After a certain breakthrough caused by the need to comprehend the combat experience of the Second World War and the emergence weapons mass destruction, the domestic military thought departed from the study and development of the fundamentals of military affairs. Today it is dead: its Soviet variety is finished, and the Russian version is not being created.
Our time every day, if not every hour, confirms: war is not “when guns are firing,” but when stories entire nations disappear, states arise and collapse. The world is already at war - brutally, on a large scale and by no means only "tanks". The field for the development of military science as the only synthetic social science capable of embracing the totality of the problems of the existence of powers is enormous today.
Causes and effects of the disaster
Among the main reasons for the catastrophic state of affairs with national military thought is the absence of a clearly formulated order of the highest state power of Russia and the high command of its Armed Forces for the theoretical elaboration of a strategic plan. Affects the lack of an independent expert body. Such an institution or center should receive orders for the development of scientific problems of a strategic nature, as well as have sufficient financial resources to formulate problems, order their development and conduct independent scientific activities. Such an expert body should be in the content of the Ministry of Defense or the Security Council of the Russian Federation and report exclusively to them.
Hinders the development of Russian military thought and the lack of adequate funding, the habit of "intellectual freebies." The resource of specialists capable of realizing the problem, articulating it clearly and proposing its own solution is almost exhausted. We need people who are able to defend their opinions in discussions and under pressure from the authority of "stars and epaulets."National mechanisms for assessing and implementing the theories of the general strategic level do not work today. And finally, a significant number of representatives of the high command of the Armed Forces have no interest in military science.
It seems that the top leadership of the state and much of the top commanders of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation are not aware of the state in which Russia and its army are being.
As a result of this catastrophe, the most important issues of state and military construction remained outside the study of modern military science. Our military thought did not offer the state a clear model of a unified system of government in peacetime and wartime, or algorithms for the transition from one state to another.
All the so-called structural changes in the Armed Forces are born exclusively in the highest offices of the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff. Without any scientific substantiation and independent examination.
Not made any important scientifically based proposals and the structure of the Ministry of Defense. The real separation of the rights and duties of the Ministry of Defense staff and the General Staff is superficial.
Structural leapfrog in the higher echelons of the army, “permanent military reform” reduces the prestige of military service, narrows the rights of the officer corps, plunging it into real poverty. All this leads to negative personnel selection and disintegration of the professional fabric of the army.
The army must be unequivocally withdrawn from the system of market relations. It is obliged to receive all the benefits from the market, without being its subject.
Military science does not develop an extremely important problem of the objective justification of the system and the specific financial content of the military personnel, based on the criteria of their labor costs, time and conditions of military service, its quality and condition. The army is waiting for alms from power. And the appointment of official salaries, and in general, the monetary support of servicemen are criminal, humiliating, since they are determined by the state voluntarily. According to the formula "three P": "finger-floor-ceiling."
Continuity and information support system
Loss of knowledge and experience in managing battle, battle and war in general. The overwhelming majority of officers of the tactical and operational units do not have their own combat experience, personal experience in organizing and conducting combat shooting exercises. Higher commanders are increasingly losing their skills in organizing and conducting large-scale exercises, maneuvers, and military strategy games. Soon in the army, no one and nothing will be able to do except reports, organizing shows, parades, and participation in minor skirmishes, sweeps and counter-terrorist operations.
It is vital to train the officer corps, including the top commanders of the Armed Forces of Russia, and the top leadership of the state, the methods, techniques, and skills of organizing large-scale and complex combined-arms and state military activities that the generation of modern veterans so brilliantly owned, that is, senior officers and stock generals laid off during the last ten years of "democratic" wave.In divisions, corps, armies, military districts, military educational institutions, it is necessary to create regular methodological councils on combat (operational) training, and under the president and the government of Russia - a council on strategic training of the state.
All competent and experienced veterans living in these areas should be involved in the work of these councils in a regular capacity.
It is imperative that for the duration of this work they can be called up from the reserve and receive a monetary allowance. The Academy of Military Sciences of the Ministry of Defense in its new status, the Assistant Minister of Defense of Russia for Science and, of course, the General Staff should deal with this.
