FRONT LINE – THAT’S US!

This report is not about the difficulties of life on the front line in the winter, but about  those young guys who are the masters and they are responsible for the land trusted to them.

This is platoon commander Lieutenant Rafael Mekhchyan. At the position he is the most senior, he is 22 years old. Five months ago, he graduated from the Military Institute and started the service. He says: “The events of vital importance for our country today happen in the front line, so I had to come.”

Raphael shows us the engineering structures in the trenches. These innovations make the position a few times more reliable and secure. Recently defense minister Seyran Ohanyan and the commander of the NKR Defense Army, Lieutenant-General Levon Mnatsakanyan visited the front line and expressed their satisfaction with structures in the positions.

Senior observer ordinary Marzpet Meletyan is on duty in the trench. It’s been a year since he implements combat duty. Already accustomed to shots, he philosophizes: “Every time when there is a shot, it does not matter who shoots – we or they, I think – life is fragile like glass.”

And here is the youngest observer soldier Gurgen Vardanyan, it is 9 months he is at the position. He says: “For a soldier – day, or night, all is the same. The main thing is that the mood should be OK. And high mood provide the most simple, ordinary things that you do not pay attention at home. For example, home-made jam, which treated Mr. Mekhchyan”.

In the dugout soldiers Sergey Hovhannisyan and Gevorg Simonyan are having rest, who serve only a few months and for the first time came to the positions. “Here I feel myself needed. For the first time in my life I’m really inspired by”, – said Gevorg.

Instead of an epilogue

We return to the military unit. In the car sounds the song of Viktor Tsoy, where there is such a line: “War is the work of the young.”

Shoushan Stepanyan

Photos by the author