Fair enough then. Here is a bit of a longer one. Starts off slow but does get into some sick stuff. As sent to me via email
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Dedovshchina Abuses: An Overview
Alexander D. was one of many conscripts Human Rights Watch interviewed for its research on the Russian armed forces. Throughout our research, conscripts from all over Russia told us numerous versions of what was essentially one and the same story. They spoke about the dedy treating them like slaves, of the violent punishments they suffered at their hands, and of gratuitous abuse. They recounted the indifference and remoteness of the officers, and the increasing despair they felt at the prospect of a full year of initiation, and, eventually, their decision to runaway. There were exceptions, of course: the occasional conscript talked about a unit where there was no, or almost no, dedovshchina. Their stories varied greatly in details, as initiation practices vary to some extent from regiment to regiment and depend on local traditions, the personalities of the dedy, the first-year conscripts, and the officers. Yet, the uniformity of the testimony was striking.
This report discusses three broad, interconnected categories of dedovshchina abuses: coerced servility, with its excessively arbitrary orders; gratuitous abuse; and excessive punishments, for failing to comply both with expected servility and for violating formal rules.
Expectations of Servility to Dedy
While the Military Code of Conduct gives second-year conscripts some formal authority over first-year conscripts who are lower in rank, it also limits this authority, stipulating clearly that orders may not be given that have nothing to do with military service or that are aimed at violating the law.81 Yet, in practice, dedy expect servility of first-year conscripts. They make up arbitrary rules that first-year conscripts must abide by, and change them at will; they expect first-year conscripts to be at their service at any time of day or night, and for any kind of order, whether lawful or unlawful, safe or dangerous, innocuous or malicious. If first-year conscripts complain, fail to deliver, or refuse to abide the rules or orders, the dedy punish them in whatever way they see fit, and often do so violently. These rules and demands dominate every aspect of the life of the first-year conscript: their day-time military duties, food, personal hygiene, health, possessions, and sleeping patterns. The military code of conduct does not provide for these arbitrary restrictions or the threats of punishment should they refuse to obey. Thus, from the point of view of Russian law, the vast majority of the orders and rules of the dedy are not lawful.
Determining whether these rules and orders also violate international human rights law is more complicated. A certain level of submissiveness to soldiers who have served longer arguably strengthens the respect for hierarchy necessary in military structures. This is the case even if new recruits are told to perform acts that are mildly degrading-for example, cleaning soldiers' dirty boots, repairing their uniforms, or fetching them food-and do not directly serve the special mission of the military. But there must be a limit to this submissiveness; otherwise the right to be free of degrading treatment would be negated. Likewise, some interference with the right to health may be acceptable, but initiation treatment may not unjustifiably threaten the health of new recruits. It is important to note that, even if many of the dedy's orders do not in and of themselves amount to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, their cumulative effect may well push them over the threshold.
In this section, we primarily discuss the orders and rules of the dedy during off-hours and with respect to the property of first-year conscripts. We also briefly discuss the situation with respect to meals and health, which was documented extensively in another Human Rights Watch report, "To Serve without Health."82 We do not consider as violative of international law the assignment of the most unpleasant tasks during day time routines, such as the dirtiest kitchen duties, or heaviest tasks keeping the military base clean. First-year conscripts generally did not talk about this in their interviews, evidently considering it a fact of life that junior conscripts perform the least pleasant official tasks. Indeed, this would seem routine in armed forces around the world and raises no concerns under international law.
Food, Money and Other Belongings
Van Bladel observes that Russian soldiers live in a "world of scarcity," lacking such "fundamental things as food, beverage and especially money."83 This may explain why dedy use dedovshchina so consistently to prey on new recruits' money, food, and clothing, and to coerce them into procuring the same.84 Conscripts face the constant threat of violent punishment for failing to surrender their property, no matter how meager, or to procure food, cigarettes, and the like.
They told Human Rights Watch that dedy routinely confiscated their property immediately upon arrival at the unit; forced them to hand over their salaries every month, as well as food and money they received in the mail or during visits from their parents. The dedy also frequently ordered first-year conscripts to procure money, food, or cigarettes, thus forcing the conscripts to ask their parents for these items or to beg on the street. The dedy's demands that first-year conscripts procure for them were so routine that, in many cases, they placed the conscripts in a permanent state of servitude. Conscripts said they were beaten for failing to comply.
"Stodnevka"
Numerous conscripts described a tradition called stodnevka, or "one hundred days." According to this tradition, every night first-year conscripts have to put cigarettes under the pillows of dembeli (conscripts who have entered the last hundred days of their military service). They must inscribe the number of remaining days before the dembel's discharge order on the cigarettes. As one conscript explained to his mother, he had to write: "Thirty-eight days remain before ded Vova's discharge. All the best, dukh Roman."85 Several conscripts stressed the cigarettes had to be of good quality, or they faced punishment.
