Afghanistan: A Russian Soldier's Story

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Summary: war of a different kind
Review: "Afghanistan" by Vladislov Tamarov, a former Russian soldier is a well written book. While, the book does not detail specific war horrors and details, it does cover the emotional toll a war takes on a person.
Tamarov at age 19 was drafted by the then Soviet Union military and sent to Afghanistan where he spent two years. His specialty was defusing mines thus facing death each time as if it was not bad enough to fight an unknown enemy in a strange land.
The young soldier took his camera to the battle zone snapping pictures at every opportunity available. The photos are mostly those of Russian soldiers and landscapes of Afghanistan. The photos are excellent. The pictures speak volumes when words fail.
He has expressed well the psychological and emotional cost of war on boys who had to grow up fast to become men. These men came back home but were not and will never be the same.

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Summary: WHAT CNN/BBC WERE NEVER REALLY ABLE TO DO...
Review: ...Tamarov's gripping narrative achieves with stirring precision. Afghanistan, as he recounts from his 20 month stint with the 'Soviet Union' army in the mid 80s, is a terrain strewn with land mines and deceitful soldiers who may smile during the day but point their bayonet at you in the dark. At the heart of the memoir is a deep undercurrent of betrayal, and not just the variety that came from his enemy -- the Afghan "Dushmans" (bandits).

With ah-ha clarity he also reveals the wool that the military-industrial complex pulls over the eyes of starry-eyed young soldiers. In his case, the Communist party had promised that they were building schools and planting trees in Afghanistan (not unlike the recent War on Terror) although the ulterior agendas could have had more to do with trafficking in gold, stones or drugs. Shortly after, in an Uzbekistan boot camp, he learnt that their real mandate was little more than to "defeat the enemy".

What follows is a memoir that does not come across as an embittered tirade on the futility of war or some such highfalutin agenda. It is a stark, honest, moving chronicle of the realities of war from the perspective of one soldier who lived to tell the tale. And for the text-averse, it is lush with pictures that even the biggest media channels have not managed (imho).

What makes the book such a compelling read though is the sheer honesty of some of the narrative. It is clear to me that the intent of this book was not to make a living off royalties but to say something that the author has obviously been deeply moved by. Incidentally, it is also very relevant to our world in general, not just within the context of his own battles.

A very satisfying addition to your stash. If you are interested in this book, I would also recommend an account of the Gulf war by a somewhat more irreverent American marine, "Jarhead".

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Summary: ANOTHER STUPID BUT PAINFUL CONFLICT.......
Review: A truly moving personal account about the War in Afghanistan by Vladimir Tamarov, born in 1965 in Leningrad, who served twenty months in that conflict. The many faces of evil in war, the coming of age from boy to man, the senseless killing of human beings, are topics that powerfully emerge from Tamarov's "diary of war". The book contains truly interesting photographs which tell a tale of haunted faces, fear, beautiful landscapes, the quiet moments of relaxation before doom and mayhem, camaraderie, that visually transport you to that nonsensical conflict.
The pictures captions come from the author's war diary. They reach, at times, powerful lyrical levels when dwelling about the central issues of the "personal experience of participation" in war. But at the end, the revelations about the stupidly conceived privileges of the brass, the manipulation of the gun ho adrenaline of the young soldiers, the doubts about the sense and rightness of the fight , the telling dreams about the horror of the annihilation of the innocents, all fade away.
Only the ultimate reflection of the fighting soldier, in all the wars that have been fought, remains, with detailed form. You are there only to survive and protect the guy next to you in the foxhole, the only one who really cares about you when the bullets are flying around. The most difficult and daunting times in the life of a young man, who has fought as a soldier and survived to tell the tale, are here, poignantly, but at the same time with sad detachment, recalled in a manner that will make you think profoundly about the banality of war. Kudos to the author for this inspired personal diary, about his experience in Afghanistan. A review by your friend Luciano Lupini.

