The flight of rust is a story of betrayal in the leadership of the USSR. Biography of Matthias Rust landing on Red Square
I accidentally came across a story about a brave 19-year-old German who in 1987 managed to land a plane on Red Square. The event is well-known, everyone saw the footage of the plane on the square, but few know how preparations for the flight went and how Matthias Rust managed to get to Moscow, bypassing the USSR air defense. A story worthy of a movie.
Rust's flight to Moscow in May 1987 launched a campaign to discredit the Armed Forces
When the German pilot Matthias Rust landed on Red Square in May 1987, this event caused many lay people to doubt the perfection of the domestic air defense system. Much has been written about this incident, but practically nothing has been published about the true reasons and how it all happened.
It is appropriate to note here some of the events that preceded this flight.
At the end of August 1983, air defense forces in the Far East near Moneron Island destroyed a South Korean Boeing 747, which violated our airspace to a depth of 500 km. The plane did not keep in touch with the ground and did not respond to the actions of fighters near the cockpit. In addition, the plane’s course crossed areas of airspace that were closed even to the flights of its own aircraft.
Counteraction to the flight of the aircraft took place in compliance with the provisions of combat documents and in strict accordance with international rules. (Note that this is not the first incident involving the shooting down of a South Korean plane.)
The press and television, especially foreign ones, opened a discussion, and sometimes just hysteria, about the legality of the actions of the air defense forces to stop this flight. Since 1985, the winds of democratic change have further fanned this topic. However, the Ministry of Defense did not make specific proposals for adjusting combat documents.
POSTCARDS WITH VIEWS OF TEMPLES
And so, on May 28 at 14.00 on the Helsinki-Moscow air route at an altitude of 600 m, an air defense unit on duty in the area of the Estonian town of Kohtla-Jarve detects a small aircraft without the identification signal “I am one of mine”, which is not in the application as allowed to enter Soviet airspace Union. This is how events developed to stop the illegal entry into the airspace of the USSR of an aircraft of unknown nationality, unknown type and for unknown purposes.
In general, the situation was reminiscent of the Far Eastern version with the South Korean Boeing, but one cannot discount the fact that the “Moneron syndrome” was still in force, and all this happened on one of the busiest air routes, practically in the center of Europe.
Only later, the materials of a thorough investigation will confirm that the technical complex of means along the entire route of Rust’s flight, which was about 1130 km, worked flawlessly, and this small airplane was observed almost along the entire route. And only the human factor and a series of incredible but tragic coincidences ultimately led to the failure of the air defense forces on duty to carry out the combat mission, to serious personnel changes in the USSR Ministry of Defense and the beginning of the reorganization of the air defense system.
To the question “Did 19-year-old German citizen Matthias Rust end up in Moscow by chance?” You can answer unequivocally: “No, not at all by chance.”
From the case materials, it turned out that the young but capable pilot was fond of flying at maximum range on his favorite, as he said, Cessna-172 aircraft. In 1986 alone, he flew several times to Shetland and the Faroe Islands. Flying over the ocean out of sight of land is not considered simple. Rust had considerable experience in instrument navigation. During 1986, he carefully studied on a map the area over which he was to fly a year later, collecting postcards with views of churches and temples in the area as landmarks. In May 1987, Rust decided that he was ready for the planned flight.
He took off from Helsinki Airport at 13.30 Moscow time. The flight plan included Stockholm, which is only two hours on a Cessna 172. After 20 minutes, Matthias Rust contacted the dispatcher, reported that everything was fine on board and said goodbye. After this, he turned off all means of communication, except for the receiver of the on-board radio compass, and sent the plane into the Gulf of Finland with a decrease in altitude to 200 m, after which it turned 180 degrees and headed to a point that had been determined in advance and was located exactly on the route connecting Helsinki and Moscow. Finnish air traffic control authorities recorded a change in the flight level of Matthias Rust's plane and a deviation from the established route. Since this posed a threat to flight safety in the area, the controller requested (by radio) Rust's aircraft. Attempts to contact the pilot were unsuccessful.
