Living with a Soviet Veteran who fought in Afghanistan

 

Victor was my medical faculty hostel roommate, and he was drafted while studying at the Vinnytsia National Medical University in Ukraine. He had served two years in Afghanistan to fulfill his international service. Before going to Afghanistan, he was a naive and bright student. He returned from Afghanistan as a changed man with emotional scars.

In 1979, Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev decided to send troops to Afghanistan. Although it was a proxy war, the Afghan rebels were deadly. They constantly attacked the Soviet defence positions. First, the regular army went to fight the rebels. Later, young people like Victor were drafted to support the regular troops. Eventually, this conflict came to be known as the “Soviet Union’s Vietnam War." The Soviet war in Afghanistan lasted for nearly nine bloody years.

Many young boys who went to Afghanistan had a dream. This dream was to buy a Japanese TV or a SONY or JVC video deck, which were luxury items under the Soviet Socialist regime. Some boys lost their arms and legs but still managed to bring those luxury items home. When Victor returned after fulfilling his military duties, he brought a sharp audio cassette player. But soon he lost interest and gave it to his cousin.

As his relatives and friends noticed, after Victor returned from Afghanistan, he had changed remarkably. He had met fierce battle in Kandahar with the mujahideen rebels and sustained an injury to his right shoulder. Also, he sustained a concussion. Victor could not concentrate on his studies and started failing exams.

As a young student, I adored rock and heavy metal music. When I played AC/DC (For Those About to Rock), Whitesnake (Silver Nights), Deep Purple (Highway Star), Metallica (The Unforgiven), and Ozzy Osbourne (Crazy Train), Victor became jumpy. He frequently asked me to turn off the music. Then I knew he couldn’t bear loud noises. He had a bad temper. He often became conflictive. Some nights Victor could not sleep, and he had nightmares. During the exam period, this became a problem for both of us. He knew that he was troubling his roommate, and at supper,  he used to consume large volumes of Vodka and then go to sleep. So his health was falling apart.

Victor never liked to talk about his Afghan experiences.  One day, an unexpected thing occurred. It was a winter night, and we were having dinner. I offered him a cup of Ceylon tea.

“This is nice tea," Victor said. It is ideal to make Chefeer.

What is Chefeer? I asked.

“That is a drink soldiers make in the army. In Afghanistan, we used to drink Chefeer frequently.

Victor said that sometimes the Russian soldiers used to indulge in highly concentrated Georgian tea, which was called "Chefeer." This highly concentrated tannin drink gave them some sort of kick to wash away their isolation in the Afghan mountains.

“It was too tough," he said suddenly. He dropped his fork and looked into my eyes.

”We were fighting Dushmans (the Afghan rebels) in the mountains. They were supported by the US and Pakistan. Some carried M16 machine guns. They killed a lot of Soviets. I saw how our boys died in the Afghan mountains. Every week, they were sending bodies from Kabul to Moscow, Leningrad, or Kyiv.

“But now President Gorbachev says it was a mistake to send Soviet troops to Afghanistan," I interrupted.

Suddenly, Victor became annoyed.

“Hell with Gorbachev, they should have thought of it before sending us to that godforsaken country. Do you know that we lost over 25,000 boys? For what? Who is responsible for those poor souls? You tell me."

Victor became more and more emotional, so I had to divert the conversation. I lived nearly one year with Victor in our hostel room. He disturbed me hugely, but, at the same time, taught me many lessons of the war. His Afghan combat experiences later inspired me to write the novel Ivange Lokaya (Ivan’s World), which was published by the Wijesuriya Publishers. In 2005, I saw Fyodor Bondarchuk's movie 9th Company, a movie about the Soviet War in Afghanistan. According to some film critics, 9th Company was equivalent to Oliver Stone’s famous movie Platoon. After watching the 9th Company, I realized the hardships experienced by young soldiers like Victor in the Afghan mountains.

Dr Ruwan M Jayatunge