About the strategic concept of rapid decisive action - a new approach to the conduct of military operations by the US Army in the 21st century
06:18 — REGNUM
The central body of the Russian Ministry of Defense, the newspaper "Red Star", today publishes the main provisions of the report of a famous military practitioner and analyst, President of the Academy of Military Sciences, Army General M.A. Gareeva“Strategic deterrence: problems and solutions,” which he spoke at a round table at the Peter the Great Strategic Missile Forces Military Academy. Representatives of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, the main headquarters of the branches of the Armed Forces, the apparatus of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, the Military-Industrial Commission, the State Duma and the Federation Council of the Russian Federation, and military scientists took part in the round table. gives the text of this publication:
Strategic deterrence: problems and solutions
National security is the concern of the state
At the present stage, strategic deterrence is becoming one of the most important and pressing problems of ensuring the defense and national security of Russia as a whole. The main feature of the emerging military-political situation is that, under the influence of the growing complex process of globalization of international political and economic relations, the objectively developing interdependence of various countries, two interpenetrating and opposing processes are becoming increasingly visible.
On the one hand, it is quite obvious that the nature and scale of the economic, environmental, energy, socio-political and spiritual problems facing the human community are such that solving them, including ensuring reliable security, requires the unification of all available the disposal of different countries and peoples of material and intellectual resources, consideration and respect for at least the most vital interests of each other. It is impossible to abolish economic, technological, information competition, which gives rise to various kinds of contradictions. But common interests of survival must unite different countries and peoples in something important. This is the objective basis for a multipolar world.
On the other hand, there are strong circles in the world associated mainly with transnational financial structures who strive to establish a monopolar world. Irrefutable data and facts provided by experts who conducted an independent investigation into the causes of the terrorist attack in the United States on September 11, 2001, allow us to conclude that this terrorist attack was the result of a clash between two opposing factions within America, one of which proceeds from the fact that the United States should submit to these transnational structures, while the other believes that it is the United States that should take on the role of a “world government.”
If we proceed from reality and remember how many fatal miscalculations that contradict its long-term national interests the United States has made over the past 10-15 years (Yugoslavia, Iraq, the unrestrained expansion of NATO, pushing the Georgian provocation in South Ossetia), then it is easy to see that the American government is far from does not always act of his own free will and is increasingly losing independence.
The most competent scientists, politicians and economists are forced to admit that capitalism with its society of unlimited consumption is not eternal. For example, the United States, with 5 percent of the world's population, consumes about 50 percent of the world's raw materials and 25 percent of petroleum products. If all countries reach this level of consumption, then raw materials and energy resources will last no more than 5-10 years, which is fraught with economic and environmental disasters. Water resources, forests, fertile lands, and environmentally friendly areas are inexorably declining.
The world is undergoing a structural restructuring of the global economic system, when the predominant role is played not by the real economy, based on natural resources, industrial and agricultural production, but by its virtual model, based on credit and financial technologies that allow making profits from the management process itself, unsupported financial transactions. Transnational companies have the opportunity to put pressure on other countries and artificially create financial and other crises in unwanted countries. The anti-Russian orientation of this policy is obvious. As Zbigniew Brzezinski frankly stated, “in the 21st century, America will develop against Russia, at the expense of Russia and on the ruins of Russia.”
Militarily, the United States is placing its main emphasis on gaining predominant superiority in space and strategic nuclear forces, focusing on the delivery of preventive, preemptive strikes, the development of long-range precision weapons, information and other high-tech means of warfare. At the same time, the creation of global missile defense systems is being accelerated. The calculation is made to deprive the opposing countries of their main nuclear missile systems with a pre-emptive strike, and to certainly destroy the remaining ones with a missile defense system.
This is the main point of installing strategic missile defense systems in Eastern Europe and other countries. Geopolitically, the United States seeks to oust Russia from the entire post-Soviet space, tear the CIS countries away from it, draw them into the endlessly expanding NATO system and block Russia from all sides, and deprive China of access to the energy resources of Central Asia.
In light of all of the above, Russia faces a stubborn struggle to establish its worthy place in the world. In this area, it is no longer possible to continue to act according to long-established patterns, but radically new approaches are needed.
