When a person leaves the ranks of the Armed Forces, the army in which he served remains in his mind and memory. I am still, like you, proud of the Armed Forces that were in the 70s - first half of the 80s: powerful, well-equipped and trained.
Five main tasks
Unfortunately, over the 20 years of the existence of the Russian army, the groundwork created in Soviet times was not only lost, but nothing new was acquired. This is a fact that is hard to dispute.
And when in 2008 Anatoly Eduardovich Serdyukov became the Minister of Defense of Russia, and I became the Chief of the General Staff, we were faced with a clear, clear picture of what should be done in the first place. We realized that the strength of the Armed Forces should be no more than one million people. This is due not only to the economy, but also to the demographic hole into which the country fell, and in 2012 it will sink even more.
We took as a basis the principle: the army must adequately, in real time, respond to the challenges of our time, reflect any threats to our country. We knew that these tasks would have to be solved without additional funding, since there was no money for the reform. We had to proceed from internal reserves, since the country was experiencing a shortage of funds, and the global financial crisis began. These were the starting points.
You remember that at the beginning of last year we set ourselves five main tasks.
First. From a mobilization, scattered army, from a huge degrading structure, assemble a combat-ready grouping, transferring all units only to a system of constant readiness. They should be staffed according to the wartime staff and equipped for the time being with what we have.
Second. To equip our army not with the latest, but at least with modern models of weapons and military equipment. But I'll tell you honestly: today there are practically no such samples in Russia. Even the most seedy artillery systems of any Western army have a minimum firing range of 41 kilometers, with all of them firing precision-guided ammunition. And our howitzers D-30, 2S3 Akatsiya, 2S1 Gvozdika, 2S19 Msta and others are capable of hitting targets at ranges from 15 to 21 kilometers. And so on any sample, if you compare.
Now we must not push back and criticize each other, but create a new army. No matter what. For the first time, we put the question this way: the Armed Forces should not receive beggarly handouts for re-equipment, but all the necessary funds that will really allow it to be done. And those 20 trillion rubles included in the GPV-2020 program make it possible to implement our plans.
Third. Raise a new officer. Now they say: you dispersed the army. But for some reason, few people remember the 90s and even the early 2000s, when up to 60 percent of lieutenants who graduated from military schools left immediately after graduation. And the rest - during the first two years of service. Did we properly train officers then, without flaws? A huge number of military universities were simply idle. Everyone knows this, but no one is talking about it now, as if it never happened.
Why did the officers leave? For two reasons: beggarly pay and lack of apartments. This problem also had to be solved. Therefore, in order to educate a new officer who would look at the war through the eyes of not the past, but the future, it is necessary, whether we like it or not, to change the military education system.
For example, the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces. In 2008, out of all the teachers there, which is about 500 people, only three served in the army. Only three people! And for the rest, the military path developed as follows: school, junior researcher, senior researcher, candidate of sciences (dissertation), Frunze Military Academy (doctoral dissertation), teacher of the VAGSh, head of the department. Not a single day in the army. Therefore, the question arose: who and who is cooking there? I had to rebuild a lot. But no one is going to take an example in this either from the West in general, or from the United States in particular.
Fourth. Armed conflicts, as you know, have become fleeting, leaving no time for mobilization deployment. Therefore, the troops must be in constant readiness to carry out a combat mission. This quality must be formed and taught to every soldier, every officer. And this also required the revision of all governing documents, manuals, charters, manuals, which were focused on past wars. We have already reworked them four times recently, but so far we have not received satisfaction. And only by the end of 2011, there is hope, we will be able to bring it up to standard.
Fifth. Social block. There was a lot of criticism here. There are still some problems with the same allocation of housing. There were times when officers were given inspection warrants for apartments in a house that did not even have a foundation. We know all this. But gradually it was possible to turn the tide here as well. We do everything to ensure that every serviceman has an apartment.
As for the service apartments, we have undertaken to provide officers with them in 2012. Service housing should be built only next to a military unit.
Who do the troops need?
Many questions arose about money allowance. They were not easy to solve. Repeated government meetings were held. At one of the last, as you know, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin said that they discussed this problem until late at night in a rather tough regime. It confirmed that the lieutenant from January 1, 2012 will receive from 50 to 80 thousand rubles. Why? Anything above 50 is various grades for class, length of service, etc. Previously, there were over twenty of these far-fetched allowances. Now there are five left. But they will significantly affect, as you know, the amount of money allowance and pension.
Mobilization component. We deliberately decided to change it. As a person who has served from a platoon commander to chief of the General Staff, I understand perfectly well that the commanders of a platoon, company, battalion will not be able to engage in combat and mobilization training at the same time. All officials, up to and including the army commander, should have only combat and operational training in the first place. But already at the level of the military district, the leadership can and should deal with mobilization readiness. This function remained there. So have we destroyed the mobilization component? No, we just moved her from the company-battalion-regiment to the level of the military district, and made her the commander of the district troops. At the same time, an appropriate structure was created. And now the entire mobilization potential, which is over 180 brigades that can be formed on the ground, is under the jurisdiction of the command of the military districts (USC).
