About the national meekness of the Great Russians (B. Sarnov). Troops in the steppe (Tale) (6 pages) Sergeant of the Khestanov Budyonny

In September 1914, on the German front west of Warsaw, a platoon of dragoons conducted reconnaissance deep behind enemy lines. Two dozen cavalrymen silently came out to the road. A German convoy was moving along it endlessly towards the front. The Kaiser's officers reasoned as follows: the convoy was huge, with two heavy machine guns and a horse-drawn battery. Only a large military unit can enter into battle with such forces, and a large formation cannot penetrate through the front.

Checkers for battle! Attack!

Hooray! “It seemed to the Germans that the front had been broken, they abandoned their rifles, and two officers who were trying to organize resistance were hacked to death. From the raid (as raids behind enemy lines were then called), the dragoons led 200 prisoners, 85 carts with warm clothes, 2 carts with revolvers and surgical instruments. All dragoons were awarded St. George medals "For bravery", and the non-commissioned officer was awarded the St. George Cross, 4th degree.

S. M. Budyonny - dragoon of the 26th Seversky Regiment. 1916

The order for the award was published in newspapers. This is how the name of Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny, non-commissioned officer of the 18th Seversky Dragoon Regiment, was heard throughout Russia for the first time.

The Cross of St. George is a special award. This is the only award that the king awarded to heroes. It was awarded either immediately on the battlefield, or by decision of the Council of St. George's Knights.

The soldier's "George" is the most honorable combat badge in the Russian army. Suffice it to say that a general who did not have such an award was obliged to salute the cavalier of St. George with the rank of private.

The Cross of St. George is evidence of personal courage. According to the statute of the order, the hero could not be deprived of this award.

S. M. Budyonny at the parade

But in 1914, statutes and regulations were being broken everywhere. The government tried to improve discipline, relying on the non-commissioned officers, and especially encouraged those sergeants who kept the soldiers at bay.

In the regiment where Semyon Mikhailovich served, the senior non-commissioned officer Khestanov was distinguished by his special fanaticism, who bullied the dragoons as best he could. Budyonny could not stand it and stood up for the soldiers.

It must be said that in addition to extraordinary courage, Budyonny also had extraordinary physical strength and dexterity. He could, as they say, “tie this monster with a sea knot.”

St. George's Cross of the first degree with a bow

And so, contrary to all the rules, Budyonny was deprived of the St. George Cross for speaking out against his senior rank. However, the award played a role in the fate of the future marshal: without it, Semyon Mikhailovich would have been shot.

The regiment in which Budyonny served was transferred to the Turkish front. Here Semyon Mikhailovich regained his award. He was again awarded the “George” of the 4th degree: while on reconnaissance, he not only obtained valuable information, but also captured an enemy battery.

Cavalry is not only about courage and the strength of a saber strike, daring and speed in attack. This is composure and calculation. For his participation in several attacks near Mendelij, where the young non-commissioned officer not only showed personal courage, but saved almost the entire platoon (this was under a machine-gun barrage!), Budyonny was awarded the St. George Cross, 3rd degree.

The dashing dragoons were especially distinguished in raids. It was here that the future marshal learned from his own experience the intricacies of operational, maneuverable warfare.

For twenty-two days, the platoon under the command of Budyonny walked around the rear, collecting information, disrupting communications, telephone communications, and looking for a weak point in the defense. On the way back, the dragoons took with them an enemy outpost. “George” of the 2nd degree appeared on the chest of an experienced front-line soldier.

And finally, again in reconnaissance, where S. M. Budyonny was sent for the “language,” he captured six Turkish soldiers and a non-commissioned officer. Semyon Mikhailovich's comrades were awarded St. George's Crosses, and he received the St. George's Cross of the 1st degree. From now on he is a full Knight of St. George. The full St. George cavaliers could be counted on one hand.

...There is an opinion about the Cossacks that they were “stranglers” of freedom, a blind instrument of tsarism. In all historical films about the Russian revolution, Cossacks with whips appear. I'm not going to prove that this is not true! But this is not the whole truth. The situation was much more complicated. The Cossack regiments had their own revolutionaries and their own heroes of the revolution, and there were mass revolutionary uprisings. Long before the revolution of 1917, a hundred of the 5th Don Cossack Regiment supported the uprising of the Lodz weavers with weapons in their hands, the whole hundred were put on trial, and Esul Rubtsov was sent to hard labor.

In 1905, six Cossack regiments rebelled. The Cossacks of the Khopersky regiment refused to disperse demonstrations in Moscow, the Cossacks of the second and third order did not report for police service throughout the Don. For campaigning and speaking out against the government at the head of his hundred, Ataman Kovalev, from the Gogolevsky farm, was sentenced to death. This was the case in all Cossack armies.

The Ural cornet Trofimov shot and killed a general during the dispersal of a labor demonstration in Chita by punitive forces.

In 1956, Arabian horses of the Terek Stud Farm took three first places in international horse racing in Poland for the main prize "Polish Derby".

The tsarist government tried to create support for the throne in the person of the Knights of St. George. They received a significant lifelong pension, their children studied for free in all educational institutions in Russia; St. George's gentlemen-farmers had their allotment increased and exempted from taxes.

But Budyonny immediately after the overthrow of the autocracy took the side of the revolution. The regiment remembered not only his courage, but also his justice and selflessness, when he, risking his life, stood up for the offended. And therefore Budyonny was unanimously elected chairman of the regimental and then divisional committee. This is where the future marshal met and began to work together with M.V. Frunze.

This is where the campaign of the legendary hero of the revolution, Red Marshal Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny, begins. Very little time will pass - and the First Cavalry will set off on the heroic march, and it will be led, according to the exact expression of the newspaper of that time, by the first saber of the young republic, the devoted son of the commune S. M. Budyonny!

For the battle near Brzeziny, the entire platoon was awarded medals, and Semyon was awarded the St. George Cross, 4th degree. The Kabardian prince was also awarded the soldier's cross, although all the dragoons believed that the prince had nothing to do with this matter. Soon the field mail delivered the Ogonyok magazine to the division. A story about the dashing attack was published there. The dragoons read and were surprised: all their trophies were exaggerated tenfold.

Are they lying? That's how they lie! Great! - laughed, looking at the magazine.

Why did they write this in Ogonyok? - Semyon showed the magazine to Ulagai.

“To encourage the spirit,” Ulagai answered him edifyingly.