First of all, a more consistent and state-wide systemic approach to ensuring national security is required. Russian Federation. Since the threats to Russia are not only military, but also largely non-military in nature, and these threats are closely intertwined, it is necessary to ensure organic unity and consistency of measures taken by the state to counter these threats, close coordination of the activities of all state and public organizations in ensuring reliable defense security. Due to the lack of such coordination in actions, we lost the Cold War.
The primary task of ensuring national security is to counter political, economic, ideological, psychological, informational, intelligence, counterintelligence, terrorist and other actions of other states aimed at undermining the national security of Russia, and to make the fullest possible use of all non-military means to ensure national security.
It should be noted that at present the volume and interpenetration of economic ties between the United States and China are such that they restrain the American leadership from any drastic actions against China. In this regard, the economy becomes the main limiting factor.
Strategic Deterrence Strategy
In the implementation of defense, including military security, a more meaningful and purposeful approach is required. We have a strictly consistent system of strategic actions in wartime: the strategic deployment of armed forces, the combat use of the Armed Forces in various forms of strategic actions. All of them are united by a single plan, the sequence of actions of control bodies and all types of armed forces and branches of the military is determined.
Activities of the Armed Forces in Peaceful time planned mainly from the point of view of preparation for combat missions during the above-mentioned strategic actions. In the past, it was all about dealing with opposing threats head-on. Excessive zeal in this area often only strengthened and aggravated these threats. For example, when we responded not asymmetrically, but directly to each turn of the arms race.
In a number of cases at that time this was justified. For example, I still believe that sending missiles and nuclear weapons to Cuba was not an adventure on our part, as they are now trying to portray. With this risky but bold step, we warned America that it, too, should not bury itself. They forced the Americans to remove missiles from Turkish territory and extracted from them an obligation not to attack Cuba.
But in our time, when the economic and military power of Russia is not comparable with the capabilities of the USSR and America, and in order to achieve greater rationality of actions, we must respond to emerging threats more flexibly and, if possible, not with direct, but asymmetrical measures. All these measures must also be united by a single goal and plan of action.
For this purpose, it is proposed to introduce the concept of “strategic deterrence.” In practice, it is already used, but is not always understood in the same way or is reduced only to strategic nuclear deterrence.
In our understanding, strategic deterrence is a set of interconnected political, diplomatic, informational, economic, military and other measures aimed at containing, reducing and preventing threats and aggressive actions on the part of any state (coalition of states) through retaliatory measures that reduce the fear of the opposite party or an adequate threat of unacceptable consequences as a result of retaliatory actions.
Strategic deterrence is carried out through the efforts and defensive power of the entire state.
On the part of the state as a whole (state bodies), it provides:
Creation of the necessary defense power of the state, based on ever-increasing economic opportunities and the high-tech defense industry. Equipping the Armed Forces and other troops with modern types of weapons and military equipment, formation of defense consciousness of society. Nationwide support for the state's defense efforts. Preparing youth for military service;
Active proactive political, diplomatic and information activities to prevent and resolve conflict situations by peaceful, political means. Organization of effective information warfare;
From the Ministry of Defense (Armed Forces) and other law enforcement agencies:
Maintenance and reinforcement by military means of political, diplomatic, economic, informational and other actions to ensure defense security by non-military means. If necessary, a demonstration of military presence and military force;
Maintaining the necessary combat capability, combat and mobilization readiness of the Armed Forces and other troops to carry out assigned and unexpected tasks;
Intelligence, counterintelligence and information activities in order to timely identify threats and possible aggressive terrorist actions against our country;
Carrying out peacekeeping and counter-terrorism operations;
Military cooperation with other countries;
Air defense of the country, security and protection state border in the airspace, underwater environment and protection of the state border on land and sea by military means;
Preparing the country's infrastructure and possible theaters of military operations for the defense of the country. Organization of territorial and civil defense;
Actions to assist the bodies, troops and military formations of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the FSB, the Ministry of Emergency Situations in solving problems of neutralizing internal conflicts, protecting and defending the most important facilities and the state border.
All these measures and defense tasks are known, and they are generally implemented in practice. We need to think about what needs to be done to increase the effectiveness of solving these problems - taking into account the lessons and conclusions arising from the experience of the so-called “five-day war” in the Caucasus.
