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| Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia |
| Interview: Sergeant Grigoriev, who defeated the enemy in hand-to-hand combat: I gave that knife to a friend |
| 2025-03-04 |
| Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. Very down to earth young man, sounds to me like. by Marina Akhmedova [REGNUM] Junior Sergeant Andrey Grigoriev, call sign Tuta, became famous throughout Russia after a video of his knife fight with a DPR VSSU soldier was distributed on Telegram channels. The Ukrainian had a camera mounted on his helmet that recorded the fight. Grigoriev won. Dying, the Ukrainian called his opponent the best fighter in the world. Tuta also received many serious wounds and was hospitalized. Video is in Russian. On January 11, President Vladimir Putin signed a decree awarding the Russian fighter the title Hero of Russia. The fighter admitted that he was shocked to learn of the award. On February 23, the head of state presented Grigoriev with the Hero of Russia Star. Andrey Grigoriev told the editor-in-chief of the Regnum news agency, Marina Akhmedova, about that very fight and what happened next. β Andrey, almost every person in our country watched the video of your knife fight with a Ukrainian serviceman, from which you emerged victorious. Hand-to-hand combat rarely occurs in the SVO, they mostly use drones there. Was this the first such case? β No. The first fight was on May 8, 2024. It just wasnβt recorded on video. And what everyone saw was my second fight on November 16. β Naturally, you also won the first fight. β Yes. β Was it about the same? β It was even worse then. β How is it worse? Was it harder to kill the enemy? β That's not the point. There were more of them, fewer of us. We got too close to the VSSU guys, so we had to resort to hand-to-hand combat. β Why? There were no machine guns? β There were machine guns, but we didn't have time to react, didn't have time to reload. So we went hand-to-hand. β They probably didnβt expect that you had knives and knew how to use them well. β It wasn't just about knives. Both we and they fought with whatever we had at hand: knives, machine gun magazines, even mugs. That was the most terrifying fight. And during the second fight we were already one on one. β What was scary about the first fight? Because there were more enemies and they were stronger than you? β Any fight is scary. It doesn't matter what weapon you have. β When the video with you appeared and everyone was talking about it, I didnβt watch it. I thought that if I watch this video in addition to what I had seen before, it will stay with me forever. I decided to watch it only to prepare for the interview, to see your feat. It was very scary. β I have never watched this video. β Were you afraid to relive these experiences? β Yes. It would be very difficult to survive them a second time. β What did you feel then? β I just wanted to do everything quickly, not die and move on. β Were you afraid that you might be killed? Or afraid to kill a person with a knife? β I was afraid that reinforcements would come to him. That's why I wanted the fight to end quickly. When the battle began, we both knew that only one would survive. With God's help, I overcame it. β You said: "With God's help." At that moment, when you were fighting, did you remember God? β No. I concentrated on the fight, I didnβt think about anything else. β Was there adrenaline and nothing else? β Yes. Adrenaline turns on automatically. β Do you become just a creature that aims to survive? β Yes. Survive and complete the mission. β The VSSU officer was also constantly shouting something. Was he calling his own people? I think he was shouting "Storm". β I donβt remember exactly what he was shouting. He was trying to call for reinforcements. I didnβt shout because our guys were far away and no one would come to my aid. There was no need to waste energy shouting, I needed to focus on something else. To complete the task and get out of there alive. β When you spoke to him later, there was no anger or hatred in your voice. You spoke to him as if he were just an acquaintance of yours ("Well, that's it, that's it, that's enough"). β He's already essentially dead. He asked me to let him go, to say goodbye to the sky and to his mother. I tell him: "That's it, come on, brother, goodbye." In any situation, you have to remain human. β I agree with you. Why did you call him "brother"? β Because both he and I were on a mission. β So you're just two people put in these circumstances? If it weren't for these circumstances, it would never have occurred to you to kill each other? β No, of course not. It's just our job. β And when you stood up and saw that he was already torn to pieces and would soon die, did you feel sorry for him? β I wanted to get out of there quickly so that others wouldnβt come. β And when he told you: "You are the best fighter", did you take these words seriously? Or was he just already in a state of affect? β I was in a state of shock. That's why I said so. β You said that you were afraid that backup might come to him because he was talking to them on the radio. At the same time, you let him say goodbye to the sky and his mother. Why? Wouldn't it have been more logical to finish him off so that he would shut up? β I donβt know. It all happened too fast. I just wanted to complete the task and leave. I didnβt pay attention to the rest. β And why did you want to complete the mission? Why are you fighting? β If you decide to sign a contract, you have to go all the way. β What should I go to the end for? β For your homeland. β But it doesnβt reach Yakutia. β It doesn't matter. If you've decided to sign the contract, you have to go. β Why did you decide to sign the contract? β Out of a sense of duty. We are the last generation that saw the veterans of the Great Patriotic War alive. We grew up on their stories of how they fought honestly for their Motherland. I have been a patriot all my life. If they tell me to go, I will go. β Did you communicate with veterans when you were at school? Or was your grandfather a front-line soldier? β I didnβt live to see my grandfathers, they died. But in our village there lived old men who fought. When they went to the club or stood in line for bread, they told me about the war. I listened attentively and was proud of them. Then I wanted my children to be proud of me too. Thatβs how I signed the contract. β Do you remember anything from their stories? β No comment. Better not. β Were these sad stories? β Yes, there were sad ones too. β Maybe the same situations happened to them as to you, but there were no cameras back then. β There were no drones back then Read the rest at this link |
| Posted by:badanov |