Operator of Electronic signals intelligence, ex-fighter, call sign Bob: "Explosion deafened me; I could only see stump sticking out above crater. I realise it’s leg; then I realise whose leg it is. I run to help..."
...Robert went to the military enlistment office at the very beginning of the war at the age of 21. He recalls his time in the army as follows: "I wanted to be someone. The only thing I didn’t want to do was paperwork. It seemed to me then that real combat experience was more truthful, more correct."
Now he is 23, and he has seen a lot: heavy fighting in Donbas, the Kharkiv counter-offensive, the deaths and injuries of his comrades-in-arms; contusion and shock when doctors diagnosed Robert with tuberculosis. And then - treatment and transition to electronic intelligence, where his sense of usefulness in this war has increased significantly.
Talking to Bob, I couldn't help but feel that this man, with his war experience and his habit of reflection and analysis, deserves his own Remarque. Maybe it will come to autobiographical prose? I'm sure it would be good.
- Let's start with 2022. Before the invasion, the Russians had been amassing forces near our borders for months, so the possibility of war was discussed at length. Did you decide back then that you would fight? When they said "they're probably going to attack", what did you say to yourself?
- To be honest, I did not expect the attack. It was a big surprise for me - even though I wasn't monitoring the situation very closely. But two days after the full-scale invasion, I was just sick of sitting in the basement.
- What kind of basement?
- I went to my friends' dormitory at the Shevchenko National University of Kyiv to consolidate with them. During the air raid alert, we were forced to go down to the basement. After staying there for a few days, my two friends and I decided to go to the TRO. We walked from the exhibition centre to the centre of Kyiv.
- And then what?
- We went to the military commissariat in Holosiivskyi district, but were told that there were no places, and we could go to Poroshenko's TRO. I still don't understand what it was and where it came from. So we went there. Although we thought that Poroshenko's party was a little bit not for us. But we wanted to fight... Not even just fight - we wanted to do something, not just sit around. Young guys want action, not just words. And we were told that their headquarters were on Tereshchenkivska Street. We went there. It turned out that it was not Poroshenko's TRO, but, so to speak, Korchynskyi's "Brotherhood".
- Why "so to speak"?
- Because it was not the main battalion with which he had been fighting since 2014, but a completely random gathering. They gathered people from rehabilitation centres and just off the street. And they were all based at my university, in the red building of the Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. We stayed there for a week and in the spring we decided to go to the Darnytsia TRO, for voluntary mobilisation. That is, officially under the auspices of the Armed Forces.
-When you were mobilising with your friends, did you associate yourself with any literary figure or historical character? I ask because I know people who initially took such guidelines for themselves. It was easier and more correct for them to have a figure walking beside them.
- It is inspiring, yes. I agree. Well, at the beginning I was more inspired by historical people. I am very fond of poetry and literature in general. That's why, for example, Stus was close to me. I was inspired by his poems. They are so stoic and supportive in a difficult moment. Nowadays, Hemingway inspires me a lot, as does Churchill. I read "The Churchill Factor" (a book by Boris Johnson). I was also very inspired. In general, I read a lot about Churchill.
- Did you read Hemingway during the war? What did you like about him?
- Yes, during the war, just a year ago, I got into it. I read almost everything by him. I have bought a four-volume set and read everything: stories, short stories, novels.
- And how did Hemingway resonate with the combat reality that surrounded you? Here you are in the Russian-Ukrainian war; you are 23 years old, and you are reading Hemingway...
- I was fascinated by the fact that the man took part not in one, but in several wars... I was attracted by the military theme and the description of people who found themselves in extreme situations. I was interested in how it affects people and society.
I love reading in general - and it's not just war-related things that can inspire me during a war. For example, "The Enchanted Mountain" by Thomas Mann. It's a very good book. It describes a man who wanted to isolate himself because he could not live in any other way. He ends up in a sanatorium where he is treated for tuberculosis. To a certain extent, this is also close to my heart, because during the war I got tuberculosis... So, in Mann's novel, a person did not want to return to society, because he was used to living in that sanatorium and nothing existed for him except this sanatorium, no other world. And this novel ends with the First World War, when he is expelled from the sanatorium and drafted into the German army. I like the way it was written. I empathised with the character. And after the first reading, I started reading it for the second time.
- Let's get back to your journey in this war. You started it with the 126th Battalion of the 112th Brigade's TRO.
