The most important priority of the General Staff
Does the manning system of the Armed Forces of Russia meet modern requirements?
The extremely difficult tasks that face the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation today have sharply raised the bar for their compliance with people in uniform. New forms and methods of hostilities, modern weapons and military equipment, informatization and introduction of innovative technologies into the sphere of warfare demanded a serious increase in the level of professional training of officers and soldiers. Which in turn caused the need to take a different look at the system of staffing the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Historical experience indicates such a paradox. Any developed state needs an army that would be fundamentally different from what it has now: it is much better prepared and technically equipped, has a high moral spirit, and provides a decent material level and social status of military personnel. That is the army of tomorrow. It is not surprising that the improvement of its staffing system is today one of the highest priority areas of activity of the General Staff of the RF Armed Forces.
Alternative to calling
It must be admitted that after the creation of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in 1992 for a long time, the Soviet system of recruitment with the obligatory military service by all male citizens inherent to it actually continued to operate.
It is believed that the starting point of the transition to a mixed method of recruitment of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (by conscription and contract) was the signing by the President of the Russian Federation of the decree "On recruitment in 1994 for military service under the contract in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation". According to him, about 150 thousands of pros were selected for military posts, defining the combat ability of the units.
The effectiveness of this method of recruitment was confirmed by the practice of building the Armed Forces. Therefore, in 1998, the federal law “On Military Duty and Military Service” is a mixed recruitment method according to which our citizens can do military service not only by conscription, but also voluntarily (by contract), established by law and maintained by present tense
In difficult modern demographic and economic conditions, taking into account the need to have an optimally sufficient trained mobilization resource, the selected mixed recruitment method is now the most acceptable for our state.
It is also applied abroad - in Austria, Finland, Norway, Turkey, Greece, and other countries. In the United States, despite the formal preservation of the voluntary principle of recruitment, citizens serving in the reserve may also be called up (without their consent) for military service for a period of one to two years or more. In Germany, since July 2011, on the basis of a parliamentary decree, has been picking up on a voluntary basis, however, the provision on universal military duty is still enshrined in the country's constitution.
The transition of the Russian Federation to military service under the contract required purposeful and painstaking work on the development of the troop recruitment system, the improvement of its legal and regulatory framework, the system of professional training, the formation of attractive conditions and the social protection of servicemen and their families. Today, a lot has been done for this, but more needs to be done. And not only the establishment of a decent monetary allowance and a sufficiently flexible system of allowances for class qualifications, physical fitness and specificity of the performance of official duties, but also the solution of issues of providing servicemen with housing and medical care.
At present, the recruitment of the Armed Forces by officers and warrant officers is carried out only on a voluntary basis. They are trained by higher military educational institutions, military training centers at civilian universities. Officers from the reserve also enter the military service.
In turn, the recruitment of military posts of ordinary and non-commissioned officers is carried out in a mixed way, combining military conscription and voluntary military service (under a contract). At the same time, up to 90 percent of all candidates for contract soldiers are citizens who are in reserve and have experience in conscription service. A lot of trained soldiers and sergeants at the end of military service also express a desire to continue it under the contract, especially in the Airborne Forces, the Naval navy.
Today, the selection system of candidates for military service under contract has been tested and debugged. In almost every subject of the Russian Federation, selection points operate, the number of which has increased from 66 (in 2012) to 81 (in 2015).
In 2012, a new type of training for candidates entering military service from the reserve was introduced - intensive general training with a “survival” course. This not only allows a civilian person to restore his skills in the military specialty, but also serves as a kind of filter from hitting “random people” into the army.
The arrival of modern weapons and military equipment to the troops also raised increased requirements for contract servicemen, which in turn required a serious adjustment of their training and retraining programs for new specialties. The scale of training specialists in the average military-special program on the basis of universities of the Ministry of Defense of Russia has increased. In addition to the military specialty, young people also receive secondary vocational education.
In order to adequately respond to possible threats to the national security of the country in a changing military and political situation, an annual increase in the number of military personnel under the contract of at least 2012 is fixed by the presidential decree 604 of the year No. 50 “On the further improvement of military service in the Russian Federation” thousand. The phased increase in the number of personnel is synchronized with the re-equipment of the Armed Forces with the latest high-tech weapons and military equipment, for operation and maintenance of which only highly skilled specialists are needed. Naturally, the number of conscripts in proportion decreases. In 2015, the Armed Forces reached the historical maximum for the first time - the number of contract soldiers in military positions of ensigns, sergeants and soldiers reached 300 thousands and exceeded the number of conscripts.
