The new look of the Russian army has already become the talk of the town. All sane people criticize him tirelessly. But Medvedev, Putin, Serdyukov and others stubbornly adhere to their line. Although any person more or less versed in military affairs understands that the results of this new appearance will be catastrophic. However, the main surprise is yet to come. It seems that somewhere at the turn of 2011-2012, just before the presidential elections, we will have a campaign with bravura fanfare about the tremendous successes in the rearmament of the army and navy. The TV broadcasts will be overwhelmed with stories in which the generals and Serdyukov will enthusiastically broadcast how, thanks to the new look of the Armed Forces, unprecedented successes have been achieved in the rearmament of the army and navy in such a short time. But all these victorious reports will be crafty. The arithmetic of these bravura reports will be primitive, but incomprehensible to the uninitiated. Let's try to give a little explanation. Publication in the newspaper "Soviet Russia".
EVERYONE knows that the main evil for the Armed Forces has been declared the existing structure: district-army-division-regiment-battalion. And also the "excessively large" number of officers in the army and navy. The elimination of such a structure and the expulsion of unnecessary officers has been declared a panacea for all the troubles of the Armed Forces. They say, we will liquidate the divisions, expel the officers from the army, and the Armed Forces will immediately acquire inconceivable effectiveness.
The technique of the deceit itself is extremely simple. Let's take 36 divisions of constant readiness, units and formations of army subordination, units and formations belonging to the reserve of the Supreme High Command (RVGK), as well as cadre formations and storage bases for equipment and weapons of the mobilization reserve. To fully provide the Armed Forces of such a structure with the necessary equipment and weapons, approximately 15,000 tanks, about 36,000 armored combat vehicles and up to 30,000 artillery pieces, mortars and multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS) are required. The numbers are big. And from this number the newest tanks
T-90, BMP-3 infantry fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers BTR-90, as well as the latest models of artillery and high-precision "intellectual" weapons make up 10% of the strength at best. That is, for the rearmament of the Ground Forces, large-scale supplies of weapons and military equipment are required. And still, even by 2020, given the current state of the Russian military-industrial complex, the above-mentioned samples, under the most favorable conditions, will make up no more than 50% of the fleet of military equipment and weapons. But at the same time, by 2020, they themselves will already become obsolete. And there are no new developments on the way. And what to do?
A way out was found amazing in its Jesuit cunning. If it is impossible to produce new equipment in the required quantities, then it is necessary to send as many of its obsolete models for scrap as possible in order to artificially raise the percentage of the newest weapons and equipment that are used to equip the army. Indeed, for 36 combined-arms brigades (in fact, reinforced regiments) the need for military equipment and weapons will be significantly, several times less and will amount to: in tanks - 2,500-3,000 units; in armored combat vehicles - about 6000–7500; in artillery systems, taking into account the few remaining artillery units of the RVGK - 6000–6500. Thus, in one fell swoop, due to the transformation of divisions into brigades and the reduction of everything and everything, the need for weapons and military equipment is sharply reduced. And at the same time, the percentage of staffing of troops with the latest models of weapons and equipment is growing significantly. Small additional purchases and the "stool" Minister of Defense with pathos reports that the army is 3/4 equipped with the latest models of tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers and everything else. Women shout: "Hurray!", And caps fly up.
Naturally, at the same time, it will be diligently concealed that such an army is capable of waging, at best, only local battles and only with an enemy like the Georgian "army". That any more or less serious conflict will lead to fatal consequences. This "reformers" do not care. They are firmly convinced that foreign "class brothers" will never go to armed aggression against them, forgetting, due to their deep historical and cultural ignorance, that many millennia of war were just fought between "class brothers" - slave owners, feudal lords, the bourgeoisie …
NOW let's compare the brainchild of the current reform - the brigade and the traditional division. In a motorized rifle division there were: three motorized rifle regiments (tank, artillery and anti-aircraft missile), an anti-tank artillery battalion, as well as battalions: reconnaissance, communications, engineer-sapper, repair and restoration, material support, medical and sanitary.