Soon the regiment was transferred to the Caucasus (tsarist Russia was then at war with the Turks). Before the battles, the division rested. The officers also relaxed in their own way: they drank wine, played cards wildly, and gambled away soldiers' food and horse fodder. Both people and horses were starving. Nevertheless, every morning the soldier sounded the trumpet signal. Sergeant Khestanov took them out for drills. A sycophant before the officers, a bribe-taker by vocation, a fist by birth, a rude animal with his subordinates - such was Khestanov.

The soldiers hated him. They complained to Semyon: he was extorting the latter. For several days now the kitchens have not been heated - there is no lunch or dinner. The horses, poor creatures, can barely stand on their feet. How will they go into battle?

What could Semyon do? He spoke with the sergeant many times. I received the answer: “It’s none of your business, non-commissioned officer.” The sergeant-major hated Semyon and was jealous, especially after Semyon rode a horse named Spaniard. There was such a restive horse in the squadron, it was hard to deal with him. He bit off the ear of one dragoon, kicked another - they carried him to the infirmary on a stretcher, and chopped off the finger of a third. Although the squadron commander Krym-Shamkhalov was considered an expert in breaking horses, he could not break the Spaniard. And Semyon (it was not for nothing that he graduated from the equestrian school in St. Petersburg while on active service) rode the Spaniard and tamed him. Now the authorities favored Semyon, and Khestanov was afraid that Semyon would take his place. And Semyon despised the red-haired sergeant because he gave free rein to his hands, because he profited from soldiers’ grub and from dumb creatures - horses. The poor horse's stomach will give out, but he can't complain...

And when the dragoons began to murmur that the kitchens were not heated even today, Semyon said:

Here comes the sergeant. I told him many times. Now you ask yourself, but not one at a time, all at once...

When will we be fed? - the soldiers shouted.

The sergeant turned white, backed away, looked around to see if there was anyone behind him. This happened at the front: they’d shoot you in the back, and it wouldn’t last long. His vile soul sank to his feet. But the sergeant was immediately found.

Be silent! - he yelled heart-rendingly.

He knew that attacking everyone would not work. You need to attack one, separate it from the rest, and take revenge on one. On whom? Yes, on the non-commissioned officer who is striving to take his place. And before the dragoons came to their senses, Khestanov jumped up to Semyon, waved his fists, and yelled right in his face.

It was you who taught the soldiers to rebel! You've been under suspicion for a long time, you bastard!..

Now, when Semyon was telling the silent listeners about the past, he was reliving what he had experienced and saw the brutal face of the sergeant.

He poked me with his fist... here,” Semyon pointed to his cheekbone. - I didn’t see the light... He turned around and pushed Khestanov with all his might. He fell and didn’t get up... for a minute, then another... I thought: what if I killed him?..

“We should kill the bastard,” said Emelyan. - We caught one of these to death.

Semyon continued the story.

Khestanov woke up and jumped up. The soldiers rushed towards him, Semyon shouted: “Just don’t touch me! Why should everyone suffer because of this bastard? Khestanov ran away.

Everyone knew: he would complain. Hitting your boss is a crime. In wartime, a military court has only one sentence for this: death.

Did Semyon repent, did he reproach himself for acting rashly? No! He saw in front of him the hungry faces of the dragoons, the bruised face of the uncomplaining soldier Kuzmenko, beaten yesterday by the sergeant, the swollen eye of another... At the trial, at least, everything will become clear: he will speak loudly about the exploits of the sergeant.

The soldiers were silent. Semyon was also silent. For some reason, I remembered my whole life at once - my mother, the village, my wife, my sisters, their hut, rooted in the ground... Now it’s all over.

Suddenly the dragoon with his ear bitten off said quietly:

What about dragoons? After all, it wasn’t Semyon Mikhailovich who beat the sergeant...

Not Semyon Mikhailovich? Who then?

The dragoon with his ear bitten off continued, pointing to Kuzmenko, who had been beaten by the sergeant:

Yes, the one who mutilated both me and Kuzmenko yesterday... Mister Sergeant - everyone heard - claimed that Kuzmenko was a careless soldier, and came close to the Spaniard horse like me, a sinner. The Spaniard horse, that's who hit the sergeant in the face with his hoof! He won't be offended. Ay, well done!

The dragoons began to make noise: they began to discuss the proposal.

And at this time the sergeant returned, all bandaged, and not alone, but with his superiors. They lined up the soldiers and began to interrogate them. No one said that Semyon hit Khestanov. Everyone, as one, reported that the sergeant had carelessly approached the Spaniard’s horse at close range and... received a hoof in the face.

At night, Semyon was summoned by Crimea-Shamkhalov. He was playing cards in his tent. The orderly ordered to wait. He whispered: if the prince wins, he will become kinder, but if he loses, then hold on!

Semyon knew that the prince did not like to bring soldiers to justice: he dealt with them with his power. “I’ll punch you in the face, I won’t put you on trial, the soldiers love me for this,” Krym-Shamkhalov always boasted to everyone. Semyon listened to the shouts of the players. Does the squadron commander win or lose? Suddenly he heard someone's mocking voice:

Oh yes prince! This is such a thing! Budyonny... a serviceable non-commissioned officer... a hero who is written about in the newspapers - and suddenly a rebel. On trial! What are you talking about, prince? Give it to me - in return I’ll give you three... no, I’ll give you four non-commissioned officers!

Call Budyonny! - ordered Krym-Shamkhalov.

Go,” the orderly whispered to Semyon.

Budyonny entered the tent. The officers abandoned the game.

“I arrived on your orders, your honor,” Semyon rapped.

Well? What did you do there? - Putting the cards aside, asked Krym-Shamkhalov.

He was gloomy - there was almost no money left on the table next to him. So, you're a loser.

Well? Why did you beat the sergeant? Well? Speak!

No, I didn’t hit him, damn it,” Semyon answered. - Mr. Sergeant approached the Spaniard’s horse at a close distance. The Spaniard tormented him.

Krym-Shamkhalov jumped up. He was scary.

Have you seen a serviceable non-commissioned officer? Such people rebelled against the sovereign and the fatherland in the fifth year. They shot their officers in the back. Get out, you bastard! On trial!

With a measured step, Semyon left the tent. His heart sank. Here it is, death is near.

And... you were tried? - asked Philip.

