The 9th Company

9th Company / 9 Рота
The 9th Company (Russian: 9 Рота) is a 2005 Russian–Finnish–Ukrainian film directed by Fyodor Bondarchuk about the Soviet War in Afghanistan. The film follows a band of young recruits from a farewell ceremony with friends and family back home, through their often brutal training in Uzbekistan's Fergana Valley, up to a bloody battle on a mountain top in Afghanistan against the mujahideen.

Plot
The film is loosely based on a real-life battle that took place at Hill 3234 in early 1988, during the last large-scale Soviet military operation Magistral. In the film, only one soldier from the company survives and the company is said to have been "forgotten" by the military command because of the Soviet withdrawal. But in reality, the story was different. The 9th Company, 345th Guards Airborne Regiment was pinned down under heavy fire on Hill 3234 between the 7th and 8th of January 1988. They managed to stop twelve attacks by an estimated 200−400 Mujahideen. The company lost six men. Another 28 out of the total 39 were wounded. Two of the killed soldiers were posthumously awarded the golden star of the Hero of the Soviet Union. The unit was in constant communication with headquarters and got everything the regimental commander, Colonel Valery Vostrotin, could provide in terms of ammunition, reinforcements, and helicopter evacuation of the wounded.

Information about the real battle of Hill 3234 can be found in the links section of this page

Troops depicted
Soviet VDV

Afghan Mujahideen

Links

 * Official website
 * The 9th Company @ IMDb
 * Battle for Hill 2334