Hay Zinvor

THE SYMBOL OF OUR LATEST VICTORIES

Hayk Ter-Tadosyan, the son of Major General Arkady Ter-Tadjosyan, remembers.

… Here are the photos. Here, under the cover, not in the album, there is a picture. Kajik is my father’s driver. (By the way, Kajik, Kajik Hovsepyan, is the same driver who took the captive Azeris to exchange during the events in Khojaly. His photo of an Azeri child in his arms released his compatriots from captivity “). At first I did not understand why he did not put it inside the album, now I understand. Kajik is a special person. My father loved her very much. There was a story about Kajik. My father and Felix Gzoghyan, returning to Srkhavend-Kichan by car after a successful battle, Kajik drives so fast that Felix Gzoghyan jokingly remarks and asks. You are young, you will withstand those shocks, adjust it somewhere, “Let’s lighten up”. They stop. When they are going to leave again, the father calls Kajik and Gzoghyan to the car shows the mine only centimeters away from the wheel of the car. Kajik stopped the car at the right time. My father looks at Kajik with pity and says: «Каджик, а знаешь, почему я тебя люблю?». «Нет, Аркадий Иванович». «Потому что в тебе есть Бог…»:

I was impressed by another case. During one of the hot battles, they were on the left front of the hostilities, but there was a problem on the right. My father had to move there quickly. To get there, they either had to drive three kilometers or cross a field under fire. There was something like a closet in the middle of it. My father sat in the commanding “Willis”, but before saying what direction they should move, Kajik, realizing that the situation was difficult, there was no time, drove straight into the field without thinking long and hard. The enemy tank immediately came out of hiding, and when the car reached the storage room, the tank fired at them. The storage room with the “Willis” was lost in a cloud of dust after the explosion. The boys, holding their breath and following all this, cried out in despair. “Commander, the commander is dead!” Seconds later, when the dust settled, they saw Willis continue on his way. When Dad and Kajik reached the right, my dad got out of the car. He cursed in Russian and said: “Sturpid but brave… ” He usually talked to Kajik figuratively. When something angered him, he said: “Kajik, they sold half of Karabakh…”: And when he was very angry, he said: “They sold Karabakh!” This was the measure of his anger. They went through many things together. I think that Kajik was really one sent by God for my father …

… It was a very difficult and difficult situation. Flour also became a strategic raw material. They asked my father from the hospital if they needed flour to bake bread for the wounded, they are hungry. He thought and decided what to do. He wrote in the necessary equipment for the military operation: So many bullets, so many projectiles, so much fuel and so much flour. When they inquired what flour had to do with that list, he said: “To perform a special tactical task.” When they were sent to Artsakh by helicopter, the Azeris shot at the helicopter and punctured the sacks of flour. Elsewhere it began to fall like a white cloud. There was a serious panic among the Azerbaijanis that the Armenians were using chemical weapons.

“Yura of 26” was very much connected with Yura Hovhannisyan. When my father told me about Yura, what a brave and powerful man he was, I always imagined another Yura, one of the freedom fighters I knew, with a glorious mustache, always carrying machine guns. One day when I found out who Yura was talking about, I was surprised. He was a physicist by profession. Modest, kind, smart, not at all strong…

… He was with “Yura of 26”. One day they received a gift of American lanterns that shone 500 meters away. It was an alien thing for us. They were very happy. They thought how to use that miracle, they found the horse. The mines were lined up, the explosives were placed on them to control from a distance. As they say, Commandos “his eye was a diamond”. He remembers the places of all the mines exactly,, when it gets dark, they direct those rays on the mines and … dump, dump, dump, they start to blow up one by one. The Azerbaijanis, seeing those lights, decide that our people use lasers. Our people caught their radio and listened to their panic. Meanwhile, in those days our people were impoverished by bullets. They had to fight with such tricks… The loss of Yura was especially hard. He always said. “I want you to have friends like he:.”

And this is the most impressive episode of the capture of Shushi for me. He said that when his comrade-in-arms, Ashot Khachatryan, reported to him that there was no other enemy in the city, he lay down and slept. People went to celebrate to finally relax. The job was already done…

Dad always asked for something and demanded to be united. He had a word. “Enough to talk, do blah blah, do business.” He was very upset, he was very angry when some political forces started to settle accounts with each other. “Our strength is in our unity.” He considered this to be our most powerful tactical and strategic weapon. He said with sorrow. “When it comes to the personal, everyone is ready, when a more general issue is discussed, they understand, but they do not unite with the same zeal.” “If you have a goal,” he told me, “do not pay attention to anyone. “Find your associates and move on.”

