Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[KP] Children of the inhuman 90s left to fight for the young. Because they are not used to retreat. Dmitry Steshin talks about simple and honest hard workers who have become new Russian heroes.
by Dmitry Steshin
Mobilized at the age of "over forty" become the backbone of our army in the combat zone. And the word "kuzmich" from fan jargon suddenly takes on a completely different meaning. "Kuzmich", KP.RU military correspondent Dmitry Steshin tried to understand this phenomenon.
Morally stable, All life Growing for one team
I myself am a seasoned "kuzmich" , I am no longer over 40, but a little over 50, so please, no offense. You can’t rewind the years you lived back, let’s put up with it.
For the first time, I heard the definition of "kuzmich" almost at the end of the 90s from the "Zenith" football fans. There was something offensive in this word and at the same time very figurative. A typical "kuzmich" at the stadium is a hard worker of decent qualifications, a foreman or foreman, a medium-sized manufacturing businessman or builder.
Age over 40, family, morally stable, all his life he has been rooting for one team. From paraphernalia - a "rose" scarf, seeds, a sports newspaper, sometimes a heating pad with beer or port wine behind the belt of "holiday" trousers. The tube from the dropper was passed under an ironed white shirt, so that you could celebrate the goals of your favorite team or fill in the bitterness of defeat right on the podium.
The fans themselves, who dubbed the "kuzmichi", often did not go to the ball at all, but preferred to defend the honor of the team with fisticuffs in the bushes behind the stadiums and in the wastelands.
As a result, the eight-year struggle in Ukraine found everyone.
Many football fans went to fight as volunteers in the summer, and the “Kuzmichs” were enlisted en masse in the fall. Although, in the Donbass, “Kuzmichi” have been fighting since 2014. Before the special operation, I only met them here in the trenches, they pulled out the most hopeless period of this conflict, when there were no hostilities, and the dead and wounded were every day. It seems that the war is not visible, but there is burned-out equipment and dugouts destroyed by shells, skirmishes with enemy sabotage groups and its regular units, trying to constantly occupy the “gray zone.”
"Kuzmichi" dragged this war in detail, not seeing much difference between the positions at the "Promka" near Donetsk and work in the shop. For young people in their 20s and 30s, such a hopeless sitting in the trenches was painful.
I'm what the shop, what the fellow
The term "Kuzmich" with a different semantic content threw the same "Kuzmich" with the call sign "Admin" into the public space. "Admin" is also over 40 years old, he fought all his life - in the mountains, on the plains and in the sands. For several months he slept on the floor to my left, in the location of the DPR battalion "Vostok" near Mariupol. On the right was Vladlen Tatarsky , aspiring by age to Kuzmichi , who had been at war since 2014.
And at our disposal, whenever possible, there were always clean floors, food, coffee. We also had a lot of potions and pills. What to do, years. In the evenings, we treated each other with medicines for colds, stomach, and pressure. Sometimes - sleeping pills. But, every morning we got up at six and left for the front.
I am on my journalistic business, "Admin" with Tatarsky - for aerial reconnaissance. According to Kuzmichevsky, in detail, they have assembled a unique set of drones for various tasks and are still literally in great demand at the front. Almost irreplaceable.
Somehow, without agreeing, we supported the harsh male order of life, although no one demanded this from us. Exactly the same order I saw many times at the "kuzmichi" in positions.
I remember that in 2018, near Dokuchaevsk, I listened to a half-hour monologue by “Kuzmich”, the former director of the state farm. He told and showed me non-standard weapons, which he took away or knocked out for his defense unit. Starting from the Donchanka sniper rifle, manufactured by the DPR, and ending with the mines with which the Kuzmich covered his opornik from Ukrainian saboteurs. According to him, while extracting this military good, he even reported from his small front-line salary. And I have no doubt about it. Good commanders value such fighters above generals.
Donchanka sniper rifle is an old PTRS antitank rifle issued to Red Army troops during WWII. Separatists stuck a scope on it, bore sighted it, then went to work with it. It uses the same 14.5mm cartridge used on the KORD machine guns on Russian tanks. This is the first time I heard this implementation called "Donchanka sniper rifle."
Born in the USSR and Deceived by the West
It is well known that the exact nickname takes root instantly. And there is something special in the generation of "kuzmichi", some unique details.
Firstly, our generation was brought up by grandparents who really fought. And the winners! Who did not fight, just took a sip of military dashing. Beloved grandchildren, all this was told many times within the framework of the "oral tradition of transferring knowledge between generations."
For example, my grandmother, who fought, explained to me at what point it was already necessary to start fighting. White bread for her was a symbol of peaceful life and prosperity. She did not like black, because it reminded her of her youth left on the front road from Stalingrad to Frankfurt on the Oder.
The second detail: it was the generation of “kuzmichi,” born back in the Soviet Union, who believed in Perestroika, and then endured the terrible deceit and humiliation of the 90s, when the USSR was dismantled under the sweet speeches of the West.
The Kuzmichi know how the Empire was traded for aniline liqueurs, Jupi powdered juices, and Uncle Ben's Negro puree. They remember how already in 1992 the attitude of the West towards Russia changed. Love and friendship disappeared somewhere, and the so-called, in terms of those years, “goat presentations” began.
It didn't for me until February 24th, 2022
These "Kuzmichi" understand that they were bred and thrown. Because after the deceit came poverty, humiliating "humanitarian", banditry, chaos and lawlessness. And a series of military conflicts: Transnistria, Abkhazia, Karabakh, Tajikistan, Chechnya, the first and second, a wave of terrorist attacks.
They did not run from mobilization like the juniors
The Kuzmichi will not step on the same rake a second time, we have an equation firmly embedded in our brains: a strong independent state - peace. And if this world needs to be conquered, do not hesitate, the “kuzmichi” will win it back, gnaw it out. "Kuzmichi" are absolutely devoid of illusions and understand that no one will do anything for them. When partial mobilization was announced, they did not flee to Georgia or Kazakhstan, like the generation of 20-30-year-olds. And most importantly, they know how to win and what this victory is worth.
All "kuzmichi" went through borderline states in their lives - wild and savory army service in the 90s, quarter-by-quarter fights, racketeering shootouts from Chinese TTs and converted gas pistols. They know how to distinguish between "a specific hit on a business from a punch" and enter the prison cell correctly. They know how to take away and how to protect.
“Kuzmich” will not hesitate to explain what he is fighting for: “for his wife”, “for the mine”, “for the boys”, “so that the children do not walk near the basements”, “for Russia”. He does not need to be agitated additionally, he, by definition, calmly endures dirt, cold, hunger and buying food with equipment for his own. But it would be nice not to take him for a dumb idiot. You can not deceive a person who is ready to part with life or health for the Motherland. "Kuzmichi" cannot stand such an attitude.
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