,
so it was enough to give the command
for the most capable units to enter Moscow.
All power was on our side.
But, just like in 1991, no one dared to do it either.
Well, there were more than 200 of my people inside the White House.
We were armed.
It was enough for a counterattack,
to break through the first line that blocked us.
Come on!
The RNU detachment is about 200 people.
Almost all of them have good military training.
General Ochalov, the Defence Minister according to the Parliament,
invites them as the main strike force.
Among the unchristened mobs of the White House defenders,
they are noticeable and look dashing.
Credit where it’s due, compared to today’s
[ Vladislav Shurygin, in 1993, war correspondent of the newspaper “Tomorrow” ]
nationalists, they were fully adequate.
There was no element of The Republic of Rus with their
throw the blacks and others out of Russia…
Their whole nationalism consisted of an idea that Russia should be great.
Glory to Russia! Glory to Russia!
Glory to Russia! Glory to Russia!
Veritable moments of glory come for Barkashov in the autumn of 1993.
Today, oblivion envelops this figure
and his militants, dissolved in the time.
He is now a monk Mikhail,
of the Underground True Orthodox Church.
He lives quietly, almost doesn’t communicate with the press.
The disappointment is too great.
There is a lingering feeling that the victory was close.
An extraordinary committee was to be formed after the deposing of Yeltsin,
which, for two years of a transitional period,
would have ruled Russia harshly, but fairly.
Ritual executions of oligarchs and putting order on the streets
would have become a prologue to a new democracy and a new election.
But politicians in the White House and the secret allies in the Kremlin
became afraid of the responsibility and betrayed the idea, thinks Barkashov.
[ Alexandr Barkashov, in 1993, leader of the Russian National Unity movement ]
I tried to convince my commanders,
that it is necessary to act harshly and offensively.
But in response I heard,
that this is a bloodshed and a civil war.
And I was always found it surprising,
both in 1991 and 1993, that when the fate of the country is decided,
when high-ranking military people
say at such a moment that a bloodshed is possible
and that it shouldn’t be allowed, that a civil war is possible,
for me it was surprising and even funny to hear.
From September 28, the perimeter of the White House is completely blocked
by the units of the Internal Troops.
They let out those who want to leave, but do not let anyone in.
And they turn off the communications.
The parliament switches to power from the reserve substation.
But there is almost no diesel for it.
For some reason, during summer preparations for the confrontation, no reserves were made.
The hot water is turned off,
they are almost out of food in the buffet.
White House corridors have no windows, it’s dark even during the day.
The road to the toilet at night was looked for,
when the floor became sticky from impurities.
Even holding a candle, it’s easy to miss the target.
It’s hardest for the buffet girls and the dish washers,
they have to use cold water in darkness.
The buffet of the White House is spacious,
a good place to spend leisure time for the besieged.
A Moscow priest, Father Nikon, gives here during the siege
an interview about the political offence of President Yeltsin.
It is unpleasant to me that again, as in 1917,
we are assured that for a good purpose
we have to make a very tiny violation.
But after the power was turned off, there was a need
for a saving intervention by the priest.
When the kitchen rebelled,
Father Nikon strengthened the spirit of the dish washers,
and not without success.
[ Hieromonk Nikon (Sergey Belavenec), in 1993, Rector of the Trinity Church in village Yazvische of the Volokolamsk region ]
At some point, the representatives
of the apparatus came to me, and said, Father,
there is such a situation,
the kitchen rebels,
they are tired of washing the dishes with cold water,
they say they’ll leave now.
Could you calm them down?
As soon as I tried to open my mouth, they said,
what are you going to persuade us for here?
Who will wash the dishes with cold water?
Our hands are done for.
So I did my sleeves up, and began to wash the dishes.
Plate after plate,
I see, they huffed a bit, but calmed down.
Then several women from the apparatus came to me,
even some of the female deputies, and also began to wash the dishes.
And the conflict was pacified.
It’s curious that the White House was originally built as a strategic building.
The Soviet of Ministers of the RSFSR was supposed to be located here.
And all such buildings should have a bunker in case of a nuclear strike,
a supply of provisions, and secret exits to the surface.
President Yeltsin was hiding in the bunker of the White House in the August of 1991.
But in the end of September of 1993,
the commandant of the building ran away,
grabbing with him the keys from the armoured door.
The canned food reserve
remained inaccessible to the inhabitants of the building.
[ Alexandr Ostrovsky, historian, author of the book “1993. Shooting of the “White House” ]
It’s impossible to enter there,
because there are such doors,
that even a blast wave cannot destroy them.
And therefore, by the 28th, there were no supplies of food left.
I specifically asked those in the White House how they were starving.
They replied that they began to eat worse, but were not going hungry.
That means that during those six days
food was delivered to the White House.
When I came to this conclusion,
I began to look for people, means, and so on.
I found the place where several cars with food drove up every night,
and the cordon moved apart.
It means that a living Supreme Soviet was needed.
People were needed for it to work.
[ Alexander Nevzorov, in 1993, a TV journalist, author and anchor of the program “600 seconds” ]
There was no oppressive feeling.
They sang merry, happy songs.
Rugged men, at war, on a mission, excited, in a besieged castle.
Cool! They were sharing sandwiches.
One mobile for 10 people, the first one back then.
It was an exhilarating atmosphere.
The White House, the Russian House, the world is in your hands.
The White House, the Russian House, the county is counting on you.
Meanwhile, supporters of the White House are preparing for the confrontation.
The weather is getting worse, it’s drizzling, cold wind is blowing.
It looks more like November, than the end of September.
The ranks are thinning, but those remaining get stronger in spirit.
The units are forming at the White House.
Uneven ranks in the Soviet sports hats.
They are trying and failing to hold the line,
and to learn to throw stones at the riot police.
While the second line throws stones, the first line, while staying behind,
takes the stones and throws them as the front line moves forward.
How many weapons are there in the White House?
In fact, not so many.
In the investigation documents, almost all the guns are accounted for.
[ Leonid Proshkin, in 1993, Senior investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the RF, head of the investigative team investigating the events of the 3rd – 4th of October 1993 ]
During the investigation, our investigation team confiscated 926 guns.
Most of them were not pistols, but machine guns, rifles, sniper rifles.
As for how serious the resistance was,
I can say that in fact,
no one was killed from any of those guns – and they all were checked.
Volunteers from different fallen-off parts of the former Soviet Union
come to Moscow to protect the Parliament.
For example, soldiers from Transnistria receive weapons.
Several officers of the “Dniester” battalion
become a good trump card in the political struggle.
[ Vladislav Shurygin, in 1993, war correspondent for the newspaper “Zavtra” (“Tomorrow”) ]
Let’s give Kalashnikovs to these 10 Transnistrians,
and let them patrol our perimeter in pairs.
Of course, their uniforms would immediately draw attention,
of course, they will immediately be questioned,
while they will be instructed to say
that the 250 man strong “Dniester” detachment has arrived.
I was very pleased to find out
that the President of Russia was quoting me in the evening,
saying, “we know that there are 250 bandits from Transnistria sitting there”.
[ Sergey Leschenko, in 1993, officer of the “Dniestr” battalion of the Transnistrian Moldavian Republic ]
We had, let’s say, 12 people in our group.
