Belarusian Who Took Flight From Army: Several Officers Confessed They Like Europe

• 20.09.2022, 10:03

Ruslan Kastsevich made a demarche when he was transferred to the border with Ukraine.

The whole country has recently learned about his deed, for which Ruslan Kastsevich was prosecuted. But, it turns out, the entire Belarusian press wrote about him several years ago, reports Salidarnasts.

'If the School Cannot Help to Decide on a Profession, Why Do You Need It?'

- At our school in the agro-town of Liady (Cherven District, Minsk Region) we had what we called a 'business company', - Ruslan begins his amazing story. - During the craft class we did not sweep the territory, but made all sorts of kitchen utensils from wood, which we then sold.

Everything was done legally, like in a real business, and each of us had specific responsibilities. For example, I was the salesman and was in charge of sales.

The management of his village school turned out to be so progressive that they also provided the most able children with training in entrepreneurship at BSU.

- For six months, every Saturday we were taken by school bus to Minsk, and then we put what we had learned into practice. When I was in the 8th form, I took part in a financial literacy contest among 9th graders and won first place in the district, then in the region, and third place in the country.

In the final of the course, we had to present our business projects. That's when I came up with the idea of an online employment centre," he said.

In 2015, at the age of 14, Ruslan gathered a team and opened a recruitment agency.

- I remember telling Yury Zisser about my project, and he even supported us financially. We started advertising, worked with IT companies, finding out what kind of specialists they were looking for, and we hired them. We employed 345 people at the time.

However, at that time I was just starting out, and we were missing out on a lot in terms of analytics, - the young man expertly assesses his first business.

The talented schoolboy was noticed and invited to take a course at the Deti-MBA business school, which, he admits, was very timely and useful:

- After that, I took on another project, organizing excursions to the offices of cool companies. These included Wargaming, Viber, EPAM, HUAWEI, major independent media, banks, etc.

It was mostly young people who took part in these excursions; the groups were formed remotely, and met in Minsk, - says the interlocutor about his unique experience.

When he was 15, he got acquainted with the management of various companies and had an internship at a large bank and a well-known advertising agency.

- I will surprise you, but at school I was far from an excellent student, - laughs Ruslan. - My grade point average was just over 8.

And he gives a very convincing argument as to why the Belarusian education system failed to keep his interest:

- I'm not an ordinary person, and I was not an ordinary student. Not everything that suited everyone was to my liking. And our system is not focused on individuality. I argued vigorously with the teachers, and then I wrote down all of my complaints to the ministry of education.

It wasn't difficult for me to write them, because I was inside the process and could consider myself an expert to some extent. I wrote that at school we do not make independent decisions, we just follow the rules and regulations. But such a system cannot bring up leaders!

Pupils do not have the right to make any choices. And the main thing that, in my opinion, students should choose subjects at school. And some can even be given the right to choose the time they come to class as well.

Having seen, with what sort of questions senior pupils used to go on our excursions, I understood that communication with professionals could help children to understand more clearly what kind of knowledge they need. After all, if the school cannot help children to decide on a profession, why do they need it at all?

You may agree that entirely aimless people often come out of school and they are busy doing something, but do not know why they need it. And they choose a university either at random, by pointing their finger at the list, or following the principle "wherever they get accepted".

Our schools do not teach students how to communicate, while communication is one of the most important skills of our time.

The environment itself, where there is often a lack of like-minded people, but where you are immersed for a whole 11 years, is certainly not favourable for fruitful work. But on the whole, I repeat, it all turns upon the lack of personalisation. And that is like giving the same task to a fish, an elephant and a bird, - the recent schoolboy figuratively says.

The very list of complaints that he compiled when he was 15 also included comments and suggestions on textbooks, the grading system, unnecessary workload, and even on teachers who often speak a different language to children.

Isn't that a good reason for the department to at least discuss the outlined problems? However, the outcome of this bold initiative was, unfortunately, predictable. The officials paid no attention to the schoolboy's letter.

'BRSM Is Essentially Dead'

- I also drew certain conclusions about the youth organisation, into which we were insistently included at the time, - Ruslan continues his account of his attempts to fight the system (read, windmills). - I saw at my school that the BRSM is a relic of the Soviet past, that the organization is not active, in fact it is dead.

Schoolchildren perceive it as a formality and it does not show any unity. Since I did not like to do anything without meaning, I decided not to join it myself. Again, I justified my refusal by stating all the observations in detail.

After this letter the young man was invited to the Ministry of Education after all.