But we do not pursue quantitative indicators. Particular attention is paid primarily to the quality of selection of candidates. As a rule, these are citizens under the age of 30 years who have a higher or secondary education who have received, according to the results of professional psychological selection, the first or second professional competence group. The selection and effectiveness of their placement in military positions, taking into account the level of vocational education, military accounting and civilian specialties, is achieved by automating these processes. In particular, the introduction of software and hardware systems, innovative development of software tools and testing techniques.
No addicts allowed
A special area of work is to ensure the quality of the recruiting contingent. As you know, the duration of the call service today is reduced to one year. The dates for the spring draft campaign were extended by law to July 15, which makes it possible to call up citizens who have graduated from higher and secondary vocational schools this year. The level of training of university graduates allows them to be appointed to military posts in a related military accounting profession without additional training. Over the past five years, the proportion of conscripts with higher education in the army has increased from five to nineteen percent.
Taking into account the reduction in the length of military service and the improvement of the conditions for its passage, the requirements for the health status of certain categories of citizens of the Russian Federation have been revised. During medical examination, modern high-tech diagnostic equipment is used, which allows to detect existing diseases at an early stage, and also excludes the direction to the troops of citizens unfit for military service and having drug addiction.
In-depth and focused work with public organizations, the media, educational institutions, parents of recruits allowed to remove the previously existing tension in the work of draft commissions. The number of so-called draft dodgers is annually reduced by three to five percent. And the results of the recruiting campaigns of the last five years show that the selection system currently being implemented is coping quite effectively with the task of improving the quality of military posts.
It is clear that in the foreseeable future a mixed way of recruiting the Armed Forces will remain. At the same time conscripts will be appointed only to positions that do not require in-depth training, special knowledge and skills. This will further ensure the accumulation in the required volumes of military-trained mobilization manpower resources. And yet a number of problems remain.
In particular, under the influence of social, economic, demographic and other factors, the situation with the preparation of mobilization reserves has significantly changed. Today it becomes extremely difficult to call a citizen in the reserve for military training. Employers of commercial structures are reluctant to let their employees go, as a rule, without preserving the average earnings or raise the question of their dismissal.
What to hide, there is a deviation of individual citizens in the reserve from participation in the military training. In part, they can be understood. Fear of losing a job, reducing family income, disrupting the habitual way of life makes people go for various tricks. It turns out that citizens are not sufficiently motivated to increase their level of professional military training and military training, and the leaders of organizations of all forms of ownership are not interested in solving these issues.
These facts have been repeatedly confirmed by our events with the call of citizens from the reserve. Each of them needs to be remembered and aware: in accordance with the Constitution of the Russian Federation, the defense of the Fatherland is its duty and duty, and the passage of military training is aimed at ensuring the defense and security of the state.
It is gratifying that today there is a general increase in patriotic sentiment in society, but this is not a reason for complacency. Together with the authorities of all levels, it is necessary to achieve an understanding of the unity of the army and the people, when citizens in fact will consider the fulfillment of military duties not a heavy burden, but an honorable duty and a sacred duty. What is being done for this?
Based on historical experience, the General Staff is currently working to improve the system of training and accumulation of mobilization resources by creating a reserve component to ensure that the Armed Forces are provided with guaranteed military personnel mobilization resources in a timely manner. This is necessary both during the mobilization period and to resolve possible natural and man-made crisis situations.
What the experiment will show
The new system of training and accumulation of mobilization manpower must meet the mobile needs of the troops (forces), sufficient amounts of accumulation of the military-trained reserve, and the maintenance of training at the proper level. It will create such conditions when citizens in the reserve will voluntarily strive to improve their military knowledge, skills and abilities, and are guaranteed to fulfill their military duty during the call-up period for warning, turnout and military service in military units.
Some, having read these optimistic lines, may smile. Yes, there are different people with different levels of responsibility and understanding of their civic duty. But, first, the road will be mastered by walking. Secondly, in the near future a new system of citizens' staying in the reserve will start working. Its essence is that the mobilization manpower reserve will henceforth be formed in the composition of the reserve of the Armed Forces. For this purpose, with the vaults, intended for staffing the formations and military units (reservists), on a voluntary basis there will be a contract of stay in the reserve. The rest of the citizens assigned to military units belong to the mobilization human resource.
