04/07/1992
After going downhill, the road turned left. It was then that the cars appeared from behind the thick willow thickets, although they had not yet acquired foliage. They were coal cars and could hardly be part of that secret, or at least covert, train. And so it turned out.
However, soon, Bragin had not walked even fifty meters when the promised blue diesel locomotive appeared, stopping ten meters from the place where the tracks crossed the dirt roadway. Instinctively looking around at each crossing of the rail line - a habit developed by every normal person who has worked at an industrial site for at least some time, Bragin reached the tracks on which the train was standing. The number matched. Guided by the instructions received the day before, Bragin walked on with an indifferent look. Behind him he heard the sound of an engine, splashes and the creaking of the suspension - the spring gravel road here was thoroughly battered by heavy transport.
The silver "Lada-2109" that had passed Bragin slowed down and stopped ten meters ahead. While he was walking this distance, the door lock clicked, it swung open, after which a threatening-looking figure in a black leather jacket rose from behind the roof. It was yesterday's driver. Quite an appropriate appearance for an unwanted reveler to consider it necessary to get out of here while he was still OK.
It turned out that the train had to be reached not from the locomotive side, but through the warehouses. There was no need to walk - a couple of minutes later the "2109" with Bragin sitting in it stopped right next to the passenger car, the windows of which were curtained. A special car of a characteristic appearance, like a track worker or a track cleaner, also caught my eye. In general, the train looked like a typical repair train.
The carriage turned out to be not even a compartment carriage, but a reserved seat carriage, some of the partitions and folding seats of which had been thrown out, but some remained, that is, it was a conversion from an ordinary passenger carriage. The man who met them in the vestibule pointed to a row of seats that were already occupied, obviously by the same people who had arrived as Bragin. Another thing that caught their attention was the satellite antennas deployed by a couple of windows, looking somewhere through the blind curtains. There were also stands with something like stationary radio stations or computers. A fan was humming somewhere. For a secret carriage - a command post, everything looked a little sloppy, hastily assembled.
- So, comrade officers, - the major began, - you will have to work on a purely technical part. This stronghold was put into operation after the regional authorities declared a state of emergency. Despite the fact that the regional administration has committed a number of unlawful and downright illegal actions, the central authorities in Moscow have considered the declaration of a state of emergency a legitimate step. This concerns what you need to know about what we can already observe.
Unauthorized formations like patrols, which are already operating and operating with the assistance of individual personnel from the ranks of the police, have one rather convincing formal argument. They recruit personnel from among civilians into their ranks and give them an explanation that they will act exclusively within the law - in a state of emergency. People are misled that their area of responsibility is civil defense. In part, this is true and in part, there is a positive aspect to this, namely, containing unrest.
We will not give an assessment of the situation as a whole, although, of course, in general this is a purely anti-state act. We are now considering individual, so to speak, tactical components of the current situation, and as for these detachments, we have chosen a line of conduct that does not provide for entering into an armed confrontation with these formations. - That's why the administration is currently under siege, and we are hiding in the repair train, - Bragin thought without sarcasm, rather with annoyance. - The next point, - the Major continued, - is the activity of civilians. This includes the following components: the well-known pro-American hysteria, which spills over into actions from hanging flags to declaring a strike. The second is pure looting and looting of stores. In part, the previously described formations are a force that restrains manifestations of looting. We see the advantage of such a configuration in the fact that the inevitable discontent of civilians, their aggression, will now be directed not at the reinforced law enforcement units, which logically should enter the city, but at the forces of the rebels themselves. Such a situation, maintaining the stake on such, so to speak, mutual compensation cannot continue for a long time, but in the coming days, as we assume, it will be exactly like this.
- So, you should not engage in any confrontation with unauthorized units, civilian patrols, "CP" as they call themselves in English, but you should also not interfere when you see manifestations of civil disobedience such as looting. Exceptions, of course, can be: overt violence against third parties, threats to life, but in general, you should adhere to a neutral line of behavior.
The police, unfortunately, have practically withdrawn themselves at the moment. There are some exceptions, but this is not what we would like to see. Having imagined themselves as the forces of law and order of the new Federal Territory, they have gone into real guerrilla warfare. Not in terms of underground struggle, but in terms of observing formal norms - they painted patrol cars as they saw fit. They stole several special vehicles based on BRDM... extortions on various occasions...