- I was met by a woman who seemed to spend all her time in her office. I told her that a lot of activity reports are just ticks on paper that have nothing to do with reality.

She argued with me, claiming that she knew better, that BRSM was working cool, etc. Eventually they thanked me and promised to send a reply to my email address. By the rules of bureaucracy, they were obliged to do so. In the end they sent an answer full of stock phrases, - Ruslan recalls.

And, having compared his abilities with the possibilities of the Belarusian higher education, he decided to give it up:

- At the age of 17 I was working in the project of a businessman from St. Petersburg, we were testing games that were about to be released. So I earned good money and immediately after school I rented a flat in the centre of Minsk. At the same time, I took 4 courses on the SkillBox platform, continued to educate myself, learned two languages and read a lot.

I didn't really understand why I should waste my time on entering somewhere, then going to classes, etc. In the future, I see myself only in business. In my opinion, no university in Belarus will teach me that. Besides, I believe that business development is impossible without freedom. In general, freedom is the most important thing for me.

'Soldiers Sweep the Street Most of the Time in the Belarusian Army'

If Ruslan had to describe all of his complaints about the Belarusian army, where he served, the list would probably be the longest.

- I knew that I was unfit for service with my diagnosis of third-degree kyphosis. However, the republican medical commission had changed my classification and I simply did not have time to appeal through the court. So I got in the 19th brigade, in the unit that was based in the village of Zaslonava, Lepel district of Vitsebsk region.

The young man confesses that he had very different expectations about the army.

- I did not know that the main part of my service would be... sweeping. Every day we were sweeping the territory, essentially performing the function of janitors. Sometimes we were not even given "professional equipment"; we had to go into the woods, break branches and make improvised brooms.

We also painted car tyres with shoe polish so that they would shine beautifully. This was especially important when the bosses arrived.

When the tanks would pass by, we had to clean up after them, then they would pass by again and we would do the same thing again.

All this absurdity is happening because the soldiers have simply nothing to do, - concludes the former serviceman.

And eloquently tells about the life of the Belarusian army, which proudly calls itself modern:

- Only one division in the unit had hot water. A regular shower in my unit was something out of the realm of fantasy. You could only have a shower once a week, in the bathhouse on Saturdays. The rest of the time, the grown men, who were doing physical work, had to walk around sweaty and filthy.

We had to wash our uniforms and jackets with laundry soap under icy water with stiff fingers. Our military units in the twenty-first century have no such luxuries as washing machines and powder.

A real soldier, in the opinion of his superiors, should not give in to such difficulties. He must spread his clothes on the floor in the washroom and scrub them off there.

Nobody cares that as a result of constant hypothermia half of the soldiers constantly have colds. At best, the medics will give you a pill, at worst, nothing at all. In general, you are treated like cattle.

- In fact, men admit that if the army really introduced them to new kinds of weapons, taught them how to use them, many of them would be interested.

- I only shot three times over the year, at the very beginning, when I was given only eight cartridges. The rest of the time we were sweeping. At the same time everyone was given some sort of automatic rifle, but no ammunition.

- Who serves in our army and with what attitude?

- Among the soldiers, the majority are the people who in principle are not preoccupied with any serious matters. Anyone who doesn't fit into this general concept and is in any way different immediately becomes the object of all sorts of attacks.

And I have experienced a kind of hazing as well. In the beginning, I had to work longer hours and in more difficult jobs. But I still didn't want to stay in tune with the majority.

- So in the army, as in the state, the basic model of relations is: he who is the strongest - he is right?

- Absolutely. However, I did manage to prove that intelligence can prevail over blunt force. When they found out that I was proficient in graphic design, they took me to work at headquarters. I was making posters for the battalion and a magazine.

This gave me some privileges, for example, at 6 a.m. I was no longer jogging with everyone else at the command "Company, get up!", but stayed in the barracks, then went to headquarters and sat down at my computer.

I systematized the process of duty in the barracks, which until then they could not organize and make a decent schedule that would take into account shifts and other things. All in all, I could have settled in well in the long run, but the war broke out.

Ruslan watched the tragic events in Ukraine on the phone, which he managed to conceal, having handed in another one on order. The young man was sure that under no circumstances would he go to war.

And when his unit was transferred to Yelsk district of Homel region on the border, he began thinking of ways not to go to the front.

- We were given 120 combat cartridges each, but we didn't have much skill. We lived in the camp like cattle: on bunk beds, sooty, because cast-iron stoves were constantly smoking in the tents.

- Did you see any Russian military?

