ВЕСЬ АФГАНИСТАН БОЯЛСЯ ЭТИХ ПАРНЕЙ! ЖЕСТОКАЯ ТАЙНА СОВЕТСКОЙ РАЗВЕДКИ

Chapter 1. The Birth of a Legend: Not Just "Shooters," But War Engineers To understand what "Cascade" is, you have to rewind a bit. Remember the assault on Amin's palace in December 1979? Operation "Storm-333." The "Zenit" and "Thunder" groups were there. They accomplished the impossible—they took the impregnable fortress in 43 minutes. But the assault succeeded, Amin was removed, the troops entered, and the Kremlin, or more precisely Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov, realized one simple but terrifying thing: the war was just beginning. An army is a hammer. A huge, heavy hammer. It can crush anything on a plain. But the mujahideen are not a regular army. They dissolve into the mountains; they are at home in the villages. You can't fight them with tank wedges. A scalpel was needed. They needed people who could not only shoot, but also think, recruit, pit gangs against each other, and carry out targeted strikes. And so, in July 1980, a decree was issued by the CPSU Central Committee and the Council of Ministers. A special forces unit, "Cascade," was to be created. Colonel Alexander Lazarenko was appointed commander. Remember that name, guys. Alexander Ivanovich was a rock-solid man. He had been through the war, served in the legendary "V" Department, and was involved in sabotage operations. What was the main draw of "Cascade"? Personnel. They didn't take conscripts. At all. The core was made up of KGB officers from all over the Soviet Union. But not the kind of people shuffling papers in offices, but graduates of the KUOS. What is KUOS? It's the Officer Training Course. Sounds boring, right? In reality, it was a "saboteur school" near Balashikha. There, ordinary detectives were trained to become universal soldiers. They knew mines and explosives, small-group tactics, languages, could drive anything that moved, and shoot anything that could shoot. Imagine: a counterintelligence major from Kyiv, a criminal investigation captain from Novosibirsk (who had transferred to the KGB), and a senior lieutenant from Minsk were all sitting in the same armored personnel carrier. Each had a higher education, life experience, a family, and children. These were grown men, about 30 to 35 years old. They understood the value of life and didn't rush into trouble for a medal, but they carried out their missions with utmost integrity. There were four "Cascades" in total. The first arrived in 1980, the fourth left in 1983, when they were replaced by the Omega group. The duration of a tour of duty was 6 to 9 months. And these weren't just months of service; they were a grinding, exhausting slog. Chapter 2. Structure: How They Held All of Afghanistan Many people think that "Cascade" was a large regiment that sat in Kabul and went out on missions. Nothing of the sort. The system was sophisticated, networked, as they say these days. The entire unit was divided into teams. And these weren't sports teams, guys; they were autonomous combat units. They were given geographic names, so the enemy wouldn't guess, but they sounded good: "Ural" — stationed in Kabul and the surrounding area. "Caucasus" — went south, to Kandahar (the thickest part of the country). "Carpathians" — operated in Herat and Shindand. "Tibet" — Jalalabad. And so on — "North," "Altai." Several such units were created, covering key points in Afghanistan. Each team consisted of 50-60 people, sometimes more, sometimes less. What's the deal? Each team lived separately from the army. They rented villas (yes, rich houses abandoned by fleeing Afghan beys) or occupied separate buildings on the outskirts. They turned them into fortresses: sandbags, machine-gun nests on the roof, minefields all around. They lived in their own commune. They had a dual mission. Officially, it was called "assisting in the creation of DRA security agencies" and "conducting special operations." Translating into our language: Intelligence and intelligence. They created a local security service, the KHAD. They trained Afghans to work. They recruited informants. A Kaskad member could go to the bazaar in civilian clothes (if his appearance allowed it), have tea with the right people, and find out where the arms caravan would pass the next day.