First of all, in our opinion, a balanced foreign policy course should be continued in accordance with the accepted concept of the foreign policy of the Russian Federation. Only peaceful development will allow Russia to achieve its main goal on economic, nanotechnological and socio-political modernization of the country.
Internationally, it is advisable to understand the approaches and norms of life of various peoples. Now in the world press the main emphasis is on compliance with the principle of preserving the territorial integrity of states. Of course, this principle must first of all be respected; it is impossible to grant statehood to every small nation.
But in addition to the principle of the integrity of states, there is also the right of peoples to self-determination. When a particular people is not provided with normal conditions for the realization of its national identity, and even more so in the case when it is subjected to oppression or genocide, in such cases any people has the right to claim state self-determination. This is what happened in South Ossetia. The aspect of division of the united Ossetian people is also important.
From this point of view, the actions of the Russian leadership and military command in response to Georgian aggression are completely justified, legitimate and necessary. If Russia had swallowed this “pill” this time and limited itself to indignation, as has happened many times in the past, it would have lost its face as a great state and few would have taken it into account either in the West or in the CIS. She would lose a lot in the eyes of Russian society.
According to the captured Georgian plans, a simultaneous attack on Abkhazia was envisaged, as well as the implementation of a number of terrorist and provocative actions in other regions of the Caucasus (for example, in Ingushetia, Karachay-Cherkessia and others) under the false slogans of developing a national liberation movement. All this suggests that Russia still faces serious challenges in the Caucasus.
All these issues are directly related not only to foreign or defense policy, but also directly affect domestic policy in Russia. In our multinational, federal state there must be a long-term national policy, and matters of interethnic relations must be dealt with systematically. In this regard, one cannot help but characterize various proposals for the abolition of national autonomies as provocative. Russia, as a multinational state, can maintain its stability only if it is built on the basis of the consistent implementation of the principles of federalism...
Purposeful, thorough work with the CIS countries is extremely important for us. For example, an acute conflict is now brewing between Central Asian countries over water sources. They are found mainly in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. But Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan cannot do without them. In general National economy in the USSR this was all regulated. Now this is not always possible, and the United States is beginning to offer its mediation services, and therefore proactive actions by Russian government agencies are required.
It is necessary to coordinate the efforts of all government bodies ensuring the national security of the state through political, diplomatic, economic and information means. In our opinion, this matter should be dealt with primarily by the apparatus of the Security Council (with appropriate clarification of its functions and structure). To coordinate efforts in the research and development of these problems, the creation of a Scientific Council of the Russian Academy of Sciences on defense issues has long been suggested.
The question of the relationship between politics and military strategy arises again. The primacy of politics over military strategy is obvious to everyone. Every war - armed conflict - is a continuation of politics. But politics in its pure form does not exist; it is viable only if it takes into account political, economic and, not least, military-strategic considerations in organic unity. Therefore, specialists of various profiles must participate in the development of political decisions, and the military, primarily the General Staff, must also make their proposals.
The task of politics and diplomacy is to create favorable conditions for the use of armed forces. But for more than 150 years, before every war, the army and navy have been placed in an extremely unfavorable position. Suffice it to recall the Crimean, Russian-Japanese, World War I, and finally 1941. And when, at a meeting of the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee in 1979, Chief of the General Staff Marshal N.V. Ogarkov spoke out against the entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan, citing the fact that this could cause serious political complications in the world; one of the influential members of the Politburo sharply “besieged” him: “We have someone to engage in politics. You think about how to solve your problems.” military tasks." We know how it all ended. There are lessons to be learned from all this.
Under all circumstances, our plans for the combat use of armed forces, including peacekeeping forces, must be developed and practically worked out in such a way that in the event of aggression or an obvious attack by the enemy, the command at all levels is clearly defined how it should act, without expecting special additional orders.
Generally in modern conditions- with high speeds of missiles, aviation, increased mobility of troops, especially in the system of strategic nuclear forces, air force, air defense, combat management activities will increasingly take on the character of implementing pre-developed solutions, programming and modeling of upcoming combat operations. High level planning operations and combat operations will be the main prerequisite for successful command and control of troops. As war experience shows, the better a particular operation is thought out and organized, the less interference from higher command is required in the actions of subordinate commanders during the operation. This was most clearly demonstrated in the Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation in 1945.