Moreover. Under these mobilization resources are laid equipment, weapons, material and technical reserves, and much more. Thus, no one violated the mobilization readiness. Therefore, to say that our mobilization resource is weakening is completely wrong.
The Armed Forces have about 725 thousand soldiers. The young man served a year and returned - is that not a mobilization resource? Yes, and various gatherings for the retraining of the officer corps, other events with storerooms were also not interrupted, they are being carried out.
The next one is about conscription service for one year. It is very difficult to prepare a competent, qualified specialist from yesterday's schoolchild during this time. Take at least the same repairman. For six months he studies the equipment that he must repair, and for six months he prepares to be fired. But we are now reducing the training time for such specialists to three months by intensifying the educational process. This will speed up their preparation and will make it possible to make four issues a year.
We made sure that we need to build up the wrong contract military contingent that we had. When contract soldiers were paid 6–8 thousand rubles each, they collected people across Russia who had not found their place in life. What for? To then suffer with such military personnel?
From January 1, 2012, the salary of a contractor will be approximately 35 thousand rubles, on the basis of which a strict selection should be carried out. Moreover, it will first be taken into account how capable a particular candidate is to study and master complex military equipment and weapons. If he passes the first stage, then a contract is signed with him for further military service. No goodbye. Let me emphasize: we need a highly trained, qualified soldier, and, excuse me, not cannon fodder.
Military education. We are transforming and improving it. The main thing is that our lieutenant should not be the same as he was received at the exit from a military university recently: with a huge cockade on his cap, a cigarette in his mouth, hands in his pockets, and swear words. You don't need such lieutenants. We need an educated, trained, intelligent person - the officer that all commanders would like to see in their subunit or military unit. This is exactly what military education is aimed at, no one is going to destroy it. And if we are mistaken in something, then we will certainly listen to everyone who knows this problem well and works with us in close contact, including the Academy of Sciences. But we are not going to blindly copy foreign experience either.
As for the rotation of the officers. Accepted is the position that existed in the Soviet army. An officer who has served 3-5 years in one place must rotate. We have been pursuing such a line for the second year already. But, as it turned out, this is extremely difficult. Here's a specific example. For example, a young man began serving as a lieutenant in the Moscow military district, rose to the rank of major, without leaving it, or even beyond the Moscow ring road. When he was offered to go to Siberia, to the Far East for a higher position, he refused. And there are many similar cases. Then the approach should be the same: if you don't go - write a report on dismissal from the Armed Forces.
So, in only one department of the Moscow Military District, 8 percent of the officers immediately put the reports on the table. Because some of them have acquired dachas, started microbusiness … Naturally, a person is no longer up to service, and even less to training and educating subordinates. And it is necessary that the officer is engaged only in his own military affairs. Therefore, the rotation was, is and will be. No one will sit for more than 3-5 years in one place and in one position.
As for the recent decision to increase the number of the Armed Forces by 70 thousand officers, this is due to the creation of new high-tech structures in the army and navy. Including aerospace defense. In addition, by order of the President, missile divisions were additionally left in the Strategic Missile Forces. Now the army aviation is being built up, the air defense system of the Land Forces is being created. And all this will require people. But we are not going to bring someone back. These officers will have to be trained not only in higher military educational institutions, we will take some from civilian technical universities, because engineers are needed first of all.
Tasks and functions separately
Considerable changes have also taken place in the structure and functions of the main commands of the Armed Forces, which has also been criticized. But the high command offices, as you remember, partly copied the functions of the General Staff. They had exactly the same bodies: operational management and others. In the structure of the military district, the army is the same. This redundant system from top to bottom was far from the most effective, since often the senior boss kicked the subordinate with kicks.
We proposed to get away from this and create a structure that itself should work. I'm alive. Therefore, we divided the tasks and functions. Now each of the three commanders-in-chief of the Armed Forces (Air Force, Navy, Ground Forces) is responsible not for 43 tasks that previously faced him, but only for 5. The first is the construction of his own type of Armed Forces. The second is the organization of combat and operational training. The third is peacekeeping operations. The fourth is the training and retraining of officers and sergeants. Fifth - the development of requirements for the models of weapons and military equipment of its type of the Armed Forces, control over their implementation at the defense industry factories. Everything. But this is a lot, and it is good that these tasks are solved efficiently and on time.
Today this mechanism must be launched. So that combat training is carried out everywhere at high damage, which some have forgotten how to organize.
We have switched to a two-three-tier management and responsibility system, which greatly simplifies it and makes it more transparent, economical and less financially costly. This greatly facilitates the solution of the tasks facing the commander-in-chief. And the brigade commander, the army commander, has no other concerns besides combat training. They are not engaged in boiler rooms, they do not deliver fuel, they do not care about light, and there is no need to paint fences.
So a lot of work is being done. There are still many unsolved problems that need to be seriously worked on. What we are doing today.