What was the point of dragging weapons across two borders?
And most importantly, we did not even think
that somebody would be shooting at someone.
But it’s possible to count on victory having such forces?
The Supreme Commander-in-Chief Rutskoy, appointed by the Soviet,
had to get the Armed Forces on his side.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
I tried.
They even brought me a telegram from the late Alexander Ivanovich Lebed.
Sasha, hold on.
All of us, the 14th Army,
the 2nd Tank Army.
Hold on, and all that. And then…
Journalist Nevzorov observes the strategic planning
of the defence of the cabinet
of the leaders of the disgraced parliament.
[ Alexander Nevzorov, in 1993, a TV journalist, author and anchor of the program “600 seconds” ]
When I entered Achalov’s office, I didn’t understand anything.
They were moving the cabinets, furniture, and chairs many times over.
What for?
So that the Special Forces, who’d rush into the office during the storming,
would get into such a labyrinth,
run through it, and then go to another exit.
It was likely assumed that they had to run in like that many times,
run out many times, and, having lost their strength,
fall and surrender to Achalov’s warriors.
The strategies were at such a level.
Nobody believes in it.
It seems to us that both sides are always represented
or, at least has at its disposal, some intelligent people,
who give advice.
It was such a traditional idiocy of Generals.
Unfortunately, I behaved sincerely at that moment.
That’s why I ended up on the side of this crazy and insidious ruse.
The casting was not held.
It was enough to look at the participants.
You wanted to present a sketchbook to Makashov,
with his beret sporting a worm.
He did not make one think of a serious general,
and he wasn’t one.
When looking at Anpilov, one was visited by a thought that
people were still being beaten up in the sobering centres.
General Dunayev, who led the defense of the White House in August 1991,
on the eve of the battle, recognises among the riot policemen
some of those who were with him back then,
and learns some interesting details
about how the street sees the situation.
I say, guys, why did you get into politics?
[ Andrey Dunayev, in1993, First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the RF. Between 21.09.93 and 04.10.93 – Acting Minister of Internal Affairs of the RF according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
How shall we put it, General?
Two – insert a swearword here – are fighting, a Chechen Hazbulatov and a Russian Yeltsin.
We are for the Russian.
I think that common sense should win in the end,
and today we must somehow agree on the surrender of weapons.
But everything indicates the decision to end
the confrontation by force has already been made in the Kremlin.
The Alfa group, with reasons given, is moved out to the White House.
They are, however, pulled back after spending the night in a bus.
The negotiations with the West are over.
The Kremlin has received a billion dollar tranche.
There is no longer any point in imitating a political process of pacification.
October the 3rd is dawning.
In the morning on Sunday, October 3, 1993,
Patriarch Alexei II serves the liturgy in the Cathedral.
While the deputy of the Supreme Soviet, priest Alexei Zlobin,
is on the square in front of the White House, with the Patriarch’s blessing.
But there is a hindrance – a yellow car of special propaganda.
It was nicknamed “Yellow Goebbels” in the White House.
Its speakers pass the orders of Yeltsin, call to surrender,
and broadcast the songs of Alla Pugacheva and “Putanna” by Oleg Gazmanov.
[ Alexei Zlobin, Archpriest, rector of the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin in the village Gorodnya-upon-Volga, in 1993 the Deputy of the Supreme Soviet ]
And when we were all set up, I turned on the microphone and said,
I, the People’s Deputy of Russia, Archpriest Alexei Zlobin,
will serve the Divine Liturgy with the Patriarch’s blessing.
I ask you to turn off the microphones.
And you know, in just a few seconds, the microphones were turned off.
It’s wasn’t even coordinated.
And for 2 hours, from 10 till 12,
the Liturgy was served over the whole White House and the surroundings.
At that time, it was also decided that the first to shoot will be anathematised.
At the end of the liturgy, I read that decision out to all the riot policemen.
At this very moment, the opposition rally on Kaluga Square
turns into an uncontrollable march to the White House.
At that time, a chain of 220 riot policemen
is facing a crowd of almost 10,000 people on the Crimean bridge,
On can hear panic notes in the police radio conversations.
One can try to cover this distance today in a quick gait –
almost 6 km along the Garden Ring.
Let’s start right here, from the Crimean bridge.
The clock starts.
Here we are at Zubovskaya Square. 10 minutes.
Here we are at Smolenskaya, another 15.
Here we are at the fork with the New Arbat.
The White House is already close, but we need to choose the road:
immediately to the left towards the City Hall, or straight and then to the left
through the alley next to the American Embassy.
All in all, we used about 40 minutes,
without any stops or reflections.
It’s about 1 km from here to the White House.
Our path is about 4 km.
It’s interesting the first column of the demonstrators
overcame the same path in the same time.
This means that they practically did not stop along the way.
Down with the Mafia bandits of Yeltsin!
The officers of the Dniester battalion now remember how easily
the attackers broke through the riot police encirclement
and captured the abandoned trucks on the Garden Ring.
[ Alexandr Pavlovich, in 1993, an officer of the “Dniestr” battalion, Transnistrian Moldavian Republic ]
Yes, a light barrier was set up.
They just had to move it aside, to push away this barrier.
They could have blocked with heavy equipment, right?
Nothing would’ve happened.
[ Alexandr Kovalev, in 1993, an officer of the “Dniestr” battalion, Transnistrian Moldavian Republic ]
People simply didn’t understand many things in their euphoria.
Why is it happening.
Then, after some time had passed, many started to come around.
And they began to realise that any driver
or mechanic, leaving his vehicle,
would, of course, shut the engine, pull out the keys,
and put them in the glove compartment or in the pocket,
locking his equipment.
While here, the keys were left practically in all the car.
At this moment, the encirclement at the White House disappears as if by order.
A few minutes later the protester enter the square next to the City Hall,
the former CMEA building.
[ Ilya Konstantinov, in 1993, the Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the RF, co-chairman of the “National Salvation Front” ]
When the column approached the Town Hall,
from the upper floors of the City Hall
they already started firing from automatic rifles
at the demonstrators.
I saw wounded people.
War journalist Vladislav Shurygin was the first wounded on that Sunday.
[ Vladislav Shurygin, in 1993, war correspondent for the newspaper “Zavtra” (“Tomorrow”) ]
At that moment shooting commenced.
And I was surprised that the shooting was so sporadic;
it was not clear from where.
I saw a sniper on the roof of the 9 storey building across the American embassy.
I remember that I was trying to take a picture of him, and at the same time
someone mightily strikes my leg with a stick.
I lower my eyes and see a hole in the leg,
some smoke begins to come out of it.
It was a shot from a gas carbine KS-23.
So the grenade pierced through the leg, and the tear gas is coming out from both sides of it.
Although most of the bullets go into the air and the asphalt –
the shooting is done more for noise and scare –
but there are already wounded and one killed.
And just as they were shooting,
there was a police station behind the hotel “Mir”.
And the policemen, as they ran out and scattered,
they simply began shooting at the crowd.
And the first shot wounded me,
while the second shot deadly wounded colonel of the police Ivan Shishaev,
who worked in the crowd as a field officer.
And I saw him, I saw how he was killed.