Of all the tasks of a national scale, the most important is the development of the economy, since without this it is impossible to solve a single problem in the field of national security. We are pleased with the positive changes in the economic development of the country and the implementation of some national programs and projects. But one cannot help but see that not all opportunities have yet been used. There is no proper investment in long-term programs, for example, in the creation of alternative energy resources and space assets. The standard of living of the population is low; economic and, especially, food security. As the “five-day Georgian” war showed, the task of equipping the army and navy with new types of weapons and military equipment is being solved slowly. Field equipment and personnel protection remain unsatisfactory.
Problems of spiritual and information security are becoming increasingly urgent. This is especially important in light of the fact that against the background of a general distortion of history, discrediting the victory in the Great Patriotic War. In this regard, perhaps one should think about creating a separate department within the structures of the highest executive power, which will be entrusted with coordination information activities on a state scale.
Military power of the state
In ensuring national security, the military power of the state also retains its importance. But when implementing strategic deterrence, military force should be resorted to only in cases where the capabilities of other means have truly been exhausted. For threats must not only be counteracted, but everything possible must be done to prevent them. This places new demands on all activities of the Armed Forces and on maintaining their combat readiness. It is also necessary to more clearly define the question of which wars to wage and to solve which defense tasks it is necessary to build and train the Armed Forces and other troops.
V.V. Putin, in his last Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly, clearly defined that “we modern Russia there must be Armed Forces capable of simultaneously fighting in global, regional, and, if necessary, in several local conflicts. We must always be ready to repel a potential external threat and acts of international terrorism." It would seem that we should proceed from this. But in practice, not only in the press, but also in some statements, they try to reduce all defense tasks to the fight against terrorism or drugs.
The fight against terrorism cannot be simplified by reducing it only to the actions of special forces. IN real life we see that so-called terrorists can take over entire countries, as was the case in Afghanistan and Kosovo. To counter them, the actions of regular troops will be required. This was confirmed in the “five-day war” in the Caucasus. Therefore, in military development, when determining the possible composition of groupings of troops (forces) in the most important theaters of operations, it is advisable to proceed not only from the current situation and available forces, but from what may be required in the future, in the most unfavorable situation. The traditional American formula for assessing the balance of power is: “Judge not by the intentions of the other side, but by its capabilities.”
A few words about our nuclear potential. For Russia, given the extremely unfavorable balance of forces in all strategic directions, it remains the most important, most reliable means of strategically deterring external aggression and ensuring its security. But lately we have been more and more persistently told that without progress towards nuclear disarmament, the multipolar world will turn into an expanding “nuclear club”; proposals are being made to establish international control over Russian nuclear potential. All this, of course, must be resolutely rejected. At the same time, it is necessary to continue to conduct persistent negotiations on mutual limitation and control of nuclear weapons.
For the reliable defense of the country in modern conditions, along with strategic nuclear forces, the creation of unified system aerospace defense of the country. At the same time, during the fighting in the Tskhinvali direction in August this year. weaknesses in technical equipment And combat use Air Force and Air Defense. Our long-known lag in communications, electronic warfare, reconnaissance, and target designation in the use of space assets has once again made itself felt. These issues, in our opinion, require special and urgent consideration by the Military-Industrial Commission of the Russian Federation.
The problems of qualitative improvement and basing of the Navy are acute, and first of all - Black Sea Fleet.
We have to admit that real defense spending, which was 2.8 percent of GDP, fell to 2.4 percent. More and more funds are formally allocated for armaments, but we receive less and less weapons. There is an obvious need for a radical concentration of scientific forces, financial and material and technical means to achieve a breakthrough in the field of elemental base, advanced technologies in the interests of creating communications, detection, guidance, control automation, electronic warfare...
In the development of weapons, it is desirable to place the main emphasis on the creation not of individual types of weapons, but of weapon systems. Modern conditions are such that the capabilities of even the most advanced weapons and the best-equipped troop groups can be most fully realized when they are integrated into unified combat systems. And the main efforts in the armed struggle will be aimed not at the physical destruction of each weapon, but at the destruction of their common information space, sources of intelligence, navigation channels, guidance, communication and control systems in general.
