Colonel-General L.G. IVASHOV answers the questions of the chief editor of "Soviet Russia" V.V. CHIKINA
Chikin V.V. Leonid Grigorievich, how would you rate the completed trial of the Oboronservis case and the main person involved, Evgenia Vasilyeva?
Ivashov L.G. This is not a judicial-investigative process, but a political and psychological performance that lasted for more than two years. Here, the law and the criminal procedure code rested, and domestic political Russian intrigue worked with its rollbacks, cuts, chums, etc. This so-called process demonstrated that there is Russia today and who run it. Returning to the third presidential term V.V. Putin saw that Serdyukov had almost crushed the army, it was not capable, the military-industrial complex did not receive an order for modern weapons and equipment, and therefore it was degrading along with the armed forces. As a matter of fact, the army was put up for auction, where the fattest pieces were taken over by their - friends and relatives of Serdyukov. The Russian military and patriotic public began to protest against the defeat of the country's defense, against the actions of the authorities led by the “supreme commander” - Mr. Medvedev. In addition, the events in Libya showed Putin that Western, above all American, friends and partners are ready to put in jail at any moment, hang up, crucify any of yesterday’s “friend” if he is militarily weak. As it happened with S. Milosevic, S. Hussein, M. Gaddafi. It is not difficult to project their fate ... Therefore, having returned to the presidential seat, Putin decided to stop the more than twenty-year demilitarization of the country and the defeat of the defense system and begin to revive the military potential. By the way, as a guarantee and your own security.
V.C. And do you think President Putin managed to restore the country's defense and how reliably are we protected now?
L.I. Valentin Vasilyevich, no need to build illusions. If for a quarter of a century, starting with Gorbachev, we showed the world an example of disarmament and peace-loving, and our “friends” in the West all these years have been heavily arming and covering our borders with military bases, then it is impossible to restore the defense potential in three years. By the way, I note that the highest defense budget in stories The United States was adopted by Congress, precisely when our army was defeated and military spending was reduced. A catastrophic situation has arisen in the defense sector of the Russian Federation, and it is no accident that the former Minister of Emergencies was appointed to the post of Minister of Defense. And the task of S.K. Shoigu was primarily to eliminate emergency consequences in the army and navyresulting from the successful actions of Serdyukov and Medvedev to eliminate the remnants of the country's defense potential.
Modern weapons systems are complex technological complexes created in close cooperation of education, science, design school and production. And if somewhere in this chain there is no one link, then the whole process of production of modern technology is disrupted. Yes, it is possible to buy the missing units, units, elements abroad, but for the time being. What we got today. Russia lost its own electronics, hardware components, and machine tools. The then Minister of Defense, Serdyukov, and the Chief of the General Staff, Makarov (Nikolka the servant, as he was called in the troops), led a policy of abandoning their own armor steel, controls, and generally headed for standardization with NATO.
V.C. But after all, the actions of Serdyukov and Makarov were not arbitrary, they were heard in the State Duma, the Federation Council, the reforms were approved by the Security Council of the Russian Federation.
L.I. You correctly noticed that the so-called. Serdyukov's reforms were not his improvisation, but the state policy of President Medvedev and his team. I. Yurgens, head of the Institute of Contemporary Development, who was called the “main brain gyrus” of that same team, speaking at a conference in Washington in July 2010, frankly stated that President Medvedev’s goal is to join Russia in NATO and to purchase equipment for the army and navy from NATO countries and Israel.
And, going back to the so-called lawsuit in the Oboronservis case, I would note that he was specifically made to the fraudulent schemes and a frivolous lady was appointed to the position of the main culprit, promising that nothing would happen to her. And the main culprits of scrapping and plunderers of the country's defense are still not only at large, but also at high positions. We, ordinary citizens, are shocked by the billions (in rubles) amounts of embezzlement of citizen Vasilyeva. But this is a ringing trifle compared to the actual damage caused by defense and security.
Serdyukov and Kᴼ destroyed military science as a system, seriously weakened military intelligence, destroyed military education. Things reached the point that in 2009, the Russian Defense Ministry refused to accept foreign military personnel for training because military translators were removed from the military education system, and the Russian language departments were disbanded. And the disbanding of military districts, armies, divisions and the transition to the brigade system - is this not a rejection of the military protection of the state and its territory? A brigade can defend one or two villages, but not a country. The command and control system was broken. It got to the point that the General Staff began to manage individual brigades. In August, 2008, when Georgia attacked not only South Ossetia, but also Russian peacekeepers (that is, Russia), for almost a day there was no one to make a decision and order the troops to repel the aggression. And if Georgia attacked along with Estonia, would we be able to repel aggression on two fronts?
And the replacement of the logistics support of hostilities with small firms and cafes? And what about the idiotic cuts in half of the number of officers, the liquidation of the institute of ensigns and warrant officers, the replacement of military personnel by military arsenals, military registration offices with civilians? And the same "Mistral", lobbied Medvedev and Serdyukov, and absolutely useless for combat missions of the fleet? These are not billions of rubles, but billions of discarded euros. So all this is not an accident, not the whim of furniture storekeeper Serdyukov, but a deliberate policy of the supreme leadership. And the Security Council, the State Duma, the Federation Council, the government, military counterintelligence, the Audit Chamber covered the organized rout of the armed forces and the military industrial complex. Only military-public organizations, including Vladimir Vasilievich Kvachkov and the Military Prosecutor's Office, headed by Sergey Fridinsky, actively fought against the looting of the armed forces. The chief military prosecutor made more than a hundred submissions to the Minister of Defense, knocking on all the responsible state structures, initiated criminal cases, but all was in vain: the crime of officials, deputies, generals traitors and merchants was stronger than armor.
