PAVEL GRACH EV 325 THE ARMY AND THE PUTSCH OF 1993 GRACHEV What is important First of all the failure of the and the revolt and the civil war that nearly happened It was about to start both in 1991 and in 1993 no doubt about that Especially in 1993 Groups were spontaneously forming around the country one of them supported the and anOther supported Yeltsin in 1991 in 1993 one was for Khasbulatov and Rutskoi and the other for Yeltsin The country was on the brink of a civil war and I think that the resolute stand of the armed forces didn t allow it to happen AVEN Please specify the role of the armed forces in 1991 and 1993 GRACHEV In 1991 the armed forces didn t allow No it would be more correct to say they didn t imprison Yeltsin That was the most important thing AVEN Practically they refused to engage in the conflict GRACHEV They didn t get involved in the con ict and thus prevented a squabble rst on the local level and then on a broader level across Russia Although the ght across the country might have been insignif- icant because Yeltsin was still unknown to many And in 1993 only the determined stand of the armed forces six inert projectiles red by a tank at the White House and the capture of those guys Rutskoi Khasbulatov Others as well as Dunayev Barannikov and so on prevented a civil war in Russia Why Because local leaders and certain military commanders were on standby Who wins If the other side had won there would have been a ght immediately AVEN Were you sure Rutskoi called and tried to send aircraft to bomb the Kremlin Were you sure of your troopers Were you sure that no one would attack the Kremlin GRACHEV Sure absolutely Because I had good commanders Petr Stepanovich Deinekin my friend was the air force commander my friend Semyonov was the army commander Prudnikov was the air defense commander and the navy commander was also our friend Yevgeny Nikolayevich Podkolzin was the Airborne Forces commander I had appointed my friends to those positions and I was sure none of them would betray me 326 REVOLUTION KOKH How did you make the decision to open re at the White House GRACHEV Yeltsin with Korzhakov and a few more men came to the Defense Ministry at about 3 00 am on October 3 We drank a little KOKH The day before Ostankino was stormed and Interior Ministry soldiers were killed GRACHEV Yes AVEN You say you drank a little GRACHEV We drank a little and everyone was so agitated Yeltsin said The City Hall and Ostankino have been seized I think we should capture those men from the White House in order to stop them I said as always Give me a written order and I am ready to execute it Korzhakov retortod What written order Yeltsin I knew they would be scared I told him In shut up Yeltsin was furious and replied You will get your written order He lied though there was no written order Then he sobered up a bit and called me at about 5 00 a m I had been prepared for the storm hinting that I would have to execute a verbal order KOKH I don t understand why they so feared giving you a written order GRACHEV I told him Certainly I will execute the order What shall I do Capture these men Yeltsin the 119th Airborne Regiment is Stationed near the White House There will be no problem But there were plenty snipers on the right and on the left there were houses nearby and there were snipers on every roof AVEN Their snipers GRACHEV Yes theirs I said No problem but we will have casualties What do you propose propose to scare them How tank will re inert projectiles straight at them They will run away At least they will go down to the basement and snipers will ee the roofs We will nd them in the basement later Okay So I ordered a tank to take a positi- on the stone bridge near the Ukraine Hotel I came up to that tank and put a captain in the seat of a gunner and a senior lieutenant in the seat I a mechanic bullets were ying around bang bang bang They won t get PAVEL GRACHEV 327 a they are about to fall I thought I told them Do you see these roofs Now start counting One two three four ve six seventh window That Inst be Khasbulatov s of ce they are all there You must hit that window - Can you do that Comrade Minister the tank has just had shooting prac- cize it s all right And do you have projectiles Live or not Live Are you out of your mind Inert Sure we have some we came here right i from the training range Now target the window And lots of people were standing nearby The bystanders loved it they watched us as if we were onstage I said Guys don t you hit them or people will die We will be mm to pieces And I asked the captain Can you hit the target can It is less than a kilometer away And do you see the American embassy building nearby There will be a scandal if you hit it Comrade Minister it will be all right Fire one I said And then I saw the projectile hitting the window precisely A re started It was beautiful Snipers ed the roofs in an instant When the snipers were gone and the tanks were done I ordered the 119th Regiment to storm the building They smashed the doors and there was some shooting inside Nine of my men died There was a clash inside the building after all but we also killed many AVEN How many GRACHEV A lot AVEN About 200 GRACHEV Maybe so nobody counted A lot AVEN From 200 to 400 by various estimates GRACHEV Many in short AVEN White House defenders GRACHEV Yes defenders A lot AVEN And who were they Conscripts or volunteers GRACHEV What conscripts They were mercenaries bandits KOKH Where did they get their guns 328 REVOLUTION GRACHEV The government the Supreme Council and any other building of the kind has armories storing submachine guns and munitions which as used in case of attack AVEN What about snipers The same GRACHEV I don t know They might have been professionals KOKH There were career of cers there Terekhov s Union of Of cers GRACHEV There were career of cers who had been bought or who h been red from the armed forces They could shoot And plenty of 2 were killed AVEN So tank of cers opened re and obeyed your order implicitly GRACHEV Implicitly KOKH And some said they were paid for doing that GRACHEV What money That might have happened later AVEN They were paid for storming the White House GRACHEV No AVEN As far I remember some bankers close to the authorities were funds from big business It s unclear where the money went KOKH To repair an abyss so that it didn t grow bigger They must pocketed the money GRACHEV There was no money We expressed our gratitude to those 0 1- - differently One way or the other Khasbulatov s forces raised their when they saw that we were serious that we were determined to get - AVEN Did you give the captain an award GRACHEV We made him a Hero of Russia And the senior lie - received a Courage Order I think Their names were classi ed and PAVEL GRACHEV 329 Here transferred to other units That was beautiful The White House was diaze Pavel Borodin congratulated me and I asked why Funds have been gned and I will make repairs I asked How much did you snatch No no no not a single kopeck As I underStand they spent 20 million repairs KOKH Nothing is said about that now This is not a big sum by modern standards GRACHEVZ It may sound insigni cant now but the sum was huge for KOKH Petr was that a good story AVBN An impressive Story The man has things to recollect Those were fundamental historic events The country was on the brink of a civil war but the solution was so simple By the way was Achalov there GRACHEV Yes he was there He was also arrested all of them were arrested Korzhakov and Mikhail Ivanovich Barsukov went inside when the danger was gone and shooting had ceased and imprisoned the defenders And I was watching Korzhakov and Barsukov leading them to a bus to take them to Matrosskaya Tishina prison AVEN And some said that forces were ordered to march to Moscow when the putsch was on but they were in no hurry to get there GRACHEV Some hot shots musr have thought our troops ride in Mercedes or Toyotas we have tanks armored personnel carriers or infantry combat vehicles Their average speed especially in a convoy and we had a huge convoy stretching several kilometers is approximately 2 0 kilometers per hour And those civilians claimed we were too slow and nearly sabo- taged the orders Combat vehicles are not a means of transportation or a taxi they are built for ghting and a new tank s service life is only 200 kilometers What can I say Our people love to talk Normal countries bring their combat vehicles to the battlefield by special trucks or by rail And in this country we are ordered to ride along a highway on caterpillar tracks and they say we are slow You know guys what hurts most 80 many people claimed to be the winners after the events of 1991 and 1993 So many tore their shirts claiming they had won This document is from the holdings of The National Security Archive Suite 701 Gelman Library The George Washington University 2130 H Street NW Washington D C 20037 Phone 202 994-7000 Fax 202 994-7005 nsarchiv@gwu edu