A while in class a while ago, a student asked me that many Russian troops who died in the Ukrainian front were posthumously awarded the title of "Russian Hero" and the Venus Medal . So, is it only after sacrificing one's life for the country that one can be qualified to receive such an honor?
Of course, the proportion of "Russian heroes" who were posthumously awarded after sacrifice is indeed not low. Take this "special military operation" as an example. Many Russian troops who have recently won the title died in battle.
The grieving mother accepted the medal for her son's life
It is very common that after the last bullet, she resolutely sounded the "Glorious Bulletin" and died with the besieged Ukrainian soldiers.
For example, Captain Ligiev, the commander of the Russian Airborne Assault Company in the picture below.
and captain Nurmagomed Gargimagomedov, the captain of the Russian 247th Guard Airborne Assault Regiment.
Captain Vladimir Zozulin.
There is also Major Sergei Panov who took the initiative to stay and deal with the enemy and finally shouted "fire at me" in order to cover his comrades' retreat.
There is also a 63-year-old former Russian Air Force Major General Kanamat Botashev who was "dead on crime".
Kanamat Botashev
The reason why Botashev is called the "former" Air Force Major General is because, as early as June 2012, he caused a major casualty accident due to drunk driving. And Botashev's "drunk driving" was a Su-27 fighter.
Botashev was sentenced to four years in prison by Military Court, suspended from execution of , and fined 5 million rubles , and was asked by the military to force retire. Until this year's special military operation began, he was re-entered.
On the Luganticsk front line, Botashev was hit by the "Sthorn" missile fired by Ukraine while flying Su-25 fighter jets to provide fire support to the Russian ground troops in order to cover wingman .
According to foreign media reports, as of the end of November, the Russian army had been shot in Ukraine with 23 Su-25
In fact, there are no special regulations for the former Soviet Union or contemporary Russia. Frontline commanders must take the lead in charge, and no so-called "glorious bombs" were issued. The resolute death of these soldiers was their spontaneous choice.
Moreover, many of them are not Russian ethnic group , but ethnic minorities in the Russian Federation. For example, Captain Ligiev, Captain Kajimagomedov, and Major General Botashev mentioned above.
Major General Botashev's funeral was held in accordance with the customs of the Cherks Muslims. The coffin was covered with the "sacred cloth" printed with the Hadith of the Quran
However, in addition to these "Russian heroes" who were posthumously awarded after their heroic sacrifice, almost half of the "living people" who can come to Kremlin to attend the award ceremony in person.
They are basically Russian military personnel who have made significant contributions to the field of national defense.
For example, the Russian Federation Minister of Defense, who is deeply trusted by Putin, is a general of Sergei Kurugetovic Shoigu.
Most recently, three commanders who were awarded this month who participated in the special military operations - Major Orlov, Major Nabiyev, and Lieutenant Colonel Chermusin.
Orlov
Nabiev
Chermusin
In addition to military personnel, another major group of awarded medals is astronauts.
For example, the famous astronaut, Sergei Konstantinovich Krikarev , he is also a person who has won the Heroes of the Russian Federation and the Heroes of the Soviet Union at the same time.
Krikarev is currently the head of the manned space program of the Russian Space Group. In formal occasions, the "Double Star Medal" he will wear, which makes people feel very touching. Sergei Krikarev is the holder of the cumulative space residence time record so far, with a total of 803 days, 9 hours and 39 minutes. The longest one of them reached 311 days in a single time.
But what is more embarrassing is that the longest time, the reason why he stayed in "the sky" was really not to complete any major task, but mainly because of "no money to go home", he was stranded on "Milion" space station (April 1991-March 1992).
Sergei Krikarev on "Mens"
During the period when he was in "the sky", he was caught up with The Soviet Union's disintegration of . The motherland that sent him to "the sky" split into 15 countries in a flash. The Baikonur space launch base, which the Soviet Union used to launch rockets, also became the territory of Kazakhstan, a newly independent sovereign state. If you want to continue using it, you have to pay a sky-high rent.
