he “Soviet” soldier threw me to the ground. I was hooded, hands trussed behind my back, thighs pushed to my chest, and a leather strap slid beneath my folded knees. Two of his comrades used the thong to hoist me up, then lower me into an oil drum that was buried vertically in the earth. When I didn’t fit, they pushed with their booted feet to wedge me inside the steel barrel. I sensed them placing a plywood lid above me. That was followed by the crunching sound of a spade stood for “survival.”