The conscripts all said forgetting to prepare the cigarette or failing to find one led to beatings. Vasilii B. said: "Every night he must have a cigarette. If you skipped a day and he comes in the evening and there is no cigarette - that's it. In such cases, they beat [you] very severely."86 The mother of another conscript said: "If eleven [junior conscripts] brought cigarettes and one did not, all [were taken] to the bathroom or storage room and beaten that night. Then the eleven [who did bring cigarettes] also beat the twelfth, who did not bring that cigarette.87
The story of one conscript illustrates the stresses associated with stodnevka particularly vividly. On May 27, 2002, Dmitrii Samsonov wrote to his parents and grandmother that the stodnevka was starting on June 19. He asked them all to send him supplies. For example, he wrote to his mother: "Mama, this is what I need for the next four months: every week a transfer of forty to fifty rubles, and a small package with Prima [cigarettes] and filter cigarettes... Mama, don't forget to send this immediately. Immediately!"88
The letter was delivered late and his parents received it only the day before the start of the stodnevka. A few days later, a second letter arrived in which Samsonov expressed his desperation:
Today the stodnevka is starting and I haven't received anything from you, nor from mama or grandma... I don't know what to do. It's 2:00 p.m. now. It will be lights-out in eight hours. I think that I will not survive this night. Or actually, I will survive but it will cost me a lot. I wrote to you, begged you-just in case, I also wrote to grandma-so you would [send me money] quickly but nobody responded. You just don't understand how important it was for me. I needed 200 rubles for the stodnevka, a pack of Yava Zolotoi [a cigarette brand name] and four cigarettes per day by June 19. That was it...89
As a post scriptum to the letter, Samsonov wrote: "I love you very much and miss you but I don't know how I'm going to survive now." In a letter dated July 13, 2002, Samsonov wrote that he was in a military hospital with a broken wrist. He wrote: "I'm not going to explain how that happened. It would take too long. I just wanted to inform you that I survived the beginning of the stodnevka." In the letter, he repeated his requests for money and cigarettes.
On July 24, 2002, his parents received a telegram saying that their son had died the day before. Later, they were told that he had slit his veins.90
Confiscation of the Property of Conscripts
Conscripts almost uniformly told Human Rights Watch that in the first days after they were assigned to a regular military unit the dedy took their civilian clothes, food packages from home, and their personal belongings. Many also said dedy forced them to swap newly-issued military clothing for their own worn-out clothes. In some cases, the dedy openly demanded that newcomers hand over these items, in other they took them while the first-years were outside or asleep.
Dmitrii Kosov told Human Rights Watch that when he and other first-years arrived at their unit outside St. Petersburg, military officials brought them into a room and sat them down. He said:
They [military officials] took us in and sat us down in the Lenin room... We sat there and waited. Then some unshaven guy comes in, his pants are falling down, and asks everyone to give him money because he doesn't have enough to buy alcohol. [When nobody volunteers,] he takes one of the people...out into the corridor. This person later returns, clearly beaten. Then he [the unshaven guy] asks: 'Is there anybody else who doesn't want to share his money?' Everyone starts to give money. Then another one comes in and says that he will soon be discharged and that he needs pants. He collects six or seven pairs of pants. Others come in who need shoes. One of them liked my coat. My wallet went the same way, as did my telephone.91
Dedy told Anatolii T. to take the food package his mother had made for him to the pantry, where, as he was told, he could collect it later. However, when he went to change his clothes in the barracks, "they sat on the bed, and had already eaten it all."92
Aleksei Koshelev was left with nothing but his trousers when he arrived at his unit. He told Human Rights Watch: "[A]ll [the clothing] we had was new. Warm jackets... They, the dembeli, had old, worn out [clothing]... And they started to take [them] from us all. I met one [a ded] in the hallway. He said: "Take it off!" I said "I won't." They started to [beat me]...they took it anyway, took my cap... I ended up in just my pants."93
Numerous conscripts said senior soldiers went through their pockets and night tables as they were sleeping or outside. For example, Vasilii S. and Aleksei Koshelev said the dedy went through their pockets at night and took their belongings. Vasilii S. said: "Whatever you have in your night table disappears within two days. They can't be locked."94 Anatolii T. said that the dedy even stole his personal items, like his watch, tooth paste, soap, and razor.95
Confiscation of Salaries
Many conscripts told Human Rights Watch that the dedy confiscated their small monthly wage for purchasing cigarettes, tooth paste, and other personal items.96 In some cases, conscripts said, officers also confiscated their salaries. A few lucky conscripts told Human Rights Watch that they were allowed to keep their salaries.