Because when I fell,
I saw a person who ran towards those policemen, shouting to not shoot,
and then I see that a grenade hits him and he falls.
The most terrible thing is that very evening
it was announced on all TV channels that
the beasts from the White House
killed the father of three kids, colonel of the police Ivan Shishaev.
And dozens of people, who were later beaten up at the police stations,
heard that this was for Shishaev.
The White House leaders are watching the events from the windows.
Soon, the White House defenders go out
to help those, who broke through the encirclement.
Again, the riot police again, as if by order, runs,
and people enter the building of the City Hall.
From this moment, the events become a whirlwind,
and even today their participants cannot clearly explain the details.
And there are still many questions.
Here is Alexander Rutskoy giving a clear order.
Young men, men capable of fighting!
Line up here to the left to form detachments,
and today we must take the City Hall and Ostankino by storm.
Hurrah!
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
And when they say, you called to go to Ostankino,
I don’t deny that. I am saying, yes, I called for it.
However, a large group was sent there – 12 people.
When I came down, I saw that Makashov lined up there,
well, by the number of the people, something like a company.
And goes with the pep talk: we will now capture Ostankino.
I say, now, my friend, slow down.
Cut all the phone lines!
Throw the officials out on the street!
Forward!
[ Albert Makashov, Colonel-General, between 21.09.93 and 04.10.93 is the Vice Defence Minister of RF, as per the Supreme Soviet ]
I was told to go to Ostankino, so I went there.
What became of it?
Some may start saying… Probably you’d start:
Have you no conscience? And why should my conscience torment me?
It should torment the one, who issued Order 1400
that violated the Constitution.
I call on our valiant soldiers to bring troops and tanks here,
in order to storm the Kremlin,
and the usurper – the criminal Yeltsin.
[ Ruslan Hasbulatov, in 1993, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of RF ]
Rutskoy gave the command, and everyone is taken somewhere,
to capture the TV station.
I thought, what, are they out of their minds?
Imagine, we are deprived of all defenders.
The cars were ready there.
Of course, it was clearly a mighty provocation,
they did not coordinate with us.
We had a completely different plan.
Well, in general, I realised that now,
most likely, we had already lost.
In these minutes, Boris Yeltsin arrives in the Kremlin in a helicopter.
The situation is unpleasant:
a crowd is rioting only a five-minute walk away from the Kremlin.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
The situation was very serious,
but one didn’t need to worry about Yeltsin’s fate,
unless he would not have done something to himself,
because Yeltsin was a person prone to suicide,
and in such situations you always have to keep an eye on him.
So, of course, when he was resting in the back room at night,
not only did I have to sit behind the controls of the country,
I also had to sometimes look in on him, to see if he’d come up with something.
Panic, if any, was only among
the servicemen of the administration, among the civil servants.
There was panic there.
Filatov was beside himself, hit his head on the table, cried.
Head of Administration is not an easy job, of course.
[ Sergey Filatov, in 1993, Head of the Administration of the President of the RF, B.Yeltsin. ]
This was an indicator of an unstable situation.
I think, it was showing that even the generals didn’t quite understand,
how the military units down the command chain will see the situation.
Still, only a small portion of society fights in such events,
while the majority always switches to the side of the winner.
From 10 to 20 thousand people participate in the events of the 3rd of October.
That’s a tribune at a football stadium.
Only a few hundred people go to Ostankino.
But in the evening of October 3,
even in the Kremlin not everyone is sure that they will win.
Too dangerous a Genie was let loose from the bottle
onto the streets of the capital.
[ Sergey Filatov, in 1993, Head of the Administration of the President of the RF, B.Yeltsin. ]
All of the police hid, naturally.
When they saw this was no joking matter,
and that policemen get badly beaten or even killed.
[ Evgeny Savostyanov, in 1993, Head of the Department of the Federal Counterintelligence Service for Moscow and the Moscow region ]
The police was largely disorganised.
And, in general, it was difficult to react to the movement of the crowd.
Their foray to Ostankino was not entirely unpredictable,
because the protection of Ostankino was very strong.
But how to intercept them en-route?
Well, looking at the map,
the action takes place on a small spot in the centre of Moscow.
If there is no police there,
it doesn’t mean that there’s no police anywhere at all.
The defenders of the House of Soviets, en-route to take Ostankino,
soon discover this for themselves.
Driving along the Garden Ring, they overtake the column
of the “Dzerzhinsky” division on Mayakovskaya Square.
Then, on the Mir Avenue, not far from the TV centre,
a column of the Interior Ministry special forces “Vityaz”.
The future killers and their victims are even
merrily waving their hands at each other.
Neither “Vityaz” nor “Dzerzhinsky” make any effort to stop
the column with the red flags that is moving towards the TV centre.
[ Leonid Proshkin, in 1993, Senior investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the RF, head of the investigative team investigating the events of the 3rd – 4th of October 1993 ]
It was possible to stop them.
Put 2-3 APCs in front, and no one would go anywhere,
but that was not done.
In other words, one gets a feeling that
someone benefited from the fact that they left the city centre,
that they left to a place where there were fewer people,
and nothing serious could happen.
But it turns out that something serious could happen.
At first, everything happens at the 17th entrance
of the TV centee building – the main entrance.
While the protesters demand air time, the fighters of “Vityaz”
enter the building from the side of the pond, and set up defence.
Then someone tells Makashov that
the broadcast can be made from the building opposite.
And he, with a some of the supporters, crosses the Korolev Street.
Here they are in plain view for the fighters,
who are located on the roofs of both buildings.
[ Dmitriy Novikov, parliamentary correspondent of NTV. In 1993, the correspondent of the Latvian TV ]
Before my eyes, a man in camouflage loaded a grenade launcher.
Dmitry Novikov, a parliament correspondent of NTV,
and back then a Latvian TV journalist,
stood with a camera in his hands at the entrance to the ASK-3 building.
Befor his eyes, a man with a grenade launcher made a shot.
It was precisely the shot of the grenade launcher
that served as a trigger
in order for everything else to develop further
according to a combat scenario.
I remember very well how I was thrown back by the shock wave.
And I was scalded by this hot air.
Who was this man with a grenade launcher,
and where did the grenade launcher come from?
[ Leonid Proshkin, in 1993, Senior investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the RF, head of the investigative team investigating the events of the 3rd – 4th of October 1993 ]
This grenade launcher was captured
from the fighters of the internal troops near the City Hall.
We managed to ascertain that it was brought here by the civilians.
The shot from this grenade launcher went to the side.
There was a flowerbed there.
The investigative group of the Prosecutor General’s Office found out that
people inside the TV centre couldn’t die from shots from the street.
There were two victims here.
Video engineer Krasilnikov was killed by an aimed shot
to the head in the inner corridor of the building.
It’s not shot through from the outside.
While the special forces officer Sitnikov was killed when
he was behind a marbleparapet with the fighters of “Vityaz”.
The investigation found that there was an explosion here.
But there were no traces of a grenade launcher shot
from the street at the site of Sitnikov’s death.
However, these two victims and a loud shot on the street
give for the fighters of “Vityaz” a reason to open
heavy fire from inside the building at the people on the street.
“Vityaz” are shooting to kill.