The artillery regiment of the division provided reinforcement of the regimental artillery without involving the artillery of the RVGK. The anti-tank fighter division was the division's anti-tank reserve. Thanks to the anti-aircraft missile regiment, the division could provide air defense not only in the line of sight directly above the battlefield with the forces of anti-aircraft divisions of motorized rifle regiments, but also significantly expand the area of destruction of enemy aircraft and helicopters, and hit “over the horizon”. The engineer-sapper battalion was very powerful, providing both the engineering equipment of positions with the laying of convoy tracks (a company of engineering vehicles), and the installation of minefields and demining (a sapper company), and the ferrying of equipment on amphibious transporters and self-propelled ferries (airborne transfer company), and the guidance of floating bridges (pontoon-bridge company). The repair and restoration battalion provided the repair of all types of weapons and equipment. The medical and sanitary battalion was able to provide treatment for a significant number of the wounded, with the exception of those who required long-term inpatient treatment. But this is in the division, and in the brigade there is none of this.
It should be especially noted that the brigade is defenseless against NATO air attack weapons. The anti-aircraft missile systems of the anti-aircraft missile regiment of the division had a range of destruction of air targets up to 12-15 and even 20 km. That is, they could hit enemy aircraft before the launch line of high-precision weapons. The current brigade has only one anti-aircraft battalion, capable of hitting air targets only within sight and at a distance of no more than 6-8 km. And most of the modern high-precision weapons of the Air Force and NATO Army Aviation have a range exceeding 6-8 km. In addition, this high-precision weapon has a let-and-forget principle of action, and therefore it is pointless to hit planes and helicopters, carriers of such weapons, after its launch. An airplane or helicopter, having fired a missile or dropped a corrected aerial bomb, turns it aside and hides behind the folds of the terrain. In other words, NATO aircraft can arrange a real beating of the Russian brigade without the slightest damage to themselves.
Of course, someone will say that the brigade can receive reinforcement at the expense of the air defense of the higher command. Here are just these means - the cat cried, since the army and front-line brigades of the air defense missile system are also "optimized", i.e. are simply overclocked. Now the S-300V air defense systems have been withdrawn from the Ground Forces and transferred to the Air Force. That is, there will be no talk of any close cooperation with combined arms units and formations. And the remaining Buk air defense missile systems are subordinated to such a high command that the brigade commander will not even have to hope for cover from their side. And in a real battle, it may well happen that all these air defense systems, subordinate to senior commanders, will gallop to the place where the brigade was beaten, when there will no longer be anyone to cover the needs there. Moreover, the question is whether the higher command will want to weaken the cover from the attacks of the enemy aircraft of its beloved. The fact that some NATO Air Force brigade is beating up is all bullshit, the main thing is to survive ourselves.
The scanty number of artillery units remaining after the "reform", primarily as a result of the disbandment of artillery divisions, deprives the brigade of hopes for a significant reinforcement with artillery, since the troops are now deprived of the most powerful means of quantitative and qualitative reinforcement of military artillery, which were artillery divisions. The newly-minted brigade will have to rely only on its only artillery battalion. Sparsely, very sparsely for a serious battle, and not for showy games of soldiers. And no chatter that now the brigades will receive modern means of controlling artillery fire will change the situation. Reliable suppression of enemy defense requires a certain expenditure of ammunition, and the more artillery barrels fire, the less time this task will be completed, and the time factor in modern warfare is of colossal importance. Any delay in time gives the enemy a chance for retaliatory steps to correct the unfavorable situation for him.
Because of the "optimization", the issue of engineering support for combat operations, in particular, overcoming water obstacles and engineering equipment of positions, will be very acute. The division could independently ensure the crossing of all its equipment through a water barrier of almost any width using floating conveyors and self-propelled ferries, and a floating bridge could be built across a river up to 300 meters wide. And there was no need to wait for the pontooners from the RVGK units. The brigade cannot do it. And it turns out that if the brigade hits any river (even a rivulet), it will have to stand up tight. Yes, infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers will be able to cross by swimming. But what about tanks, artillery, rear units? And the brigade, instead of throwing itself over the water obstacle, will stamp long and stubbornly on the banks of the river. Either you have to wait for pontooners to creep up from somewhere from afar (which is not a fact!), Or to return units that have already crossed over from the other side and stomp to where the pontoon bridge has already been built. Only now, a long wait for the pontooners will lead to the enemy calmly bringing fresh forces to the bridgehead captured by our troops and simply dropping the units that have crossed into the river. And the accumulation of several brigades at the only pontoon crossing is a tasty prey for enemy aviation. And you will end up with a bottleneck through which the brigades will squeeze through with difficulty, and the enemy will beat them in parts. Or would the would-be reformers hope that the enemy will kindly leave all the bridges across the rivers intact and safe? And take the engineering equipment of the positions of your troops and the laying of column tracks on the road? The company of engineering vehicles of the engineer battalion had a large number of earth-moving and track-laying equipment. With this technique, in the shortest possible time, field fortifications could be prepared, which provided shelter for personnel and equipment. Or column paths were laid for the movement of troops, rubble on the existing roads were dismantled. None of this is available in the brigade. What for? After all, the stool reformers are firmly convinced that all these brigades will not have to participate in anything other than ostentatious "wars" in front of the eyes of the "highest" persons.