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Summary: Tovarich
Review: Back when "Afghanistan:A Russian Soldier's Story" was called "Afghanistan-Soviet Vietnam", Mr. Tamarov was a fixture at a Manhattan intersection where he personally sold his book. By no means was he some street crazy, some holy fool warning of the apocalypse. No, he was a peaceful man who had peered into the abyss and lived to tell about it. He had a natural affinity for all combat veterans, no matter the uniform they had worn, but particularly Vietnam veterans ("my brothers"); he was known to effusively welcome them back "...from the land of the dead". Vietnam veterans just about had to force Mr. Tamarov to accept payment.

So it's good that Mr. Tamarov has come in from the cold and good that his book can reach the audience it deserves because brother Tamarov truly has something important to say about war and warriors. There is a vibrant, restless energy to this work (no doubt purchased at the cost of the blood shed and the tears wept during the nearly two years Mr. Tamarov spent on the battlefield) that more than compensates for its flaws. Yes, the writing sometimes meanders, yes the translation could be better, and yes, some of the photographs are grainy; this is not yet another slick, coffee-table glossy "war retrospective" that is pretty but passionless. This is a grunt's-eye, gritty memoir by a passionate writer who wants (and needs) to tell all about the horror, the horror. It is a remarkable achievement.

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Summary: Great Photos, Good book
Review: Being in Afghanistan I ordered a few books on the history of the soviet era here to get a better idea of my surroundings. I carry a gun but also carry a camera and love photography when I fly. This book has good photos, all black and white and good captions for the photos. I'd reccomend it because it is rather succinct and easy to read. The only reason it gets 4 stars instead of 5 is that there is not enough to read at times. some pages are 90% blank with their captions being the only reading, I felt that there could have been a bit more to write.
Remy

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Summary: A memoir you will NEVER forget!
Review: Here is a riveting memoir by Vladislav Tamarov. In 1984 men were drafted into the Soviet Army at the age of eighteen. There was no choice. Unless you were in college or disabled, you served. Many men broke their legs to avoid serving. Others, the more wealthy, bribed their way out. Vlad was in college two years when the law changed and he was off to boot camp. Training the men needed, they never received. Training the men did NOT need, they got. (For example, lots of time was spent learning to parachute, even though it was a well known fact that no one used parachutes in Afghanistan.)

Vlad was born January 12, 1965. His "Date of Military Service Application" was April 26, 1984. This memoir really began when an officer walked up to Vlad at a distribution center and asked, "Do you want to serve in the commandos, the Blue Berets?" Vlad kept a tiny calendar where he crossed off his six hundred and twenty-one days, one-at-a-time. Vlad kept detailed records of each mission he participated in. He had his own little code, shown in this memoir. Two hundred and seventeen of those days were spent on combat missions. In addition to Vlad's coded diary, he secretly took many photographs. This book has dozens of the pictures littered throughout, and makes a powerful impact on those who read it.

***** Vlad, a minesweeper, portrays the horrors of war in vivid details. The reader can almost hear the explosions nearby and smell the fear of being shot at. Once you have read THIS book, you will never forget it! *****

Reviewed by Detra Fitch.

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Summary: Riveting. . .Poignant. . .Heartbreaking
Review: Only from a foot soldier's perspective can one gleam the horror, trauma, and insanity of war--of being far from home in a distant, strange land where young soldiers were dying in a conflict propped up and perpetuated by politicians and bureaucrats. Vladislav Tamarov furnishes a firsthand account of war's brutality in his riveting book, AFGHANISTAN: A RUSSIAN SOLDIER'S STORY.

And Tamarov wasn't just any foot soldier: as a 19-year-old draftee he was selected to be a minesweeper in a country littered with mines, where one mistake or misstep carried fatal, permanent consequences. For 621 days in the mid-1980s Tamarov served his country in Afghanistan and did what was necessary to survive, to live another day--to be able to go home, even though "home" would never be the same upon his return.