The ratio of reservists and mobilization of human resources is determined based on the number of military posts that determine the combat capability, the purpose of the deployed military units and the economic capabilities of the state.
The creation and development of the new system will be carried out systematically in conjunction with the plans for the construction of the Armed Forces. An important stage in its formation was the federal law No. 288-ФЗ “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation on the Creation of a Mobilization Human Reserve”, which entered into force on January 1 2013. It defines the relevant legal and organizational framework.
As part of the implementation of the law, the Government of the Russian Federation dated 3 of September 2015 of the year No. 933 approved the “Regulation on the procedure for the stay of citizens of the Russian Federation in the mobilization human reserve”. It determines the order of their admission to the mobilization manpower reserve in peacetime, stay in it and the exclusion from it, as well as the conclusion of the contract and its termination.
At the government level, work is underway to identify sources of funding and ensure the order of monetary payments to this category of citizens during the period of their call for military fees.
In 2015, the President of the Russian Federation signed a decree “On the creation of a mobilization human reserve of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation”, providing for an experiment to introduce a new system of training and accumulation of mobilization human resources. In 2015 – 2016, with the adoption of all necessary regulatory legal acts, we will test it. Based on the results of the work, a practical transition to a new system and the development of its infrastructure are planned.
The creation of a national reserve in the Russian Federation will make it possible to form formations and military units with minimum terms of readiness for combat use, staffed by professional specialists. The training of reservists will be provided by regular passing of military training for up to 30 days, their involvement in mobilization and tactical exercises as part of the units to which they are intended in accordance with the contract.
Responsibilities, as well as rights, as well as the conditions of stay in the reserve, we repeat, are governed by the contract. When reservists perform their respective duties, an effective system of incentive and compensation payments is provided for. Thus, the consistent implementation of measures for the preparation and accumulation of the required volumes of military-trained human resources will help to increase the mobilization readiness of the troops (forces).
Summing up, it must be said that the chosen system for recruiting the Armed Forces, including mobilization human resources, is today the best, justified by the realities of the time and assigned tasks, ensures the maintenance of the required level of combat readiness of troops (forces).
The extremely difficult tasks that face the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation today have sharply raised the bar for their compliance with people in uniform. New forms and methods of hostilities, modern weapons and military equipment, informatization and introduction of innovative technologies into the sphere of warfare demanded a serious increase in the level of professional training of officers and soldiers. Which in turn caused the need to take a different look at the system of staffing the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Historical experience indicates such a paradox. Any developed state needs an army that would be fundamentally different from what it has now: it is much better prepared and technically equipped, has a high moral spirit, and provides a decent material level and social status of military personnel. That is the army of tomorrow. It is not surprising that the improvement of its staffing system is today one of the highest priority areas of activity of the General Staff of the RF Armed Forces.
Alternative to calling
It must be admitted that after the creation of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in 1992 for a long time, the Soviet system of recruitment with the obligatory military service by all male citizens inherent to it actually continued to operate.
It is believed that the starting point of the transition to a mixed method of recruitment of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (by conscription and contract) was the signing by the President of the Russian Federation of the decree "On recruitment in 1994 for military service under the contract in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation". According to him, about 150 thousands of pros were selected for military posts, defining the combat ability of the units.
The effectiveness of this method of recruitment was confirmed by the practice of building the Armed Forces. Therefore, in 1998, the federal law “On Military Duty and Military Service” is a mixed recruitment method according to which our citizens can do military service not only by conscription, but also voluntarily (by contract), established by law and maintained by present tense
In difficult modern demographic and economic conditions, taking into account the need to have an optimally sufficient trained mobilization resource, the selected mixed recruitment method is now the most acceptable for our state.
It is also applied abroad - in Austria, Finland, Norway, Turkey, Greece, and other countries. In the United States, despite the formal preservation of the voluntary principle of recruitment, citizens serving in the reserve may also be called up (without their consent) for military service for a period of one to two years or more. In Germany, since July 2011, on the basis of a parliamentary decree, has been picking up on a voluntary basis, however, the provision on universal military duty is still enshrined in the country's constitution.