Soon, Rust’s plane disappeared from all radar screens of the surveillance system 40 km from the coastline over the waters of the Gulf of Finland. Within 30 minutes, a search helicopter and two patrol boats were sent to the area where the plane was supposed to crash, and some objects and a small oil slick were discovered. Presumably, the conclusion was drawn that the plane fell into the water and additional forces and resources were needed to reliably verify this (a few months later, the Finnish rescue service would issue Rust an invoice of 120 thousand US dollars for carrying out search and rescue work on the spot supposed disaster).
Pyct, meanwhile, carried out his plan to reach the city of Moscow. The weather at this moment was cloudy, with clearings, with the lower edge of the clouds 400-600 m, the wind was west, and drizzling rain fell from time to time.
For about an hour of flight, Rust strictly followed the course of the radio beacon, the navigation station of which was located in the Helsinki area. Further, the entire flight was carried out according to the readings of the magnetic compass and visual comparisons of objects that were previously plotted on the map. The main landmarks are Lake Peipsi, Lake Ilmen, Lake Seliger, and the Rzhev-Moscow railway. With such extensive landmarks, it is simply difficult to get lost.
TURN
So, information about the detection of an unknown aircraft arrived at the automated command post of the unit at 14.10. Negotiations with civilian dispatchers took place for about 15 minutes under the conditions of “moneron syndrome”; what could it be? By this time the plane was already near the coastline. Three on-duty anti-aircraft missile divisions were put on combat readiness, they observed the target, but did not receive commands to destroy, everyone was waiting for the decision of the commander of the Air Defense Army, Major General Kromin.
When it became clear that this was not the requested aircraft, all army units were put on alert #1 and a pair of fighters on duty were scrambled from Tapa airfield to identify the object.
At 14.29, the pilot, Senior Lieutenant Puchnin, reported that in a break in the clouds he observed a white sports aircraft, like the Yak-12, with a dark stripe along the fuselage. This was already in the area of the city of Gdov.
The decrease took place at the junction of the detection zones of two radar units, and for a period of up to 1 minute Rust was not observed on the radars. However, the flight path in the automated system remained stable.
At 14.31 the object was detected, but with a heading of 90 degrees instead of 130. It was now moving along the Gdov-Malaya Vishera highway. It was decided that the same object had been discovered. From the army command post, instructions were given to clarify the parameters of the object and a command was issued to scramble another couple of fighters on duty to identify it. The fighters returned empty-handed. According to the pilots' reports, they found nothing on their onboard radars. However, the mark was steadily observed by all ground units. Changes in movement parameters were noted: speed within 80-85 km/h (instead of 180-210 km/h), altitude 1000 m (instead of 600 m).
Professionals know that in spring and summer, under certain climatic conditions, stable vortex currents arise in the atmosphere, which move with wind currents, exist for quite a long time and on radar screens it is very difficult to distinguish them from a small aircraft. In such cases, great experience and skill are needed. At this moment, apparently, he was not enough to make the right decision. The calculation was obliged to note that within a minute the height of the object almost doubled, and the speed decreased almost three times.
At 15.00 Rust’s plane was already in the Pskov area. The weather improved, the rain stopped, and Rust again took the altitude of 600 m as the most economical for this type of aircraft and continued the flight.
In the same area, training flights of one of the aviation regiments were taking place. There were from 7 to 12 aircraft in the air in different zones. Some took off, others landed, so their number was constantly changing.
RUST IS LEGALIZED
At 15.00, in accordance with the schedule, the code number of the state identification system was changed. All ground and air assets and systems had to carry out this operation simultaneously.
This did not happen immediately with fighters. Being carried away by the technique of piloting, not all young pilots switched the necessary switch in time, and immediately they became “strangers” to the air defense system. The commander of the radio engineering unit, knowing the situation with the unidentified aircraft, orders the operational duty officer of the system in which the fighters were located to forcibly assign the sign “I am one of my own.”
“Otherwise we can shoot down our own,” he explains his position to the young officer. He, in turn, explains that this contradicts the instructions and documents. An officer of a higher command post removes an intractable senior lieutenant from duty and replaces him with a young lieutenant who, without understanding the military situation, carried out the order, assigning the attribute “I am one of my own” to all fighters in the air, including Matthias Rust’s plane.