As a result, we see that a brigade is something slightly stronger than a regiment, but much weaker than a division, unable to solve any significant combat mission on its own, but at the same time cannot count on significant reinforcement from the higher command.
The armed conflict in South Ossetia revealed the enormity of the situation in the Armed Forces as a result of the notorious Yeltsin-Putin "reforms" in the country. However, instead of admitting this fact, instead of admitting that practically a crime was committed when the army was being destroyed, it was decided to use a kind of trick. As already mentioned, all the blame for the appalling state of the army was placed not on the authorities, but on the structure of the army. They say that it is not the Yeltsin-Putin reform that is to blame, but the structure in the army is bad, and therefore there is no rearmament.
The bottom line is that in a "new look" the Armed Forces will be able to fight only with an operetta army of the type of Georgian warriors. A meeting with a strong, numerous and well-armed enemy will lead to a quick and inevitable defeat.
The new uniform will cost the Russian army 25 billion rubles
Within three years, servicemen of the army and navy will switch to a new uniform. This was stated by Viktor Ozerov, Chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Defense. The funds will be allocated from the federal budget. (RSN.)
I WANT to use such a remark. All the nonsense that a small, but exceptionally well-equipped army will give a hundred points ahead of a mass army is a fairy tale for crazy liberal intellectuals. One example. In 1914-1915. on the Black Sea, the German battle cruiser Goeben was far superior in combat power to any of the outdated Russian battleships. A one-on-one meeting with him would be fatal for any of these ships. But Russian battleships always went out to sea only in a brigade of three ships. And never once did "Goeben" dare to engage in a decisive battle with three Russian battleships at once. For one simple reason. Calculations showed that as a result of this battle, one of the Russian battleships would be sunk, the second was seriously damaged, but the third would get off with moderate damage. But "Goeben" is also guaranteed to go to the bottom. After that, the German-Turkish fleet in the Black Sea will practically cease to exist as a real force. The loss of the Goeben would be fatal for him. Because the damaged Russian battleships will eventually return to service, and the Goeben cannot be reached from the bottom of the sea. The Russian fleet will retain its combat capability, albeit somewhat reduced, but the combat capability of the German-Turkish fleet will be irreparably undermined. Therefore, for a mass army, the loss of even several formations in battles is not fatal, these losses can be replenished at the expense of a mobilization reserve, the deployment of new divisions based on storage bases or cadre formations, and military production. But for the notorious "small, well-equipped" army, the loss of just one formation or even one unit becomes an irreparable loss, leading to a complete loss of combat capability and the death of the entire army as a whole.
The last remark. On the eve of World War II, the British Empire's Grand Fleet numbered 17 ships of the line. Of these, 10 ships of the types "Rivenge" and "Queen Elizabeth" built in 1915-1916. were already obsolete, and two battleships - "Lord Nelson" and "Rodney" - were, to put it mildly, not entirely modern. And only 5 battleships of the "King George the Fifth" class were commissioned literally on the eve of the war. That is, the newest battleships accounted for only 30% of the number of battleships. However, the Lords of the Admiralty, even in a nightmare, could not dream of going on a scheme: to write off ten outdated battleships in one fell swoop and cheerfully report that the number of the newest battleships in the British "Grand Fleet" now amounts to 70% of the number of linear forces. For such tricks, the gallows would inevitably await them. But in the British Navy, such machinations would not have passed, and in the Russian army, everything will be very chocolatey. First, a wholesale write-off of equipment for scrap, followed by cheerful reports, victorious reports, the delight of the sycophantic media.
