Note that in the video, which you can watch on the home page of our website, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov is posing behind the banner of the Kalmyk regiment of 1812.

On May 21, 1756, that part of the Stavropol Kalmyk Army, which consisted of baptized Kalmyks, was given a military banner, drawn up according to the sketches of the military governor-general Neplyuev. The banner shows a fortress, a cross above it, and armatures of irregular troops on the sides.
The unbaptized Kalmyks have preserved their ancient banner (tug) of the Dhungar period. From the descriptions of the commander of the Second Astrakhan Kalmyk regiment, noyon (prince) Serebdzhab of Tyumen), it follows that it shows the military patrons of the Torguts and Derbets. The first banner shows a rider on a white horse ,"Daichin-Tengri" - a holy warrior, patron of war and warriors, an assistant in battles and victories.
In the hand of the holy horseman is the staff of the banner, on which are inscribed "tarni" - Kalmyk prayers. The end of the staff is decorated with a gold ball and a trident. The rider's face is beautiful and completely calm, the whole figure expresses complete serenity - a symbol of fearlessness and self-control in moments of danger. The rider is without a sword, and the arrows rest in his quiver.
Another one shows one more saint who is Okon-Tengri, the patroness of Derbets. This is the opposite of the first, a symbol of destruction and merciless revenge. She is also riding a white horse and in her right hand she holds a huge sword and a small dagger. The rider's path is a bloody river, and lightning flashes around. The banner is consistent with a turbulent period of Kalmyk history.
These banners, kept in the Khosheutovsky khurul of the Astrakhan province and destroyed by the Bolsheviks during the civil war, were photographed and described in 1912, with the permission of the Tyumen princes, by the Russian historian and ethnographer Prozritelev. He also included the pictures in his book “The Military Past of Our Kalmyks. Stavropol Kalmyk Regiment and Astrakhan Regiments in the Patriotic War of 1812”, published in 1912 in Stavropol.