By 16.00, already legalized, Pyct flies over Lake Seliger and falls into the area of responsibility of another unit.
The system's tracking tools again confirmed that an aircraft was detected without the "I am mine" signal. Analysis of the situation again. The duty pair of fighters rises again. In low cloud conditions, the commanders did not dare to lower the fighters to an altitude below 600 m, breaking through the clouds from top to bottom. It was too dangerous. Thus, Rust's plane was not visually detected.
The day before Rust’s flight, one of the Air Force planes crashed 40 km west of the city of Torzhok; a search and rescue group was working here. One of the helicopters that day and hour served as a communications relay, patrolling in the area. The decision was made that the plane without the “I am mine” signal was the application helicopter, which was in the search and rescue zone. Twice legalized Rust continued his flight to Moscow. There were less than two hours left before landing.
Without accurately understanding the unidentified target, General Kromin reported it to the command post of the Moscow Air Defense District and the Central Command Post (TsKP) of the Air Defense Forces as a simple violator of the flight regime, that is, a Soviet light aircraft that had taken off without a request.
The operational duty officer of the Central Command Command, Major General Melnikov, not having a complete description of the aircraft violating the flight regime, did not report it to the Commander-in-Chief of the Air Defense Forces, Chief Marshal of Aviation Koldunov, who was at his workplace at that time. The First Deputy Chief of the General Staff, Lieutenant General Timokhin, who remained in charge of the Chief of Staff, did not respond to the report of the operational duty officer. Hoping that the Moscow District would deal with the intruder aircraft themselves, General Melnikov gave the command to remove this target from the alert at the Central Command Control Center.
At the district command post at that time, intense combat work was underway on control targets, which was led by the first deputy commander of the district troops, Lieutenant General Brazhnikov. He did not attach any importance to the information about “a simple violator of flight regulations.”
ACCORDING TO THE LAW
Now let us turn to the legislative or legal basis for the actions of air defense forces on duty. USSR Law on the State Border of the USSR of November 1982. Article 36 stated: “Air defense troops, while protecting the State Border of the USSR... in cases where stopping a violation or detaining violators cannot be accomplished by other means, use weapons and military equipment ".
10 months will pass, and in accordance with this Law, on September 1, 1983, a South Korean Boeing that intruded into the country's airspace will be shot down. The fact of his downing will be hidden for some time behind the words “observation of him was lost.” And only a week later, in the Statement of the Soviet Government, it will be reported that “the interceptor fighter carried out the order of the command post in full accordance with the Law...”
The law was, however, by order of the USSR Minister of Defense, by which it was put into effect, it was allowed to open fire only on military aircraft of capitalist countries. And that's not always the case. As a result, having reached units and subunits, the order “grew” to a special instruction of... 20 pages. And according to this document, whoever made the decision to use or not use fire could go to prison.
If we add to this the Chicago Convention, according to which lethal fire on civil aviation intruders is prohibited, then one can imagine the position of all those who led the air defense forces on duty on that ill-fated day.
GOAL - RED SQUARE
Meanwhile, at 18.30 Matthias Rust had already approached the outskirts of Moscow, crossed Khodynka and headed straight to the Kremlin. The weather in Moscow was spring-like, warm, windless and partly cloudy.
Pust's plans included landing the plane directly in the Kremlin. But, having convinced himself from a height of 60 m that there is no suitable site there, he decides to land on Red Square, the size of which allowed him to do this.
With a left turn and descent, Rust comes in for landing between the Kremlin's Spasskaya Tower and St. Basil's Cathedral. However, this could not be done due to the many people in the square. He makes a second attempt, sharply gaining altitude and turning around the Rossiya Hotel. Also descending, turning on the navigation lights and shaking his wings, Rust hoped that passers-by would understand his intentions and clear the diagonal of the area for landing. However, this did not happen.