The street is wide open. There are even no trees.
Most people are unarmed.
They can be easily shot, like figures at a shooting range.
However, to the aid of the special forced, shooting from
from the two TV centre buildings, an APC arrives.
And one of them is carrying a red flag.
It first shoots at the façades of the buildings,
as if imitating an assault on them.
And when people rise, thinking that their protection has come,
the machine gun of the APC turns around
and shoots directly at the crowd.
46 people were killed on the street of Academician Korolev that evening.
Among the dead are foreign and Russian journalists,
as well as ordinary bystanders.
It’s a Sunday evening, and nearby are VDNH
and Ostankino Park, where people go for a walk.
[ Ilya Konstantinov, in 1993, the Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the RF, co-chairman of the “National Salvation Front” ]
A terrible scene happened in front of my eyes.
I saw a drunk man with an accordion…
He came from somewhere.
There were some ladies with him, not in the most sober of states either.
He was walking, playing the accordion and singing songs.
People told him, shouted to him not to go there.
There’s shooting there.
He just waved his hand and said, “Get away from me.”
And so he walked with his accordion and songs.
He walked along Korolev Street,
towards the TV centre, until he was cut over by a machine gun.
In front of my eyes.
[ Victor Anpilov, in 1993, chairman of the executive committee of the movement “Labour Russia” ]
And then, when everything was over,
I took a suburban train to the city centre.
Personally, I realised that the battle was lost.
However, few people were foreseeing Kremlin’s victory with such certainty on the night of October 4.
It seemed the city was plunged into chaos.
But even chaos has clear outlines.
The “Dniestr” battalion receives in the White House
the task to move out to the building of ITAR/TASS.
Rutskoy’s appeal to the people is sent there.
At the building, the Transnistrians
almost engage in a battle with the internal troops.
Those received information that
the main information agency of the country is being captured by Chechen.
The officers managed to peacefully resolve the conflict.
But the documents, found in the building
did not leave any chance for a peaceful outcome.
[ Alexandr Kovalev, in 1993, an officer of the “Dniestr” battalion, Transnistrian Moldavian Republic ]
Having gained access to the building of TASS,
we found documents of special importance.
The documents said that
in case of the victory of the Red-Brown plague and Rutskoy’s coming to power –
and the message was written by the US Secretary of State –
the United States and the Armed Forces of the USA
take upon themselves the responsibility to enter the territory of Russia
and take under protection important and especially important objects.
Here is footage of Moscow that night.
A bloody battle is going on near Ostankino,
while on the central streets,
there is a strange mixture of silence and revolutionary disorder.
Mayor Luzhkov and Yegor Gaidar appeal to the Muscovites with a request
to come to the building of the City Hall on Tverskaya street in defence of President Yeltsin.
Unarmed people go to the square with the monument to Yuri Dolgoruky.
But it looks more like a folk festival.
– Are you pouring it for me? – Yes, yes, yes.
– It’s for everyone. Let them sign up.
[ Alexandr Ostrovsky, historian, author of the book “1993. Shooting of the “White House” ]
People really poured there, I even know some of them.
I still have one good acquaintance
who participated in the Perestroika movement.
He said: “When I heard of it, I decided that nothing would remain of Perestroika.”
“I didn’t want Andropov, Brezhnev, and especially Stalin, to come back.”
The Central Television turned off the broadcasts,
but from the studio on Yamskoe Pole,
the liberal intelligentsia is agitatedly broadcasting to the whole country.
Our poor homeland is in danger. Do not sleep!
Terrible things threaten us. The Communists will come back again.
They’re killing our peaceful population.
They’re killing the policemen who must protect us.
And they are protecting us not from thieves,
not from murderers, not from robbers, not from rapists.
They are protecting us from those who protect the Constitution.
What kind of damned Constitution is this?
And where is our army?
Why doesn’t it protect us from this damned Constitution?
At this time Boris Yeltsin is already sleeping peacefully.
But just in case, Boris Berezovsky offers
to buy helicopters for the evacuation of the president, but…
only through his trusted middlemen.
[ Alexander Nevzorov, in 1993, a TV journalist, author and anchor of the program “600 seconds” ]
Crazy little Boris [Berezovsky] was the one fussing the most.
He was convinced that it was impossible to evacuate using the allocated helicopters,
so, it was paramount to urgently buy helicopters somewhere through him,
and save Boris Nikolaevich using only on these helicopters,
as it would be unrealistic to save him with the other helicopters.
And as for all the generals,
all sorts of intelligence officers and special forces,
they were naturally nervous with anticipation.
And they felt this nervousness on their, let’s say, not so slim buttocks,
all the while trying to perceive in which direction the wind will be blowing.
[ Victor Baranec, in 1993, Head of the Information Department of the Ministry of Defence ]
Another thing that I vividly remember is, of course, the panic mood
on the floors of the Ministry of Defence and the General Staff.
Inside, there appeared some people with guns,
wrapped in duct tape Afghani-style.
It also looked kind of mad.
I also remember the conversations about how Gaidar called in a panic,
demanding the Army not to hesitate and
go to the aid of those, who support Yeltsin.
To which one of the generals replied to him angrily on phone,
you bring bags of money, and we’ll figure it out later.
I remembered this well too.
[ Alexander Nevzorov, in 1993, a TV journalist, author and anchor of the program “600 seconds” ]
While here there were romantic old men
with uniforms full of medals,
dressed-up Cossacks and Barkashovites,
then the other country,
which consisted of regular workers of the authorities,
it naturally remembered 1991,
when it turned out that
it was so easy, so comfortable, and so profitable to betray.
And so they were looking for
the opportunity, and waiting for this moment
when it would be possible to betray again.
But since the romantic country, the Soviet country,
had neither strategy, nor tactics, nor real leaders,
it turned out that there’s no one to betray.
One would like to betray someone, but there is no one to betray
In the seeming chaos, money still had to be counted exactly.
Deputy Minister of Finance, Andrey Vavilov
gets instructions from Prime Minister Chernomyrdin:
To procure a billion roubles in cash, let the government have it at hand.
[ Andrey Vavilov, in 1993, First Deputy Minister of Finance of the RF ]
At some point, Chernomyrdin called me
and said, we need money in cash.
Then Boris Fedorov arrived, the Minister of Finance, and we went…
We went to think where to get the money.
Hodorkovsky arrived, and brought $300,000 in cash.
And Gusinsky arrived.
Gusinsky said,
“I’m ready, I have a lot of security services,”
“they’re ready to fight on your side,”
“but I can’t give money,”
“because if you suddenly lose,”
“I need to have something left for living.”
On his cherry-coloured Lada 2109,
the 30-year-old deputy minister goes to the “Goznak” factory.
Next to him is only a guard with a machine gun,
while the path leads through the anarchic Moscow.
[ Andrey Vavilov, in 1993, First Deputy Minister of Finance of the RF ]
I was driving, he took a machine gun, sat in the front seat,
and we quickly reached “Goznak” (state printing services)
on Lyusinovskaya Street.
It was not so far away.
I remember driving almost without rules,
some paces on the side-walks to take short-cuts.
The main thing was to get there at high speed.
So we got there, they prepared a kind of a box with money,
we threw it in the trunk, sat back, and I brought it.
