Free Fall (25 page)

The other soldiers, when they found out that I was a sniper, would often ask me what was so great about my position that had me roaming around at night in the middle of enemy territory, going through mine fields, risking my life to find the best position and staying there
motionless for hours watching the enemy, when most of the time things were resolved in a few seconds, or with a single explosion . . . I'd smile just slightly, but if I were sure that they wouldn't take it the wrong way, I would reply that I was motivated by a great love for death, the true pleasure that only hunting human beings can provide. A sick feeling.

I stood there in position waiting for the exact moment to shoot, and it seemed as if I was being cradled in the arms of death, that death appeared just for me; a shiver went through my body, like when someone you love touches you or breathes on your skin . . . I knew I was putting myself on the line for this one second, but in that moment death and I were the only ones left on Earth, and she did her terrible dance for me, the one that's always the same but different every time, charged with emotion, with grace and a lethal beauty that made me feel good. In those moments I felt like I was part of an eternal mechanism, an entity that surpassed human understanding. It was without a doubt the madness of an assassin – me – but it gave me certain sensations that can't be compared to anything else.

When the war was over and I was back home, I talked about this experience a lot with my grandfather, telling him how killing human beings had made me feel differently than hunting animals in the forest. In his way, he consoled me:

‘Every man carries both God and the Devil within himself. In some situations it's right for one to prevail over the other; that's the only way man can survive.'

The war in Chechnya was a true hell, and my personal devil had to be at the height of his strength: that was his place and his time.

Once I unloaded the round in the last guy's head I immediately glanced at the others; they were all lying on the ground except for one. He was on his knees, one hand gripping his throat and the other making strange motions in the air as if he were swimming. I'd hit him in the neck, and even though the wound was fatal he still had a few seconds to live before leaving this world. Often, during battles – especially if there was more than one target, as in this case – I had no way to observe that macabre spectacle I found so captivating, and so death did its dance alone, without sharing it with me.

I immediately shot another round and hit him right in the head. His body fell beside his comrades'.

Just then we heard shouting coming from the enemy camp. I didn't have enough time to look up before our men had already opened fire, using all the firepower we had prepared.

With the grenade launcher my comrades hit the bags where the Arabs kept their ammo. Two powerful explosions lit up the sky. Someone shot a volley of bullets at us from a nearby bush. I tried to take aim and shoot him, but the enemy immediately stepped on one of our mines and blew up. Then there was a series of more shouting, shooting, explosions, tracer bullets whizzing
through the air – they were trying to get rid of us, but our fire was so heavy they couldn't. One by one the enemies began to emerge from the camp, and, running towards us, they set off the mines we had planted all around. Everything was on fire; within moments there were bodies in flames everywhere, on the ground, in the trees – the enemy camp looked like one big bonfire with the Arabs running around disorientated, shooting in every direction.

I hit one in the chest and he fell right away; then he put his palms on the ground and tried to get back up. I got him in my crosshairs and shot again; the second bullet demolished his nose and maybe also his eyes. His head dangled, but he was still alive – he held a hand up to his disfigured face as if afraid to touch it, or as if he wanted to free himself from a sticky substance. I aimed again and this time the bullet lodged right in the back of his neck. Through the scope, I saw his raised arm slowly droop down.

Nosov shouted something to me, but with all that racket I couldn't make sense of anything. Then he motioned for me to look to my left. One of the infantrymen was placing the machine gun right next to me, in order to strike the enemy from a closer distance. As soon as I realised, I covered my ears with my hat the best I could, but within seconds the infantryman had already used up the first magazine. Hearing a machine gun from close up is like getting pounded in the head, I hated it. I grabbed my Kalashnikov and crawled a few metres over to Nosov. Our captain was firing single shots, using a dioptric scope.

‘That bastard has a grenade launcher, take him out before he can fire!' he ordered me.

I immediately started looking for the target, but I couldn't see it.

‘Right behind the tent, between those two trees!' the captain yelled.

I looked in the direction Nosov indicated. I couldn't see anyone, just an RPG grenade launcher peeking out from behind a tree. I shot at the RPG but didn't hit it right away; I only got it after two tries. When it exploded, a man fell dead from behind the tree. Another man popped out from the same place – he was clutching his belly, bent over so far he seemed hunchbacked – clearly he'd been hit by the shrapnel. Anyone who has been in war knows that it's better to take five bullets than a single fragment from a grenade. I took him out too, firing a round right at his head. He fell, his hands still on his stomach. A part of his skull flew off; once he was on the ground, his head looked like a half moon with a huge crater.

The enemy was no longer responding to our fire. We were only firing single shots, at most a few short blasts from the machine gun. The entire forest in front of us was on fire, and now and then, when the flames reached the bodies, you could hear the rounds exploding directly inside the enemies' guns, or in the magazines hooked to their bulletproof vests.

The flames were very high; nothing of their camp was left. Perhaps in addition to the ammo for the grenade launchers, the Arabs had had some gas-powered devices. When they explode, they can create a fire that can reach
a temperature of ten thousand degrees for a few seconds over a ten-metre circumference. The burst of flame they produce can incinerate armoured cars instantly and leaves little trace of the human body. You only know that there was a person there at the time of the explosion from the oil stains you find on the metal or the cement.

In an instant, it was all over. I had observed that terrible spectacle through the scope of my rifle, while Nosov watched the enemy camp go up in flames through his small pair of binoculars. The fire was strong, blinding; ammo continued to explode, you could see sparks flying everywhere, but around the clearing everything seemed calm. Our captain was satisfied, making a quiet noise that sounded like a purr – he always did that when he was happy with the outcome of an operation.