Having made another U-turn over the Rossiya Hotel, Rust nevertheless managed to use the stopwatch to detect the operating mode of the traffic light on the Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge. Having begun the descent over Bolshaya Ordynka Street, Rust very accurately calculated the descent trajectory of his aircraft. And, as soon as the traffic light at the beginning of the bridge turned red, the plane, almost touching the chassis of the roofs of the cars, touched the bridge covering with its wheels. This distance was enough to slow down, taxi to the cathedral and turn off the engine. The clock on the Kremlin's Spasskaya Tower showed 19 hours 10 minutes, but it was far from evening.
DEBRIEF
Rust's flight gave rise to heavy accusations not only against the Air Defense Forces, but also against the Armed Forces. On May 30, a meeting of the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee was held, which ended with the dismissal of the Minister of Defense, Marshal of the Soviet Union Sergei Sokolov, and the Commander-in-Chief of the Air Defense Forces, Chief Marshal of Aviation Alexander Koldunov.
By June 10, 34 officers and generals were brought to justice in the Air Defense Forces. The flywheel of punishment continued to spin. Many were removed from their positions, expelled from the CPSU, dismissed from the Armed Forces, and put on trial. The prestige of the Armed Forces was dealt a blow. In fact, the entire leadership of the Ministry of Defense, up to and including the commanders of military districts, was replaced. It seemed that there were some circles in the country interested in undermining the people’s trust in their Armed Forces. This was evidenced by the reluctance to understand that the country's air defense system was created to combat not any means capable of flying into our airspace, but primarily to repel attacks from air and space by combat aircraft, cruise missiles and other unmanned aerial vehicles that pose a danger to objects of the country that no air defense of any state in peacetime can resist air hooligans deliberately violating airspace, especially on sports-type aircraft at low and extremely low altitudes. Such a task is beyond the capabilities of the state from an economic point of view, and even more so for a country with a border length of more than 60 thousand km.
A BLOW TO PRESTIGE
In this case, Rust’s flight to Moscow was clearly provocative. The flight was planned in advance, as evidenced by the choice of an experienced pilot, his program of purposeful training on instruments for maximum range, and a thorough study of the features of the upcoming route over the territory of the USSR.
One can only guess who was behind this provocation. The calculation of striking a blow to the prestige of the USSR Armed Forces and their leadership, at the center of which were the Air Defense Forces, was accurate. And yet, the power structures, starting with the Politburo, created a national level of excitement around the problem of the Rust flight. Thus, his people were confused and the prestige of the Armed Forces was undermined.
It turns out that our potential enemy inflicted a serious defeat on the defense capability of the USSR through the hands of the “own” Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee. Rust marked the beginning of a decline in the prestige of service in the Armed Forces, which continues to this day. There was no need to even dream of anything better.
The West relished Rust's flight to Moscow. The Stern magazine praised his “feat” of breaking through the strongest air defense system of one hundred surface-to-air missile launch complexes, 6 air regiments with 240 interceptor fighters, etc. The article reported that after 48 hours, Air Defense Commander-in-Chief Alexander Koldunov, who shot down 46 German planes in World War II, lost his post, and that the incident with Rust gave Mikhail Gorbachev a reason to remove 75-year-old Marshal Sergei Sokolov from his post as Minister of Defense...
It was also noted that on May 1, on the podium of the Mausoleum there were only five military men instead of fifteen. The calculation of Rust's adventurous flight was confirmed. We knew how to deal with our own.
On August 4, Rust, who was sentenced to four years in prison, was pardoned. In an interview with an Izvestia correspondent, Andreev, a member of the board of the USSR Prosecutor's Office, in every way belittled the severity of the criminal's guilt, reducing Rust's "leprosy" to malicious hooliganism, painted a picture of the favorable conditions in which Rust was kept in the colony. But our commanders were punished with all the unjustified cruelty for this case. No one even thought of rehabilitating them.
It is worth recalling here how similar cases were dealt with in other countries. On September 12, 1954, a Cessna aircraft landed at the White House in Washington, next to the presidential residence. The plane crashed after colliding with a tree near a building. The pilot died.
Soon after landing, Rusta made unauthorized flights over Paris for several nights in a row, a light aircraft, diverting known forces and means to prevent flights.
