Army reform in Russian

15 September 2010 8 722 2

The great moan is on the Russian land. The damned reformers from the Ministry of Defense did not confine themselves to the defeat of our glorious army, they now encroached on the sacred — on the system of military education. A terrible thing happened: it was announced that neither this year nor next year military universities would accept cadets. Moreover, last year, about 25 to the percent of those who graduated from military schools were offered not sergeants' posts, but officers. It seems that this year it has been proposed to become sergeants already half of 15 thousands of graduates of military universities. In addition, the reformers allowed the discipline of future officers to fall below the baseboards. The cadets received the right to freely leave the territory of a military higher educational institution whenever they please. Thus, an exciting adventure called “cadet AWOL” can become a thing of the past. Just before our eyes, the glorious traditions of our Armed Forces are being destroyed. What, one wonders, will wise gray-haired colonels remember behind a glass of vodka ?!

Speaking seriously, right now the reformers have come to one of the main, if not the most important issue of the modernization of the Armed Forces. Because everything that has been done so far - the elimination of parts of an incomplete composition, a sharp, more than double reduction in the number of the officer corps - all this is more or less meaningless unless cardinal changes occur in the officer education system.

As I have written more than once, if there is any sense in the ongoing reform, he is in rejecting the concept of mass mobilization, on the basis of which the country's defense of the last 150 years was built. In accordance with it, during the threatening period, several million reservists should be drafted into the army, and then to fight, certainly by number, not by skill. With such a system of military construction, it was possible to fight for decades to increase the initiative of officers, but in the end nothing could be achieved. For one simple reason: when the troops are supposed to be used by huge masses, any initiative of the unit commander is not needed and even harmful. Therefore, an officer, especially a junior officer, is doomed to be an insignificant cog, whose personal knowledge and skills are not needed by anyone.

I do not think that the suspension of admission of cadets is explained only by the fact that there are no posts for young officers, since the number of military units and formations has decreased several times (in the Ground Forces, as many times as 11).

Today, the Russian military leadership has finally realized the need to create a professional sergeant corps, began training qualified junior commanders. But as soon as the sergeants decided to cook properly, it immediately became clear: Russian junior officers were out of work. Because (it is necessary to call things by their own names, even if it is very offensive), our officers' higher military educational institutions still prepared not professionals, but military artisans who could feel professionally wealthy only in the mass conscription army.

Therefore, the most important direction of military reform is a fundamental change in the system of military education and conditions of service. Education in the majority of military universities is still built in such a way that the future officer receives knowledge only "in the part of him concerning". That is exactly as much as is necessary to be able to master one or two samples of specific military equipment. To make our officer a true professional, the entire education system must be drastically changed.

I remember well what a surprise (mixed with disdain) caused the first acquaintance of our generals with the programs of all three US military academies. It turned out that neither in West Point (the training officers of the ground forces), nor in Annapolis (Navy), nor in Kolorodo Springs (Air Force) is given any serious attention to the disciplines that make the cadet a specialist in one type of weapon or another. Instead, the program is roughly divided in half into natural science and humanities disciplines. Mathematics, physics and chemistry teach a person to learn. Thanks to them, graduates of American military academies easily master specific military specialties: pilot, ship navigator, platoon commander. Moreover, all these specialties are graduates of West Point, Annapolis and Colorado Springs (as well as graduates of civilian universities who decide to become officers) receive after graduation exams - in special training centers. And the humanities give officers an understanding of their place in such a complex modern world (and at the same time the ability to command, control people, without resorting to assault).

It is to such a system of education that the reformers from the Ministry of Defense are likely to move. If so, then a two-year pause with the admission of new listeners is simply necessary. In order to radically rebuild the curriculum. The only question is who will do it. It is not yet clear who will teach the teachers. Honestly, the current situation does not inspire much optimism. Twenty years ago, the former Marxist-Leninist departments in military schools were quickly renamed the departments of political science. With preservation and mentality, and the level of training of teachers. Several times I got into the hands of textbooks, made by such political scientists, if I may say so. These works were a wild mixture of primitive nationalism, Marxism, densely flavored with humilia with extensive reasoning about the passionarity of nations.

Optimists, however, hope that the turn in military education will occur due to the fact that in future training programs a considerable place will be given to foreign languages, and this will open up before the young officers open spaces for self-improvement. In this sense, our reformers strictly follow the course of Scharnhorst and Clausewitz, who reformed the German army at the beginning of the 19 century. They demanded that any officer necessarily read special literature in foreign languages. I'm not sure that the same scheme will be possible to implement later 200 years: today's Russian cadets still differ from Prussian junkers.

Anyway, the Ministry of Defense clearly concentrated on building a system in which a person who deliberately chose the military profession would enter the military university. A person who should not be forced to learn. That is why the reformers allow the future officer to plan their studies themselves, but at the same time banned the retake of twos. For the littered exam must be a deduction.

However, all this will be useless, if the rules of service are not fundamentally changed. All calls for intellectual growth and self-education seem to be frank hypocrisy, if we bear in mind that the career of the Russian military is entirely dependent on the personnel officer and immediate supervisor. And if the officer is at least seven spans in the forehead, he will not advance anywhere if the personnel officer and the head do not want it. To change the situation, it is necessary to hold all appointments to higher positions through an open and public competition. About this is not heard.