At first I thought of running. I persuaded two more, wretched people like me, to leave together. But suddenly, at the very first crossing - we were going to the city of Karo, closer to the front - even before the overnight stop from which I was about to flee, the regiment was formed into a square. The regimental banner was carried into the middle. I heard the command: “Senior non-commissioned officer Budyonny to the middle of the regiment, gallop, march!” I gave spurs to my horse and galloped up to the regiment commander.

The adjutant read for a long time, I didn’t understand much, everything was confused in my head. I understood one word: they would shoot me. “To be shot,” the adjutant read clearly.

The system of maintaining troops that existed in the tsarist army gave officers the opportunity to freely dispose of the money that was allocated for the maintenance of soldiers and horses. The officers drank the money and lost it at cards, and the soldiers starved. In Alexanderdorf, things got to the point where they completely stopped preparing food for the soldiers of our regiment and giving out fodder to the horses.

I remember how once, in my presence, the sergeant of the squadron, Bondarenko, turned to captain Krym-Shamkhalov-Sokolov with a request to release money for food for the soldiers:

The soldiers are starving, your honor.

The captain swore obscenely, and then threw three rubles out of his pocket and shouted:

Here, buy them a cart of wood, let them gnaw!

Soon after this, sergeant Bondarenko left the regiment due to illness, and senior non-commissioned officer Khestanov remained acting sergeant. He was a non-commissioned non-commissioned officer in the worst form, despising the soldiers and groveling before the officers.

From the very first day of my arrival in the regiment, Khestanov hated me for my kind attitude towards the soldiers and did not miss an opportunity to discredit me in any way. No matter how difficult it was for me, I usually restrained myself in dealing with him. And yet Khestanov brought me to the point where I could not stand it and almost paid for it with my head.

Once, during shooting lessons held near the hitching posts, the soldiers asked me a question that never left their lips: when will the hunger strike finally end, when will they finally be fed humanly?

What could I answer?

Seeing Khestanov approaching us, I said:

Here comes the sergeant. Put this question to him yourself. I have already told him about this many times, but to no avail. Just speak not one at a time, but all at once.

The soldiers did just that.

When Khestanov approached, I commanded: “Get up!” He looked at the people and ordered them to sit down. The soldiers sat down and all asked in one voice:

When will they start feeding us?

Khestanov turned sharply to me:

Are you the one who taught your soldiers to rebel?

I told him that I didn’t see any rebellion here:

People have not been fed for more than a month, and they have the right to ask why this is happening.

Khestanov, turning blue with anger, shouted:

Stand still, you're under arrest! This is not the Armavir pogrom, you have been under our suspicion for a long time, you bastard! - and he shoved his fist in my face.

I could not bear the insult and, instead of standing at attention, I turned around and hit Khestanov with force. He fell and lay motionless for a long time. Having risen, Khestanov grabbed his head and silently left.

I told the soldiers that if any of them reported to the command that I had hit the sergeant, I would be put on trial and shot. The soldiers were silent until someone suggested blaming the Spaniard's horse.

We had such a horse of an evil disposition.

Many have already suffered from it: someone’s ear was bitten off, someone’s finger was bitten off, someone’s hoof was grabbed by him. And so, when Khestanov was passing along the hitching post, the Spaniard hit him - the stable orderly saw this “accident.”

Having agreed on this, all the soldiers kissed the blade of the checker and swore an oath that they would not hand me over under any circumstances.

It was difficult to say what turn things would take. The dragoons, based on past experience, believed that if the squadron commander called me and beat me, he would not bring me to justice, but if he did not beat me, then he would definitely bring me to justice.

I called a break for a smoke break. But before the soldiers had time to smoke, the bandaged Khestanov approached, followed by the senior platoon non-commissioned officer Gavresh.

Khestanov ordered the formation of a platoon. I formed the soldiers in two ranks. On the right flank in the first rank stood the stable orderly of the platoon Piskunov.

Did you see how Budyonny hit me? - Khestanov turned to him.

“No, I didn’t see it,” Piskunov answered.

Current page: 3 (book has 18 pages total) [available reading passage: 12 pages]

On the national meekness of the Great Russians

And suddenly it dawned on me: after all, a “person of Jewish nationality” is nothing more than a former “Jewish face.”

B. Sarnov

The critic Benedikt Sarnov has three great passions: he loves to speculate on military topics, he is tireless in the fight for culture in general, for Russian culture in particular, for the Russian language in particular, and, of course, he cannot live without denouncing anti-Semitism. In any case, it is these “three pillars” that frolic in his books - “Stop being surprised!” (M., Agraf. 1998) and “Our Soviet Newspeak” (M., Materik. 2002).

With the last two of the three passions mentioned above, everything is clear: the first is explained by literary education and profession, the second by nationality. But the passion for the military theme in its most varied aspects, from pre-war insignia to the question of the professionalism of our military leaders and the events of the Great Patriotic War, is very mysterious. The man did not serve in the army, was not in the war, but come on, he judges and judges.

At least start with the insignia. Before the war, we read in Newspeak, they were like this: four cubes - a captain, one sleeper - a major, two sleepers - a lieutenant colonel, three sleepers - a colonel... And who told him this - Voinovich, perhaps, an expert on the army? After all, everything here is nonsense. Four cubes did not exist at all, and the rest was like this: captain - one sleeper, major - two, lieutenant colonel - three, colonel - four...

In another place, without batting a discerning eye, he writes that in our country “yesterday’s colonel became a marshal.” Who is this? When? Give at least one example. Where is that mysterious colonel? He can't say anything. But again it’s nonsense! Even Bulganin went through the necessary hierarchical ladder: being a member of the Military Council of the Western Front, he, naturally, received the rank of lieutenant general on December 6, 1942, then, while remaining at the front as a member of the Military Councils of other fronts, he became colonel general on July 29, 1944, November 17 1944 – army general. And only on November 3, 1947, after he was appointed Minister of the Armed Forces of the USSR, he was awarded the rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union. And Beria became a marshal, being a people's commissar, a member of the State Defense Committee. Even Brezhnev became a marshal not from colonels, but from generals.

Budyonny, Voroshilov, Egorov, Tukhachevsky had unconventional paths to the marshal rank, but they also achieved high positions in the army during the revolutionary years of the Civil War, and in such times traditions were violated not only in Russia. Sarnov is silent about the fact that Trotsky, who never served in the army, was the People's Commissar for Military Affairs and also the chairman of the country's Revolutionary Military Council, that is, he essentially held marshal positions.