Photo: RIA NEWS
The transition of the Russian Federation to military service under the contract required purposeful and painstaking work on the development of the troop recruitment system, the improvement of its legal and regulatory framework, the system of professional training, the formation of attractive conditions and the social protection of servicemen and their families. Today, a lot has been done for this, but more needs to be done. And not only the establishment of a decent monetary allowance and a sufficiently flexible system of allowances for class qualifications, physical fitness and specificity of the performance of official duties, but also the solution of issues of providing servicemen with housing and medical care.
At present, the recruitment of the Armed Forces by officers and warrant officers is carried out only on a voluntary basis. They are trained by higher military educational institutions, military training centers at civilian universities. Officers from the reserve also enter the military service.
In turn, the recruitment of military posts of ordinary and non-commissioned officers is carried out in a mixed way, combining military conscription and voluntary military service (under a contract). At the same time, up to 90 percent of all candidates for contract soldiers are citizens who are in reserve and have experience in conscription service. A lot of trained soldiers and sergeants at the end of military service also express a desire to continue it under the contract, especially in the Airborne Forces, the Naval navy.
Today, the selection system of candidates for military service under contract has been tested and debugged. In almost every subject of the Russian Federation, selection points operate, the number of which has increased from 66 (in 2012) to 81 (in 2015).
In 2012, a new type of training for candidates entering military service from the reserve was introduced - intensive general training with a “survival” course. This not only allows a civilian person to restore his skills in the military specialty, but also serves as a kind of filter from hitting “random people” into the army.
The arrival of modern weapons and military equipment to the troops also raised increased requirements for contract servicemen, which in turn required a serious adjustment of their training and retraining programs for new specialties. The scale of training specialists in the average military-special program on the basis of universities of the Ministry of Defense of Russia has increased. In addition to the military specialty, young people also receive secondary vocational education.
In order to adequately respond to possible threats to the national security of the country in a changing military and political situation, an annual increase in the number of military personnel under the contract of at least 2012 is fixed by the presidential decree 604 of the year No. 50 “On the further improvement of military service in the Russian Federation” thousand. The phased increase in the number of personnel is synchronized with the re-equipment of the Armed Forces with the latest high-tech weapons and military equipment, for operation and maintenance of which only highly skilled specialists are needed. Naturally, the number of conscripts in proportion decreases. In 2015, the Armed Forces reached the historical maximum for the first time - the number of contract soldiers in military positions of ensigns, sergeants and soldiers reached 300 thousands and exceeded the number of conscripts.
But we do not pursue quantitative indicators. Particular attention is paid primarily to the quality of selection of candidates. As a rule, these are citizens under the age of 30 years who have a higher or secondary education who have received, according to the results of professional psychological selection, the first or second professional competence group. The selection and effectiveness of their placement in military positions, taking into account the level of vocational education, military accounting and civilian specialties, is achieved by automating these processes. In particular, the introduction of software and hardware systems, innovative development of software tools and testing techniques.
No addicts allowed
A special area of work is to ensure the quality of the recruiting contingent. As you know, the duration of the call service today is reduced to one year. The dates for the spring draft campaign were extended by law to July 15, which makes it possible to call up citizens who have graduated from higher and secondary vocational schools this year. The level of training of university graduates allows them to be appointed to military posts in a related military accounting profession without additional training. Over the past five years, the proportion of conscripts with higher education in the army has increased from five to nineteen percent.
Taking into account the reduction in the length of military service and the improvement of the conditions for its passage, the requirements for the health status of certain categories of citizens of the Russian Federation have been revised. During medical examination, modern high-tech diagnostic equipment is used, which allows to detect existing diseases at an early stage, and also excludes the direction to the troops of citizens unfit for military service and having drug addiction.In-depth and focused work with public organizations, the media, educational institutions, parents of recruits allowed to remove the previously existing tension in the work of draft commissions. The number of so-called draft dodgers is annually reduced by three to five percent. And the results of the recruiting campaigns of the last five years show that the selection system currently being implemented is coping quite effectively with the task of improving the quality of military posts.
It is clear that in the foreseeable future a mixed way of recruiting the Armed Forces will remain. At the same time conscripts will be appointed only to positions that do not require in-depth training, special knowledge and skills. This will further ensure the accumulation in the required volumes of military-trained mobilization manpower resources. And yet a number of problems remain.
In particular, under the influence of social, economic, demographic and other factors, the situation with the preparation of mobilization reserves has significantly changed. Today it becomes extremely difficult to call a citizen in the reserve for military training. Employers of commercial structures are reluctant to let their employees go, as a rule, without preserving the average earnings or raise the question of their dismissal.