But neither in the USA nor in France were defense ministers fired for these flights, much less the honor of all armed forces. They treated it more sensibly there. First of all, we strengthened the radar service, urgently introduced more advanced technical means into combat formation, and speeded up the flow of operational information.
Rust's landing in Moscow at one time turned into a great tragedy for the Air Defense Forces in conditions when air defense fully met the requirements of the time. Now let’s try to imagine a similar flight in our time, when the air defense system in relation to its main assets has been significantly weakened due to the implementation of the so-called. the principle of "reasonable sufficiency". Today, such a “Rust” can fly unhindered almost anywhere and at any time. There's a lot to think about.
At the controls of the plane that landed on Red Square in 1987 was 18-year-old German Matthias Rust. A joke immediately appeared that there was now a Sheremetyevo-3 airport in the center of Moscow. The Soviet generals had no time for jokes - many lost their posts, including the Minister of Defense.
Matthias Rust himself, who has since served time both in the USSR and at home, recently in an interview with Stern magazine called that flight irresponsible and added that he would definitely not repeat it now. However, he won’t be able to. The skies of Europe are still closed to him, although history itself is not closed even 25 years later.
Matthias Rust prefers to control the situation. He recently returned from Latin America. There I passed as a pilot again. Flew. In Europe, Rust has not been allowed to fly an airplane for 25 years.
“I sometimes dream about that flight, usually during the day, when I take a nap after lunch. And even if I have a little free time, the memories come up on their own,” says Matthias Rust.
Rust sat down on the Bolshoi Moskvoretsky Bridge. Then he drove to Vasilievsky Spusk, willingly signed autographs, spoke, and brought a letter of peace to Gorbachev. They even brought him bread and salt. And it seemed that the Iron Curtain was just a smoke screen, because everything was so simple.
“The flight maps were available. The KGB still didn’t want to believe me that I simply ordered them, like any other road atlases. Then they themselves ordered the same maps through the Soviet embassy then in Bonn and were very surprised when they received them "- recalls Matthias Rust.
Here is the route of an 18-year-old pilot who had flown only 50 hours at that time: a long flight from Germany over the sea to the Faroe Islands, followed by Iceland (Reykjavik), Norway (Bergen), Finland (Helsinki), and then almost at random to Moscow. He navigated by railroad. This part of the route is full of the most amazing coincidences. Rust's plane flew into the rescue operation area. The bomber crashed. Many helicopters in the air. Rust's Cessna is mistaken for a light-engine Soviet aircraft. Then he is once again assigned the code “I am mine.” At the same time, Rust was discovered immediately after he crossed the state border and could have been shot down, including on the approach to Moscow.
“We have the S-300 system, it takes the target at 100 meters. And if I launch three missiles at this lousy airplane and they explode at an altitude of 50-100 meters, and there is a kindergarten below, what will I do then? It was a provocation planned 100% advantageously,” says the commander of the Moscow Air Defense District troops in 1987-1989. Vladimir Tsarkov.
Tsarkov claims: Rust’s flight is an operation of Western intelligence services. And the border violator himself is a well-trained pilot, and he had already visited Moscow beforehand. Rust says: he sat down at random.
“Without visiting the site, it is impossible to land in such difficult conditions. What if there is a cable passing over the road, this is unknown,” notes Michael Hanke, instructor at the Pegasus pilot school.
And although pilots of the same planes in Germany still sometimes jokingly say: “Well, let’s go to Moscow,” they all understand that now such an adventure would be impossible.
In fact, Matthias Rust’s flight had virtually no impact on the development of small aviation in Europe. The terrorist attacks of September 11 had an impact. After them, a special device is installed on any aircraft, which transmits the individual identification number of the aircraft to ground services. That is, on the radar it is no longer just a dot, but a dot with its own unique number, that is, for example, this plane cannot be confused with any other in the air.
A Soviet court sentenced Matthias Rust to 4 years in prison. He served a little more than 14 months in a model colony. After his release, his fate was not easy. He returned to Germany, but even after that he broke the law. First, an attack on a woman with a knife. It's time again. Then stealing a sweater from a department store. He explains that he was barely making ends meet.
