Sulom-Beck Oskanov

Sulom-Beck Oskanov (Russian: Суламбек Осканов; 1 August, 1943 - 2 July, 1992) is an Ingush Air Force Major-General. Oskanov was born in 1943 in Plievo, Chechen-Ingush ASSR into a peasant family. On 23 February 1944, together with whole Ingush and Chechen nations, he was deported to prison camps in Kazakhstan during the operation Lentil. Oskanov then returned to Chechen-Ingush ASSR, joined the air club in Grozny. In 1962 he began serving in the USSR armed forces. In 1966, he graduated with high honor from Kachinskoe air force school. He then served in Germany and became commander of Lipetsk center of military education in 1989. Oskanov was a friend of the first Chechen president Dzhokhar Dudayev, and the first Ingush president Ruslan Aushev. He was also a test pilot of MiG-29 and in 1992 while piloting a MiG-29 in difficult weather, during the flight the electronics malfunctioned. Oskanov was unable to eject and died in the crash and was later buried in Plievo, Ingushetia. He received the Hero of the Russian Federation with gold medal.

Aftermath

Russian Imperial House claims that Oskanov was "the first hero of the Russian Federation".
One of the MiG-29S received Oskanov's name.
The airport in Magas, Ingushetia is named after him.

Controversy

Many people in Ingushetia believe that Oskanov's death was staged by Yeltsin's FSK (Federalnaya Sluzhba Kontrrazvedki later known as FSB) to prevent the repeat of the sequence of events in Ingushetia that happened before in Chechnya with Dzhokhar Dudayev.

References

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