Fortunately, the organization did not abandon him in the end. After coordination among multiple parties, he helped him return to the earth.
The picture below is a photo of Sergei Krikarev being carried out of the cabin door. The words Soviet Union are printed on his space suit , and the armband is a Soviet red flag composed of sickle and hammer.
But the Soviet Union, which had been away for more than ten months, no longer exists. The land where he landed in return capsule no longer belongs to his motherland, but the independent Republic of Kazakhstan. The city he lives in was changed from Leningrad to the old name of the Tsarist Russian era - St. Petersburg .
From Sergei Krikarev's experience, we can also see that the title of "Russian Hero" and the Medal of Venus are both continued Soviet traditions.
" Soviet hero " was born on April 16, 1934. It was established by the then Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union in accordance with the instructions of Stalin .
Committee stipulates that those who receive this title will also receive a "Lenin Medal", which was the highest-level medal of the Soviet Union back then.
Medal of Lenin
By August 1, 1939, the presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union issued another decree, deciding to establish a new medal specifically used to express the identity of the Soviet hero - the Medal of Venus.
This is mainly considered because the recipients of the Lenin Medal are too broad, covering socialist builders from all walks of life. Therefore, it is necessary to tailor a medal for the "Soviet hero" who is mainly aimed at military personnel.
So, from this time, the title of "Soviet Hero" and " Venus Medal " as the highest honor of military personnel have become a fixed combination.
This Venus Medal is made of gold with a purity of 95%. It has a simple shape and the main body is a golden five-pointed star. On the back is a silver base with a numbered base and the front hanging on it is covered with a red ribbon, symbolizing the Soviet flag.
The Soviet era of the Order of Venus
The Soviet hero who received the Order of Venus number 1 was the pilot Anatoly Vasilyevich Lyapidevsky from Ukraine.
Anatoli Vasilyevich Lyapidevsky
In 1934, seven Soviet pilots led by Eliyapidevsky once overcome all difficulties and risked their lives to successfully rescue the Arctic expedition team and the crew of the "Cheliusky" icebreaker.
Liyapidevsky and his comrades
The subsequent stage of the Patriotic War was an era of emergence of Soviet heroes.
But for many complex reasons, the Russian people, Ukrainian people and Belarusian people, these three Eastern Slavic peoples who originated from Kievan Rus , have the highest proportion of people who have won the title of Soviet heroes and the Medal of Venus, and are the most well-known in related deeds.
gives a few examples.
In November 1941, on the day when Zhuoya was killed, her female teammate Vera Volosina was also brutally killed.
The Nazi hit the girl of Jewish descent with a butt, then hung her up and beat her with a horse whip, but she refused to say anything.
Finally, the German army hanged her outside the village of Golovkovo. But because the scale of the execution was small, Vera was tortured to the point of being very weak, had a high fever, and did not even have the energy to walk onto the gallows, and was very silent when she died.
Therefore, before her execution, she was not as fighting spirit as Zhuoya and shouted slogans.
movie "Zoya", the heroine is very physically fit, and after suffering from torture, she can still deliver a speech before her death, shouting slogans
Villa was executed for a long time, everyone thought she was missing. It was not until 1942 that her mother found the cemetery with the help of the villagers and recognized her daughter - the bones were beyond recognition, but the beautiful red hair and leather boots as gifts for the 17th birthday, as well as the testimony of the villagers who witnessed the whole process, told the painful mother that this skeleton was Vera Voloshna.
Later, Vera's deeds have been widely circulated, but in terms of popularity, they are far less than Zhuoya, who was awarded the title of "Hero of the Soviet Union".
It was not until 1994 that this Jewish girl who sacrificed her life for the country was posthumously awarded the title of "Russian Hero" and the Medal of Venus.