“Everything turned out this way because it had to happen. It’s just my destiny,” says Matthias Rust.
The plane in which Rust made the historic flight is exhibited in Berlin at the Technical Museum. Here it is one of the symbols of the end of the Cold War. However, his wings are still decorated with signs resembling a bomb. There are still too many questions in this story today. The case materials of the pilot Rust are still classified.
On August 3, 1988, an unusual prisoner was released early from a Soviet prison. It was Germanic amateur pilot Matthias Rust, who a year earlier became famous throughout the world for landed the plane on Red Square. Then this event caused a lot of noise: how did a 19-year-old guy manage to discredit the Soviet air defense system, why did he need to commit this crazy act, and what punishment did the brave man suffer?
One day, 18-year-old Matthias Rust was watching TV; the news was talking about how negotiations between the American and Soviet governments in Reykjavik had reached a dead end. The young man decided that he should help the USSR and the West improve relations. At least, this is how he explained his motives at trial: “I thought I could use the plane to build an imaginary bridge between the West and the East, to show how many people in Europe want to improve relations with the USSR.”
At that time, Matthias Rust had the right to fly the plane, and he had already spent about 50 hours in the air. On May 13, 1987, he informed his parents that he intended to travel by plane to Northern Europe in order to fly the required number of hours to obtain his professional pilot's license. On May 25, Mathias arrived in Helsinki; on May 28, he told dispatchers that he was heading to Stockholm. But Rust was moving in the wrong direction, and later disappeared from radar altogether.
A search and rescue operation immediately began in the area of the Finnish coast. A large oil slick was noticed on the surface of the sea, and it was then assumed that the plane had crashed. While they were searching for the pilot at sea, he crossed the Soviet border over Estonia. Of course, the radars immediately detected him, and soon a MiG fighter was next to him. He accompanied him for some time, but no order for further action was received, and the MiG soon disappeared.
The fact is that in 1984, the Soviet military shot down a South Korean passenger plane, which violated USSR airspace. As a result, people died, and after that it was prohibited to shoot at civilian and sport aircraft. When Matias was flying in the Pskov area, the local air regiment was conducting training flights. Some planes were taking off, others were landing. At 15:00, all pilots were supposed to change code at the same time, but due to inexperience, many did not do this. Due to the confusion that arose, all aircraft were assigned the “me-us” attribute, including Rust’s plane, which was among them. When he flew over Torzhok, rescue work was carried out there after a plane crash, and Rust’s plane was mistaken for a Soviet search helicopter.
On the evening of May 28, a German Cessna plane landed on the Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge and drove to St. Basil's Cathedral. The pilot climbed out of the cockpit and began signing autographs to surprised passers-by and tourists. He was arrested a few minutes later. The next morning, all the newspapers reported a sensation: “The country is in shock! The German sports pilot dishonored the huge defense arsenal of the USSR on Border Guard Day.”
There were several versions about the reasons for Mathias’s action: he was trying to win a bet, he wanted to impress his girlfriend, he was carrying out an assignment from foreign intelligence services, he made a spectacular marketing move in support of his father’s business - he was selling Cessna airplanes in Western Europe, and the news that this - the only aircraft that defeated the Soviet air defense system could help revive demand.
Matthias Rust was arrested and tried for hooliganism and illegal border crossing. He was sentenced to 4 years in prison, but a year later he was released early. The head of the air defense forces, the minister of defense and about 300 officers lost their positions. And people began to call Red Square “Sheremetyevo-3” and write jokes on this topic.
Upon returning home, Rust was deprived of his piloting rights as a “mentally unbalanced” person. Soon he ended up behind bars again: while working as a nurse in a hospital, he rushed with a knife at a nurse who refused his advances. In 2001, he was tried again - this time for stealing a pullover. Apparently, he really couldn’t be called mentally stable.
Rust’s “peace mission” is still questioned: there are too many inconsistencies and large-scale consequences: after that, mass purges were carried out in the Soviet army - as if they were waiting for the right occasion. Therefore, many call Rust’s flight a carefully planned provocation, of which there were many during that period:
On May 28, Border Guard Day was celebrated in the Soviet Union. In 1987, this holiday for the Soviet border guards turned out to be hopelessly ruined - a foreign plane landed in the center of Moscow, near St. Basil's Cathedral.