However, there is an example when not a “colonel” or even a “lieutenant”, but a private became a “marshal”: the artist Sergei Bondarchuk, having played the role of Taras Shevchenko in the film of the same name, immediately received the title of People's Artist of the USSR. And did Stalin make a mistake here?

The critic declared Voroshilov illiterate, and Tymoshenko and Budyonny completely illiterate. What daring! But I think that they, not to mention military affairs, even knew literature and the Russian language better than Sarnov. I am sure that none of them would have written, as he did, about Mandelstam and his wife, whom the guards escorted into exile, like this: “two people of different sexes (!) under the escort of three soldiers.” Here I would like to ask: “Were the soldiers same-sex or different-sex?” None of the marshals would have said, as he did, “uniformed generals” or “civilian (instead of “secular”) dress of the metropolitan,” none of them used words the meaning of which, as he did not know, and, of course, none I would not mock the famous partisan commander, twice Hero of the Soviet Union, who did not graduate from the Literary Institute, who once allegedly made a spelling mistake in the word “read.” Moreover, the writer G. Baklanov had already chuckled to his heart’s content about this before, and Sarnov is following someone else’s trail...

S. M. Budyonny, as you know, served in the army from the age of twenty, i.e., from 1903, there were no lectures by Professor Asmus on aesthetics. But here’s what was said in his 1921 certification: “A born cavalry commander.” I have not heard anyone say about Sarnov that he is a born critic. Further: “Has operational and combat intuition.” Where is Sarnov’s intuition if he even quotes famous quotes from Pushkin and Sholokhov incorrectly? Further: “He loves cavalry and knows it well.” What does Sarnov love and know well? Well, Galich (“Famous!”), Voinovich (“Wonderful!”), Aleshkovsky (“Wonderful!”), Zhabotinsky (“World history does not follow Lenin - according to Zhabotinsky”), and also, of course, Israel (“Sand , on which Israel built its nation-state, became a stone").

What's next? “S. M. Budyonny intensively and thoroughly replenished the missing general educational baggage and continues to educate himself.” Then he was 37 years old, and later, adding to the aforementioned baggage, he graduated from the Special Group at the Military Academy. Frunze. But Sarnov, as we have seen and will see again, was very poor at replenishing his luggage after graduating from high school, and in his old age he lost a lot of it. Finally: “Budenny is gentle and courteous with his subordinates.” Even with subordinates! And the partisan hero mentioned above was never subordinate to Sarnov, but the critic considers it possible, together with Baklanov, to mock the late hero.

Well, as a result of almost seventy years of his service in the Russian army and participation in many wars, Budyonny was awarded four St. George Crosses, four St. George medals, became Marshal of the Soviet Union, three times Hero, holder of the Order of Suvorov first degree, eight Orders of Lenin, six Orders of the Red Banner and many other awards. And Sarnov? Where are his medals, titles, prizes, and finally, applause? Just as he received one literary badge at the end of the institute, he has been walking around with it for fifty years. Apparently, this explains the strange fact that the critic was especially angry with Semyon Mikhailovich, who died in God more than thirty years ago. In the last book, as already said, he declared the deceased to be completely illiterate, and in the previous one he did not skimp on even a separate slanderous tale about him.

*** * ***

He says that the critic G. Moonblit... What kind of Moonblit? And the same one who was once taught wisdom by Sholokhov, and Sarnov’s neighbor at the entrance from apartment 122 (his neighbors are his main source of knowledge and impressions of being). It’s as if this Moonblit, when he first came to the famous Admiral Ivan Stepanovich Isakov on some business, saw a portrait of Budyonny in his office and asked:

– Why do you have this portrait hanging here?

The admiral could answer such unceremoniousness to the newcomer: “What is your damn business? My office - I hang whatever I want. To someone else’s monastery...” But Ivan Stepanovich restrained himself and politely said as if it was a gift from Budyonny himself. “It would seem,” writes Sarnov, “the question is settled. But that’s not what Moonblit was like.” He continued his rudeness:

– The fact is that our literary brother has his own account with this man. We cannot forgive him Babel.

Firstly, what does the admiral care about some unknown brothers? Jewish, or what? I would say so. Let them not hang portraits of the marshal in their homes, but what does he care about them? Secondly, what was so terrible that Budyonny did to Babel, after which it was impossible for his brothers to forgive him even after many years - did he blow his head off with a saber at full gallop or send him to a camp? No, it turns out that at the beginning of 1924 he spoke in the magazine “October” with sharp criticism of Babel’s story “Cavalry”. Well, he wrote his story after being a journalist in the First Cavalry, and Budyonny was the creator and commander of the legendary army. Did this deprive the army commander of the right to criticize the book? Who knew the army better - its creator and commander or the correspondent?

The fact is, writes the younger brother Sarnov, that Budyonny “destroyed” the book of his older brother Babel. Was the book banned or not published? Nothing like this! Gorky himself spoke out in her defense, and not just anywhere, but in Pravda. And from 1926 to 1933, “Cavalry” was republished 7 times as a separate book and twice in 1934 and 1936 included in collections. Other writers could only dream about it. But Sarnov doesn’t say a word about all this.

What happened next between brother Moonblit and Isakov? The author reports that he “carried out propaganda work” with the admiral. Oh, the brothers can do this! I found Budyonny’s article somewhere, dragged it in and “forced me to read it, literally rubbing the admiral’s nose in.” Just think, the matter ended quite happily, even very successfully for the writer, and 30-40 years have already passed, and Moonblit still cannot forget and calm down, he is digging the earth. But “the admiral did not react at all.”

Some time passed, Brother Moonblit was again with the admiral and saw that there was no portrait, and he “with a feeling of deep satisfaction” allegedly said:

– I see that my story still made an impression on you.

– No, that’s not why I took the portrait.

- Why?

– Semyon Mikhailovich claimed (!) that he had four Georges, but it turned out that they were linden trees. I did not consider it possible to keep a portrait of this man in my office.

Amazing! After all, if the middle brother burned with hatred of Budyonny and took revenge on him 40 years after his article, then the younger brother is also burning and slandering when almost 80 years have passed. What irrepressible malice!.. We, with our Russian meekness, cannot understand this.