There were a lot of talk about where they were used.
They were not used anywhere.
They were just lying in a safe on the Old Square.
A couple of days later, when it all ended,
I took them to the Ministry of Finance,
and then they were simply taken back to “Goznak”.
They were not used,
they were not unpacked, nothing happened to them.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
Meanwhile, everything quietened down in the Ministry of Defence,
all the windows were draped, silence…
No one is about to do anything.
No one is going to neither storm the White House,
nor to clean up Ostankono.
The troops have stopped at the level of MKAD (Moscow Ring Road).
The Taman (motor rifle) Division, the Kantemir (tank) Division, paratroopers, no one enters Moscow.
We had to wake up Yeltsin,
to sort it out, because if you don’t give Grachev an order,
then he’ll be procrastinating.
But the night meeting in the General Staff is difficult.
The Army is noticeably hesitant.
Minister of Defence, Pavel Grachev, demands a written order from Yeltsin to use force.
[ Sergey Filatov, in 1993, Head of the Administration of the President of the RF, B.Yeltsin. ]
He says, “Boris Nikolaevich, I need a written order.”
They looked at each other for a long time.
Yeltsin did not say a word,
but instead Chernomyrdin went at him.
“What order do you need?
“Do you not see that gangs have appeared?”
“The bandits are at large in Moscow.”
“You must do it by the virtue of your position and stop this outrage.”
“What kind of order do you need?”
Well, he yelled at him, so Grachev said, okay.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
When I realised that Yeltsin was angry,
the President was angry, the Commander-in-Chief was angry,
and none of his high-ranking generals
could say anything, I got up,
as a civilian – I was in civilian clothes.
I say, “Boris Nikolaevich, I feel that you are not achieving anything here.”
“I have a deputy, a former saboteur.”
“He has a plan on how to deal with the White House.”
The assault plan had already been approved.
It was supposed to be a demonstrative show of reprisal.
Tanks were supposed to demonstrate the strength of the state.
The first to arrive at the House of Soviets at dawn on October 4,
are unidentified APCs with armed civilians.
Listen, they are not uniformed.
It’s not clear who they are.
They are not in uniform, guys, they are in civilian jackets, yes.
[ Victor Baranec, in 1993, Head of the Information Department of the Ministry of Defence ]
Among them were many whom I mentioned earlier,
who ran around at night with machine guns, wrapped in duct tape –
the so-called “Afghan group” that supported Pavel Sergeyevich.
They rushed there not because of the political convictions,
or because they loved Grachev so much.
They owned a very serious business in oil, gas and other thing.
They understood that it’s “game over” if power changes hands.
Some are still hiding abroad to this day, “the winners”,
because they on the wanted list.
So they were the first to go there.
Now they started shooting.
This moment will remain for a long time in the subsequent mythology
as “the attack of the militants of Beitar”,
members of the Jewish Nationalist Organisation.
The ignominious “Beitar” will also be associated with the snipers,
who will soon open fire in all directions.
[ Benni (Evgeniy) Briskin, in 1993 – the leader of the Russian division of the Jewish organisation “Beitar” ]
Beitar is a youth movement – a kind of “Boy Scouts” or a “Pioneer” movement –
a subsidiary of the Israeli movement “Likud”.
Therefore, I think, someone joked – I remember,
that after the events of 1993, there was a joke of that time,
that “Beitar” sounds like a “BTR” (an APC).
Therefore, it’s already scary, right?
In fact, of course, there were never any snipers.
F*** it, sniper!
From the windows of the White House, one can see
how the police and military units are converging on it.
[ Andey Dunaev, in 1993, First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the RF. Between 21.09.93 and 04.10.93 – Acting Minister of Internal Affairs of the RF, according to the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
And I see that Barkashov’s men broke the window,
installed machine guns,
and then the police drove up.
And those are my friends.
I’ve served with them for a long time,
and now they’ll be killed on my watch.
Literally pointing the gun at them I said,
Stop, look, there shouldn’t be a single shot made.
At the same time, towards the White House,
to the area of ​​the broken encirclement,
from different sides, there come APCs of the internal troops,
and the troops of the Ministry of Defence.
Some vehicles go to the White House along the Rodzhidelskaya street,
others turn off the Krasnopresnenskaya embankment and into Glubokij alley.
Upon seen each other at shooting distance,
the units open a chaotic counter fire.
The troops have no coordination.
They don’t understand where the enemy is,
and shoot at any shadow, especially an armed one.
[ Leonid Proshkin, in 1993, Senior investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the RF, head of the investigative team investigating the events of the 3rd – 4th of October 1993 ]
The division of the internal troops, on the morning of the 4th, managed to fight
with the Taman Division, with the Kantemirov Division,
and with the 119th Parachute Airborne Regiment.
I think there were 9 killed there.
Receiving such chaotic news from the Krasnopresnenskaya embankment,
Yeltsin demands that the elite “Alpha” group is sent into the assault.
But the special forces understand that getting involved
in this affair can become a disgrace.
Commander Zaytsev says that he does not intend to shoot
at the elected deputies and civilians.
[ Gennadiy Zaytsev, in 1993, commander of Group A (“Alpha”) ]
Do you refuse to carry out the order of the President?
Once again, heavy silence.
Captain Yemelyanov of the 119th Parachute Airborne Regiment,
in the meantime, positions his unit for the assault of the House of Soviets.
He has no comms with the internal troops,
and he does not know what is happening on the other side of the White House.
By that moment, his regiment had already lost five officers.
They are being shot at by snipers from the houses behind them.
They were preparing to engage in battle the defenders of the Parliament,
while the bullets came from the other side.
[ Andrey Yemelyanov, in 1993, Captain of the 119th Parachute Airborne Regiment ]
After we took up positions under the fence,
several bullets hit this fence from the rear.
I realised that we were shot at by the snipers,
who set up either on the roof of the House of Soviets,
the COMECON building, or some other high-rise.
The f**-ing snipers.
At this time, inside the building, the Parliament defender Valery Smirnov,
is preparing to repel the attack of Captain Yemelyanov.
He sees from the large windows of the dining room,
how the 119th Regiment takes up positions in the square of Pavlik Morozov.
He also sees shot traces on the glass panes,
but he notices that the bullets are flying into the White House along a strange trajectory.
[ Valery Smirnov, in 1993, co-chairman of the National Salvation Front ]
And if you trace the trajectory of the entrance hole and the impact hole,
they clearly point to the roof of the American Embassy.
This fact surprised me so much that I came up to several holes.
To see if I made a mistake? No, I did not.
The 119th Regiment set up its positions around the building,
but Captain Yemelyanov leads his soldiers from under the fire and inside,
through the broken windows of the eastern façade.
He sees a large congregation of people in the entrance hall.
[ Andrey Yemelyanov, in 1993, Captain of the 119th Parachute Airborne Regiment ]
Moreover, there were all sorts.
A Gypsy camp near the stairs,
a little further, near the internal windows, there was a school class with a teacher.
People were gathered in the foyer of the White House,
basically, in order to be sacrificed.
It was necessary to compromise Yeltsin’s regime,
and the government of that time.
Naturally, it would not have been possible to hide the death
of so many people in the foyer of the White House,
and, accordingly, it would have had a great public response.