Anton A., who served in a railroad troops unit north of St. Petersburg, said that, before he and his peers received their first salary, conscripts who had served six months more than they had, warned them that they had to hand their salaries over the dedy. "We went to get [our money], came back to the Company and handed it over." Anton A. said that he did not always have to hand over the full amount. "Sometimes they allowed us to keep sixteen or six rubles, sometimes nothing-as they [the dedy] saw fit." Once, Anton A. tried to keep his salary because he wanted to call his mother: "Junior Sergeant S. asked me for the thirty rubles. I said [that]...I wanted to phone home. He did not beat me but began to intimidate me: 'Do you want to live normally here? ... Watch out.'" Anton A. said that after that he "did not have a quiet day..." The dedy beat and taunted him, apparently in retaliation. Shortly after, he ran away.97
Alexander Sukhanov said that the starshina of his Company, a second-year conscript, disbursed salaries to conscripts. However, he always kept part of the salaries for himself. Once, when Sukhanov asked for his full salary, the starshina told him that he withheld it "for me, for gasoline. After all, it's me who drives around searching for you, or takes you to the military prison in my own car. You can't expect me to spend my own money on that, can you?" Sukhanov said that when he collected his salary, a ded always accompanied him: "As soon as you leave the Company, he [the ded] says: 'Let's share... God ordered [people] to share.' So I get the money, want to give him [just] ten rubles. He takes it all, quietly turns around and walks away." Sukhanov said the dedy routinely took the salaries of all twenty first-year conscripts in the company, with the exception of one conscript who had befriended a ded.98
A number of conscripts said they signed a registry every month to confirm receipt of money they never actually saw. In these cases, it was not always clear whether the dedy or officers took the money. For example, Aleksei K., who served as commander of a squad in Totskoe in Orenburg province, told Human Rights Watch that the commander of his battalion came by with the registry once a month, saying "Today is salary day," and had conscripts sign the registry. However, Aleksei K. and his fellow conscripts never saw a penny. He did not know where his money went. Aleksei K. also said he had spent the few months of his military service in a unit in Krasnodar Region, where officers made sure everyone got their full salary every month.99 In some cases, officers and dedy offered justifications for not giving conscripts their salaries. For example, Pavel P., who also signed for his salary every month but never received any money, said that he and his peers were told that the money was used to buy soap for them.100
Confiscation of Money and Food from Correspondence
Dedy and officers routinely screen packages and letters for conscripts and confiscate any money and other valuables they contain. For example, Alexander Sokolov told Human Rights Watch that his grandmother sent him a five ruble note in every letter. While he received all her letters, the money was always gone and the envelopes were taped up.101 Aware of this pervasive practice, Pavel P. told his parents not to send him anything valuable: "Why [should they send things], if half disappears right and left?"102 Anatolii S. instructed his mother to specify the sender of the letter as someone not related to him because mail from parents was more carefully scrutinized. The mother of one conscript told Human Rights that, after a while, she started writing on the envelopes: "There's no money in here, give the letter to the soldier, he's expecting it."103 Conscripts whose parents sent food packages by mail said they were forced to "share" the package with the dedy. Ilia B. told Human Rights Watch that when a person receives information that a package has arrived, "he goes there with the starshii..., takes the package and comes back to the unit...and opens his package. And that is it... Two or three dedy walk up and say: 'Let's have a look.' They look, and half [your stuff] is gone. Another looks and you're left with one piece of candy."104
Visits by Relatives
Dozens of conscripts told Human Rights Watch that, whenever relatives visited them, the dedy confiscated whatever valuables and food they received. They said that refusal to give up these items led to beatings and was pointless anyway, as the dedy took the desired items nonetheless. In a number of cases, the dedy put together "shopping lists" for the relatives. The dedy frequently also sent conscripts from the area to their homes to get food and money, or made them contact their parents so they would visit them.
