Zinky Boys

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Zinky Boys (Russian: Цинковые мальчики, romanized: Tsinkovye malchiki), also translated as Boys in Zinc is a 1989 documentary book by Belarusian writer Svetlana Alexievich about the Soviet–Afghan War. The title refers to zinc-plated coffins in which the fallen soldiers were transported home to the Soviet Union as "cargo 200". The book collected anonymous memoirs of soldiers and relatives. The book followed the method she employed in her two previous documentary books on war, War's Unwomanly Face and Last Witnesses. Although the author corrected the language of the interviewees, she avoids any commentary. German literary critic Dietmar Jacobsen writes: "The result is shocking. The reader accompanies people full of enthusiasm and a willingness to sacrifice themselves into a war that brutalizes them to the extreme. Young men who love their parents and grow up with books, pictures and music become killing machines whose idealism is not long enough to cope with the bloody reality. While official propaganda at home cultivates the image of the heroic "internationalist fighter" who helps the Afghan people throw off the yoke of feudalism, builds wells and roads, takes part in the collectivization of agriculture and paves the way for women to have a self-determined future, people on the ground live in constant danger of death, poorly equipped and with inadequate food supplies, drawing strength for the next few hours from drugs and alcohol and often mutilating themselves to escape the horror." A number of plays and two documentaries were based on the book.