In the military command and control system, in principle, the idea of closer integration of all forces and assets (including logistics) in the theater of operations under the leadership of regional commands deserves approval and support. In principle, it does not really matter what they are called: “commands” or “military districts” vested with operational-strategic functions. Two points are fundamentally important here.
Firstly, there should be no new intermediate link between the Supreme High Command - the General Staff and the command in the theater of operations, because this will complicate and reduce the efficiency of troop control. And it is inappropriate under any circumstances to have military districts and regional commands at the same time.
Secondly, in any option, it is mandatory that the forces and assets of all types of armed forces and departments involved in solving defense problems be subordinated to the regional command (district). This requires a strong-willed decision from top management and appropriate regulations and provisions.
The withdrawal from the Ground Forces of their combined arms associations of army aviation does not justify itself. Front-line aviation must also be preserved, with its operational subordination to the commanders of the troops in the most important strategic directions. The Air Force Commander-in-Chief does not have the ability to constantly monitor the situation in the theater of military operations and directly control aviation on the battlefield.
It is necessary to equip and organize the service of aviation gunners in combined arms formations, and to establish close interaction between aviation and other types and branches of the military.
In connection with the military operations in Tskhinvali, a lot has been written and discussed about the effectiveness of our intelligence. We don't know how things really happened. Therefore, let's not rush to conclusions. But taking into account what happened in 1941 and in subsequent local wars, I wanted to say only one thing. Reconnaissance involves not only obtaining data about the situation, but also very complex analytical work, comparison and analysis of conflicting information, the ability to distinguish genuine information from misinformation, draw objective conclusions and proposals for making informed decisions. We have always lacked this and probably still lack it today...
Despite some inevitable errors in a combat situation, in general the actions of the command, troops and naval forces in the North Caucasus were, in my opinion, expedient and skillful. Life has once again shown the naivety of the statements of false innovators in military affairs, that now tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and the Ground Forces in general have outlived their usefulness and that air strikes alone can decide the fate of a battle and an operation. Of course, air support and air strikes are important, and in some cases decisive, but the role of combined arms formations and formations, including tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, and artillery, does not lose its importance. In South Ossetia they played a major role in repelling aggression and defeating the enemy. In order for troops to suffer fewer losses, it is necessary to improve the military equipment of the Ground Forces, the protection of personnel and equipment.
But a number of articles have now appeared in the press, claiming that our troops fought in the old way and did not use modern methods military operations characteristic of “democratic countries” and their armies. The aggression of the United States and other NATO countries against Yugoslavia in 1999 is still considered an example, when missile and bomb attacks on cities destroyed power plants, hospitals, bridges, and other infrastructure of the country, which forced the country’s leadership to capitulate, and the Ground Forces were practically not involved .
If we follow this example and fight purely “democratically,” then the Russian army should have bombed Tbilisi, Batumi, Kutaisi, Poti, the entire infrastructure of the country and forced Georgia to capitulate. But this is not a “democratic”, but a barbaric method of warfare, which was widely used by the Nazis and, to some extent, continued by the Americans and British, bombing residential areas of Dresden in 1945, dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Nowadays, Saakashvili did the same in Tskhinvali.
Russian troops fought not with the population, but with Georgian troops and special forces trained by the Americans. Therefore, our soldiers had to repel the advance of superior enemy forces, launch attacks and pursue the enemy, carry out air strikes on enemy military targets, and the sailors of the Black Sea Fleet had to cover the sea coast of Abkhazia.
In the Russian army, in addition to equipping them with modern weapons and control equipment, it is advisable to pay special attention to improving the quality of operational and combat training. IN last years there were many international, joint exercises with other countries. It is clear that they are important from a diplomatic point of view, as a demonstration of positive trends in the field of interstate relations. But at the same time, we must admit that these, like some other exercises, are often of an ostentatious nature, where all upcoming actions are known in advance. From a military point of view, such exercises, I think, are of little use. By the way, in terms of the methodology for conducting exercises in the American army, where division commanders themselves conduct exercises with their formations, there is nothing to learn from them. If the commander himself develops and conducts the exercise, knows everything for himself and the other side, he cannot get any practice in real command and control of troops. Therefore, Marshal G.K. Zhukov called such exercises self-indulgence.