And the very last remark. Everyone now knows the latest know-how of the current minister, who decided that the army does not need officers - platoon commanders. The sergeants are enough. And you don't need to teach a platoon commander for four years. Therefore, admission to military universities has been suspended. The absurdity of this statement is visible to the naked eye to any person who is more or less versed in military affairs. Yes, in order to vengeance the parade ground, dig ditches or paint fences for four years, it is not necessary to teach a person to be an officer. And fight? After all, an officer - a graduate of a military school - was trained to organize hostilities up to the battalion (division) level inclusive. The failure of the company or battery commander in battle was not fatal for the unit, did not mean the loss of control of the unit, any platoon commander was prepared to immediately replace the company or battery commander. And even the commander of a battalion or division, if necessary. If we have platoon commanders of half-educated sergeants, then one successful hit of high-precision ammunition can turn not only a company or battery, but even a battalion or division into a herd, into a helpless uncontrollable crowd, when no one will know what and how to do. This is especially true of artillery. Any artillery lieutenant could carry out all the fire missions facing an artillery battalion. But this is an officer who studied at a military university for four or five years. What will the sergeant be capable of? At best, shoot with direct fire. This is at its best. And how would the would-be reformers think to fight? Ask the enemy to wait until the sergeants are trained to take command of a company-battery or battalion-battalion? Or persuade the adversary not to fight until they find someone in our rear who can take command of the units?
And WHERE will company and battalion commanders come from then? Are we going to produce them right away, without going through the primary command post? Or will these positions be immediately reserved for the sons of general from military training centers at civilian universities? When his son is a general and is five years old at home, with daddy and mommy, he finds himself, and immediately makes a dizzying career. Almost like under the all-Russian autocrat Elizaveta Petrovna. From a young age, they wrote down the ignoramus in the regiment, he sat at home with the nurses, and the service went on. By the age of eighteen - already a colonel. What is not an example for today's "stoolists"? This is what kind of room there will be for the current generals! When they were son, without having served a day in the army, they will immediately become colonels at the age of 18! I give this know-how. Is free.
One gets the impression that the army is being prepared only for ostentatious maneuvers, when they rehearse everything three hundred times in advance, before showing it to the "highest" persons. And they don't even think about what the consequences will be in a real battle from the half-educated platoon officers. Well, everything is clear with the minister and his advisers, but do the multi-star generals, singing along with this orgy, do not understand this? Or, in a desire to please a high official, are they ready to go to any mockery of the army, just to sit in their chairs and not lose access to bread places?
Of course, the problem requires much more serious coverage than is possible in such an article. In particular, no one thought about how the transfer of aviation engineers and aircraft technicians to civilian personnel would affect the combat effectiveness of the Air Force. After all, flights must be carried out both day and night, without time limits, and
civilian personnel live according to the Labor Code, they have a working day from 9:00 to 18:00. And how to fly at night, how to conduct exercises? You cannot give a civilian an order that flights should start at six in the morning, he does not care, he will demand to change his labor agreement, collective agreement. And no orders, if they contradict labor legislation, are not a decree for him. Imagine the picture: the flights are underway, and then all the ground personnel get together and go home, their working day is over. And they wanted to sneeze at the orders of the commander, they are not military personnel. Or is the furniture minister seriously convinced that the dismissed officers will simply have nowhere to go, and they will still crawl on their knees with a request to take them as civilian specialists in order to feed their families?
And what about the "optimization" of logistics? The great stool strategist suddenly made the discovery that the rear support of the army was not needed, they say, civil commercial structures could well be engaged in this. Only now the land is full of rumors that the units are going to the training ground, to the training center, and the merchants refuse to go there, or such prices for services are wringing that no military budget will be enough. And the officers have to buy all sorts of "doshiraki" for their money in order to feed the soldiers. And if there is an armed conflict? It is not customary for us to declare mobilization and impose a state of emergency. Troops will go to war, and suddenly they have enough, but there is no fuel, no ammunition, no food, merchants refused to go under the bullets. And doctors from civilian polyclinics, too - their employment contract does not say anything about the war. And how are we going to fight? How will we save the wounded? Again by the heroic efforts of the soldiers? Again, a soldier for himself and for that guy will plow? And the "stool workers" will then reap the laurels, ascribe all the successes to themselves? If these successes are.
Unfortunately, society is not alarmed by what is being done to the army once again. But only if it hurts, and the army will not be able to fulfill the tasks of defending the Fatherland, who will we ask? Nobody wants to ask themselves, and the tandem will not allow asking the minister. Anyone and anything will be the cause, but not the thoughtless reforms of the furniture minister and his patrons. And will anyone already ask when the foreign patrols will be on the streets?
