The main holiday of the Ukrainian Army, or everything - according to Maupassant

Smart Ukrainians came up with the idea to celebrate - and they celebrate in the most luxurious way in the last month of the year! - there are so many good holidays that he is happy happy a tirelessly kind and warm Ukrainian soul. The names of the saints mean holiness and the holy - holiday, that's Ukrainian.

I would live like this and live, rushing through the years, celebrating and rejoicing.

But after 2014, Ukrainians relate to the two December holidays, which were not so adored even in 2013, in a completely different way, at first - even a little confused and lost, and then - increasingly more consciously and meaningfully.

Because in 2014, one of the most vile wars of our time, and maybe even in world history, began. However, about "brothers" and "fraternal embraces" - separately and over time, not festively.

And I am talking here about our current holidays, which were not so noticeable and understandable before: the Day of the Armed Forces of Ukraine - December 6, and December 12 - the Day of the Ground Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

Holidays that practically did not exist before 2014 - in the army, which practically did not exist. The awarding of innocent people with hundreds of personal pistols and the awarding of torches to generals who did not smell gunpowder do not count...

This is the venerable Ukrainian Army today. I упоминается among the best armies in Europe and the world.

And what happened to the Army of Ukraine until the last peaceful year of 2013?

Everyone who is observant and not indifferent to the Army naturally remembers the most striking, bright, strangely emotional moments from the first days of the creation of the Armed Forces, from the beginning of the still disastrous 90s. Strange emotionality lies in the fact that, on the one hand, there was a pleasant emotion - awareness of novelty, the beginning of something huge, necessary, important that will change the entire life of the army and the people for the better.

But the emotion was different, on the other hand, it was strange because the news concerning the "military Ukrainian perestroika" was unexpected, unusual, and raised doubts about the quality of thoughts of those who broadcast information related to the army.

And how right those who had doubts turned out to be over time...

One remembers the strange excitement of the little officer-rear-tail officer who quickly faded into the reserve, who - with a nervous tremor in his voice - choked with joy: a small company was created with the army and flourished. And our hero is "on the job". He sells left and right kungs and spare parts for cars that have been in long-term storage and, of course, are in excellent, pristine condition. And the wheels of Novyokhonki were "realized" - you can't count them.

It must be said that Ukraine, as the second echelon of the Warsaw Pact bloc, was jammed with warehouses filled with everything necessary to arm, form, shoe, clothe and feed a good dozen armies of all kinds in the shortest possible time, if only the damning capitalists would strike in the USSR But the imperialists were in no hurry to attack. Warehouses with military equipment stood untouched. In a word, to loot under the signs of seasonal sales of military property, sorry, the property was overflowing...

Ten years later, already stunned by the unexpected boomerangs of the former "perestroika implementation", leaders and fathers-commanders began to raise the question of purchasing tires for the vehicles of the army and, I do not exclude, the navy...

And what was the chatter of the ensigns, who were amused by the first words of the new rear guard, addressed to the ensign-driver: "Well, tell me where here in this beautiful city you can buy a couple of beautiful apartments for a thousand and fifty evergreens?". It is immediately clear that the back is made of reliable, thrifty, you won't get lost with it.

But it was precisely with such that the army disappeared. The information that the soldiers are asking the local population not only for a cigarette because they want to smoke, but also for money because they want to eat, filled the media with confusion.

Quietly, without publicity and fuss, and it will never be too late to make a noise, kindergartens, pioneer camps - with beautiful pine trees around no less beautiful lakes - in picturesque places, left the possession of the Ministry of Defense, because everything is best for children...

Some narcissistic Volyn patriotism, it seems, with the mindset of "enough for my tenure" stomped his feet and contemptuously waved his hands away from the military pilots, trying to take away the juicy square kilometers of the airfield and the airfield. The local "strategist" operated with the appropriate terminology: "No one will ever need this again, what kind of combat training, what kind of combat readiness, will you tell me more about the war?".

The apotheosis, or one of the apotheosis, of absolute disrespect for the armed forces and people in camouflage with army epaulettes on their shoulders, the fact of an absolute boorish attitude towards the army and army property, was the apotheosis with the help of seizure, in fact raiding, - judges led by non-standard "seeder" Zvarychym - to the magnificent building of the Air Force Headquarters on Saksaganskogo Street in Lviv, stunning in its beauty and location. The Ministry of Defense forgot about true honor and dignity, then they were not capable even of this building recapture back, that there was already stuttering about the defense of the Fatherland...

Then strangely, almost synchronously, ammunition warehouses exploded, which always allowed to hide camouflaged ends in the murky waters of total confusion.

By the way, about camouflage. The camouflage was useless, and the shoe was terrible. And how else, when the entire head of the department called and still considers it his main victory destruction of rags. Well, I think throwing not the flags of the enemy at the foot of the mausoleum with the body of the former army, but rags pierced by the bullets of eternally cumulative soldiers' heels is shocking...

It was with such medieval baggage - the baggage of the middle of the last century - that the former army burst into an upheaval of a planetary scale - into a modern war.

It broke, but it didn't break. Thanks to people. Half-starved, but unbreakable and therefore legendary.

We were literally born with our army. Newly. Learned the word "drone". We got rid of the stupid pictorial habit of riding on armor and not wearing armor on the front. Our mass media are full of news about new, completely new and completely new, the latest military equipment, which goes to the front. And the form of clothing is new, not the same camouflage that melted from the touch of a cigarette. And the boots are already of such a quality that they won't fall apart if they are ordered to walk to the enemy's lair.

And the enemy knows all this. And the enemy does not like all this. It seems to him that he can still frighten, but the time of the naked, hungry and frightened Ukrainian army has irretrievably passed. We will still have the opportunity to compare, we will certainly return to this comparison - we will compare our forces and those of the enemy.

In the meantime - a quote from a classic of world literature, whose opinion cannot be ignored. "War is barbarism when a peaceful neighbor is attacked, but it is a sacred duty when one defends the Motherland," - Guy de Maupassant. We are destined to fight with barbarians who have stabbed us in the back.

We stood up, our army stood up at the most terrible moment.

And therefore we are invincible. Think about it in December.

And not only on the 6th and 12th...

And on New Year's Eve, raise a glass to the Main holiday of the Ukrainian Army, a holiday that is inevitable - for our victory over the enemies!

...Recently, in a supermarket, my grandmother caught a soldier dressed in modern clothes: "Son, maybe I need to buy you a cigarette, maybe I should buy you something tasty, dear?".

Rodnenky took out a pack of hryvnias from his pocket, clearly not without a desire to demonstrate his financial and economic power, and said in response with a sense of self-respect: "Come on, grandma, I'll give you a kilo of chocolate candies?".

...How far we have come, how far we are forever from the naive 2013.

Vasily Tochylo