*** * ***

I. S. Isakov died in 1967. S. M. Budyonny - in 1973. I decided to call Moonblit, but it turned out that he, too, had passed away not long ago. As in almost all the stories and fables that Sarnov tells, he was the only one left alive. Then, indignant at the slander against the late marshal, I got hold of a photograph of Budyonny, where he was captured in 1916 with all the crosses and medals, and sent it to a kind classmate at the Literary Institute with a letter in which I advised: “Hang up this portrait in your home, Benya.” S. M. Budyonny and pray for him every morning and evening, as for your savior, and ask him for forgiveness.”

Tell me, after such vile slander of a literary shtafirka against a glorious Russian marshal, is it possible to believe her even for three kopecks and respect her for even a nickel? Even though Brother Benedict did not dare to reprint his lies in a new book, where there are many reprints...

It would be appropriate to add that Budyonny received not even four crosses, but five. He says in his memoirs “The Path Traveled” (M., 1958): “For the battle near Brzeziny, all the soldiers of my platoon were awarded medals “For Bravery,” and I was awarded the St. George Cross, 4th degree.” And later, he says, there was a quarrel with sergeant Khestanov, who “kicked me in the face with his fist. I couldn’t stand the insult, I turned around and hit Khestanov. He fell and lay motionless for a long time. The soldiers were silent until someone suggested blaming the Spaniard’s horse.”

“The regiment was ordered to line up in a square. The standard was brought to the middle. And suddenly I hear the command:

- Senior non-commissioned officer Budyonny to the middle of the regiment, gallop, march!

The regimental adjutant read out an order to the division that I was subject to a field trial and execution.

“But, given his honest and impeccable service, it was decided not to put him on trial, but to limit himself to depriving him of the St. George Cross.”

This, dear, is more serious than your expulsion from the Komsomol at the Literary Institute in 1947. No sergeant Khestanov punched you in the face and you were not threatened with execution, even though you hinted at something like that, and they were restored soon. And now you yourself are in the role of sergeant Khestanov, only he hit the young non-commissioned officer once, and you endlessly spit on the grave of the old marshal.

Budyonny again received the 4th degree cross on the Caucasian Front in the battle for the city of Van, during which his 3rd platoon of the 5th squadron of the 18th Seversky Dragoon Regiment captured a battery of three guns; George 3rd degree Semyon Mikhailovich was awarded for his participation in several attacks near Mendelij; 2nd degree - for a 22-day raid behind enemy lines; finally, 1st degree - for night reconnaissance, during which six Turkish soldiers were captured. And the high Soviet awards were a natural continuation and development of these St. George awards...

How many guns did you and Moonblit capture, how many Turks were captured? You are only wandering around the rear of Soviet history... However, it is possible that Moonblit lied here, and Sarnov acted as the custodian and popularizer of dirty lies. Division of labor between brothers...

After the assassination of the Russian Prime Minister Stolypin by the Jew Bogrov in September 1911, the killer’s father publicly stated that he was proud of his son, and V. Rozanov wrote in a letter to M. Gershenzon in December 1912: “After Stolypin, everything somehow ended for me ( Jews). Would a Russian dare to kill Rothschild or even the “greatest of them”.

And now, 90 years later, a Jew tears off four St. George crosses from the late Russian hero. How can I, an internationalist, relate to this? And imagine, instead of standing up for the defense of national honor, he is helped in the vile Russophobic matter by Russian publishing workers: O. Razumenko, Z. Buttaev, M. Sartakov, R. Stankova... Would a Russian, say, dare to rip off two Gold Stars from the late Colonel General of the Tank Forces David Abramovich Dragunsky, they say, were not given according to merit, brother Mehlis contributed, etc.? Even if such a scoundrel had been found, the same Easel-Sartakovs, Razmenko-Buttaevs would have stood before him like an indestructible wall...

*** * ***

After the fecal attempt regarding Budyonny and our other marshals, Sarnov, naturally, tried to do the same with the honorary titles of our country: “The word “hero” became the official title: “Hero of the Soviet Union”, “Hero of Socialist Labor”. The introduction of such a title, by the very procedure of its conferment, suggested that a person could be designated a hero.” Yes, of course, you can “appoint” it, but only after the person has done something heroic. What is striking here is not so much the malice of the mind as its poverty, complete inability to make analogies and associations: after all, similar honorary titles exist all over the world! For example, the Queen of England took and appointed the husband of Galina Vishnevskaya as a knight. She awarded him the title "Knight of the British Empire". Why was Sarnov silent? Why didn’t you go with Moonblit to Red Square with a poster “Down with the appointed knights!” Why was he silent when the title of Hero was given to Mikhail Romm, Sergei Yutkevich or Daniil Granin?

We immediately read that the title of Hero was given to us “not always deservedly.” Well, it’s not for anyone who doesn’t even have the “Eight Centenary of Moscow” medal to judge this. But, of course, it also happened that it was undeserved. So where does this not happen! And it happened that they were undeservedly accepted into the Writers' Union and even hired to work at Pionerskaya Pravda. God has a lot of things...

But then the Great Patriotic War began. What does Sarnov have about this? He first of all states that there was no organized evacuation of the population. How can your tongue not fall off? After all, as he writes, he and his daddy and mommy immediately ended up somewhere beyond the Urals... The Evacuation Council was created on June 24, on the third day of the war. By the summer of 1942, the Germans had captured the territory where, as Stalin said in his famous order No. 227, more than 70 million people lived. Whole Germany! It was simply impossible to evacuate everyone, but almost 10.5 million were still evacuated, including from the western border regions: from the Baltic states - 120 thousand, from Moldova - 300 thousand, from Belarus - 1 million, and also from Moscow - 2 million, from Leningrad - 1.7 million, etc. Moreover, 2593 industrial enterprises, of which 1523 are large, such as the Kharkov Diesel and Kharkov Tractor Plants, the most important workshops of the Kirov plant, the Hammer and Sickle plant, Elektrostal, Gomselmash , "Zaporizhstal", units of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station, etc. Moreover - 145 universities, 66 museums from the RSFSR alone, dozens of libraries, theaters, etc. Moreover, 2.4 million heads of cattle, 5.1 million. sheep and goats, 0.2 million pigs, 0.8 million horses (Great Patriotic War 1941–1945. Encyclopedia. M., 1985, pp. 801–803). World history has never known anything like this.