Light-engine aircraft "Cessna-172", piloted by an 18-year-old German Matthias Rust, had a huge influence on the history of the Soviet Union.
The landing on Red Square became the reason for the resignation of Defense Minister Sergei Sokolov and the Air Defense Commander-in-Chief Alexandra Koldunova, who were opponents of the policy Mikhail Gorbachev, as well as for a large-scale “purge” in the ranks of the Soviet military, which, according to foreign experts, was comparable only to the “purge” of the “Great Terror” of the late 1930s.
Even 28 years later, there is no consensus on whether Rust’s flight was the escapade of a lone youth or a carefully thought-out operation by the special services.
Rust himself insisted years later that this was a mission for peace. Inspired by the warming relations between West and East, the young man decided to build an “air bridge”, flying to Moscow and landing in the very center of the Land of the Soviets.
Lost over the Baltic
Rust received his pilot's license in 1986 at the Hamburg Aero Club. At the same flying club in May 1987, the German rented a Cessna 172 and also received detailed maps necessary for the flight. According to Rust, he did not inform anyone about his true intentions.
Starting on May 13 from the airport in Itersen, Rust reached Iceland on May 15 through the Shetland Islands and the Faroe Islands. On May 22, the German flew to Bergen, Norway, and from there, on May 25, to Helsinki, Finland.
In the capital of Finland, he finally decided to fly to Moscow.
On the morning of May 28, having refueled the Cessna, Rust took off from the airfield, declaring Stockholm as the target. Airfield staff noticed that the Cessna was not only filled to capacity, but additional fuel tanks were also installed in the cabin. The flight to Stockholm clearly did not require such an amount of fuel. Nevertheless, Rust was allowed to fly out.
The Cessna took off at 12:21, and twenty minutes later the plane left the airport control area. Rust stopped communicating with air traffic control, turned towards the Baltic Sea coastline and disappeared from Finnish airspace near Sipoo at approximately 13:00.
Finnish dispatchers regarded the disappearance of the Cessna as a possible accident, alerting the rescue services.
The Cessna was driven from the very border
Rescuers found an oily spot in the sea, which led to the conclusion that a disaster had occurred. It is not clear to this day where the stain came from. Subsequently, when it became known where Rust’s plane actually flew, the Finns billed him $100,000 for the work of the rescuers. However, when there was a big fuss around the flight in the world, the lawsuit was withdrawn.
Matthias Rust's Cessna at that moment crossed the Soviet border near the city of Kohtla-Jarve and headed for Moscow. The pilot was guided by a magnetic compass and pre-designated objects - Lake Peipsi, Lake Ilmen, Lake Seliger, the Rzhev - Moscow railway line.
Immediately after Rust’s flight, a persistent myth appeared that the military, celebrating Border Guard Day, “missed” the intruder plane, as they say. Actually this is not true.
At 14:10, the Cessna was detected by radio equipment of the air defense units. Three anti-aircraft missile battalions were put on alert, but they did not receive orders to destroy them.
Later, Rust’s plane was also visually detected in the area of the city of Gdov by Soviet fighters, who identified it as a “Yak-12 type sports aircraft.”
The Cessna was flying at low altitude and low speed, and the fighters were unable to accompany the light aircraft. Therefore, after flying around the intruder, they returned to base.
It’s impossible to shoot down, it’s impossible to plant
The picture of the helplessness of the Soviet military in front of Matthias Rust, firmly entrenched in many minds, is completely incorrect. Indeed, the air defense system is built with an eye toward much more serious and dangerous targets than a light aircraft.
Nevertheless, the Cessna was spotted and could have been destroyed. However, no orders for such actions were received from Moscow.
First of all, because the USSR was dominated by the story of the destruction of a South Korean passenger Boeing on September 1, 1983. And although in that story, by and large, there was no fault on the Soviet side, the Kremlin under no circumstances wanted a repetition of such an incident.