- Their camp was not far from us. I saw them driving their vehicles towards the border. I know that our people were helping them, I guess they were bringing water and provisions.

The commanders did not explain to us why we were there. At first they said that we would guard some objects on the territories occupied by the Russians, and then they said that we had to guard the territory of the camp from some saboteurs, who were supposedly present in the forests of Homel.

- How did your comrades-in-arms feel about the war?

- When it started, some of the contractors wanted to terminate their contracts. Nobody, of course, allowed them to do that.

Everyone was offered to switch to contract service. We even had a survey to find out why we didn't want to do it and what it would take to make us want to. There were answer options in the questionnaire, such as "increase the salary," something else.

At the time I personally wrote that I would not choose any of the answers because I had other interests in life.

The officers had their own propaganda, they were being brainwashed round the clock. They would talk about how the "Nazis" organized the Euromaidan in 2014. The higher the military officer was in rank, the more vehemently he defended the propaganda talking points.

'They Threatened to Take Me to the Forest, Where I would Tell them Everything'.

Ruslan admits that the events in Bucha were a trigger for him. At night of April, 6 he left the camp. He did not intend to desert, he wanted to create a precedent, after which he would definitely not be sent to war.

Having studied the law, he knew that leaving the place of duty for less than two days was an administrative offence and was ready to be punished.

The soldier was brought back to his unit the next day and sent to the guardhouse for 21 days. Ruslan was interrogated by KGB officers.

At first a criminal case under article "desertion" was brought against the guy, under which he could be sentenced to 7 years in prison. But a medical examination revealed serious problems with his heart. It turned out that at the time of committing the offence the young man was not fit for military service at all.

However, instead of being discharged from military service, another case was initiated against Ruslan, accusing him of stealing the duffel bag with which he had escaped from the camp.

- I had packed some food for myself in this bag the day before, because I did not know how long I would be on the run. And this is military property, - the interlocutor explained.

After being summoned to the Investigative Committee, Ruslan Kastsevich left Belarus and is now in Georgia.

- Don't you regret that you took the decision, after which you went through so much?

- No, of course not.

- At what point were you scared?

- Probably, when I finally made up my mind to change everything. It was at night, almost suddenly, when I found out the details about Bucha. I knew then how important it was to me, but I was scared.

It didn't go that smoothly. There were patrols all over the camp. One of the patrolmen spotted me. And that moment was worrying, too.

It was also because we had been warned the day before: if you see somebody in the camp who is a stranger you have to shout 'halt'; if he does not react, shoot in the air; and if there is no reaction after that, shoot to kill.

That is, I could have been shot because it was not clear who I was in the dark. I was partly reassured by what I knew about our soldiers, who were not prepared for any kind of shooting.

And I turned out to be right. The patrolman did not shout or shoot, he followed me for a while and came back. As I learned later, he didn't even report spotting me, as he was scared because he had lost me.

Only in the morning, when everyone woke up, saw that I was gone, and started looking for me, he reported what had happened.

- You wandered through the forest until the afternoon of the next day, with your feet soaking wet, not knowing what was coming next...

- I don't remember where I was wandering, but I came out to a settlement. I saw a helicopter looking for me. Then they called me and said that someone from the battalion was coming to get me, but the military commandant's office came. They found photos from the protests in my phone.

- Were you subjected to violence?

- Physically, no, but they threatened to take me to the forest where I would tell them everything. And the next morning I was sent to the guardhouse to the solitary confinement cell.

There I had to sit still, with my back straight, and learn the regulations, and from time to time they made me read the regulations aloud. If the guard thought you were sitting badly, you would have to stand at attention with outstretched arms. I had to stand at attention for a total of four or five hours.

But sitting still is even harder because the back hurts so much. Besides, you also have to sleep at attention, on your back with your arms stretched along your body. You cannot turn onto your side.

The surface is hard, the lamp that hangs over you will not turn off. You cannot cover your eyes with anything. Food is brought in, and you walk once every three days for 20 minutes marching to attention.

A special contingent is chosen to be the guards, people who have no empathy. However, when I was released, they apologized to me, saying it was nothing personal, it was their job.

- And how were you received by the brigade after the guardhouse?

- Some of my comrades-in-arms were supportive, I even used to keep in touch with some of them until I deleted my social media page. I was much more surprised by the officers' revelations. Several people at once decided that I was someone they could trust now, and confessed that they also did not want to be in the army, did not support the current government, and that they like Europe and not Russia.

Their family circumstances do not allow them to leave the unit. To be honest, I was particularly struck by these people's revelations.