As for the strike movement, television played the main role in information coordination of the population. Unfortunately, we were unable to prevent the seizure of the broadcasting center. On the morning of the first, a message was received from an undercover officer on duty. The first stage took place then. An armed rapid response group met resistance from a detachment, as we now know, recruited from among the criminal element. In response, the police reported that they had put the corresponding plan into action, but obvious sabotage led to the fact that the arriving units of the internal troops were met by two units of armored vehicles provided, or rather, stolen from another part of the internal troops. The ensuing paralysis in carrying out further actions to unblock was accompanied by sabotage aimed at disorganizing communications with the higher level of leadership.
- They bought everyone, so that's their entire plan, - Bragin thought to himself.
- So the first day was lost, - the major continued, - With the help of television broadcasting, the rebels managed to convince the population of the seriousness of what was happening. Stop it! In the seriousness of what they are declaring. They made us believe in the reality of the region's separation in favor of the United States.
The response to the anti-state act will be comprehensive, among other things, involving the use of special technical means. Our unit will work in this direction.
Let's move on to the technical part, which you will have to deal with. We have a system that includes a number of infrasound emitters. There are similar systems in the United States.
The major clicked a button on a small wired remote control.
- This is a mobile ultrasound station.
A photograph of a minibus with some kind of unit on the roof appeared on the suddenly lit white screen of the projector. The device bore little resemblance to anything related to acoustic equipment. Rather, it looked like some kind of small-sized missile launcher - a package of short pipes coming out of a box, which in turn was located on a rotating support, which also provided up-down rotation. Neither give nor take, a launcher. - This is the CRAE system - the abbreviation stands for close-range acoustic emitter. The emitted vibrations are mainly in the audible part of the sound spectrum - from ten to twenty-two kilohertz, but everywhere it is called by its second name - an ultrasonic system.
The second example is the South African "rhinoceros" system.
The photo shows a pickup truck with a barrel-shaped installation placed in the back. This one looked simpler, and was clearly fixed motionless.
This one uses infrasound. According to descriptions, its radiation is absolutely not perceived by ear, but there is an additional siren operating at a frequency of about a few kilohertz. In general, in terms of frequency, the secondary emitter is a regular siren. But only in frequency. There is one point, which is as follows: those exposed to infrasound mistakenly attribute the inevitable discomfort to the action of the audible sound. Yes, in the mildest version, it is just discomfort. So, those irradiated attribute this to the work of the sound siren, which emits not the usual smoothly changing tone, but rather atypical abrupt signals. Quite expectedly, there were cases when the use of this siren alone had the desired effect without any infrasound. Of course, the protesters understood everything, but they did not understand it right away, and they did not convey this to everyone. So, from time to time, this sophisticated technique works to this day. At least, it did not become ineffective at some particular moment.
- Now let's move on to what we have. The Excess-E system consists of a group of dispersed infrasound emitters operating in the mode of emitting oscillations in the range from ten to fifteen hertz. As emitters, they can be used and are used for their, so to speak, civilian purpose - they provoke the condensation of fog particles and their precipitation. The radius, however, is insignificant and the efficiency is somewhat lower than stated.
- In my opinion, there is no such efficiency at all, - Bragin noted to himself, - the fogs were and are. And who does it bother anyway? Maybe at airports.
- In addition, such precipitation of fog particles binds particles of industrial emissions and smog.
- Exactly, I heard about this, - Bragin recalled - probably this is an invention of those years when they began to charge water and hang magnetic field generators on gas lines, supposedly improving fuel.
- The task is to prepare the system for operation in emergency mode, - the Major announced in the meantime, - To do this, it is necessary to check the operability of each individual emitter and, if possible, carry out repairs. If this is possible, - he specified, - One group will do this. The next group will install the remote control modules. These devices are special-purpose equipment, and their presence in places with unlimited access was considered inadvisable. The devices provide remote control via the city telephone network and have a backup communication channel in the VHF radio range. This is a regular, unencrypted remote control device plus a digital circuit containing pre-recorded programs with various pulse emission options. The connection is one-way. Technically, the emitters can be controlled via the telephone network, using a simple decoder that looks like, for example, a power supply system node, but it was decided that such a premature connection of the emitters to the telephone network would inevitably be detected and would serve as a pretext for unnecessary speculation, of which we already have more than enough.
You begin work immediately. In the next car you receive special clothing and repair service documents. The equipment is there too. Questions?
- Is there really no one else, since it was necessary... at least how they found me - this is guerrilla warfare, - Bragin mentally wondered before someone, the first to break the silence, asked how this system should affect people.