Apparently, people were gathered there for this purpose.
On this footage, shot back then in the White House,
it can be seen how the 27-year-old Captain Yemelyanov
goes directly to General Makashov and his guards.
– Who am I talking to? – General Makashov.
– Who are you? Where is the senior officer? – I am the senior officer.
– Put the gun on the ground. – Where is the senior officer?
I am the senior officer.
Please cooperate. We will not shoot.
Put the gun down.
Everything is fine, put the gun down.
Lower the guns.
Already lowered.
Who are you?
[ Albert Makashov, Colonel-General, between 21.09.93 and 04.10.93 is the Vice Defence Minister of RF, as per the Supreme Soviet ]
I say, fool, put the gun down,
otherwise, God forbid, you will shoot.
And there was a narrow corridor there,
and I say, well, people will tear you apart here.
I say, throw him out into the street,
otherwise, God forbid, we’ll be responsible for him here.
He turned around and left.
Women!
We will not go.
It’s you who won’t go, but other women…
Others don’t want to. Women!
It’s ugly, really.
Come on, sort it out among yourselves.
Sort out what?
And I promise on my part to take out all the people who have no weapons.
Captain, be careful.
What guarantees do you give that you will not kill them all?
Captain Emelyanov still manages to agree
on a safe exit of a part of the people from the building.
His soldiers accompany them almost to the subway.
[ Andrey Yemelyanov, in 1993, Captain of the 119th Parachute Airborne Regiment ]
From the basement, we managed to evacuate almost all the people.
I, through my radio officer,
passed the information to the battalion HQ
about my negotiations with Makashov and Rutskoy,
and that for surrender they need a representative of the state power,
who can guarantee their lives.
[ Hieromonk Nikon (Sergey Belavenec), in 1993, Rector of the Trinity Church in village Yazvische of the Volokolamsk region ]
I was a participant in the negotiations with Captain Andrey Emelyanov
of the 119th Parachute Airborne Regiment,
who at some point just came to the defenders in the area of the main stairs
and said, let’s somehow solve the issue of women and children here.
I saw a normal Russian officer in front of me,
not someone bloodthirsty.
In general, I felt the pain, the tragedy of a civil war.
At the same time, through another exit,
President of Ingushetia Ruslan Aushev and President ofKalmykia Kersan Ilyumzhinov take people out.
[ Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, in 1993, President of the Republic of Kalmykiya ]
There were a lot of women who worked in the canteen.
When we’ve already penetrated there,
they said, “Kersan, come on, help us,
how can we get out?”
There are a lot of people there.
They just couldn’t get out,
who are not deputies, but just servicemen.
Tanks go out on the bridge.
They stand for a while without shooting.
The shells were not brought in,
and before that, they hadn’t been able to crew them.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
When Yeltsin asked, will there be 10 tanks at 7 o’clock?
No.
Where are the tanks?
There are tanks, but there are no tankmen.
Tankmen are gathering potatoes.
Well, the soldiers are gathering potatoes,
let the officers sit in the tanks and go.
[ Victor Baranec, in 1993, Head of the Information Department of the Ministry of Defence ]
In fact, all the tank crews were from officers,
who were processed in advance.
I managed to find the captain.
I will call him Rusakov.
I interviewed him.
He openly said that they were promised a bag of money
for the completion of this task.
Tanks make the first shots.
CNN channel broadcasts live.
It is difficult to find a more successful battlefield in Moscow.
On the one side there is CNN office,
on the other, the American embassy.
As if on purpose, at the request of a film director.
[ Alexander Nevzorov, in 1993, a TV journalist, author and anchor of the program “600 seconds” ]
There was a big dispute between the TV broadcasting side
and the generals.
As a result, the TV crew bribed some general,
and placed the tank in the most beautiful spot.
CNN crew carefully arranged the tank.
The tank would’ve shot without them,
but they asked “not from there”, as leaves were still on the trees then.
Tankmen on the bridge adjust the direction of the fire.
The next shell hits the window of this office on the 15th floor.
The room is small.
The destruction is very strong.
No one can still give an exact answer,
how many people were here at that moment.
Direct hit does not leave a chance.
But likely, most of the inhabitants of the upper floors
went down by the time of the tank attack on the White House.
It is safer there, in the interior.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
Tanks shot with blanks.
No one shot with real shells.
If you shoot with a shell,
they would have demolished a few floors of the White House.
[ Sergey Leschenko, in 1993, officer of the “Dniestr” battalion of the Transnistrian Moldavian Republic ]
What blanks?
Are you kidding me? As if I haven’t seen blanks.
Alexander Vladimirovich was on the 15th floor,
and then we went down to the 5th floor in the morning.
Later, when someone from the higher-ups from the other side said,
well, we were shooting on the 15th floor.
Guys, you knew perfectly well where you were shooting.
You were shooting exactly where Rutskoy had been before.
You just didn’t know that before that we had gone down.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
So, one shell hit my office.
I went to the lounge room.
I had a jacket hanging there.
It was cool in the morning.
And I went into this room to put on this jacket.
And a shell flies into the office.
I went out…
You had to see it.
But here is the head of the RNU, Alexander Barkashov,
for the first time in 20 years, telling his version of these events.
According to him, the shelling of the White House from tanks
is a staged performance.
He himself corrects fire at empty rooms,
staying in direct contact with the Minister of Defence, Pavel Grachev,
whom everyone considers to be faithful to president Yeltsin.
[ Alexandr Barkashov, in 1993, leader of the Russian National Unity movement ]
Most likely, it was done to show
what kind of barbarian Yeltsin is,
how he disregards the Constitution,
and that he expels the Supreme Soviet deputies
with the help of tanks, over satellite phone.
We talked to Grachev.
He explained everything to us.
That’s the whole song.
He is no longer among us,
I would like to say about this man
that he was not on the side of Yeltsin,
so there was such a historical truth.
I just know for sure that he was on our side.
And he would have done everything that had to be done,
if not for this weakness within the Supreme Soviet,
which broke the situation.
[ Victor Baranec, in 1993, Head of the Information Department of the Ministry of Defence ]
Grachev, said in one interview,
we simply knew the location,
we shot at those halls where there were no people.
This is the only thing one needs to say, thank you, Pavel Sergeevich.
This is literally a theater of military actions.
All houses roofs and embankments
are covered with people like a mezzanine at a premiere.
Random passer-bys are dying from sniper bullets.
An officer of the “Alpha” group is killed.
They can’t decide whether to storm the White House or not.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
The group stopped to faltering when the lieutenant was killed.
When he was dragging out a wounded soldier
from the battlefield,
he bent down,
and a sniper bullet hit him under the bulletproof vest.
And he died.
[ Gennadiy Zaytsev, in 1993, commander of Group A (“Alpha”) ]
It was not coming from the White House.
It was a sniper’s shot.
It was made, I think, with the aim to make the personnel angry
so that they would rush at to the White House
and destroy everything right and left.
But this did not happen.
These elusive snipers are the main mystery of those events.
Everyone saw that they were shooting, but no one saw them.
And those who saw them, will never speak.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
Korzhakov received weapons from the Sofrinskaya Brigade.