Unfortunately, at this time, the country she defended with her life has long disappeared...
There is also the famous ace female sniper Lyudmira Mikhaillovna Pavlitchenko . This former Ukrainian female college student shot and killed 187 enemies in two and a half months in the battle of Odessa Battle. Later, in the battle to defend Sevastopol , the record was improved to 309 people, becoming the woman with the most killing enemies at that time.
Lyudmira Pavlitchenko
In October 1943, Lyudmira was awarded the honorary title of the hero of the Soviet Union and the Medal of Venus.
The heroine who won this honor at the same time as her also has a Kazakh female soldier named Manshuk Mametova.
However, Mametova's certificates and medals were led by her mother, because the heroine was already killed in the Battle of Neville.
Mametova, who has received a technical secondary school education (he was considered a high education back then) was originally just a civilian, but later applied to be a field nurse, and later she was trained to become a machine gunner.
In order to cover her comrades' retreat, she took the initiative to stay and continued to fight alone. Before her death, she used machine gun to destroy more than 80 German troops.
Manshuk Mametova
In the Patriotic War, Kazakhstan, with a population of only more than 11 million, actively responded to the call of the Supreme Soviet and sent one tenth of the military and civilians to participate in the Patriotic War. It was the franchise that year that except Russia, the third one was Ukraine. In the end, about 600,000 Kazakh soldiers who participated in World War II failed to survive the day of victory.
But as mentioned earlier, Kazakhstan is not as good as the other two franchise republics - Russia and Ukraine.
What's even more tragic is another ace sniper whose title was canceled due to the issue of national ownership, Chechen Abhadi Idrisov.
As of April 1944, when Idrisov was injured and transferred to the rear hospital, his sniping score was 349 people. During his treatment, he was also awarded the title of "Hero of the Soviet Union" and the Order of Venus.
Unexpectedly, in February 1945, Idrisov, who was about to return to the team after recovering from his injury, suddenly received a notice that he had been cancelled from his military and took back all honors and medals, including the "Soviet Hero". He was later deported to his hometown and exiled to Kazakhstan in Central Asia with other fellow villagers.
Chchens' exile route
In the days that followed, Idrisov made a living by herding sheep for the commune in Kazakhstan.
Fortunately, local Kazakhstan cadres respect this combat hero very much and have always helped him as much as possible, arranged residences and applied for subsidies.
After the war, the Soviet Union's ethnic policy became moderate. After Khrushchev came to power, he began to rehabilitate ethnic minorities such as Chechnya who were charged with "collaborating with enemies". Idrisov also returned to his hometown in 1956 and enjoyed certain treatment as a combat hero.
But it was not until 1983, shortly before Idrisov's death that the Soviet Union restored his title of Soviet hero and awarded him the Medal of Venus, which had been confiscated for nearly 40 years.
In his later years, Idrisov once again wore the medal of Venus, which symbolized the heroes of the Soviet Union,
objectively. Throughout the Cold War era, the meritorious system of the Soviet military system was relatively fair. Some grassroots ethnic minority soldiers can become senior commanders through self-strength struggle and receive meritorious commendations.
For example, the first generation of Chechnya rebel leader, Jorhar Musayevich Dudaev.
He performed very well in the Soviet Union's military operations against Afghanistan in the 1980s. He has won Soviet awards 12 times, and has been promoted to the Air Force Division Commander and awarded the rank of major general. In 1989, given his heroic command and meritorious experience on the battlefield in Afghanistan, Major General Dudaev was awarded the Red Flag Medal and the title of "Hero of the Soviet Union".
Johar Musayevich Dudaev (1944.2.15-1996.4.21)
Ironically, when the Soviet Union was strong, Dudaev actively strived to be a good comrade and a good party member; when the Soviet Union was about to collapse, he was the one who rushed in front and worked hard to tear off bricks and tiles.
