Of all the lapses and fallacies of the soviet-styled Belarusian system, one of the most disgusting is the mandatory military service. All Belarusian men are obliged to serve in the army unless they have some good reasons not to do so. One such reason exempting from the military service is poor health. Each conscript has to go through a series of medical checks before he or she is approved to be a soldier. Well, it is so, of course, unless you are an opposition activist and the authorities want you blocked away from your “socially harmful” activities.
Recently, a number of young opposition activists have been forced to become conscripts in the Belarusian military. The draft was imposed on them in a rushed fashion, without proper health checks. A few days back, the guys took their oath of allegiance, and now they are soldiers officially.
Today RFE\RL reported that one of these poor draftees, Zmicier Chvedaruk, has serious health issues and needs a surgery. And this is just a couple of days after he took his military oath.
Chvedaruk, a Young Front member, studied at a theological college. The guy was arrested and taken to the enlistment office, then to prison where he was locked up for a couple of days and then transported to a military station. Chvedaruk’s religious views are incompatible with the military service in principle; his pasty complexion and a rather lean figure make him look anything but belligerent. But for some weird reason, he needed to be locked away. How is this political draft different from political imprisonment? Just a few days into his military service, his health issues have begun to surface. The unlawfulness of Chvedaruk’s rushed conscription is now evident. We should definitely not keep silent.
But there is a larger problem here. The mandatory draft is a misfortunate vestige of the soviet past. It is also a recurring trait of authoritarian regimes. In Belarus, the military serves, although inefficiently, a certain ideological task to forge patriots of our Matrix. The Matrix is the system we have. It is based on so called Belarusian ideology, which is a brew of de-ethnicized patriotism, allegiance to the president and the state. It is a very peculiar patriotism, which is closely related to a soviet military tradition and has very little of what Lithuanian or Polish soldiers are taught as part of their drills. I guess about 100 percent of the Belarusian army officers speak Russian. In fact, none choose to speak Belarusian when they address their soldiers (unless in person if so required). The Belarusian military personnel are almost entirely Russian-speaking, and the Belarusian language is often greeted with hostility and misunderstanding.
A big problem of the Belarusian army is hazing. It is not what you can see in the American military where one can face some ritualistic forms of harassment as a way of initiation. The Belarusian hazing can last much longer and be much more severe. One of my schoolmates returned home from the military prematurely. Returned handicapped. The cause is obvious – hazing. You are lucky if you have an athletic figure and know some kung fu. Consider yourself in trouble if you don’t. Of course, it depends on where you are stationed. There are places where hazing is very limited, but there are some places where it is still a big issue.
The Belarusian army is certainly not the best place to spend a year of your life, especially, when the commander-in-chief, Mr. Lukashenka, is so unfit for the position.