(Sofrinskaya: 21st Separate Operational Brigade of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the RF)
While the snipers came to the Vnukovo airport
where Korzhakov met them.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
Shots came only from the White House.
[ Leonid Proshkin, in 1993, Senior investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the RF, head of the investigative team investigating the events of the 3rd – 4th of October 1993 ]
Bullet does not choose.
Bullets fly in different directions.
A machine gun volley could have gone badly off
And the bullet just flew into the window.
But there were a lot of people among the killed,
who did not have anything to do with this.
Here the soldiers spotted a sniper
on the roof of one of the houses
on the corner of the Garden Ring and Novy Arbat.
But it is not so easy to suppress his firing point.
That building, you see?
Towards the Kalinisky Avenue and the building on the right,
From 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. they couldn’t smoke the snipers out of there,
despite the intense fire that almost everyone present there conducted.
Schoolgirl Marina Kurysheva waited out that day with a friend in her grandmother’s apartment.
Come on, quick!
She came to the kitchen window
and the sniper hit her right in the neck.
In this footage you can see
how Marina’s father desperately tries to save his only daughter.
The doctors took too long to arrive.
She was 16 years old.
At this moment it’s dangerous to walk the stairs of the White House.
They fire at the windows almost non-stop,
especially at any movement inside.
All the space on the street is also shot through.
One can neither exit the building nor pick up the dead and wounded.
I feel sorry for the man.
Oh, f—, I know him!
Who?
A guy from he second battalion, I know him.
According to the official statistics,
against 62 machine guns of the security detail of the Supreme Soviet,
and a total of 900 firearms that were in the building,
during the day of October 4,
the Kremlin musters:
80 armoured personnel carriers,
10 tanks,
60 airborne amphibious infantry fighting vehicles,
20 assault infantry fighting vehicles,
15 combat reconnaissance patrol vehicles,
60 additional armored vehicles
of the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Internal Affairs,
and over 40,000 servicemen.
The army units, not counting the troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs,
used 32,000 machine gun bullets.
Inside the White House, there were found 157 shot casings.
[ Recording of Rutskoy ]
I beg the comrades in arms
those who hear me,
come immediately to help at the building of the Supreme Soviet.
If the pilots hear me,
take off in your planes.
This gang has squatted in the Kremlin
and in the Ministry of Internal Affairs
and from there leads the management.
[ Alexandr Rutskoy, in 1993, vice President of the RF, from 21.09.93 to 04.10.94 acting President of the RF, according to the version of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
These are emotions, you see.
These are the emotions from under the intense shelling.
And you know, not only emotions against the backdrop of this shelling,
but also the emotions of disappointment.
Guys, there was a medical station at the 20th entrance.
Surgeons were sitting there.
The 20th entrance.
Now we turn right, drag him there and then down slowly.
We won’t pass along the stairs.
We’ll pass.
I’m off.
Let’s go.
Guys, who knew this one?
Nobody knew him, to be honest.
Who knew him?
This is probably his wallet.
Half an hour ago or later.
But just a kilometer away,
an ordinary Moscow life continues.
The subway works,
only the metro bridge opposite the White House is closed.
Shops and stalls are working,
a symbol of a new economic era.
At the same time, some special services officers
ask Sergey Isakov, who headed back then a small airlibe,
to prepare a plane to take out of the besieged White House its leaders.
The leaders, however, refuse to flee.
Then it was decided to take out a detachment of the Russian National Unity
under the command of Aleksander Barkashov.
Their introduction into the defence of the White House was a mystery,
and so too was their leaving it.
[ Sergey Isakov, in 1993, head of a private airline ]
Yura came, brought a pillowcase filled with passports,
with special devices for making passports.
And a specialist.
I don’t know where they came from, but passports of such a series,
and generally foreign passports, they just don’t appear.
That’s why I say that not everything was so unambiguous in the country.
The detachment of the Russian National Unity
leaves through the underground communications.
The Barkashovs have already lost one firefighter in the shoot-out.
They come to the surface, in one of Moscow districts.
Now their task, as ordinary Muscovites, is to get to the airport.
A completely new plane is waiting for them there, which they,
simple mechanics according to the new documents,
will accompany for painting to the Dutch city of Maastricht.
[ Sergey Isakov, in 1993, head of a private airline ]
They took one plane,
which was not even painted.
It was in green factory painting.
They changed on the field one number,
painting it right on the hull.
With a brush.
At this time, the Alpha group enters the building of the Supreme Soviet.
The officers of the special forces ask over the radio to stop firing,
but the frequencies of all units are different,
and negotiations have to be conducted to the sound of shooting.
Most of the deputies who remained in the building during the assault
are in this hall, where the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet usually convened.
This is the least dangerous room for such a group of people.
It is located inside the building,
and even small windows in the foyer overlook the courtyard.
Neither a stray nor a targeted bullet will reach here.
It’s in this hall that the commander of the “Alpha” group will enter with a white flag
to make a surrender proposal to the deputies,
which it is already impossible to refuse.
[ Gennadiy Zaytsev, in 1993, commander of Group A (“Alpha”) ]
We said, there are two options:
Either we create a corridor from the Alpha to the side of the embankment,
where there will be buses that will take everyone
who is in the White House to the nearest metro stations.
If this option is not accepted, then in 20 minutes
we will start the assault on the White House.
[ Alexandr Barkashov, in 1993, leader of the Russian National Unity movement ]
Then the Alpha tried to penetrate through the underground communications,
but we took them prisoner.
The colonel, the major and the captain.
They say, we are negotiators, so we lead them to the deputies.
Along the way comes Makashov.
“Stand and tremble, I’m an Army General!”
Or was it lieutenant, I don’t remember…
“Who are you? Introduce yourselves?”
They do so.
Leave them be!
They are going to the deputies, so let them.
On one of the lower floors of the House of Soviets,
Father Alexei Zlobin performs the sacrament of baptism.
Several deputies decided to become Orthodox Christians.
In an office, hastily converted into a church,
there came dozens of people.
Even some communist deputies take baptism in these minutes.
[ Alexei Zlobin, Archpriest, rector of the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin in the village Gorodnya-upon-Volga, in 1993 the Deputy of the Supreme Soviet ]
I baptised probably 15 people.
Took confession and gave communion to 70-80 people.
I look, there is a long, thin barrel.
An Alpha came out of it.
He saw me and said, Father get ready, we will lead you all out
from out of this fire.
They were on different sides of the front.
General Zaytsev and a priest-deputy.
But since then, the former Alpha commander
is a frequent guest in Tver region, in an ancient church,
where Father Alexei has been serving for 5 decades.
[ Gennadiy Zaytsev, in 1993, commander of Group A (“Alpha”) ]
I want to tell you as at a confession
that in the White House
we did not make a single shot.
No one was killed by our hands.
I say frankly, if we had executed the President’s order,
I would not be sitting in front of you now.
It would have meant hands soaked in blood.
But when Alpha is preparing to take people out,
the rest of the units open heavy fire on the building.
While on the street, the “defenders of democracy”, summoned by Gaidar,
are ready to tear apart everyone who leaves the White House.
At this time, General Korzhakov is squeezing a gun.