- It all started with this Darnytsia District Military Commissariat. Then most of the people who were there signed a document on voluntary mobilisation and officially joined the 126th battalion of the 112th Brigade's TRO. What can I say? We did almost nothing for three months. Of course, we had some training. But very locally, we were taught some basics. It was also irregular; basically, we just went on patrols. Even then, I realised that what I definitely did not want to be was a soldier.
- Why?
- Because you have to do what you're told and not look for the meaning in what is said. And I wasn't used to that. Three months later, we passed the training ground in the Dnipropetrovsk region and then went to Kramatorsk. We went to dig the second line of defence...
- Looking ahead, was your first combat experience similar to what you expected?
- No.
- How did you imagine it and what was it like in real life?
- To be honest, I was preparing myself for the worst.
- For example?
- You or your comrade-in-arms have had an arm or a leg blown off. You are surrounded, you have to do something. Supercritical situations, when you are on the verge of life and death and need to pull yourself together, not fall into a stupor.
- What was it like in reality?
- It's much more real than I imagined. And less dramatic. Not as picturesque and not as exciting. I did not even take part in a small arms battle. Most of my encounters with the enemy were at the level of shells or mines. But I have seen the consequences of what metal can do to people - and it is no less terrifying. But in such circumstances, I had no time to be afraid. I simply did not have time. I had to do something. And I did everything I could to save my life and the lives of my comrades.
- Do I understand correctly that you have been a shooter since the beginning of the war?
- Yes, I was. Now I'm not a shooter anymore.
- When you were told you were going to be a rifleman, did you feel disappointed? Maybe you wanted to be different in the war?
- But no. Basically, I wanted to be anything. The only thing I didn't want to do was paperwork. It seemed to me at the time that real combat experience was even more truthful, more correct.
- What kind of weapons did you deal with?
- AK 74. I also fired a Czech machine gun, I don't remember its name. We also had a "Maxim" at our positions, but I did not shoot with it. I usually worked with AK-74.
- If you, as an experienced warrior, could give your inexperienced self, a neophyte in military affairs, one piece of advice, what would you advise?
As for advice to myself, an inexperienced person, I would say this: you need to keep a strong spiritual foundation. Because the war knocks the ground out from under your feet. In order to prevent such phenomena, when a person cannot realise himself in a different environment from the military, dangerous one, you need to have an understanding of who you are and what you are for. You need to clearly understand that you are not the same as the military world - the world of violence and nightmares. You are who you are, and you will remain so. You can be who you are in other worlds.
- In the same summer of 2022, our troops in the Kharkiv and Kherson regions launched a counter-offensive. Did you have a chance to take part in those actions? What do you remember?
- It was the Kharkiv counter-offensive operation led by Syrskyi. It was in mid-September that we withdrew from our positions and left. We were assigned to the 81st Airmobile Brigade. They were taking their positions back, and we were gaining ground. We went to Sviatohirsk and forced the river. Actually, the first real horrors began there. For the first time, we were hit by shells. And while we were crossing, 100 metres away, we moved away from the crossing, and a couple of mines hit the very spot where we were forcing the Siverskyi Donets. It was the first moment when we realised that a counter-offensive is not a game.
And I remember how my brother-in-arms exploded in Sviatohirsk on a "petal" type mine, which is detonated and reacts to movement. Or it explodes in 24 hours. There are two types.
- Did your brother-in-arms step on a "petal" with his heel or toe?
- With a toe. But the situation there was so stupid that I don't even know. Our guys found a car in Sviatohirsk - a "Lada" or a "Zaporozhets", I don't remember. This car had driven into a sinkhole, and we had to get it out. My comrade and I were just going for water. After collecting water, we saw that a man who was trying to pull the car out needed help. Ivan went to help, and I stood aside, because two others had already approached him. That is, there were four of them in total from our company. And they started to lift the car. And one of our guys said: "What are we doing here? There's a sapper's mark here".
- Oh.
- And before I can shout to them to get away from there, there is an explosion. I don't understand anything. I was stunned; all I could see was a stump sticking out above the crater. Then I realise it's a leg, and only then I realise whose leg it is. And I run to help.
- Results.
- One of my brothers lost half of his foot. Another got his legs cut. I put a tourniquet on them. Trouble (his call sign) was holding up well. He did not scream; he turned white, though. But he behaved quite calmly. We successfully evacuated him.