The author shares with the reader his most intimate, personal, painful feelings about his experiences, both during and after the war. And the accompanying photos--pictures of young soldiers little older than boys thrust into a needless war with even more needless death--are truly heartbreaking. In fact, AFGHANISTAN: A RUSSIAN SOLDIER'S STORY is not for the faint of heart: it is an eye-opening account of the insanity of war that must be told, again and again. Highly recommended.
--D. Mikels

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Summary: These pictures are a memorial
Review: The words in this testimony of a soldier's own war can easily bring tears. But it's the photographs, sometimes bleak, sometimes showcasing soldierly comeraderie, surrounded by the hauntingly beautiful Afghanistan landscape, that will make a mark on the reader. I was shaken to learn that some were taken just hours before the subject died. Tamarov's writing captures the excitement of these kids going off to war, having been fed the Soviet line, and the dissilusionment that follows, as well as the inability to reintigrate after the war. But the pictures capture everything, that excitement and dissilusionment, the confusion and fear of the minesweepers as it began to sink in that "I don't think we're in Kanachek any more," and that their jobs would be considerably more dangerous than they had expected.

Very moving.

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Summary: Afghanistan A Russian Soldier's Story - A personal tale!
Review: This is the extremely poignant story of a young Russian from Leningrad by the name of Vladislav Tamarov who at the age of nineteen was conscripted into the Soviet Army knowing full well his destination upon completing his basic and airborne training, Afghanistan. Rarely if ever have I read a story such as this, told with the full depth of emotions over what someone has seen and been forced to participate in.

After his conscription, Vladislav went to basic and airborne training, where by his description the training was wholeheartedly inadequate to the task at hand. But then, armies can train basic trainees in the very basics of soldiering but they can never fully prepare them for the realities that lay ahead when facing actual combat. Of note is the fact that he and his fellow trainees spent a lot of time on the airborne training only to never use it in Afghanistan.

Armed with this most minimal of training, Vladislav and his fellow basic training graduates headed off for Afghanistan. Landing in Kabul he saw the first of many dichotomies where the people of Afghanistan attempted to continue to live their lives the best they could despite rocket attacks and a constant shifting between the Afghanistan government's forces and the Mujahadeen. To add to his already cumbersome load of trying to learn how to survive in combat, he was also immediately picked out to be a minesweeper, the job that few soldiers of any army wants to have.

Vladislav goes on to tell us of the many strife's and hardships that both he and his fellow soldiers endured and some which who did not survive. I found the style in which he told his story to be quite compelling as he tells it with a great depth of emotion to include areas where he seems to almost be in a dream/nightmare state where in one paragraph he's home, he's made it and in the next paragraph he's still in Afghanistan running for his life or attempting to save a friends life.

Of interest is how for quite some time at the beginning of this war the Soviet people were not told what was happening and why young soldiers were coming home in zinc coffins. To us, as Americans, it would seem unthinkable for our government to commit so many assets to a combat action without telling the general populace. To think that the USSR attempted to do is almost inconceivable.

Overall this is a story in pictures and words that is very telling of the experiences young men go through in war and the author deserves high praise for bringing it to print and those of us fortunate to have read it! I myself am in the Army and I found that I learned a great deal from this person that today I call a friend but back in my early days in the Army I was told he and his fellow soldiers were my enemy, thank God that's a war that never happened. I hope for him today that the demons of this war do not still haunt him for he and his fellow Afghansti have seen enough demons!

I highly recommend this book to any and all for it will certainly enrich your knowledge of the Soviet Afghan war and bring you in touch with the author who a truly honorable man who when he was but a mere teenager was forced to grow old before his time. {ssintrepid}

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Summary: The Real Thing
Review: This is the most amazing book I have read all year! It's not just a story, in his own words, from a young Russian soldier in that terrible place, but it is a photo book full of the most beautiful but tragic black and white photos. You see the haunted faces of Vladimir Tamarov (the author and photographer) and his brother soldiers, many of which did not make it back. And as you read his haunted words, how he came back and could not ever be the same, how his friends who died there visit him in his dreams. They were eighteen and nineteen but they look sixteen. The title "Soviet Vietnam" is quite haunting. I believe if I met the author now I would be reminded of our own boys who were damaged by Vietnam. They also were just draftees (conscripts) in a place where they did not want to be. As for our soldiers who are now in Afghanistan, it's true they are fighting the same vicious enemy as Vladimir did! But, don't our men look ever so much better fed, and organized, and equipped, and trained, then those poor Soviet conscripts? I reccommend this book so highly, I would personally buy a copy for all my friends.