After we have been in the “Vostok” brigade for about a month, the August “pocket” events began. In the battles for Ilovaysk, Amvrosievka, Marinovka, Saur-Mogila, and other towns and villages of Donbass, for the first time the units of the junta suffered a very heavy defeat that forced them to take on the defensive at first, and then, with huge losses, to fall back. The immediate threat of encirclement and capture of Donetsk was removed in that campaign, but the risk that the Armed Forces and the National Guard of Ukraine could enter into the city remained.
In early August our training came to an end, the first combat missions started. By that time, the guys from the “Essence of Time” movement, who worried about Donbass, brought excellent clothes and shoes, comfortable and beautiful outfit to the unit, which was soon tested in combat. The unit was formed and received its baptism by fire in Yasinovataya, where we got our own base.
I spent August and early September doing humanitarian work, organizing the delivery of goods to orphans and refugees, thanks to the help of All-Russian Parents’ Resistance (ARPR) and personally Maria Mamikonyan, Vera Sorokina and Vladimir Pilipenko, whose care and concern I felt even through lines of text on the screen. These operations were new to me; I learned and traveled a lot thanks to those people))
At that time my comrades from the “Essence of Time” information center, located back then in the press center of the “Vostok” brigade, arranged, in fact, wholesale video production, shooting several reports for EoT TV DPR a day. The reports became more professional, informationally and visually richer. Meanwhile the guys from the information center managed to engage in several other areas of work: to gather news, to structure them, to work with people from different levels in the army and the government of the Republic, to travel through the combat sites, to cover the humanitarian disaster, and, of course, to study “Essence of Time” materials.
In Yasinovataya the combat group started to grow thanks to the militiamen, who shared our beliefs and proved themselves on the positive side in the “Vostok” training company. They found friendly support, strong team, and exhausting exercises in the “Essence of Time” unit. In addition to physical training, our unit has always focused on independent work, reading, watching documentaries on different areas of military life. And it gave its fruit; I especially remember Zhenya-Belka’s words (killed on 17 January in the defense of the “Monastery” position) about the severity of the training: “Had we been taught the same way, half of my friends would have been alive.” He knew what he said, having gone through Slavyansk, Shakhtyorsk, Torez, Yasinovataya. In general there were quite a lot of veterans of Slavyansk in the “Vostok” since the beginning of July 2014, and they were not uncommon in our unit.
We had our own base, which allowed us to organize a training grounds, where a variety of units, including those of DPR army, are still being trained. In addition to rifle range we got an area for machine gunners, snipers, rocket launcher operators. We were able to increase our level of training ourselves, to get used to weapons, to coordinate units. A well-known journalist Graham Phillips, “Grisha”, who made the famous photo at the background of our base with the “Essence of Time” unfolded flag, visited several of these coordinations.
In early September 2014, the “Vostok” brigade carried out an operation to liberate the road to Gorlovka, with the “Essence of Time” unit acted as the tip of the spear, as tankborne infantry. After not too persistent resistance, the Armed Forces of Ukraine fell back to Verkhnetoretskoye and Krasny Partizan, and the Independent Tactical Group “Essence of Time” remained in Panteleimonovka, a large settlement nearest to Gorlovka – one of the bastions of DPR militia. Here, the unit carried out a variety of functions, but the main one was the same – tank guarding, emplacement in case of advance of Ukrainian military, reconnaissance, combat training and combat coordination.
Our unit has grown even more, it became possible to keep one branch on the guard of the base in Panteleimonovka, and one in Yasinovataya, not counting Yasinovataya base personnel and service of the rear.
I stayed in Panteleimonovka almost permanently, realizing my suddenly uncovered “talent” of cooking. My task was to feed militiamen with preferably varied meals, tasty and healthy, and I succeeded at that with the help of the guys. Nevertheless, work in the kitchen didn’t allow to miss training, I was just released from guard duties.
Tank crews lived together with us, we guarded them, and there were anti-aircraft gunners who guarded us. There were many interesting people among them, who had abandoned the peaceful life for the sake of resisting fascism, for example, there was a snake catcher with years of experience, whose callsign, Taipan, is the name for the most venomous snakes on the planet.
We lived amicably with tank crews and anti-aircraft gunners, rare incidents quickly stopped, we ate from the same pot, together went to training, sat near th
e same campfire in the evenings, reminiscing our past lives, making plans for the future. Of course, the plans were not going to come true, because there was the ORDER.
Field training, position development, shooting, documentaries, instructions, books, every day was intense, every day was planned a week before, and during the evening muster there were only reports of completed work and analysis of what was learned. I think it’s in Panteleimonovka, where the backbone of the Independent Tactical EoT combat group was formed, which continues to accomplish missions set by the command.
However, the “Essence of Time” performed not only military work, political activity did not stop as well. Joint viewings and discussions of new lectures, and reading literature were organized. Effectiveness of self-education on the bases was probably less than in the information center, due to the tight schedule of combat training and work, but it didn’t stop. Sometimes the whole mission was even able to gather to discuss the political situation, the challenges that it sets before us, to identify ways to achieve local goals.
At that time, our friend Igor-Bolgarin worked actively; he was a member of the People’s Council of DPR. Often according to his initiatives, we participated in the public life of the Republic, for example, it was he who organized the referendum with the help of the “Essence of Time” cell in Donetsk on one of the ballot stations of Kiev district, near the Donetsk airport, back in may 2014. At the airport Bolgarin died a heroic death, but it happened much later.
In the second stage most of the guys have already decided on specializations, to which they dedicated all of their time. Someone became an assault trooper like Matros. Someone became a sniper, like Mars and Liteyshik. Someone, like Gazetchik and Lom, joined the service of the rear, without which the life of any unit intending to engage in any meaningful activity is impossible. For example, Feldsher and Bolgarin, together with Gazetchik, were actively engaged in camera operator, reporter activity, but the majority of the footage is not meant for a wide audience. But the movies and videos posted on YouTube and shown at the “Essence of Time” political schools, were edited precisely out of their material.
In October we have been already got accustomed to the service, established communications, and by the beginning of November, the system worked like clockwork. The sand sometimes got in the mechanism, but was quickly ground with the help of Volga, Iris and Pyatnitsa. During the next rotation in Yasinovataya, on about 8th to 10th day of November, I heard about our future entering the airport for the first time. But that’s another story.
Other stories of “Essence of Time” unit soldiers: “Essence of Time” unit in Donbass
Source (for copy): https://eu.eot.su/?p=7809