- What happened to him next?
- He has already received prosthetics. He lives with his wife in Amsterdam.
- I hope they do well. Robert, didn't your hands shake when you were putting the turnstile on? Where did you learn to do that?
- It was in the Dnipropetrovsk region. We were undergoing coordination, and there was a separate course in tactical medicine, which I attended together with our platoon medic. I went and studied from a woman who has been doing this since 2014. She taught me. I know her call sign - Scythian. She was good at telling me how and what to do.
- You see how well she taught you. Perhaps it was thanks to her that you saved Trouble.
- I think so, thanks to her. Because she was chasing us about how quickly we should put the turnstile in place.
- So, did your hands tremble when you were putting on the turnstile?
Afterwards. And when I put it on - again, at such moments I mobilise all my strength and stop being scared. I was scared before, but I mobilised myself a little bit. Maybe this is my peculiarity. I belong to the category of people who are fully mobilised in critical moments. There is no stupor, I want to act. I get clear in my head what I need to do and how.
Later, of course, I was shocked. I was walking and couldn't hold back my tears. In general, I kept repeating how stupid it was. Although, perhaps, there is no other way.
- You were injured in Bilohorivka. When did it happen and under what circumstances?
- It is worth saying that after 3-4 months we were going to be replaced. There was a rumour in the battalion. We had already handed over all our weapons and were going to go to Kyiv. We were even told that we were going to Kyiv the next day. We were very happy, of course. We were already packing our bags. But then there was an order that the rotation was cancelled, and we were moving on. We had only guesses where we would go. Although it was just then, in autumn - it was the end of October - that the defence of Bakhmut was beginning. We thought we would be sent there. But we were thrown to Bilohorivka. We went there in a strange way, through Izium, because the crossing there was destroyed.
We were taken to the mountain at night, it was raining. We went there with all our equipment. We were told that we were going to stay for a day, but in fact we were replaced only three days later. In the morning, the 91st had to take back a water pumping station near Bilohorivka. But the frontline was going on, we were sitting on the mountain. And they started to hit us with mines. In the morning, there was an unsuccessful assault of the 81st. After that, more NGU soldiers from Kulchytskyi's battalion came to us, sat in our positions, and then they were taken away.
The whole day is cannonade - shooting, shooting, shooting. Mines here and there. "Grad" rockets were firing, scattering "petals". We had to walk carefully. We reached the lower position, and there was an attempted assault by the Russians. We found out only in the morning, because there was no connection. There was another company there. Thank God, they fought back. And a couple of times there were arrivals next to us. I didn't feel very good, but again, I was not afraid. Just a feeling that since we were here, we had to do something.
I had different tasks. I had to endure shelling there and endure shelling here. Then I carried out the wounded a couple of times. Almost all of our platoon was injured, either severely or lightly. Thank God, no one was killed. Everyone was taken out. At the end of the third day, we were also taken out. And when I came down from the mountain, I realised that I felt nauseous and dizzy. The adrenaline had worn off, I guess, and all the symptoms of the concussion appeared. I couldn't eat properly, I couldn't do anything. I remember like a blur that I was sent to Dobropillia and then to Dnipro.
- What were you thinking about in the evacuation vehicle?
- About those who remained there. I tried to keep in touch with them, I understood that this was not the end; maybe there would be many more such things in the future. I tried to somehow abstract myself from it all. I closed myself off, sat thinking about what would happen to me and the guys.
- What did the doctors in Dnipro say?
- Back in Dobropillia, I was discharged with a full medical history: closed craniocerebral injury, acubarotrauma, concussion - that's it. Basically, I had a rest in Dnipro. I was injected with medicines. I was under a drip maybe once. By the way, for some reason, all contused are put on a drip, but I was injected with dexamethasone...
A week later, I felt fine, and the doctors in Dnipro saw no point in keeping me there. But for some reason they did not want to let me go to Kyiv. I live there, I have a unit there, but for some reason they did not want to let me go there. They sent me to Lutsk, and I stayed there for one day. The next day, the doctors came to me and asked: "Where are you from?" - From Kyiv. What are you doing here? Go to Kyiv. By the way, this is how some army or medical institutions work here.
I was on medical leave in Kyiv for a month. A month later, I went for a MMC and found out that I had tuberculosis!
- Wow. How did this happen?