In addition, the pilots’ report confirmed that we were talking about a light-engine civil aircraft, and the Soviet military had no right to shoot down civilian aircraft. Actually, the same was the case with the South Korean Boeing, since it was mistakenly identified as an American reconnaissance aircraft.
The Convention on International Aviation, also known as the Chicago Convention, requires that when light sport aircraft violate the airspace of countries, they should not be shot down, but forced to land. It was not possible to land Rust with the help of combat fighters for the reasons described above, and the military did not quickly find another way.
Bridge named after Rust
Thus, the Cessna flew safely to Moscow at 18:30. As Rust himself said, he wanted to sit in the Kremlin or on Red Square, since he simply did not know any other places in Moscow. But there were no conditions for landing in the Kremlin, and there were many people on Red Square.
As a result, the pilot, coming from the direction of Bolshaya Ordynka, boarded the Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge, which can rightfully be called the Rustov Bridge from then on, and coasted to St. Basil's Cathedral.
Curious people gathered around the plane. Rust got out of the cabin and began to communicate with people. Among the Muscovites and guests of the capital, there was a schoolboy with excellent knowledge of a foreign language, who served as a translator. They began to take autographs from the German pilot.
Surprisingly, in the first minutes there were no intelligence officers among those who surrounded Rust. Only the policeman on duty inquired whether the pilot had a visa and, having learned that he did not have one, left the German alone.
While Matthias Rust was telling Muscovites about his desire to talk with Gorbachev, the military appeared and surrounded the plane, but did not take any harsh action. Only at about 20:00 three people in civilian clothes invited Rust to come in to give an explanation.
Later, the pilot said that he was interrogated somewhere near Red Square. This is not surprising - Muscovites know that the complex of buildings of the State Security Committee is located within walking distance from the Kremlin.
Lefortovo hospitality
We talked to Rust politely, asking who organized the flight and what his goals were. The German insisted - he is for peace and friendship, he flew in to express his support for Gorbachev.
He really supported Gorbachev - thanks to his flight, the Soviet leader dealt a powerful blow to the positions of the military, who were critical of his policies.
But Gorbachev did not want to meet with Rust. The German’s hopes that he would be scolded and released were also not justified. He was charged with hooliganism, violating aviation laws and illegally crossing the border. On September 4, 1987, Matthias Rust was sentenced to 4 years in prison.
In fact, Rust spent only 432 days in the Lefortovo detention center. Although they treated him correctly, the German was in a depressed state. And in vain - the Soviet prison looked like a much more pleasant alternative than a surface-to-air missile, which could well have “visited” Rust during the flight.
In the summer of 1988, the famous head of the USSR Foreign Ministry, and at that time the chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Andrei Gromyko, signed a decree amnestying Rust. On August 3, 1988, the pilot returned to Germany, where for some time he became a very popular person.
An open meeting of the judicial panel for criminal cases of the Supreme Court of the USSR in the case of German citizen Matthias Rust, a 19-year-old amateur pilot who is accused of violating the rules of international flights and malicious hooliganism. Photo: RIA Novosti / Yuri Abramochkin
"It was an irresponsible act"
However, this did not last too long. Rust was remembered again in the fall of 1989, when he was put on trial in Germany. He served in alternative service in a hospital, where he stabbed a nurse who did not share his love feelings. In 1991, a German court sentenced Matthias Rust to 4 years - that is, to the same term as the Soviet court had previously sentenced. As in the USSR, in Germany they showed leniency towards him, releasing him after 15 months of imprisonment.
Rust then traveled the world, married an Indian woman, converted to Hinduism, became disillusioned with both his wife and religion, returned home, where he again found himself on trial - in 2001, he was caught stealing a sweater from a department store.
It seems that the memories of the flight to Moscow became the main thing in his life. He willingly meets with journalists, talking about him; for his 25th anniversary in 2012, he even released memoirs.
Then, in 2012, Stern magazine published the opinion of 44-year-old Matthias Rust about his act committed in May 1987: “Now I look at what happened completely differently. I certainly would not repeat this and would call my plans at that time unrealizable. It was an irresponsible act."
