'I always thought that war was black and white. But it is colour.'

Arkady Babchenko was still a naïve 18-year-old when he and his fellow teenage conscripts arrived in a transit camp just north of Chechnya. Fresh off the truck, the new recruit rapidly learned the meaning of savagery and fear, before he'd even been near the front line. By the time he started his active duty, he had developed a tough skin against the harsh treatments meted out by his seniors and grew hardened and cynical.