The officer corps is “wild”: they hardly read professional and just good literature. The impoverished maintenance of officers and military high schools does not allow to write out neither professional Russian, and especially foreign magazines. Major military libraries are not available. The libraries in the garrisons and units are in a pitiful state. The military libraries of leading academies are not digitized, the library of the General Staff does not have its own premises. The Military Encyclopedic Dictionary and the Military Encyclopedia are not digitized.
The formation of a national public military library based on modern digital media and the Internet, that is, available at every university, garrison and unit, is an important part of military science and educational work.
It is necessary to restore the system of publications of military scientific works on a wide range of problems and to have for this purpose a special publication (for example, the “Bulletin of the Public Military Expert Council”), as well as to create a Center for Military Domestic Studies.
Russian military thought should move to a new modern information support system and be based on the Unified Information Scientific Network of all libraries, military education institutions, science and archives with access to an information bank created under the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces or a special fund, and with access to such national information networks of the leading states of the world.
It is necessary to equip all military universities and libraries with the Internet as a priority. And of course, one should not forget about independent work, study and military-scientific creativity of the officer corps. The officers 'self-training should become an integral part of his combat and operational training and part of the officers' daily life in the units and garrisons.
Institutional aspect of the problem
Military-scientific work should be actively pursued not only in the staff structures of the General Staff and military schools, but also in public organizations, independent expert structures and institutions and supported by the activities of an independent Public Military Expert Council, supervised by the Security Council or even the President of Russia.
Serious scientific work can only be successful if there is a centralized control of military science. This implies the existence of a state order for the development of scientific problems - a kind of “Gosplan” and “State order”, as well as a professional “State reception” of research. Which in turn implies its “Gossnab”, that is, guaranteed payment for scientific work and the whole system of its stimulation.
One of the most dangerous negative factors of modern military and state construction is the lack of real and effective mechanisms for evaluating the proposed theoretical searches and their implementation.
There are almost no specialists left in the Ministry of Defense and even in the General Staff capable of professionally and strategically evaluating and analyzing the proposed expert studies of a general strategic nature, as well as making their own correct professional judgment. At the same time, they all look at their direct superiors, who for various reasons know the subject even worse. Those who make major decisions do not personally meet with the carriers of ideas and authors of theories, which means they depend on the opinions of their incompetent performers. The practice of making essential decisions through meaningless and endless approvals does not just lead any decision or theory to its exact opposite, but also removes all personal responsibility from the participants of these decisions. And finally, no one is responsible for the implementation of the decision entirely and does not track the course of their execution in a planned and daily manner.
In the field of military science, there is practically no search for new ideas and their talented authors. They are not given opportunities for work, creativity and practical realization of ideas in the interests of Russia and its Armed Forces.
“The search for talented people,” writes outstanding Russian scientist Vladimir Rubanov, “needs to be actively pursued, and not expect applications for a commercially profitable and at the same time non-risky project. Global bounty hunters select talents based on original publications, bright presentations at seminars, etc. So intellectual cream is removed even before they are ready to create project teams. ”
In the field of military science, things are getting worse a hundred times. For any idea other than direct prohibitions on “dissent”, there is a system of official filters, which leads to the practical destruction of both new ideas and their talented authors.
In order for the Russian military thought to come out of a state of coma, serious institutional changes are needed. It is necessary to decide on the creation within the Presidium of the RAS of the Council on the problems of war and peace and a separate direction of academic (fundamental) research in the field of military affairs.
The Minister of Defense should introduce the posts of assistant to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation for Science and Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation for Science, as well as create an independent Center for Military Science giving it the status of the leading scientific structure of the Ministry of Defense. Perhaps a similar decision of the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation - the President of Russia on the creation of such a structure within the Security Council of the Russian Federation.
Since any social science is always opportunistic in nature, that is, it serves the views and ideas of today's leadership, the key word here is “independent,” which implies the possibility and right of the center’s leadership to conduct independent personnel, scientific and economic policies, relying on the corresponding right and the generosity of the Ministry of Defense and the state.
The Russian Academy of Sciences should establish an independent Center (committee, direction) of military sciences.
Today, the state has finally realized that in fundamental science (despite the fact that it does not give an immediate effect and does not immediately pay off), it is necessary to invest huge amounts of money and encourage its creators in every possible way. Otherwise, there will inevitably be lagging behind the developed powers, dependence on them and ultimately the loss of national sovereignty and national security.
Knowledge is always power, so military knowledge must become our professional cult.