On December 13, 1941, Alexander Fadeev reported to Stalin: “All the writers and their families (271 people) were personally put on trains by me and sent from Moscow on October 14 and 15... Please note that over 200 active Moscow writers are at the fronts, at least 100 on their own went to the rear during the war and more than 700 members of the writers’ families were evacuated at the beginning of the war” (Power and the Artistic Intelligentsia. M., 1999. P. 476). We now know who was ahead of everyone.

Sarnov writes: “Many remained. Including Jews who did not believe Soviet propaganda. They were sure that rumors about the anti-Semitic policies of the Nazis were greatly exaggerated. They all died, of course." So you had to believe Soviet propaganda. Moreover, Hitler was in power for the ninth year, and there were not rumors about his anti-Semitic policies, but the most reliable information. By the way, the Soviet films “Professor Mamlock”, “Swamp Soldiers”, “Karl Brunner”, “The Oppenheim Family”, which were based on the works of Feuchtwanger and other German Jews by our Jews: E. I. Slavinsky, were shouting about it at the top of their voices. G. L. Roshal, G. M. Rapoport, A. I. Minkin - but the Jews, it turns out, did not believe them. Here's the audience!

“My grandmother and grandfather died,” the memoirist writes. “They didn’t live so close to the border and could easily have left.” But my grandfather said that he remembered the Germans from the previous war. These are cultured people, and there is nothing to be afraid of them. To all persuasion he answered: “What, I don’t know the Germans?” Their death was terrible: they said that after the Nazis shot local Jews, the earth moved for several days...” Well, the earth moving is a hackneyed newspaper cliche, but God rest with them, and it’s good that the grandson did not declare them victims of a personality cult.

However, in another place in the book, he, apparently imbued with his grandfather’s faith in the culture of the Germans, nevertheless relieves the Nazis of responsibility: “In forty-two, my grandfather and grandmother were killed. It was believed that they were Germans. But in fact, most likely, those same peasants are “God-bearing, Dostoevsky.” That is, Russians. Sleep well, Reichsführer Himmler. Brother Benedict has no claims against you.

*** * ***

So, the war is on, our affairs are bad, and Stalin, says our historian, in despair and fear “returned Rokossovsky from the camp. And he even seemed to be deigning to make a joke at the same time: he supposedly found time to sit.” Yes, Rokossovsky had been under investigation since August 17, 1937, but Stalin, of course, did not know this division commander (major general), one of 993 pre-war generals. And they released him, reinstated him in rank and returned all his awards not after the dramatic start of the war, but on March 23, 1940. And he was immediately appointed commander of the 9th Mechanized Corps. What a pity that Sarnov did not serve there at least as captain.

No, he works as a clerk, and again takes on our marshals: “In the very first months of the war, the complete professional incompetence of all Soviet marshals was revealed... Voroshilov, Budyonny could not fight with Guderian’s tanks, they suddenly turned out to be unsuitable for the profession.” This literary professional talks about military professionalism, not even suspecting that, for example, Voroshilov did not meet “Guderian’s tanks”... Why is he silent, for example, about Marshal Rydz-Smigly, as well as about Kutsheb, Stakhevich, Schilling and others the generals of Poland, who commanded so professionally that the government fled from Warsaw to Lublin on the sixth day of the war, and ten days later to Romania? After all, they still had a million-strong army against the Germans’ one and a half million. And what is the professionalism of the Dutch and Belgian military leaders, the first of whom capitulated on the fourth day of the battle, and the second surrendered their capital on the seventh day? And what about their professional kings and queens who instantly found themselves in London.

Finally, what can you, disabled person, say about the professionalism of the French and English generals and admirals, if the Germans had 136 divisions, and the Allies as a whole still had 147, and besides, they had eight months to prepare a rebuff, but already on June 12, on the 33rd day of the battle, General Weygand declared Paris an open city, and on the 14th the Germans arrived there? Do you have any complaints against your allies? Or do you think that the height of professionalism is to declare the capital an open city on time? At least I reminded them that our Brest Fortress alone lasted longer than their Paris, and Odessa - twice as long as Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam combined.

What do you think, my friend, when on December 5, Soviet marshals and generals began to drive German generals and field marshals away from Moscow, why did Hitler hastily send some into retirement, some into the reserve - and the commander of Army Group Center, Field Marshal Bock (December 18), and the Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces, Field Marshal Brauchitsch (December 19), and your Guderian, commander of the 2nd Panzer Group. Didn't they all turn out to be unsuitable? And from February 1941, when we continued to drive the Germans west, to September 1942, when the plan to capture Stalingrad collapsed, Hitler fired another 66 generals from the active army. That's how much of a professional nerd he turned out to be! And you are silent, you don’t care...

Some military leaders deserve special attention from the author. Here is what he writes, for example, about Army General I.E. Petrov: “He was a legendary commander, if only because one of all the front commanders was not a marshal.” One of all... Ah, Benya!.. Well, who is pulling your tongue?.. If we were talking about the end of the war, then at that time the fronts were commanded by Chernyakhovsky and Bagramyan - not marshals, but generals. And Petrov, for failure in the offensive, was then removed from command of the 4th Ukrainian Front and in April 1945 was appointed chief of staff of the 1st Ukrainian Front. During the entire war, the fronts in most cases were commanded not by marshals, but by generals, starting with Zhukov, Konev, Rokossovsky, the first of whom became a marshal in January 1943, the second in February 1944, the third in June 1944. th. And Pyotr Petrovich Sobennikov commanded the Northwestern Front with the rank of major general. After all, it wasn’t difficult to inquire about all this, but Sarnov was so accustomed, picking his teeth after a hearty lunch, to denounce unprofessionalism and illiteracy everywhere, he became so lazy even in “Pionerskaya Pravda” and is so pleased with himself and his knowledge that he no longer understands the position in which he puts himself as a know-it-all.

But here he is also trying to provide an anti-Stalinist ideological base: “Petrov was not a marshal for a reason. When the front advanced, Stalin removed him and appointed another commander. Because during an offensive, human losses are always very high, and Petrov proved every time that the offensive was poorly prepared: he pitied the people. When the front went on the defensive (during the defense the losses were not as great as during the offensive), Petrov was again appointed commander.”

The critic condensed all this nonsense only to impress upon the reader: Stalin did not spare people! But here I am writing about this and, therefore, I regret it. But why Petrov did not become a marshal, if not during the war, then at least after it or after the death of Stalin, like Bagramyan, Grechko, Eremenko, Moskalenko, Chuikov, Sarnov never explained. Not enough brains? If only I could borrow from Voinovich...

