“I want to become a military man. I want to work in a military unit as a commander. I like military life. I want to be like my father ․․․ »
This is how Garnik Malkhasyan started the list of dreams in his composition during his school years.
Garnink
“My Garnik has been very exemplary in everything: at school, in military service, in peacekeeping troops. He studied excellently at school, then entered the University of Economics. His father was a military man for 23 years, we even lived in a military unit, from there his love for military work arose. He wanted to be admitted to Vazgen Sargsyan military college from the very beginning, my husband did not let him, he said, ‘the military bread is very bitter, do not go’. At that moment we were able to persuade, but then we could not. He graduated from the management department, but, nevertheless, chose the military path and from 2019 he served in the peacekeeping troops.
My husband participated in the first [Karabakh] war. Garnik was 10 months old when the war started. The war of that time was different; this one is completely different. Once, when he was 3 years old, my husband put the tanker’s hat on his head, put a tanker’s hat tank on his head and took him to battle. He was very excited about it and said everywhere, ‘I took part in a battle with my father’.
Since September 27
Garnik was supposed to be on vacation for a month from September 28, but the war started, and on the morning of the 27th he was called back to work with “alarm”. We were in Kapan when we learned it was a war. By the time we got home, he had already left and I had never seen Garnik anymore.
The last time I talked to him was on the 29th. He said that everything was normal, that they were in Vardenis. I did not know that he was in Karvachar until he died.
He was already injured in the afternoon of September 30. My husband and my other son were 1 km away from him, they wanted to join their troops, they said, ‘wait for the shift to come down, you will go up with the next shift’. The shift came down, and Garnik was not in it. He was injured in the shoulder, and when a shrapnel tore his lungs, he started bleeding internally. The army gave a lot of casualties that day. He was wounded, but did not come down from his position. He fought until his last breath.
Garniks received two of his medals for good service in the army. Then he received the “Best Fighter” medal. And the last medal – for “Combat Service”, he received posthumously.
We (the family)
He was married and has a wonderful wife. May be, God wanted his intelligent wife to be by my side after him. He has two children, but he did not see the second one: his wife was 4 months pregnant when Garnik died. But he was very happy that he was going to have another son, he said, “brother needs a brother.” After Garnik, there is only emptiness left, only his two children fill our lives, we live for them.”
Ani Torosyan