And the fact that, having become president again, V.V. Putin allocated more than 20 trillion rubles for military needs, firstly, an awareness of the real military threat, and secondly, an attempt to plug the gap that was formed as a result of the activities of Medvedev, Serdyukov, Makarov. Today, the former organizational and staff structures in the armed forces, the same divisions, are being restored. But the division is not only personnel, but also expensive equipment, thousands of units. So they need to be purchased. So the billions of rubles incriminated to Vasilyeva are merely a disguise of the real damage to the country's defense.
V.C. Leonid Grigorievich, then why did Serdyukov and Makarov find themselves out of prosecution? Makarov, it seems, was not even involved as a witness in the case.
L.I. Makarov got his: for neglecting the interests of the Fatherland, silence and cheating became the Hero of Russia, he received a huge pension, yes, apparently, something else.
But Serdyukov cannot be judged without setting several dozen high-ranking officials in the dock. Imagine how Padva’s lawyer, for example, will shield Serdyukov. First: "He is not a professional; in military affairs he does not understand anything, he could not be appointed to the post of Minister of Defense." Those. blame the one who appointed. Second: “After all, Serdyukov did not make decisions on the implementation of certain reforms, he only proposed them, by virtue of his own, purely trading, knowledge and experience. These proposals were considered at meetings of the Security Council, committees of the Federal Assembly, approved by the government, where the ex-minister of defense S. Ivanov was the deputy prime minister in charge of defense matters. So Serdyukov is not guilty of anything, completely different officials are to blame. ” Third: “There were generals and officers around the Minister Serdyukov, the Defense Ministry Board, who also applauded all the innovations of my client,” the lawyer would say.
And, of course, Serdyukov is pretending to be a lamb, so injured by the young, which negligent girls have fingered around. Who to plant? No, because there is no Stalin friend. Such is the nature of big crime and big betrayal.
V.C. The sad picture you painted. But nevertheless why Vladimir Vladimirovich before leaving a post of the president appointed the furniture vendor to a post of the Minister of Defense? We admit that in Soviet times, furniture storemakers in the face of shortages were a priori bribe takers, though not all, but many. And after the conscious destruction of the USSR, Serdyukov continued the path of a businessman away from furniture.
L.I. In 2012, in a personal meeting with V.V. Putin, I asked him the same question. I did not get a clear answer, so we can only build assumptions. My version is as follows: leaving temporarily from the post of the president of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Vladimirovich insured himself with a “safety cushion” by proposing a weak successor who would have to work as a senior legal advisor at a large enterprise or on a collective farm to become the head of the legal department. For the people to wait for Putin to return as soon as possible, because by definition Medvedev was not ready to lead the country. Well, so that the army didn’t bump under a strong defense minister and didn’t refuse to support the candidacy of the returned Putin, he was appointed to the post as head of staff. With this tandem of two completely incompetent people - the “commander in chief” and the minister of defense — the army will unequivocally support Putin. What happened. In addition, Putin, being prime minister, was very indirectly responsible for the state of defense. But Vladimir Vladimirovich, apparently, had no idea that in four years such a huge damage would be inflicted on the defense and the geopolitical situation would be aggravated ...
V.C. Sorry, I interrupt you, Leonid G.. After Serdyukov was appointed Minister of Defense, you said in an interview that Putin could have appointed his Labrador to this position ...
L.I. Yes, something is really said. There was an insult for the humiliation of the army, which I gave more than forty years, which went on a mission of liberation to Paris, Berlin, Manchuria, and in general covered its banners with eternal glory. And it was always led by worthy people, except perhaps Trotsky. But now I would have refused my conclusions - a Labrador would not bring so much trouble to the army and the country as Serdyukov.
V.C. Leonid G., and what happened during the final meeting of the Krasnopresnensky court, when the judge ignored the position of the state prosecution (8 years of probation) and appointed 5 years of real life? Is this the courage and objectivity of the judge, or has politics intervened here?
L.I. As for the General Prosecutor’s Office, it’s not for the first time that it comes up with “humane flexibility” in high-profile cases, and in this case the state prosecution ignored the real scale of the crime committed by a group of officials and tries to shield them. But regarding the judge, let's thank this courageous woman and let us not guess whether she showed independence, bearing in mind the independence of the court, or someone from above decided to make a gift to war and military veterans on the eve of Victory's 70 anniversary, demanding to give a real term Vasilyeva. And this is possible in our country. Or maybe Vasilyeva herself was fed up with PR and arrogance by her “colleagues”. After all, she behaved too provocatively and mocked the entire law enforcement system.
V.C. Hence, there is hope that at least some particle of justice will triumph, and Vasilyeva will serve a real term.
L.I. I would like that too. But, apparently, we have not grown to an independent court, to the level of a fair social and state system. Therefore, the continuation of this political and psychological performance may be very likely. Vasilyeva will sit for several months, and then either the appeal will work and she will be released, with apologies and payment of compensation, or they will be released on parole, including in time her stay under arrest in personal apartments. And this will be another spit in the face of all honest people of Russia, an insult to the military community, the personnel of the Armed Forces. This will be another mockery of professional investigators who honestly do their hard work of collecting evidence. The liberal crime of which we spoke above will triumph and demonstrate its power over Russia. Because the main culprits from fair retribution are gone. God forbid that I was mistaken ...
V.C. The team of "Soviet Russia" will also believe in a fair retribution to criminals, destroying the country's defense. Thank you, Leonid G., for a frank and honest conversation.
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