- I don't know. Although when we were travelling around Donbas, we slept in incredible places. I would never have imagined that I could sleep in such places. It turns out that you can - underground, in damp basements, with mould... That's how it happened somehow.
- Judging by the fact that you are now in service, it was not a very severe form of tuberculosis.
- No. It was a closed form of tuberculosis. I didn't even feel the symptoms I was told about: sweating, fever, rapid exhaustion. However, now I feel the consequences: I am no longer as hardy as I used to be. I have a hard time with heat. And the cold is also harder to bear.
- But do doctors say that they have neutralised the main danger?
- I was cured. Only scars on the lungs and residual changes remained. I was treated for six months. I took antibiotics, was in the central military hospital, had 2 or 3 weeks of active therapy. Then I enrolled in a dispensary, where I was given medication.
- What did your friends and family think of it?
- We were shocked, to be honest. It was a shock for me too.
- I can imagine.
- What is very ironic is that a few days before I had a conversation about tuberculosis. We were sitting with a fellow soldier who had been wounded in Bilohorivka, and his girlfriend and I were putting a tourniquet on him. And she told me that she had an open form of tuberculosis. First, her brother got sick, and she got sick from her brother. And so she was treated for a year. She had an open form of it.
Back then I thought: I'll probably never have something like this! And here's a surprise. It was nothing. I felt like a nineteenth-century aristocrat dying of tuberculosis. It was considered an aristocratic disease (smiles ironically - Y.K.).
- You have the willpower to joke like that.
- I cannot perceive it in any other way.
- Do you feel the effects of the contusion in any way?
- But no. Thank God, there are no obvious consequences. Only a little deaf in the right ear. But recently I had an audiometry, and they told me that everything was within the normal range. That is, my right ear is a little worse at hearing, but not significantly.
- Then you were transferred to the Electronic Signals Intelligence battalion?
- After that, there was a reserve battalion. One, then another. My unit did not want to dismiss me. Instead of the resignation letter I submitted, I received an order to transfer to Chernihiv region. It was a surprise for me, of course. And I was unfit for medical examination in six months. And we have this precarious situation where the letter of the law does not allow both discharge and non- discharge, because such a status was not spelled out.
- How so?
- It was not determined what to do in such situations. According to the laws of peacetime, this status is final for writing off. But they did not specify how to do it during martial law. That's why I was told that it was unreasonable. That is another ironic situation in life. I had to sit in an abandoned camp in the Chernihiv region and feed mosquitoes.
- Soon after, you were transferred to another battalion, where you are engaged in electronic intelligence. What are your responsibilities?
- This is the maintenance of sensors that show... wings, for example. But I have a wider range of tasks. This is already beyond the jurisdiction of our conversation. I can only say that, in principle, I had to learn everything myself. There are knowledgeable people here. And there is nothing complicated. The main thing is the desire to learn something new. I consider myself a quick learner and can absorb knowledge that may be considered complex due to its technical nature. But it's not, because it's not higher mathematics. You just need to know some basics and have a desire to learn. In general, I have seen people here who carry this burden with enthusiasm; they add all sorts of cool projects, collaborations, developments - just because they want to do something. And looking at this degree of communication, I had a culture shock because working at a computer, your efficiency is much higher than sitting in a trench and catching mines with your teeth.
- It seems that your sense of being needed in this war has increased.
- Yes. The feeling of what I can give... Although in the army, the feeling of being useless always haunts you. You are needed only to do something. As soon as you don't do it, you are useless. Even if you want to do something much better, some tasks that can give much more efficiency, you become useless to the command because of your stubbornness, because you don't want to follow their instructions, but give them ideas on how to improve their work. This attitude - you're the smartest - this unwillingness to accept ideas, this rigidity - is the key point. This is generally the cornerstone of the incompetence of some personnel in our army. Especially those who hold command positions.
-Do the Russians continue to have an advantage in terms of electronic warfare equipment? In the first months, I remember that our military paid tribute to their training in this area.