*** * ***

Our chronicler attacks the Supreme Commander-in-Chief with even greater ferocity than the generals and marshals of the Red Army. It turns out that he began spying on Stalin at the age of eight, as soon as he went to school, and his talent for this had already emerged. Even then he came to the conclusion that his dad was a smart man and his friends Rabinovich and Shulman were also smart. “But Stalin?.. I perceived the definition of “smart person” as applied to him as completely inappropriate, incorrect, and in no way related to him.” Why not? But because he “in his boots and semi-military jacket, about which dad said that it was appropriate to wear it to the restroom, and not to meet with foreign diplomats, clearly did not belong to the class of intellectuals.” What a prodigy! But so did daddy, who apparently had a special suit for going to the restroom!

“Not the least role for me,” continues the prodigy critic, “was played by Stalin’s low forehead.” True, he now considers this consideration “totally childish.” But nevertheless he writes: “One old newspaperman told me that in the early 30s all newspapers were given a special instruction from above: when publishing Stalin’s portraits, increase the leader’s forehead by two centimeters.” What an old newspaperman! Where is he? What's his name? Fear God! And here, as in previous stories, you again simply rob your brother, this time Roy Medvedev. It was he who swore in the book “The Tyrant’s Family” (Nizhny Novgorod, “Leta”, 1994): “Not only artists, but also photographers enlarged Stalin’s forehead by one or two centimeters.” And you stole this nonsense. But the main thing is that you are no longer eight years old, but nearly eighty, but you firmly believe in this crazy story, as if you were eight.

And he also shames Stalin for allegedly not knowing how to swim. Let's say. So what? And Hitler, suppose, was an excellent swimmer. But on April 30, 1945, he dived in Berlin and never emerged. Besides, here's an interesting fact. One day, young Stalin was walking with friends along the sea embankment in Baku. Suddenly a three-year-old girl fell into the water from the pier. Everyone was confused, rushing about, shouting: “Boat! Lifebuoy!" But you can’t wait, he’s a child... And Stalin, who cannot swim, rushes into the sea and pulls out the girl. Her name was Nadya Alliluyeva. How could she then not love her husband-savior... And which of your brothers, Benya, of these floating historians, deep-sea thinkers, double-breathing intellectuals, unsinkable liars, is capable of such...

*** * ***

But a year has passed, the child prodigy is already nine, and he, continuing surveillance, comes to the conclusion that Stalin’s speeches and reports are “a collection of banalities.” Let's say. For example, aren’t we seeing them in the report “Results of the First Five-Year Plan” on January 7, 1933?:

“What are the results of the first five-year plan in four years in the field of industry?

Have we achieved victory in this area? Yes, we achieved it. And they not only achieved, but did more than the hottest heads in our party could have expected. Even our enemies do not deny this now...

We did not have iron and steel industry, the basis of the country's industrialization. We have it now.

We didn't have a tractor industry. We have it now.

We didn't have an automobile industry. We have it now.

We didn't have machine tools. We have it now.

We did not have a serious and modern chemical industry. We have it now.

We didn't have an aviation industry. We have it now.

In terms of electrical energy production, we were in last place. Now we have moved to one of the first places.

In terms of the production of petroleum products and coal, we were in last place. Now we have moved to one of the first places,” etc.

What boring platitudes! And no oratorical beauties!..

Stalin’s report at the Extraordinary VIII Congress of Soviets on November 25, 1936 “On the Draft Constitution” especially sank into the trembling soul of the prodigy. The boy listened to the report on the radio, but this seemed not enough - then he also read these platitudes in the newspapers. And that's what struck him. Before the start of the report, “as if on command, exclamations were heard: “To my dear one!.. To my beloved!.. To my leader!.. To my teacher!.. To my best friend!..” I open on page 545 of “Questions of Leninism” of the 1952 edition, the last during my lifetime. This is where this report begins. There are indeed cheers, but neither before nor after the report there is a single word listed by Sarnov, except for the word “leader.” The old man's memory failed the prodigy. And in the newspaper the boy was struck by the shorthand note “incessant applause”: “What does “incessant applause” mean? After all, sooner or later they will definitely fall silent.” I'm leafing through the text of the report. There are many litters, but, of course, there are none - “incessant applause.” Oh, how cruel a child prodigy is to a child prodigy...

The conclusion is this: all this was fake and organized in advance. “Until now, however, I have not been able to find out,” writes the former child prodigy, “whether these loudmouths were in a regular position or whether it was a social workload. I only know (I read it in A. N. Yakovlev’s book “The Pensieve”) that they even had a special name “responsible for enthusiasm.” The stinking Yakovlev whirlpool as a source of knowledge of life! We have to live until then...

Well, let's not argue with such a fanatic of truth as Yakovlev. Let's say there were organizers of applause and exclamations. But the report was also interrupted 16 times by bursts of laughter from the entire room. 16!.. Ask, Sarnov, Yakovlev’s teachers, how they organized this. Moreover, remind him that, say, Stalin’s report at the 17th Party Congress in 1934 was interrupted by applause 48 times, and in addition, the transcript contains the following notes: 5 times - “Laughter”, 2 times - “General laughter”, one once - “General laughter” and once again - “Laughter of the whole hall.”

*** * ***

Now open your book to page 122 and re-read K. Chukovsky’s diary entry dated April 22, 1936: “Yesterday at the congress I sat in the 6th or 7th row. He looked back: Boris Pasternak. I went to him, took him to the front rows... Suddenly Kaganovich, Voroshilov, Andreev, Zhdanov and Stalin appeared. What happened to the hall! And HE stood, a little tired, thoughtful and stately. One felt a huge habit of power, strength, and at the same time something feminine and soft. I looked around: everyone had loving, tender, spiritual and laughing faces...” Try yourself in front of the mirror to give your face a spiritual look. What will you do? Did your friend Voinovich really have a loving face when he received a prize from Putin’s hands...

But Chukovsky continues: “Seeing him—just seeing him—was happiness for all of us. Demchenko kept talking to him all the time. And we were all jealous, envious - happy! Every gesture he made was treated with reverence. I never even considered myself capable of such feelings. When they applauded him, he took out a watch (silver) and showed it to the audience with a charming smile - we all whispered: “Watch, watch, he showed a watch” - and then, leaving, already near the hangers, we again remembered this watch. Pasternak kept whispering enthusiastic words to me about him, and I whispered to him, and we both said in one voice:

“Oh, this Demchenko was overshadowing him!” We walked home together with Pasternak and both reveled in our joy.”