Aleksei Koshelev told Human Rights Watch that whatever his parents brought him during visits was taken away: "For example, my relatives came to visit, we sat around for two hours... I can't immediately eat everything, [but if I] bring a bag back to the Company, already at the checkpoint [it's]: 'Come here, we're going to search you...'"105 A number of conscripts told their mothers not to bring them care packages. Ilia R. told his mother: "Mom, it's pointless. I won't even get near my unit with this." He told her that the dedy would be waiting for him at the entrance to his base to shake him down upon his return.106 Another conscript told his mother that she should visit him only when he was in the military hospital because otherwise her visits were more trouble than good.107
In some cases, the dedy placed orders with conscripts who expected visits from relatives. For example, Anton E.'s mother told Human Rights Watch that the dedy instructed her son to make sure she brought packages of soup: "I told him I would [get some] and he said I should buy extra, that it 'wasn't for us.'" A fellow conscript of her son's later explained to her that the dedy had "warned him not to return without gifts."108 Egor Z. said the dedy ordered him to get his parents to bring him money, cigarettes, and notebooks when they were visiting. When Egor Z. did not get the dedy what they wanted, they beat him and announced that "things would get really bad" if he did not produce the goods by the next morning. Egor Z. and a fellow conscript climbed over the military base's fence that night and ran away.109
A number of conscripts who served near their hometowns said that the dedy told them to get money or goods from their homes. Alexander Sukhanov told Human Rights Watch that a ded told him and his fellow conscripts: "'I can't eat here, I'm sick of it, I want something else. Who's local?" When they learned that Sukhanov was a local, they instructed him to call home and "order something tasty." Sukhanov said his father brought some food over. The next day, the ded wanted something more "filling" and accompanied Sukhanov to his house to get more food. Sukhanov' mother told Human Rights Watch that at first she did not realize what was happening and put together some food. After that, she visited his unit twice per week and brought food packages each time, which the dedy took away from him every time.110 Dedy sent Vladimir Z. to his sister, who lived nearby, for money.111 Stepan K.'s mother told Human Rights Watch that dedy instructed her son to make his parents to bring 650 rubles to the unit. She said that the dedy told him that if his relatives did not bring these items before a specific date, "you will not have a life."112
Demands for Money, Cigarettes, and Other Goods
A number of conscripts recounted how dedy demanded that they give them money, cigarettes and other goods that they did not have. These conscripts said the dedy did not care how they got these goods, by begging, stealing, or otherwise, and that they faced physical violence if they failed to deliver. For example, Vladimir P. told Human Rights Watch:
[The dedy] openly demanded money. Absolutely nobody was interested in where you were going to get it. At the factory, for example, [where I was sent to work] I had to put a cigarette every day [under the dembel's pillow]. In addition, you have to give them cigarettes during the day; they don't buy cigarettes. If he [the ded] wants to smoke, he walks up to you [and says]: "I need a cigarette." I initially had some money... If someone didn't have money, they asked passers-by. Our unit is located in the city and you could walk up to the fence [and beg]. This was a daily practice.113
The mother of another conscript said that dedy put her son and his peers out on the streets at night with orders for vodka and sausage. She said:
These poor soldiers stand in Severomorsk with outstretched hands. I saw it myself when I drove by, they stood there... They also sent my son... he doesn't get rest at night, he's already sick because he doesn't sleep... And then, what can [he] do, he knows that if he does not bring vodka and sausage back [he will be punished]. ...and who will give him money at night? So he either has to steal handbags from women, or rob apartments, or sell himself. [My son] was beaten for returning without anything."114
Ilia R. told his mother that he and his fellow conscripts were "thrown across the fence" at night in order to get cigarettes and vodka. He described the attitude of the dedy as "if you don't have money, go and steal it." She said her son never stole anything, returned empty-handedly and was beaten.115
Pavel P. said that whenever a first-year conscript was given leave, he had to bring money, food, cigarettes, or other goods back for the dedy. Once, when Pavel P. failed to do so, the dedy scolded him for not bringing anything back, gave him three blows to the chest, and told him that he would not be given leave again. Later, when Pavel P. had to go to the military hospital for an unrelated illness, the dedy ordered him to bring back cigarettes and other things. He told Human Rights Watch: "Where am I supposed to get these? After all, I can't go and beg for it, can I?" So he decided to run away.116
Aleksei L. ran away from his unit because dedy punished him for failing to bring them the one hundred rubles they had demanded from him. His mother told Human Rights Watch that he did not have the money and was unable to find it. As punishment, the dedy put two military overcoats and a bullet-proof vest on him and beat him. The dedy told him the next day that if he did not bring them one hundred rubles that night, the "execution" would be repeated. Aleksei L. ran away together with a fellow conscript that evening.117
Off-Hours
Dedy considersleep a luxury that first-year conscripts have not yet earned, and frequently make that understood. Indeed, many first-year conscripts said the nights were a time they dreaded. One conscript captured the mood of many others when he told Human Rights Watch that "nobody liked lights-out because the most horrible things happened [at night]. We eagerly awaited reveille."118 Many first-year conscripts said that the dedy kept them up until long after lights-out at 10:00 p.m., or said they woke them in the middle of the night. Many told Human Rights Watch that they suffered from severe sleep deprivation and several maintained that they regularly "fell asleep standing."