- They have an advantage only in large electronic warfare systems, such as "Pole-21", "Zhitel", "Borisoglebsk". These are jamming stations that operate for many kilometres, over a long range. They are effective against UAVs because they jam the GPS, which is needed to control the wings. This is a problem. But they have no advantage against trench electronic warfare, mobile electronic warfare. To the extent that we have such means, they have them. Because the demand for these means is high, because we are now in the era of fpv drones, which we need to defend against. And in fact, the main problem on the front line is these fpv drones. Just as we use fpv drones effectively, so do they. Maybe not as efficiently, but they are using them on a larger scale. Because they have a truly mass production of fpv drones. While we don't have such mass production at the state level. But the problem with their fpv drones is the frequency. The more mass-produced a product is in terms of frequency (i.e. a series of drones have already been produced at a certain frequency and they cannot change frequencies and re-arrange mass production to other frequencies), the easier it is for the enemy to adapt to them. So there is a slow reaction to our response to their drones. They make drones in large numbers, but because of their large numbers, they cannot quickly switch to other frequencies. These mutual disadvantages result in parity.
- Recently, it has been noticed that enemy drones fly very low during attacks on Ukrainian cities and villages. What is the reason for this?
- Maybe with the fact that the radar can be tuned to a certain altitude, we need to work on clear targets. If we are working on the Shaheds, we know that they usually fly at these heights. If it flies lower, and we don't have a given range to cover the gap where he flies, then of course the radar will not notice it. This is a manoeuvre that is used, and you have to adjust, include it in the probability, so to speak. Because you can't see the target on the radar, you have no guidance on where to shoot. Because the radar shows the height, range, etc. And if you can't see the target, you can only rely on the sound. If the whole thing is happening at night, the target is black, the sky is cloudy, you can't see much.
- Let's change the subject. Do you follow what is happening in the rear? Are there any processes there that confuse you or, on the contrary, inspire you?
- I don't like these overly mainstream things - when people do something without thinking about what they are doing. They don't think about it, they don't analyse the information.
- For example?
- For example, I don't like the total ban on even Ukrainian writers who, for some reason, wrote in Russian. In my opinion, there are double standards here, because there are authors with frankly dubious views, but they write in Ukrainian - and so let's praise them! And what if a person had clear views, even if they contradicted the foundations of the Ukrainian state, because of ignorance of the historical context? Listen, people make a lot of mistakes in judgements about certain figures. And why? Because opinion leaders charge some mainstream things into our society. That is, some bloggers, not even experts, but upstarts who have become popular because of activities other than literary or historical, begin to say such provocative things...
- I agree with you, there is a lot of such pseudo-journalistic rubbish from amateurs with a good tongue in cheek in the information space nowadays.
- ...I mean, these things are provocative for me, and for people, this is what they might want to hear. And, picking up this idea, people start to carry it without understanding the context, reasons and meaning of what they are saying. And they repeat it like parrots. I have met many such people who say the same thing. You start to prove something to them, talking about the historical context, and they don't even want to hear you! I don't like this.
Propaganda generally softens brains. People are being fed what they want to hear, especially the masses, who are compliant enough to be injected with something. And it is against this backdrop of the war with Russia that politicians or opinion leaders are deliberately stirring up interest in this, although it has no basis in fact. They somehow argue the historicity of Ukraine, or something else... We are similar in this, by the way, to Russia. I can't stand it, the cult of some kind of historicity, the greatness of the state. That is, we are much more similar to Russians than we think. This is a shame. It's quite a shame.
- I'd like to ask you this last question. What does your department need most? What do we ask our readers to contribute their money to?
- I wouldn't say about the unit, but I would say about my brother-in-arms, who is engaged in a programme of training FPV crews to shoot down enemy wings, and is also developing his own FPV wing. That is, he is raising money for components for it.
- It is a matter of utmost importance. What is the call sign of your colleague?
- Call sign is Ali. Together with his comrades, Ali developed his own FPV wing (aircraft). The project is called "Somali". This FPV wing was designed to destroy aerial targets, namely enemy reconnaissance aircraft (Orlan, Zala, Supercam, Skat...).
The project is 95% complete. There is only a little bit left. We have already spent over UAH 120,000 of our own funds. Now we need to assemble 4 aircraft and conduct combat testing to confirm the fully operational model.
- How much does one such board cost on average?
- About 20,000 UAH. We did everything at our own expense, but unfortunately, we ran out of resources. We have been doing this for 3 months and have made 32 test runs. Now we are forced to either postpone this project for 2 months or ask you for help. We need 4 wings - 80,000 UAH. The most active donors will receive trophies!
Those who wish to help complete this project can donate here: https://send.monobank.ua/jar/3a79uZbp2v
Yevhen Kuzmenko, "Censor.NET"
Photo: from Robert's archive
