Source: Committee of Soldiers' Mothers of St-Petersburg

Warrant officer Sergei:

The food: "We went to help with the unloading, they had brought bricks" - signifying that they had brought bread. They transport it on open trucks called 'Urals'. The bread is stale, covered in dirt and saturated with salt water. But even so, everyone tries to steal a loaf. For one and a half - two weeks they didn't bring any bread to the base.

We shot cows, and when there were no more left, we shot dogs and ate them.

We sneaked around the cellars, stole pickle, anything lying around, jam. We took mattresses, rugs, pillows, blankets to sleep on in our tents. We had to change them a lot because of all the lice. The deputy commander of the regiment ordered us to burn everything, but what can you burn when you have nothing to lie on anyway?

At the base the lads drink a lot, and swap and trade things with each other. They fight over vodka, petrol, and tinned meat.

We only smoked trophy cigarettes (taken from rebel bases or the houses of peaceful civilians): 'Congress', 'Parliament'. You can't smoke the ones that we're given freely: Usmanskaya 'Prima' is just like grass - you get a terrible cough from them, they're disgusting. They give us five packets a month. Once they only gave the whole division fifty packets of 'Belomorkanal' from the Pogarsky factory - old, soggy packets, the tobacco was like powder, like snuff, you started to cough straight away from it, your throat starts to burn.

There is practically no nutrition: dry rations for the day. Daily ration-1: galet biscuits, tinned meat - one tin, porridge - one tin, dry drinks, two sweets, raisins, tea with sugar. Daily ration-2 and -3: the portions are even more meagre. In fact you always have to make the rations last three or five days.

There was absolutely no hot food, and if you were given any after a battle, then it was rice and 3-4 tins of meat for the whole company (120 people). The porridge is like wall putty, you could plaster with it.

If you have to go into battle, then there is no hot food. They put your food in your backpack (one ration). We had tea from burnt sugar, at least that gave it some colour.

Supplies: according to the law, you are supposed to get new camouflage gear after one month of service. In practice, they haven't given us anything since October. People take it from dead Chechen rebels. You have to go into battle in civilian clothes, the soldiers looked like the bandits, and were afraid that they would begin to shoot at their own people.

The technology is thirty years old, repaired, darned and re-darned, even since the last war. It is only through their heroic efforts that the mechanics manage to stick them together and repair this unsuitable technology.

Colonnades of armoured infantry vehicles are impossible; you go 2-3 km then stand and wait while the cars cool down and pull each other along with cables. That is how up to half of the cars fall out of the line on marches.

The sub-machine guns were either used before or have been rescued from the scrap heap, made in 1976 and don't shoot at all any more. You just have to kick the machine guns to get them to work, like kick starting a motorbike. Only commanders and snipers have new weapons.

Private Roman:

Lice - there are so many in the tents. When your washing comes back from the laundry, there are lots there too. First and second category linen has so many lice that you would think that it was taken straight from the bodies of the dead or that they washed the floor with it.

Incurring injuries

Warrant officer Sergei:

One of our divisions ended up in a fire ball and everybody was burnt. Then the commander gave the command by walkie-talkie for heavy artillery. The artillery gave 2-3 volleys and then 'they buried all those who had been burnt'.

They are allegedly doing this for humanitarian ends - so that the wounded and killed don't end up in the hands of the Chechens. If a wounded man is lying on the battle field and there is no way of dragging him out, then a sniper fires at him. Sergei has also done this to his own men.

Private Zakhar:

Several soldiers were injured while storming Grozny and they tried to drag them from the battle field, but the heavy firing made this impossible. They made a few attempts and saw that at least two were alive. They tried using the tank, but even the tank couldn't get to the wounded. Then the order was given for the rocket launchers to be used and the wounded and dead were burnt. Motive - to keep them out of the hands of the rebels.

Artillery fire on soldiers of the same unit

Private Vladimir:

At the beginning of the war, we were stationed near Bamut, and there was a serious incident when our own artillery started to bomb the 'Grad' installation from the infantry camp. Two tents were burnt to the ground, 10-11 people were killed, a young nurse was amongst them.

Private Andrei:

We were positioned above Bamut when the artillery fire suddenly started. Lots of people were killed, we managed to hide in a trench.

'Dedovshchina'- the army culture of exploitation and torture by superiors

Private Andrei:

At night, the older, superior officers posted the new, young privates on guard, of course, they fall asleep, and then the Chechens come and kill the soldiers. It happened in the Argynsky gorge, when the Chechens completely destroyed two tents (about 16 people).

Warrant officer Sergei:

If a soldier lets down his comrade, then he will definitely die in the next battle - your own men will kill you, because you have to be able to rely on them.

Unidentified corpses of soldiers

Warrant officer Sergei:

In Mozdok a cemetery was opened behind the hospital.

They just wrote: 'unknown'. They didn't collect the bodies of those who were killed by a direct hit to the unit, and they didn't tell anyone about their deaths, since there was no corpse.

Private Roman:

Mikhail Mashkeev died on the 6th December near Urus-Martan. He is from Karelia, an only son, he was commander of the 1st division of the 2nd company, he had been drafted, was at the beginning of his second year of service. He was completely burnt. During one of the clashes, one of the vehicles for landing troops received a direct hit from a grenade launcher. When they were taking his remains to the base, they still had the skull, but it must have got lost on the way. When the commander saw the few burnt bones, he said that Mashkeev should be listed amongst those who were missing, because there was no skull. They, most probably, threw the bones away.