In the autumn of 1991, before the Soviet Union had disintegrated, Dudaev left his post without authorization and returned to his hometown of Chechen, which had been away for decades, and began to engage in desperate activities to split the country (Checchen was an autonomous republic within the Russian Federation, the Soviet Union's franchise republic, and the disintegration of the Soviet Union did not affect the relationship between Chechnya and Russia).
The autonomous republic in the Russian Federation, 20 is Chechnya, 5 is Dagestan,
In the end, this "Soviet hero" who betrayed his oath was "designated" by the Russian army during the First Chechen War.
It was during the First Chechen War that the Russian Federation began to award this highest military honor to military personnel, but the name was changed to "Hero of the Russian Federation", which is what we are now familiar with. The red flag on the top of the Venus Medal was also replaced with a three-color Russian flag.
The Russian army in Chechen War belongs to the first batch of winners of the "Russian Heroes" and the Russian version of the Golden Star Medal.
As mentioned at the beginning, at present, except for astronauts, almost half of the "Russian heroes" are posthumously awarded.
Many of them were soldiers who died in the first and second war against Chechnya in the 1990s.
After all, the tragic level of these two wars is extremely amazing in the history of modern warfare.
. The one who was posthumously awarded the title of "Russian Hero" after his death is also the former Chechen regional leader who actively supports national unity, Ramzan Kadyrov (Xiao Ka's father).
Kadrov’s father and son
On May 9, 2004, at the Victory Day of the Patriotic War , the old Kadyrov was killed on the rostrum by Chechen separatists in the form of a terrorist attack (there is a saying that bomb was secretly embedded with cement columns when the Grozny Stadium was built a year ago). On the rostrum of the gymnasium, Lao Kadyrov watched the performance of celebrating Victory Day. This was the last image he left behind during his lifetime. President Putin soon posthumously awarded Lao Ka's title of "Russian hero".
Later, Putin awarded Lao Ka's son Xiao Ka, Ramzan Kadyrov's "Russian Hero" and the Golden Star Medal to commend his stability maintenance work in Chechnya.
So, Kadrov and his son are the only Russian federal citizens who have won the title of "Russian Hero" and the Medal of Venus.
Later, in addition to astronauts, whether it was the Russian-German War in 2008 or the later Syrian War , some soldiers were awarded the title of "Russian Hero".
But the same rule is still the same, many people do not have the chance to pin the Golden Star medal on their chests with their own hands. Those who come to accept this highest honor are their grieving relatives.
Let’s look at the recent Russian-Ukrainian war. As of the end of October 2022, 21 Russian airborne troops alone won the title of “Russian Hero”, of which 20 of them have clear identities (picture below).
And 17 of these 20 people were posthumously awarded after their sacrifice. At the end of
, let’s talk about something sad.
The embarrassing experience of Leonid Solodkov, the last winner of the title of "Hero of the Soviet Union".
On December 24, 1991, Gorbachev signed the Seventh Presidential Decree (the Soviet Union followed the United States at the end of the Soviet Union and also implemented the presidential system), awarding Leonid Solodkov, the captain of the 3158 ship who performed special missions, was awarded the title of "Hero of the Soviet Union" and the Medal of Venus and the Medal of Lenin.
The next day, the Soviet Union announced its disintegration.
That's it, Leonid Solodkov became the last Soviet hero, the last winner of the Golden Star Medal and the Order of Lenin.
Leonid Solodkov, the one he wore on his chest was the Soviet Union's Medal of Venus
The award ceremony was not held until January 16, 1992.
, who was responsible for awarding him a medal, has been replaced by President Yeltsin of the Russian Federation.
Although the Kremlin also organized this solemn ceremony according to the usual specifications, the atmosphere on the scene was not good. The enthusiasm and pride of the heroic ceremony in the past no longer existed, and almost everyone had a solemn and confused expression.
Leonid Solodkov did not make a passionate remark as usual, and only said "Thank you, comrade" to President Yeltsin.