And this is not the diary of the collective farm foreman Maria Demchenko, a noble beet grower, but of a super-intelligent writer. And I wouldn’t be surprised if over time it turns out that it was she and Pasternak who were the “organizers of enthusiasm.” And did Boris Leonidovich think that after the 20th Congress and Khrushchev’s report he would write the poem “The cult of personality is splashed with mud...”. And Sarnov is one of its suppliers.

German artillerymen discovered us and transferred fire in our direction. They shot unsuccessfully. The shells traveled a long distance and exploded without causing us any harm. However, a large column of enemy infantry began to advance from Brzezina, and we had to quickly get off the highway to avoid falling under their fire.

Having arrived with a platoon at the location of the division, we found there only abandoned squadron kitchens and a horse-mounted cannon with the lines cut off. We did not understand why the division retreated, but from the carts with oats, cereals and various products left along the way, it was clear that it retreated hastily.

Catching up with the division, our platoon picked up along the way everything that was thrown by it. In one cemetery we buried our dead soldiers with honors. Only on the third day did the platoon catch up with its regiment, which had retreated almost a hundred kilometers from Brzezina.

For the battle near Brzeziny, all the soldiers of the platoon were awarded: some with St. George's Crosses, others with medals "For Bravery". I was awarded the St. George Cross, 4th degree.

The squadron commander, Captain Krym-Shamkhalov-Sokolov, was also awarded the Soldier's Cross, although his participation in the battle consisted only of running away from the enemy. The battle took place on Michaelmas Day, and the captain of Crimea-Shamkhalov-Sokolov, who converted to the Orthodox faith, was called Mikhail. The dragoons joked:

Apparently it was awkward to get around the birthday boy.

The Tsarist military press, covering events on the Western Front, wrote that the valiant Caucasian Cavalry Division defeated the Germans with a dashing attack near Brzeziny, capturing large trophies. At the same time, the trophies captured by our platoon were increased exactly tenfold in the message.

I asked Ulagai:

Why do they write lies?

“To encourage the spirit,” the lieutenant answered angrily. - After all, this is the first victory of our division over the Germans.

At the end of November 1914, the Caucasian Cavalry Division was transferred by rail to the Tbilisi area for combat on the Turkish front. Our 18th Seversky Dragoon Regiment was quartered in the German colony of Alexanderdorf and stood here for more than a month awaiting dispatch to the front.

This time of service in the tsarist army remains the darkest in my memory.

Even on the Western Front, the officers of our division led an idle lifestyle and had little interest in how the soldiers lived. Upon arrival in Tbilisi, the officers completely decomposed. In front of the soldiers, they drank, played cards recklessly, and committed debauchery. The system of maintaining troops that existed in the tsarist army gave officers the opportunity to freely dispose of the money that was allocated for the maintenance of soldiers and horses. The officers drank the money and lost it at cards, and the soldiers starved. In Alexanderdorf, things got to the point where they completely stopped preparing food for the soldiers of our regiment and giving out fodder to the horses.

I remember how once, in my presence, the sergeant of the squadron, Bondarenko, turned to captain Krym-Shamkhalov-Sokolov with a request to release money for food for the soldiers:

The soldiers are starving, your honor.

The captain swore obscenely, and then threw three rubles out of his pocket and shouted:

Here, buy them a cart of wood, let them gnaw!

What could I answer?

Seeing Khestanov approaching us, I said:

Here comes the sergeant. Put this question to him yourself. I have already told him about this many times, but to no avail. Just speak not one at a time, but all at once.

The soldiers did just that.

When Khestanov approached, I commanded: “Get up!” He looked at the people and ordered them to sit down. The soldiers sat down and all asked in one voice:

When will they start feeding us?

Khestanov turned sharply to me:

Are you the one who taught your soldiers to rebel?

I told him that I didn’t see any rebellion here:

People have not been fed for more than a month, and they have the right to ask why this is happening.

Khestanov, turning blue with anger, shouted:

Stand still, you're under arrest! This is not the Armavir pogrom, you have been under our suspicion for a long time, you bastard! - and he shoved his fist in my face.

We had such a horse of an evil disposition.

Having agreed on this, all the soldiers kissed the blade of the checker and swore an oath that they would not hand me over under any circumstances.

I called a break for a smoke break. But before the soldiers had time to smoke, the bandaged Khestanov approached, followed by the senior platoon non-commissioned officer Gavresh.

Khestanov ordered the formation of a platoon. I formed the soldiers in two ranks. On the right flank in the first rank stood the stable orderly of the platoon Piskunov.

Did you see how Budyonny hit me? - Khestanov turned to him.

“No, I didn’t see it,” Piskunov answered. - I saw how the Spaniard horse hit you and you fell, and then jumped to your feet and ran.

Khestanov shouted in fury:

You're lying, you bastard!

Having calmed down, he repeated the question, addressing the soldier Kuzmenko, who stood in the second rank behind Piskunov’s head.

Kuzmenko was the most undeveloped soldier in our platoon; he was indifferent to everything. I was afraid that he would not stand it and would give me away. However, this did not happen; Kuzmenko calmly replied:

No, Mr. Sergeant, I saw how the Spaniard’s horse hit you, you fell, and then I don’t know where you went.

Khestanov interviewed all the soldiers in the platoon. Everyone said the same thing. Once again he looked at all the soldiers in turn, he spat, cursed and left with Gavresh.

We did not know what Khestanov and Gavresh reported to the squadron commander, but it was clear that Khestanov would try to take revenge on me.

Two days after the incident, Krym-Shamkhalov-Sokolov called me to his apartment. When I came to him, he was playing cards with the officers of our regiment.

When asked to report on me, the orderly replied:

Wait, the captain is banking now.

The door to the room was slightly open. The officers were sitting at a table on which a pile of money lay among wine bottles. I heard Krym-Shamkhalov-Sokolov say:

Have you heard, gentlemen, about this scoundrel?

One of the officers asked:

About whom?

Yes, about Budyonny,” answered the squadron commander. - He beat up Sergeant Khestanov, and now I called him.

So what are you thinking about putting him on trial?

Necessarily.

One of the officers began to persuade Krym-Shamkhalov-Sokolov not to bring me to a field trial, but to limit myself to disciplinary action. He remained silent and, having finished the bank, called me.