Dadash Rzayev Dadash Rzayev Garib oglu ( ) was Minister of Defense of Azerbaijan from February to June 1993 and is currently the Chairman of Confederation of Azerbaijani Officers in Reserve . His active service in the army lasted for 40 years , 37 of which were in the Airborne Troops . Early life . Rzayev was born in 1935 in Delimemmedli city of Goranboy Rayon , Azerbaijan . He never planned a military career but always wanted to be a pilot . In 1953 , he was enrolled at Azerbaijan Technical University . A year later his studies were interrupted and he was conscripted to military service at Soviet Airborne Troops stationed in Belarus for a period of 3 years . After military quarantine , he was directed to confidential state Officers School in isolated location in Kazakhstan for a period of one year . After completion of his course , he returned to the military service . Six months before completion of his service , he was sent to continue his military education at School of Airborne Troops . He graduated from the school in 1959 . While a cadet he has been awarded with Order of the Red Star for excellence in his studies . Active military duty . Soviet Army . Rzayev started his military career when he held the rank of Lieutenant . After graduating from military school , he was first sent to the 106th Guards Airborne Division at Tula , Russian SFSR . He was then promoted to Captain . Unlike other officers , he ran a 40 km distance to shooting range in front of his tabor of soldiers and always did exercises prior to his soldiers during the trainings for encouragement purposes . Soldiers of his tabor always received higher grades when commander of the army checked the statistics . After completion of Frunze Military Academy , he served as Commander of airborne regiments in Kaunas , Lithuania and then in Baku , Azerbaijan . After that , he was appointed First Deputy to Commander of 12 , 000 men division . Rzayev was then assigned to troops in Lviv , Ukraine where he established airborne brigade . During this time he was promoted to the rank of Colonel . During the Ogaden War , Soviets provided assistance to Ethiopian government and Rzayev was sent to Ethiopia as an " agricultural expert " . He created an airborne brigade for the Ethiopian Ministry of Defense and led some combat operations . He ' s said to have played a significant role in formation of Ethiopian troops . During the Soviet war in Afghanistan , he supervised 4 tabors . Azerbaijani Armed Forces . Rzayev came back to Azerbaijan and started working at " Karabakh Public Relief Committee " which supplied him with a helicopter . He visited villages in Karabakh and transported food to isolated areas . He received his rank of a General in 1991 . At the end of 1991 , the new Defense Minister Valeh Barshadly appointed Rzayev his deputy . On September 25 , 1991 President Ayaz Mutalibov appointed him Commander of " National Self - Defense Forces " . Rzayev was the author of the military oath of allegiance which was taken by him and the first unit of the independent Azerbaijani Army known as " The First tabor " based on unit 18110 of the Soviet Army , on December 8 , 1991 in the Martyrs ' Alley . Once Barshadly became the Chief of General Staff of Azerbaijani Armed Forces , he ordered him to create northwestern military corpus . Rzayev took the assignment and created a 12 , 000 men corpus in the Tovuz region . During the Karabakh conflict , he personally led the operation which captured the village of Bashkend . On February 21 , 1993 he was appointed Minister of Defense by President Abulfaz Elchibey . On June 17 he was sacked by President Abulfaz Elchibey and on July 16 , 1993 he was accused in the report of the investigative commission of the parliament of being a part to skirmishes during the Ganja revolt of June 1993 and was removed from the position of Minister of Defense . He retired from active service in the army in 1995 . and remained in the ministry working at " Military Scientific Center of the Ministry of Defense " . However , 30 generals , colonels and high - ranking officers , including Rzayev were laid off in 2009 due to ongoing reforms in the ministry . Later years . Confederation of Officers in Reserve . Rzayev has since been the Chairman of Confederation of Azerbaijani Officers in Reserve . The organizations has branches in 65 regions of Azerbaijan . As the chairman , Rzayev has been an outspoken proponent of appointment of military training course teachers in secondary schools by the Ministry of Defense , not Ministry of Education so as to improve the quality of knowledge of youth before they are conscripted for active duty . He has also been a proponent of aligning the Azerbaijani army according to NATO standards . Rzayev is confident that existing Azerbaijani manufacturing plants have a capacity to start producing the T - 72 tanks to foster the domestic military production in Azerbaijan . Guinness world records . In 2009 , Rzayev made headlines after parachuting from an airplane at the age of 74 . This was his 1506th time on parachute . He first did it on January 16 , 1955 as a cadet . Rzayev took off on an airplane from the Balakan base of " Technical Sports Organization of Azerbaijani Military Volunteers " and jumped when the plane reached the altitude of 1 , 000 – 1 , 200 meters . He was the oldest person at 74 to jump off with a parachute on the territory of post Soviet states and the third person in the world to do it at that age .