What to hide, there is a deviation of individual citizens in the reserve from participation in the military training. In part, they can be understood. Fear of losing a job, reducing family income, disrupting the habitual way of life makes people go for various tricks. It turns out that citizens are not sufficiently motivated to increase their level of professional military training and military training, and the leaders of organizations of all forms of ownership are not interested in solving these issues.
These facts have been repeatedly confirmed by our events with the call of citizens from the reserve. Each of them needs to be remembered and aware: in accordance with the Constitution of the Russian Federation, the defense of the Fatherland is its duty and duty, and the passage of military training is aimed at ensuring the defense and security of the state.
It is gratifying that today there is a general increase in patriotic sentiment in society, but this is not a reason for complacency. Together with the authorities of all levels, it is necessary to achieve an understanding of the unity of the army and the people, when citizens in fact will consider the fulfillment of military duties not a heavy burden, but an honorable duty and a sacred duty. What is being done for this?
Based on historical experience, the General Staff is currently working to improve the system of training and accumulation of mobilization resources by creating a reserve component to ensure that the Armed Forces are provided with guaranteed military personnel mobilization resources in a timely manner. This is necessary both during the mobilization period and to resolve possible natural and man-made crisis situations.
What the experiment will show
The new system of training and accumulation of mobilization manpower must meet the mobile needs of the troops (forces), sufficient amounts of accumulation of the military-trained reserve, and the maintenance of training at the proper level. It will create such conditions when citizens in the reserve will voluntarily strive to improve their military knowledge, skills and abilities, and are guaranteed to fulfill their military duty during the call-up period for warning, turnout and military service in military units.
Some, having read these optimistic lines, may smile. Yes, there are different people with different levels of responsibility and understanding of their civic duty. But, first, the road will be mastered by walking. Secondly, in the near future a new system of citizens' staying in the reserve will start working. Its essence is that the mobilization manpower reserve will henceforth be formed in the composition of the reserve of the Armed Forces. For this purpose, with the vaults, intended for staffing the formations and military units (reservists), on a voluntary basis there will be a contract of stay in the reserve. The rest of the citizens assigned to military units belong to the mobilization human resource.
The ratio of reservists and mobilization of human resources is determined based on the number of military posts that determine the combat capability, the purpose of the deployed military units and the economic capabilities of the state.
The creation and development of the new system will be carried out systematically in conjunction with the plans for the construction of the Armed Forces. An important stage in its formation was the federal law No. 288-ФЗ “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation on the Creation of a Mobilization Human Reserve”, which entered into force on January 1 2013. It defines the relevant legal and organizational framework.
As part of the implementation of the law, the Government of the Russian Federation dated 3 of September 2015 of the year No. 933 approved the “Regulation on the procedure for the stay of citizens of the Russian Federation in the mobilization human reserve”. It determines the order of their admission to the mobilization manpower reserve in peacetime, stay in it and the exclusion from it, as well as the conclusion of the contract and its termination.
At the government level, work is underway to identify sources of funding and ensure the order of monetary payments to this category of citizens during the period of their call for military fees.
In 2015, the President of the Russian Federation signed a decree “On the creation of a mobilization human reserve of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation”, providing for an experiment to introduce a new system of training and accumulation of mobilization human resources. In 2015 – 2016, with the adoption of all necessary regulatory legal acts, we will test it. Based on the results of the work, a practical transition to a new system and the development of its infrastructure are planned.
The creation of a national reserve in the Russian Federation will make it possible to form formations and military units with minimum terms of readiness for combat use, staffed by professional specialists. The training of reservists will be provided by regular passing of military training for up to 30 days, their involvement in mobilization and tactical exercises as part of the units to which they are intended in accordance with the contract.
Responsibilities, as well as rights, as well as the conditions of stay in the reserve, we repeat, are governed by the contract. When reservists perform their respective duties, an effective system of incentive and compensation payments is provided for. Thus, the consistent implementation of measures for the preparation and accumulation of the required volumes of military-trained human resources will help to increase the mobilization readiness of the troops (forces).
Summing up, it must be said that the chosen system for recruiting the Armed Forces, including mobilization human resources, is today the best, justified by the realities of the time and assigned tasks, ensures the maintenance of the required level of combat readiness of troops (forces).
Information