The Freedom Fighter: A memoir of a member of the Donbass Militia in the War in Ukraine

Vitaly Afrikaner

The Freedom Fighter

Black Hundred

Moscow

2015

The Freedom Fighter

One mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter.

14th of June, 2014, Donbass region, Eastern Ukraine

Judging by the sound, something big and heavy is coming at us from the northwest. Fuck, the bad thing about being a rebel fighting against the government army is that you dont have something big and heavy, and they do.

A loud sound, like a lot of layers of some rough fabric being torn at once, drowns out the hum of the approaching armored vehicles. Then again, closer this time.

Its a KPVT! Grim warns. Everybody stay sharp, they are coming!

I peer into the thicket so hard my eyes hurt. Adrenaline isnt gushing from my ears yet, but my heart is pounding and my palms are sweaty (hooray for wearing gloves). The only thought inside my head is Dear Santa, dont let me screw up!" Another sound of "torn fabric" changes into a shattering crash when a KPVTs heavy bullets rip through the pines 10 meters to our left.

Sniper, you alive there?! Grim shouts.

Still am!

Okay! Watch the thicket, theyll try to come through there!

Got it!

The roar of the engines seemingly stops getting closer. Several more bursts of KPVT fire tear through the forest, but the armor is clearly shooting blind. Fuck, where are the infantrymen...?

Bitch!!! Take this!!! A mix of Grim s swearing and PKM fire pours out from our right flank. In response to that, a few small arms bullets whistle out of the distance and hit the pines above our position. Damn, what am I supposed to do?? What if Im needed there?? But what if I go there, and they attack here?? Finally, I decide to stay at my position until further orders.

Sniper! Come fucking here!! Mosquito , to the left flank. Watch the thicket!

I squeeze past Marine and Mosquito to get to the main position. No one peeks far out of the trench the boss is carefully observing something on the opposite side of the road, and Handyman is simply sitting on the ground.

Grim briefly explains the situation: "They are coming from the north side! Keeping to the gullies so I cant get them! There are more of them at 1 oclock, in the thicket! You try to get them, and we will cover you!

Meeeh... Well, an order is an order. After selecting a more or less comfortable position, I start to scan the 12-to-1 oclock sector. The view is obscured by the forest, but the trees are far apart so I can see something. Damn, its torture to work as a sniper from a squads position. If I live through today, Ill find myself a nice position in the forest, 200-300 meters from here. So... Nothing-nothing-nothing-BANG! My eye barely catches some movement through the scope, and my index finger immediately responds.

I wonder, how do they shoot semi-auto sniper rifles so rapidly in movies? I lose my target after a shot, so I need 2-3 seconds to find it again. Well, probably its a matter of habit.

What?! Grim shouts.

Some movement in the thicket!

Did you get him?!

Hard to tell. Realistically, there wasnt a chance; I had jerked the trigger too sharply and spoiled the shot.

Shit! All right, keep looking!

I try to pop out a bit, and immediately the Ukes on the other side of the road open fire on our position. The bastards got within 50 meters of us, theyre right on the other side of the road. Because of the terrain we are five meters above them and separated by two slopes, two ditches and an elevated road there is no clear line of sight between us and them, and we can only trash the trees above each other. And thats exactly what Grim joyously starts to do, sending half a belt of PKM rounds toward the enemy.

Assessing the low efficiency of his efforts, he grabs his AK and launches a couple of GP-25 which means standing up from the trench, and that makes one an easy target for the enemy. Besides, the Ukes activity at 12 oclock intensifies again, including the fucking KPVT with its 14.5mm bullets and occasional shots from God-knows-where, and all of that is whistling by unpleasantly close to us. One consolation was that the group of Ukes on the other side of the road apparently did not have UBGLs, otherwise they would have made our life much more fun. I wonder, what the heck is the rest of our company doing?

Chief, tanks! the sharp-sighted Handyman calls out.

The three of us intensely peer between the trees.

Grim reacts quickly: "Its an APC! Kiddo the pipe [slang for RPG-7]! Afrikaner suppress the thicket! Both of you, stay clear of the backblast!"

Yeah, a great warning, sure. How the fuck can I suppress the thicket with a sniper rifle, while watching the back end of Grim s RPG at the same time? Well, to hell with it. I peek out, studying the forest. Meanwhile, Grim stands up out of the trench and starts aiming the pipe. Handyman and I start dashing around to avoid the back end of the RPG, which makes our attempts to suppress the Ukes in the thicket rather sporadic. The enemy isnt blind and, having noticed Grim s courageous torso sticking out of the trench, begins shooting. After a few bullets whizz by a couple inches above his head, Grim ducks back into the trench and, using rich expressions, gives his feedback to me and Handyman about the quality of our covering fire. Being used to his manner, we do not pay too much attention to his well-deserved reproaches, and begin to shoot at the bushes on the opposite side of the road, and the forest behind them.

Simultaneously, an RPK

We send a few 40-mm painkillers from our UBGLs to alleviate the poor guys suffering (dont know if it helped, but he shut up at least), and then we are distracted by the APC which had crawled up to 200 meters from us and continued to approach slowly, firing short bursts at the roadblock to our rear. Grim grabs the RPG again, but sets it aside a few seconds later. Only two cucumbers [slang for rockets], damn it!" he explains. "We have to save them in case they send tanks. Sniper, why the hell are you sitting on your ass? Go and watch the 10-to-2 sector!"

As you wish, my lord. I climb into the firing niche and begin to study the slope in the designated sector. Nobody, nobody...and what is that...the deafening roar of a PKM (the muzzle less than a meter from my head) hits my ears so hard that I instinctively duck to the bottom of the trench. Grim keeps sending short bursts of armor-piercing/incendiary bullets through the trees at the approaching APC.

"You fucking imbecile! Are you insane?!" I respectfully express my dissatisfaction with the commanders actions. Grim simply keeps shooting, with the facial expression of a child who has received a long-awaited gift for Christmas. The belt spent, Grim throws the machine gun to Handyman for reloading, grabs his Kalash, fires a magazine and a UBGL round into the thicket, takes back the PKM and fires one more entire belt of APIBs at the APC. And then it stops. Stuck in place. I mean the APC, not our commander though he looks inhuman sometimes, I wouldnt call him it due to subordination. There is neither smoke nor too much damage to be seen, but the engine stalled, and its not moving or firing. 7.62x54R can penetrate an APC in the side, much harder to manage with angle and distance, but ~200 API rounds could definitely disable one... Or the crew could have panicked.

The U-infantry also fell silent for a couple minutes, probably wondering what the hell happened.

Grim is already thinking aloud about how we can flank around the stalled APC, cut it off from the rest of the government forces and take it as a trophy. Well, you never know, it could work. Alas, the calm does not last long the second APC opens fire toward us from somewhere behind the first one, then U-infantry swarm the thicket ahead, just a couple hundred meters from where we are, and immediately open fire. Judging by the sound, at least two SVD snipers are among them, too.