Blackmail

38 KIEV, UKRAINE

In the tail of the Ilyushin IL-76 jet aircraft, Sergeant First Class Roman Savvin sat in his webbed seat along the transport bulkhead, the last soldier in the 125-man detachment. Wearing full combat gear and two parachutes — a main on his back and a reserve strapped to his stomach — he waited patiently, taking comfort in the familiar vibration from the aircraft’s four turbofan engines. Tonight, Savvin’s aircraft was one of over one hundred IL-76s and a slew of other transports carrying Russia’s VDV–Vozdushno-Desantnye Voyska — airborne troops and their equipment.

They had initially headed west over Belarus, with some aircraft carrying only troops, while others carried a small cadre of soldiers and the airborne units’ armored vehicles. Unlike its Western airborne counterparts, which were essentially light infantry, the VDV was a fully mechanized infantry fighting force with significant firepower. Each unit was outfitted with a plethora of air-dropped armored vehicles: Typhoon armored personnel carriers, BMD infantry fighting vehicles, and self-propelled mortars, howitzers, anti-tank guns, and air defense missile systems. Compared to Western airborne troops, the Russian VDV was a heavily armed force.

The IL-76 banked to the left, beginning its journey south behind the Ukrainian front line. As the aircraft steadied on its new course, the Russian airborne motto echoed in Savvin’s mind:

Nobody but us.

For the objective assigned to his unit tonight, the motto was apropos. A few minutes after turning south, Savvin felt the aircraft descending, and he knew it wouldn’t be much longer. The light at the front of the aircraft fuselage still glowed red, and as he waited for it to turn yellow, his thoughts drifted to his joint training with American airborne troops several years earlier.

After the Cold War ended and during the brief period Russia and America embraced each other as friends, Savvin had trained for a short time with his American counterparts at Fort Benning, Georgia. He had memorized the American airborne cadences during their training, and although there were many variations of the C-130 cadence, one in particular tumbled through his mind as he prepared for tonight’s jump:

He remembered stopping by a training session at Fort Benning, where the instructor was explaining the aircraft exit procedure, which included the requirement to count to four — one thousand, two thousand… By the time you reached four, you should feel a tug on your harness as your main parachute deployed.

The Jump light at the front of the aircraft fuselage shifted from red to yellow. Savvin and the other men in his unit stood, hooked their parachute static lines to a cable in the overhead running the length of the fuselage, then turned aft, watching the aircrew open the cabin door. Less than a minute later, the light turned green and all 125 paratroopers moved toward the open door in unison, exiting at one-second intervals.

Upon reaching the end of the fuselage, Savvin turned toward the opening and, in one fluid motion, placed a hand on each side of the opening and launched himself from the aircraft. In a reflex action practiced hundreds of times, he tucked his chin against his chest, pressed his elbows against his sides, and snapped his legs together, bending at the waist into a pike position just before his body was buffeted by the aircraft’s slipstream. As Savvin tumbled through the darkness, he began his count.

One thousand, two thousand…