When he thought about the future, Kars saw it. And he saw it clearly not from a lyrical point of view, but from a strategic point of view. After all, we thought that Artsakh was not possible either…

During the 44-day war, boys came to us. were programmers. They asked, “Arkady Ivanitch, how can we help?” He said, “Can you make a drone?” For two months these people left all their work and did it. The commandos said they could not do it. They stayed hungry and thirsty day and night, and … it turned out. We tried, unfortunately, we did not manage to apply it until the end of the war. Everything is possible: All you need is a wish.

During the 44-day war, we worked with volunteer detachments, Mob. All the work was carried out under the leadership of Arkady Ter-Tadjosyan. He did not talk much, he did not like to give speeches. Maybe he would approach during the training and say: “How are you”: That was enough for the boys. They were excited, their eyes were shining … When we were saying “Goodbye” to the boys near the DOSAF building, he would definitely come in person and say goodbye to everyone. He was happy that so many people were willing to go to the border for the sake of the homeland, but he was worried. if only they could learn a few more things…

When in 1992 In Artsakh he accepted the command of the self-defense forces, my father’s first order was to strictly observe the laws of the Geneva Declaration. This was especially the case at that time with the captives. And it was a real shock for him to learn that in the 44-day war, prohibited weapons are used against the military and civilians. As a soldier, he understood well what a catastrophe it was, what horrible human suffering it was. It was a pity that the issue was not raised properly. He was saying. “A rocket is fired at Israel, and people all over the world are shouting, ‘Peace be upon you!’ “And here we are burned alive, and there is no response.” I reported the situation of the day to him. I was showing some things. He was saying. “It is not necessary anymore. “Do not show it.”

He has hardly slept in recent days. And he knew I was there. he was talking to me. But he was in a different reality. He was fighting… He was giving the names of his comrades-in-arms. “May, May, hold the right flank! Samvel, take the children out, the children! ” I would say, “Daddy, relax a little, go to sleep.” He turned to me and said: “Everything is normal… You sleep”: The names of their comrades-in-arms were taken to the intensive care unit with concern for their lips and soldiers. We realized that it is already on the way…

He even overcame the pain of losing Shushi, but something else was beyond his power… The last meeting was with the parents of our dead boys, on March 9. I saw him for the first time, standing stubbornly and not having an answer to the question addressed to him. “I do not know how I can help you.” When I watch the video of that meeting now, I see a helpless grandfather who lost his grandchildren… When he came home from the meeting, he said these words: “My heart is sparkling …”: I did not understand at first, to be honest. The next day he said. “My heart hurts.”

… The children adored him. He gathered the neighbors’ children and took them for walks every day. The children, young and old, were knocking on the door when the time came. “Is Dzyadz Arkady at home?” It is seven o’clock. It’s time for a walk, won’t he come out? ” I would say, “Grandpa, your friends have come.” He never refused. was coming out. They had a route around the American University. Seven of them went for a walk, soon becoming fifteen. They talked about their topics of concern: what brand of bicycle is it, what speed can be developed on a skate? He cared a lot about their safety. would ask. “Why didn’t you put a helmet on your head, knees on your legs, and armrests on your elbows?” He attracted children who did not know him like a magnet…

Arkady Ter-Tadosyan never refused invitations from various educational institutions. He liked to communicate with children, teenagers and young people. He often said: “When I was a child, I used to say, ‘Stay smart, or the Turks will come and cut off your ears.’ Now no grandmother says such a thing to her grandchildren, on the contrary, the Turks say stay smart or the Armenians will come… We are a strong nation, and I see the realization of our goals in you … ”

… Shushi misses its liberator, the heroic general of Armenia and Artsakh, a true legend, our beloved Commandos … But Shushi is also waiting for its liberators, those who continue the work of our glorious Hero.

.. And there will be another wedding in our mountains …

By KNAR TADEVOSYAN

Photos from Arkady Ter-Tadosyan’s personal archive