Suddenly, about five kilometres further down, at the opening of the valley, a green signal flare went up in the sky. It lingered in the air for about ten seconds, and then started to fall. It was another enemy group, maybe the ones who were originally supposed to attack us – they had probably intended to block the exit from the valley, push us into the mountains and make us fight the group we had just eliminated. A plan like that revealed their fear of direct combat. They had surely planted mines on the path that they'd wanted to force us to take. All these elements proved that it had all been planned down to
the last detail – undoubtedly with the support of our command.

Unfortunately for them, they weren't very well trained. Word was that the Arabs had a makeshift field hospital in those mountains, where in addition to caring for the wounded they sent the younger soldiers to learn something from those with more experience. Our blazing victory and the panic that had spread among our adversaries (although the attack had been unexpected) were proof that these weren't expert soldiers – otherwise the whole thing wouldn't have been so easy.

Nosov put down the binoculars and smiled at me:

‘Kolima, son, you know what that flare means?'

‘I don't have a clue, Ivanisch,' I replied, though in reality I had some idea.

He gave me a light tap on the head, like adults do with children when they've made a mistake.

‘That flare, soldier, means that today we're going to ram it up their arses so far they'll get sore throats!'

Hearing him talk that way was a good sign. Nosov only said things like that when he was certain of victory. So I smiled too.

The captain rose to his feet and ordered the others to pick up the ammo scattered all over the ground. Everyone got to work. An infantryman snapped a twig off a tree and swept the shells away, hiding them under the bushes. Soon the terrain was clear.

The infantry sniper came up to me:

‘Hey, brother, where'd you learn to shoot?'

‘In Siberia, I used to go hunting with my grandfather
. . .' I showed him the piece of cardboard I used to cover my eye. ‘See this? It helps.'

He was young. He seemed fascinated and intimidated. It was clear that he had found himself with a precision rifle in his hands just because someone in his command needed to assign the role of sniper to a draft soldier.

Often with infantry snipers, nobody explained anything to them. They learned to shoot in combat. When I had the chance, I showed them what were, in my opinion, the essentials for getting through this gig.

There's a whole science behind using a precision rifle. To ensure that your shots make the maximum impact, you have to calculate every detail. A person who's a good shot at a non-professional level can learn during war – over the course of six months – all the little tricks and secrets to turn him into a master sniper. The important thing is to get a lot of practice and be careful of everything, obviously first training yourself how to avoid getting shot. Many soldiers, since they'd never had any instruction, developed instinctive personal techniques, some of which were actually interesting, and so sometimes I also learned something from them.

I met quite a few snipers who came from highly specialised schools – people who knew everything about the theory – and used excellent, extremely accurate weapons, with which (thanks to very sophisticated electronics) they could cover great distances. Yet they came to a bad end
the moment they came face to face with an enemy armed with even just a regular assault rifle, a weapon that couldn't shoot more than six hundred metres away.

That happened because they came to war without field training. Nobody had told them that the sniper's primary talent depends on his capability to kill without thinking. You have to be calm, relaxed, and – as the old Siberians used to say – ‘have a frozen heart and a cold hand'.

Nosov, without losing any time, called three from our group and three infantrymen to scour the enemy encampment:

‘Don't pick up grenade launcher rounds, explosives or undetonated hand grenades – take only the ammo we can use. If you find usable weapons, collect them, put them together and blow them up. If you find anyone still breathing, use your knives, use fire only if necessary. If you find any documents, maps, electronic devices, means of communication, bring them here immediately . . .'

Moscow, Deer, Zenith and three explorers went right down. I took position to keep an eye on them, and the young explorers' sniper accompanied me. A little way from us, Nosov surveyed the scene with his binoculars.

For a while there was no sign of our group, and then Moscow came into view. He led the others, keeping his
rifle levelled, and Deer and Zenith followed, covering him on both sides. The explorers brought up the rear, the last one walking slowly, backwards, looking around. They stopped in the middle of the camp, illuminated by the light of the fire. Moscow signalled for Deer and Zenith to lower their rifles. They pulled out their knives and went off in opposite directions, each followed by an infantryman with his rifle up, ready to shoot if necessary.

Moscow went over to an Arab who was lying face down. He turned him over and cut his bulletproof vest laterally; he quickly checked the pockets, emptied a bullet case, putting the cartridges into his backpack, and moved right on to the next, while the infantryman followed him like his shadow. At one point, Moscow came across a man who was wounded; he slid his knife into his heart and the man died without batting an eye.

Within ten minutes the entire camp was cleaned out. Deer and Zenith had backpacks full of ammo; Zenith had found a heavy machine gun with a night scope. He dragged it along with a set of magazines looped together with a belt.

After emptying the chambers, they threw all the weapons they had found into a ditch in the middle of the camp, and then set them on fire. Zenith and Deer took two big heavy logs, placed them over the hole to stifle the explosion a little, then they left with the infantrymen, running towards us. They jumped over the stream and clambered up the steep little road, and in a second they were back with us again.

Moscow was alone in the middle of the camp. He
looked around for a moment and then tossed a hand grenade in the ditch. Then he threw himself somewhere in the dark, under cover. The explosion was very loud and we instinctively ducked down. Fragments of weapons went flying everywhere, scattering around the camp and surrounding woods; they were almost all from AKs, which were now completely unrecoverable. Moscow's figure emerged from the dark. He went over to the ditch for a second, toed what was left of a rifle and then ran back over to us.

‘Excellent work, boys,' Nosov commented.

Zenith went to the captain and showed him the machine gun that, against orders, he had kept:

‘Ivanisch, don't be angry,' he implored, ‘but I couldn't leave it there. It'll be useful to us – look how many clips it has, and it even has a night scope . . . I'll carry it myself, I swear . . .'

Zenith was physically very strong – none of us had any doubt that he could carry the weapon without any trouble – but we knew very well how important respecting orders was to Nosov.