He has a verbal order from the President not to take Rutskoy and Hasbulatov alive.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
I had Yeltsin’s personal order
that it was better not to leave neither of the two alive.
But the fact is, for that it was needed to find a secluded spot
Not simply [shoot] in public view.
When we rushed the ground floor,
there were about 100 deputies
and they covered the two leaders with their bodies.
Meanwhile, deputy Baburin leaves the building with a group of other deputies.
They are not touched, taken outside, and let go.
But Baburin is stopped.
[ Sergey Baburin. In 1993, Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the RF ]
Two special forces fighters argued for the honour of shooting me.
Then came other [officers].
When these two enthusiasts
got distracted by other detainees,
they took me away from this wall
and sent me to the prison cell.
There are people who know the truth.
But Alexander Kоrzhakov, although he writes memoirs, is silent.
This topic is taboo for him.
In a private conversation, he told me a lot.
In particular, he confirmed that he had a verbal order to liquidate me.
[ Alexander Korzhakov, in 1993, head of Security service of President Yeltsin ]
Come on, he shouldn’t lie.
Sergey does everything for own benefit.
Well, he didn’t manage to win.
There was nothing like that.
So he needs to invent something.
Meanwhile, deputy Oleg Rumyantsev goes to the adjacent street,
but it turns out that it’s not easy to get to the subway.
[ Oleg Rumyantsev, in 1993, deputy of the supreme Soviet, executive secretary of the Constitutional Commission of the RF ]
We passed towards the Nikolaev street
where we became witnesses to the lynching
with the defenders of the White House,
who were undressed, beaten, their ribs got broken, and so on.
[ Yuri Zhukov, Doctor of Historical Sciences, in 1993, deputy from the Krasnopresnensky district Soviet of Moscow ]
I saw a scene that I will never forget until my very death.
From there, from the alley, people in camouflage, in black masks
took out people who, as I understood it,
were the very defenders of the White House,
put them against the wall and shot in front of everyone.
Go straight!
Straight ahead.
No, a dead body!
The official number of the victims is 123 people.
The defenders of the House of Soviets speak of thousands of victims.
[ Alexandr Barkashov, in 1993, leader of the Russian National Unity movement ]
As for the large number of victims, I can say that
the victims from our side are, of course, greatly exaggerated.
Of all my people who were in the White House, two people died.
The main victims came when the APCs broke through at 4 a.m.
There was such a camp there.
Some elderly women, some children, some diggers joined in.
They were crushed by tanks
and they died from the bullets that came out of the APCs.
[ Leonid Proshkin, in 1993, Senior investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the RF, head of the investigative team investigating the events of the 3rd – 4th of October 1993 ]
Back then we checked all over Russia, in every region, all missing persons.
I don’t want to argue very much.
I say, give me the last names.
But the dead, they would have to be de-registered, they stopped working,
they stopped feeding their families.
They were mostly men, after all.
The investigation was wrapped up a few months after the events
when the new State Duma accepted the amnesty.
But the team of investigator Proshkin was able to establish for sure
that none of the victims was killed by weapons
located in the White House.
Weapons of the military units used on October 3 and 4,
were prohibited to be taken for expertise.
On the evening of October 4, 1993,
the President of Russia explains to his people the political situation:
Everything that happened and is still happening in Moscow
was an armed coup, planned in advance.
I appeal to the citizens of Russia.
The armed fascist-communist coup in Moscow…
Asshole.
…will be suppressed in the shortest timeframe.
It is organised by communist revanchists, fascist leaders,
a part of former deputies, representatives of the Soviets.
Under the guise of negotiations, they amassed strength…
This is an amazing document of the epoch.
Not a single thesis of Yeltsin’s appeal correspond to reality.
But the country, exhausted by the long decay,
so wanted to hear simple and clear explanations.
The White House is still smoking
and not all the dead are buried,
but passers-by are already taking selfies against the blackened windows.
Until the start of the repairs,
the Parliament building, where it is now decided to locate the government,
is closed for almost a week.
During this time, as the investigation and the State Duma Commission established,
property worth 376,131,559 roubles were stolen.
[ Leonid Proshkin, in 1993, Senior investigator of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the RF, head of the investigative team investigating the events of the 3rd – 4th of October 1993 ]
A lot of weapons were stolen,
which, by the way, were later sold by officers of the internal troops,
including to the bandits.
[ Ruslan Hasbulatov, in 1993, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of RF ]
There are tens of millions of dollars there.
Paintings, golden weapons, dishes, ceramics….
Well, very valuable.
They drove the crane to the window
and pulled out the paintings and everything through the window.
In Moscow there are patrols and curfew.
At this time, the Barkashov’s detachment is already flying to Europe.
Yak-42 lands in Maastricht
and the passengers are awaited by cars with diplomatic plates.
The secret well-wishers of the special services took care of the cover.
[ Sergey Isakov, in 1993, head of a private airline ]
Several cars arrived, minibuses,
with diplomatic plates.
From Germany, from Belgium…
and I think, from France.
They were taken apart by groups, by surnames.
And they were driven off.
It literally took 10-15 minutes.
And Sergey Isakov saw that plane almost 20 years later in TV news.
Yak-42 fell near Yaroslavl with the “Locomotive” hockey team on board.
Behind the steering wheel was the same pilot
who steered the unpainted plane
on its first flight to Maastricht in October 1993.
It was from October 1993
that a completely new era of Russia began.
Later would come two Chechen wars,
a default, terrorist attacks.
The sunset of Yeltsin’s liberal circle will begin almost immediately.
Not believing in the Constitution,
not believing in the laws being adopted,
not believing that your participation can change anything,
these are the macro consequences that we have to face today.
[ Ruslan Hasbulatov, in 1993, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of RF ]
To some extent, I am even gloating over today’s liberals.
Now they are not happy both with the Constitution and Putin.
But listen! You created this Constitution!
You eliminated the parliament from power!
You transferred all power to two top executive officials,
the President and the Prime Minister.
So you got what you wanted.
[ Alexander Nevzorov, in 1993, a TV journalist, author and anchor of the program “600 seconds” ]
When the last Soviet person, brought up back then, dies,
then, probably, all this will be annulled,
and the taste of the former empire, not of this caricature of Russia,
a shameful one,
but that real empire,
on the wreckage of which the hut called “Russia” was hastily cobbled together,
then it will disappear forever.
One of the first decisions of the new Duma
will be the announcement of amnesty
to all participants of the events of autumn 1993.
An the investigation was stopped almost immediately.
The conclusions of the investigation rocked the impressions, instilled in the masses
about a fair battle between good and evil.
It was easier to announce amnesty and try to forget everything.
On October 5, when the upper floors of the House of Soviets were still smoking,
its ex-defender, Valery Smirnov, came by subway
to collect his parked car.
All is as before in this peaceful Moscow.
Subway, shops, traffic lights.
A person with a weapon and a bullet-proof vest get into the car next to him.
They briefly and calmly look at each other.
They get into their cars and drive apart.
They will never see each other again.
They were enemies, remained enemies,
but the returning peaceful life
does not give them a chance for confrontation,
although they both, having been to a two-day war in Moscow,
understand that everything in life is temporary,
including silence.
According to the official data, 154 people died on October 3 – 4 of 1993.