Today marks 10 years since the creation of the «Vostok» battalion, which later became a brigade. As I look at this video of the brigade’s first appearance at the Victory Day parade on May 9, 2014, I recall myself in May of that year. And, suddenly, I wonder: had Russell, who was still in America at that time, seen these shots? For some reason, I had never asked him precisely that. Considering how closely he had watched the events unfold from the very beginning of the so-called Maidan and had acutely experienced the massacre of people in Odessa, I think that he did see them. Did he think then, in America, that he would come here and become part of «Vostok»? I know that, even then, he had wanted to join those militiamen he saw in interviews, whose courage and selflessness he had admired. It was because he saw real Warriors standing up in defense of their land, disagreeing with the coup in Kiev. Russell told me about this many times. In December of 2014, he became one of them by purchasing a one-way ticket. Having arrived in Donetsk on December 7, 2014, to protect the innocent people of Donbass, he knew that he would never return back to the United States.

Every year, on this day, Russell always congratulated all of the fighters of “Vostok”, led by Alexander Khodakovsky. Therefore, today, I, Lyudmila Bentley, am doing this on his behalf, in memory of all the Heroes of “Vostok”, those living and those who had sacrificed themselves for their comrades. And Russell is one of them, because his death was also sacrificial...

Today is a truly great holiday for all of us - Victory Day! But I can't think about anything but my innocently murdered husband. Therefore, this holiday for me passed, as the song goes, with tears in my eyes.... I remembered a very joyful, light and powerful in energy video from May 9, 2016, when Russell and the information center “The essence of time” filmed the Victory Parade and the procession of Donetsk citizens in the “Immortal Regiment” along the main street of Donetsk, where we were all solemnly welcomed by the First Head of the Donetsk People's Republic Alexander Vladimirovich Zakharchenko. I carried a portrait of my grandfather, Nikolai Yarmolovich, my mother's father, a front-line soldier who had a Nazi bullet in his body for the rest of his life.
Here is the video. It was deleted by YouTube, but, thank God, it survived in the archive.

Сегодня поистине великий праздник для всех нас - День Победы! Но я не могу ни о чём думать, кроме как о моём невинно убиенном муже. Поэтому этот праздник для меня прошёл, как поётся в песне, со слезами на глазах... Вспомнила очень радостное, светлое и мощное по энергетике видео от 9 мая 2016 года, когда Рассел и информационный центр "Суть времени" снимали Парад Победы и шествие дончан в "Бессмертном полку" по главной улице Донецка, где нас всех тогда торжественно приветствовал Первый глава Донецкой Народной Республики Александр Владимирович Захарченко. Я несла портрет своего дедушки, Николая Ярмолович, отца моей мамы, фронтовика, носившего вражескую пулю в своем теле до конца своей жизни.
Вот это видео. Оно было удалено Ютубом, но, слава Богу, сохранилось в архиве.

Сердечно благодарю Николая и Алёну Пивоваровых за приглашение присоединиться к ним сегодня в автопробеге с посещением знаковых для всех дончан мест в праздник Великой Победы!
Мы, свято хранящие память о подвиге старшего поколения, возложили цветы к мемориалу "Танк" (могила гвардии полковника Франца Андреевича Гринкевича, командира танкового подразделения, смертельно раненого в 1943 году при освобождении Донецка от фашистов) и к мемориалу "Твоим освободителям, Донбасс " в парке имени Ленинского Комсомола, а также посетили мемориал "Шурф шахты 4/4 бис", где захоронено 75 тысяч человек, уничтоженных насильниками Гитлера (такое забывать нельзя).
Выражаем нашу солидарность с бойцами на передовой, противостоящим недобитым бандеровцам.
Слава бойцам, которые сегодня вновь, как и в те далёкие дни, отвоёвывают для людей право жить в добром и справедливом мире!

I cordially thank Nikolay and Alyona Pivovarovs for the invitation to join them today in the rally with a visit to the places significant for all Don citizens on the holiday of the Great Victory!
We, who hold sacred the memory of the heroic deeds of the older generation, laid flowers at the memorial “Tank” (the grave of Guards Colonel Frants Andreevich Grinkevich, commander of a tank unit, mortally wounded in 1943 during the liberation of Donetsk from fascists) and to the memorial “To Your Liberators, Donbass” in the park named after Leninsky Komsomol, and also visited the memorial “Shurf of the mine 4/4 bis”, where 75 thousand people who were destroyed by Hitler's rapists are buried (it is impossible to forget such things).
We express our solidarity with the fighters on the front line, opposing the unkilled Banderites.
Glory to the fighters, who today again, as in those distant days, win back for people the right to live in a good and just world!
https://vk.com/nikolaipivovarov?w=wall8164718_20986