“From Oblivion to Immortality”: the heroes of the “Asian” division
August 22, 2020
2020 is a year of significant anniversaries: the 75th anniversary of the Victory and the 100th anniversary of the formation of the TASSR. Many events are dedicated to these fateful events, including the Days of Culture of the Republic of Tatarstan held in Moscow.
On August 14, at the federal memorial military cemetery in Mytishchi, a grand opening of a monument to the grave of a legendary veteran of the Great Patriotic War, General of the Army M.A. Gareev took place. In the afternoon, the public of the capital and a delegation from the Republic of Tatarstan laid flowers at the monument to the great Gabdulla Tukay. In the evening, a meeting with Tatar poets organized by Plenipotentiary of Tatarstan in Moscow at the Tatar cultural center was held. It was attended by chairman of the Writers’ Union of Tatarstan Danil Salikhov, people’s poets of the Republic of Tatarstan Ravil Fayzullin and Marsel Galiev, honored art worker of the Republic of Tatarstan Ramis Aimet, laureate of the S. Suleimanova’s awrd Shamsiya Zigangirova.
At this meeting, Romen Guzairov’s book “From Oblivion to Immortality”, published for the anniversary of the Victory, was presented, prepared for publication by the Tatar national-cultural autonomy of the Moscow region in cooperation with Headquarters of the Tatars of Moscow. The book opens with a color photo of the monument to the Soviet soldier in honor of the soldiers who fought on the most tragic, but heroic Rzhev-Vyazemsky bridgehead. On the left flank of this front, the 146th Infantry Division, formed in Kazan, was operating; the Nazis called it “Asian”, because in its ranks there were many natives of Tatarstan. This book is about the fate and deeds of the soldiers of this division – commander of the 512th regiment M. Rakhmatullin, artilleryman I. Romanov, private V. Shagiakhmetov, the division commander General S. Karapetyan and many others. The division’s glorious combat path ran from the defenses of Moscow to the capture of the Reichstag.
The peculiarity of the content of the book is that its “front part” is organically linked to such an important topic as post-war generations expanding the truth and memory of war heroes, returning missing soldiers to the ranks. The genesis and development of the search movement in Russia is described by General A.V. Kirilin is one of the founders of the Memorial OVD. The works and discoveries of the search engines of Tatarstan are discussed in the article by R.F. Yamaleeva “Gone Into Immortality”. In the chapter “When the Past Becomes Present”, a reader will find out with what inspiration the museums dedicated to the history of the 146th rifle division work in Tatar schools. The relevance of the book “From inexistence to Immortality”, referring to readers, speaks in its preface Colonel-General R.S. Akchurin and People’s Poet of Tatarstan R.G. Faizullin.
This is not the first joint publishing project of the «Headquarters of the Tatars of Moscow» and the national-cultural autonomy of the Moscow region. Three years ago, a unique book was published about the famous Tatars of the Moscow region, which included more than seven hundred people.
Romen Guzairov personally presented “From Oblivion to Immortality” to all writers and participants of the literary evening on August 14, who emphasized the importance of the topic and timeliness of publishing such a book. Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Tatarstan Akhmetshin Ravil Kalimullovich, accepting its copy, remembered the book “Tatars of the Moscow Region”, highly appreciated it and wished Romen Guzairov to write and publish a book about the Tatars of Moscow. The Tatars of Moscow made a significant and undeniable contribution to Russian history, science and art. Such a publication would clearly demonstrate that the main source of the power of our country is in its multinational wealth.
«Headquarters of the Tatars of Moscow» and the Tatar national-cultural autonomy of Moscow decided to present the book “From oblivion to immortality” to the Kazan cadet boarding school named after Hero of the Soviet Union B.K. Kuznetsov. A museum has been organized in the cadet boarding school, where the exhibits and history of this truly unique 146th rifle division are carefully preserved. It was also decided to donate copies of this book to public organizations and patriotic clubs in Kazan. Now, in the year of the 75th anniversary of the Great Victory, it is important to raise interest in studying the glorious pages of our history of the younger generations of Tatars.
