Kremlin Hails Slain Troops as Heroes

Many fathers would be happy to hear their sons declared heroes. Not Vitaly Travin.

Travin’s son, Mikhail, was one of 84 Pskov paratroopers killed two weeks ago in Chechnya’s southern mountains when they were overwhelmed by rebels and called in Russian artillery fire on their own position. The death toll is the highest so far in a single battle in Russia’s 6-month-old war in the separatist republic.

Eight paratroopers were buried Tuesday with eulogies from acting President Vladimir V. Putin, in Moscow, and Defense Minister Igor D. Sergeyev, who lauded them as “faithful sons, true soldiers, defenders of the Fatherland.”

The paratroopers’ funeral comes at a critical time for Putin, less than two weeks before Russians go to the polls to decide whether to keep him as president. Soon after becoming prime minister in August, Putin launched a fierce offensive against the rebels, and his popularity has been seen as closely tied to the popularity of the war. Since he took over as president on New Year’s Eve, Putin has faced the challenge of winning election before battlefield losses erode public support.

Travin, having tossed a handful of orangish clay into his son’s grave and downed a shot of vodka for fortitude, was unmoved by Putin’s fine words.

“This isn’t even a tragedy. It’s the end of our lives. We lost our only child in this stupid war,” Travin said. “Of course, now they will make heroes of all of them. But my son wasn’t a hero. He was just a kid.”

The paratroopers were members of one of Russia’s most elite and storied regiments--the 104th Airborne, based in Pskov, a medieval garrison town of 200,000 near the Estonian border. As Russia observed a national day of mourning, Pskov held a joint funeral for the first eight of the dead; five of them, including Mikhail Travin, were buried together in the city’s central cemetery.

“The authorities have no other option but to make them heroes now in order to cover up for someone’s mistakes,” the elder Travin said.

In Pskov, support for the war and the men fighting it is still strong. But many among the thousands who thronged the city streets Tuesday to pay their respects to the dead have begun asking questions.

“When people have died, you can’t say their deaths were in vain. But still, I don’t think this was justified,” said 36-year-old Yelena Syrtsova, whose husband serves in the 104th Airborne. “Is Chechnya worth this kind of loss? You have to at least ask the question.

“I want this to end soon,” she said. “I don’t want any more of our boys sent to the slaughter.”

Putin observed the day of mourning by attending a memorial service in Moscow and sending a letter to the families. It fell to Sergeyev, the defense minister, to read the letter and comfort the mourners, and he appeared to find the task distressful.

In his remarks, he gave new details of the battle, including that Russian intelligence had failed to detect the presence of thousands of rebels in the area before the paratroopers were sent in and that reinforcements were unable to break through the rebel cordon.

“Dear relatives and friends, forgive us for not having been able to help the paratroopers in time,” Sergeyev said, his voice quavering. “You know that paratroopers will never leave their comrades in trouble, but in that hard situation, there was simply no alternative. They will go down in the history of Russia’s heroic military acts. Their example will be used to bring up a new generation of defenders of the Fatherland.”

Sergeyev compared the paratroopers to the legions of Russian soldiers who have fought in other costly and legendary battles, including the Battle of Borodino against Napoleon and the battle for Stalingrad during World War II.

Asked whether the incident could threaten public support for the war, Sergeyev appeared caught off guard, saying, “I don’t know.”

Throughout the war, Russian leaders have been sensitive about reports of Russian losses. No matter how many Russians are killed, the official reports always give the rebel death toll as several times higher.

It took authorities more than 10 days to acknowledge the magnitude of the death toll in the disastrous Feb. 29 battle in the Argun Gorge of southern Chechnya. Of the 90 men in the company, only six survived. Russian officials claimed to have killed an astonishing 700 rebels in return.

“Who knows what really happened down there? They aren’t telling the truth,” complained Inna Vasilyeva, a 55-year-old nurse and friend of one of the victims. “These boys died honestly. But whether the powers that be acted honestly, who knows? We don’t know whether these deaths were necessary.”

Irina Bakhshaliyeva, 41, whose husband serves in the 104th, said she doesn’t believe the official death toll and is “uncomfortable” with the government’s long silence about the battle. But she said she expects support for the war to increase.

“Even more of the men are going to want to go to Chechnya to take revenge,” she said. But even those willing to question the war’s goals and conduct weren’t willing to hold Putin personally accountable for problems. Nelya Smirnova, 59, expressed dismay at the mounting death toll but insisted that Putin was not to blame.

“This all got started before him,” she said. “I feel very sorry for the boys. The more heroes we get, the more victims there will be.”

The Russian government puts the current Russian death toll at about 1,800. But human rights groups, including the respected Soldiers’ Mothers Committee, estimate that the true scale of Russian losses is twice that figure or more.

Alexei Ivanov, a 26-year-old truck driver, predicted that the massive death toll will increase, not decrease, support for the war.

“We need to straighten things out down there, that’s for certain,” he said. “If we’re going to fight, we have to fight to the end. People won’t understand if you cut it off prematurely after so many people have given their lives. I think more people here are going to sign up in order to finish it off.”

But it’s unlikely any of them will be from young Travin’s family. The soldier had just completed his training and had yet to make a single parachute jump when he found himself in the Argun Gorge. He turned 20 just two weeks before his death.

“Who needs this? What’s it all for?” Travin’s aunt, Nadezhda Khlystun, cried out before collapsing in tears at his graveside. “What I want to know is, who sent him there to die?”

Alexei V. Kuznetsov of The Times’ Moscow Bureau contributed to this report.