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Alpha Squad's primary function is believed to be to carry out urban counter-terrorist missions under the direct sanction and control of the Russian political leadership. However, little is publicly known and other plausible missions would include a variety of paramilitary, policing and/or covert operations.
By Russian standards, Alfa squad is lavishly supported and funded and has access to state of the art small arms and equipment. They are known to employ chemical agents in hostage rescue operations and be capable of functioning in an NBC environment. Little further information is publicly available. At a guess, they would have both sniper and counter-sniper capability, tactical EMS, demolitions, tactical intelligence and other functions typical of both police SWAT teams and the special operations community. It is unknown whether they have dedicated hostage negotiators.
"Alpha Group" or Spetsgruppe A, a special forces ( spetsnaz) or special operations detachment OSNAZ unit attached to the KGB was created in 1974 within the First Chief Directorate of the KGB on the orders of Yuri Andropov, then Chairman of the KGB. It was intended for secret foreign operations.
Their most notable mission during the Soviet period was the seizure of Amin's palace in Afghanistan on December 27 1979, which began the Soviet invasion. The storming of the Presidential Palace in Kabul by 700 Alpha operatives in Afghan uniforms resulted in heavy casualties for Alpha, including the unit commander, but resulted in the killing of the Afghani president, Hafizullah AminHafizullah Amin ( August 1, 1929 December 27, 1979) was the second President of Afghanistan during the period of the communist Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. Born in Kabul, Afghanistan. He gained a BSc in Mathematics and Physics from the University o and his approximately 200 elite guards.
During the Soviet coup attempt of 1991The Soviet Coup of 1991 or the August Coup crushed the hopes of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev that he could at least hold the union together in a decentralized form. However, in the eyes of the remaining Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) conser the Alpha group, under the command of Major General Viktor Karpuklin was assigned the task of entering the White House, Russia's parliament building, and killing Boris YeltsinBoris Nikolayevich Yeltsin (bah-REES YELL-tsin) (b. February 1, 1931, Sverdlovsk [now Yekaterinburg], Russia, USSR), became the first President of Russia in 1991, and the first democratically elected leader in the country's history. Early Life Boris Yelts and the other Russian leaders following a planned assault on the entrance by paratroopers. This order was unanimously refused.
During the Soviet war in Afghanistan they were called "red devils" by the Mujaheddin. The unit has continued to exist after the collapse of the Soviet Union and has been used in a variety of difficult situations, such as the Moscow Theatre Siege.
The most recent operation conducted by Alfa was the liberation of Moscow hostages and the killing of 49 well-armed guerrillas in the Moscow theatre siege of 2002. In the latest Moscow hostage crisis there have been reported 129 hostages killed, but taking notice of the whole amount of all the hostages present in the theater, this number is roughly 16%. No hostages were killed by Alfa operative gunfire. It should be noted, however that many special forces units tasked with hostage rescue operations would consider an operation in which even a single hostage died to be a failed operation, regardless of the cause of death. The hostages killed in the Moscow theatre siege died as a result of the use of nerve toxins by Alfa operatives.