Not so long ago, passions flared up in a number of Russian media that the Defense Ministry was cutting off the oxygen of democratic ideals for domestic servicemen serving on a contract basis. The instigator here was the Izvestia newspaper, which published a rather controversial material that the Russian Government prevents contract servicemen from living according to democratic principles. Where did the Izvestia journalists get such thoughts from?
The whole point, it turns out, is in the supplement to the instructions of the head of the defense department No. 205/2/180 signed back in March this year by Anatoly Serdyukov. This appendix, which has generated quite a bit of backlash in certain quarters, is the "List of restrictions and prohibitions applicable to contract military personnel."
In the document, before the immediate prohibitions begin, Serdyukov demands from the commanders to "bring the whole essence of the document to the signature" to the contract servicemen. At the same time, the minister states that the document must have two copies, one of which must be kept in the personal file of the serviceman, and the other must be handed over to each serviceman.
The requirements themselves are based on several Federal Laws: "On the State Civil Service", "On the Status of Servicemen", "On Combating Corruption", "On the Procedure for Leaving the RF and Entry into the RF" and "On State Secrets".
The largest number of disputes arose around several points of requirements. These requirements are in the form of direct quotes below.
1. Restricted the rights to inviolability of private life during verification activities during the period of registration (re-registration) of access to state secrets.
2. It is forbidden to refuse to perform the duties of military service on the grounds of attitude to religion and to use their official powers to promote this or that attitude to religion.
3. It is forbidden to discuss and criticize the commander's orders, exercising their right to freedom of speech, expression of their opinions and beliefs, access to receiving and disseminating information.
4. It is forbidden to make public assessments, judgments and statements regarding the activities of state bodies.
Violation of these and a number of other requirements may result in the early dismissal of a soldier from military service. In addition, a serviceman who violates the items on the list may be subject to administrative, material and even criminal punishment.
At first glance, it may seem that the requirements of the Ministry of Defense for contract servicemen are rather strict. However, here you need to understand the other side: the requirements apply exclusively to those people who themselves have chosen military service as their main activity, which will bring them income. In other words, if a person has taken the oath, then he must strictly observe it, and since he has leaders, then strict observance of their orders is his direct duty as a soldier. The text of the oath contains such a clause as "to comply with the requirements of the Military Regulations, orders of commanders and chiefs."Therefore, the concern of those who say that pressure is being exerted on the military is completely incomprehensible. Yes, in that case, the military oath itself is nothing more than pressure, but it is taken by people who link their fate with the army through a contract, as if on a voluntary basis, and not out of a stick …
Let's try to think about what the Armed Forces of Russia would be like if neither the military oath, nor the four points of the above requirements were binding.
So, a certain soldier takes the oath, gets a certain position and begins to fulfill his military duties. This serviceman begins to subject his own interpretations to the very first order of his commander, and to make himself more convincing in the dubiousness of the order, he finds contact with the media: so, they say, today he received an order to clean the tracks of the tank, and why should they be cleaned if tomorrow the dirt sticks again … And in general, write this down, dear correspondents: my commander is a fool, I don’t understand at all who approved him for this position, it would be my will, I arranged everything differently in the military unit … Apparently, in the understanding of some human rights activists, freedom of speech in Russia the army should look like this.
But here there is one quite significant problem: the army from a very rigid system with a traditional hierarchy and rules of subordination will turn into a very original discussion platform, where first everyone is given the floor, and then by voting and transparent ballot boxes it will be determined in which direction the battalions to advance and whether to clean the tank tracks or still wait until winter …
But apparently, this state of affairs is not particularly worried about those people who speak negatively about the restrictions concerning military personnel.
In particular, lawyer Dmitry Agranovsky states that the ban on public statements about the decisions of his commanders, as well as the ban on assessments of the activities of state bodies, violates the rights of military personnel as citizens of Russia. In his opinion, all these requirements and prohibitions are unconstitutional.
Attempts to find information about his military service in the biography of Agranovsky's lawyer were unsuccessful. And, you see, it would be strange if a person who gave some time to serve in the ranks of the Russian Army would allow himself such very controversial statements about freedom of speech in the RF Armed Forces. Obviously, it is not the servicemen themselves who are more concerned about the “infringement” of the rights of contractors, who are well aware that, according to their official rights and duties, they can and cannot, but people who are insanely far from the army.
Naturally, from the point of view of, let's say, a civilian man in the street, the situation with why a restriction on the right to privacy should be introduced during the registration of a serviceman's admission to state secrets may be incomprehensible.
Many people who think in the same paradigms as Dmitry Agranovsky, under the word "restriction of the right to privacy", apparently understand something like this: people in black masks can burst into a soldier's bedroom in the middle of the night and check if he had time in a fit of tenderness give his wife any secret information about his service. Yes, all restrictions on the right to privacy of a soldier in this case relate to the verification of his biographical information. And this check of the beginning was carried out far from yesterday. Both before 1917 and in Soviet times, before the admission of a serviceman to a certain position associated with the need to keep state secrets, his family ties, ties and, let's say, public contacts were checked.
And if we talk about the undemocratic nature of the Russian army, then the same question can be addressed, for example, to many banks that, before deciding on a loan, require the provision of documents confirming the availability of work and the level of the borrower's earnings. No matter how they try to interfere in private life?.. So the Ministry of Defense at least calls things by their proper names, and does not try to replace concepts with the help of juridically intricate terms, as representatives of financial systems do.
Why have lawyers not bothered about this "restriction of the right to privacy" on the part of the banking community?
If we talk about the prohibition on the fact that a serviceman made public judgments regarding the activities of state officials, such a prohibition is understandable. But are there any states in the world, the servicemen of whose armies, without hiding their identity, criticize the policy of the state authorities from right to left? In any country in the world, if you want to criticize, then first write a report confirming that you do not want to defend the interests of this particular state, and then criticize as much as you like … In all other cases, public criticism from military personnel of state power is called neither than more than calls for the overthrow of the constitutional order. Neither more nor less …
Well, as for the prohibition of propaganda of one or another attitude of Russian servicemen to religion - everything seems to be clear here too. Attempts to play Martin Luther in the presence of the shoulder straps of a Russian serviceman somehow do not at all fit either with the Charter of the Armed Forces, or with the very concept of a Russian officer. Even the regimental priests are faced with the task not to call for confessional feats or confrontations, but to organize the spiritual and moral patriotic education of servicemen.
Therefore, all the words that the Ministry of Defense has decided to restrict the rights and freedoms of Russian servicemen can only be associated with the remoteness of the authors of these words from the realities of military service with its traditions and characteristics.