It is necessary that the experience of local wars and conflicts (including Afghan and Chechen) be more fully reflected in the content and methods of training command and control bodies and troops. It is known, for example, from the experience of these wars, how much attention was paid to the protection and defense of communications. Not only reconnaissance units and patrols were sent, but also permanent military guards and outposts on the most important routes. But the case of the commander of the 58th Army in South Ossetia suggests that this experience was forgotten. This applies to many other issues, including the use of unmanned aerial vehicles and the creation of reconnaissance and strike systems.
How many “PR exhibitions” have we had where new form clothes. But we never saw the well-protected and comfortable clothing needed on the battlefield on soldiers and officers. On this issue, it is apparently necessary to consult first of all with highly experienced soldiers and sergeants.
Based on the results of the August events in the Caucasus, the greatest satisfaction is caused by the high assessment of the morale of the Russian troops, which was given by the President of the Russian Federation D.A. Medvedev. If after all the anti-army campaigns, discrediting the Victory in the Great Patriotic War and military service in general, if after all the actions to desecrate our military past and military service, soldiers and officers showed themselves worthily on the battlefield, then this indicates that the margin of safety of moral foundations in society and the army, accumulated by the traditions of previous generations, is still quite large.
The example of veterans, the ongoing military-patriotic work still produces results. But we must remember that this moral force, moral spirit also has a kind of “motor hours”; they cannot be exploited endlessly without renewing and constantly replenishing the resource human factor. Therefore, not only the state, but also society is obliged to constantly take care of the formation of the defense consciousness of citizens, the approval of the ideas of defending the Fatherland, the patriotic education of youth, and in every possible way raising the incentives and prestige of military service.
After Russia’s decisive actions in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the entire West came out against us, the CIS countries are still wavering, and against this general background, the old truth once again clearly emerged: under all circumstances, in difficult times, Russia invariably has only two allies: the army and the fleet. Let us once again bow and say thank you to those who served and continue to serve in the ranks of the most faithful people of our Motherland.
Recently, a number of new strategic concepts have been actively implemented in the US armed forces. The goal is to prepare the armed forces to cope with the threats of the new century.
So, in July-August current year Large-scale exercises Millennium Challenge 2002 took place, in which more than 13,500 personnel of all military branches were involved. The budget for the exercise was more than $235 million. The purpose of the exercise is to work out the connectivity and interaction of units and subunits of all branches of the US armed forces, as well as the procedure for interaction with other federal departments during “quick decisive actions.”
As noted by US Army military experts, Rapid Decisive Operations (RDO) is the form of military action for the US Army's missions in the next decade. RDOs focus primarily on the operational level, but the concept of RDO also has strategic and tactical implications. Preparation for RDO is focused and continuous, focusing on actions that allow you to influence the behavior of the enemy and deter him from making certain decisions. In the event that deterrence fails, RDOs provide the ability to quickly and decisively coerce or defeat an adversary in order to achieve strategic objectives without a lengthy campaign or large build-up of forces. RDO can be successful both on its own and, if necessary, to prepare the conditions for transition to action during a large-scale regional conflict involving the use of heavy weapons.
The basis of quick decisive actions is network-centric warfare (NCW). NCW is a powerful set of warfare concepts that enable military forces to gain complete advantage over the enemy by using all available information about the environment, the enemy, and the enemy. own strength Oh.
Network confrontation includes simultaneous actions in physical,informational And educational areas.
Physical domain. The physical domain is the traditional domain of war. This area unites the traditional spheres of confrontation - land, sea, air and outer space. This is the area in which physical weapons platforms and communications systems operate. Therefore, the elements in this area are the easiest to identify. Combat power in this area is traditionally measured by the effects of physical defeat.
Information area. Information area is the area in which information is created, processed and accumulated. It is also the area in which command, control, communications, communications and intelligence systems operate. In the battle for information supremacy, the information area is the area of greatest sensitivity. Previous approaches to performance assessment information systems are no longer sufficient to measure the quality of information, new assessments are needed to determine the possible “effect” of the use of information means of influence.
Cognitive area. The cognitive area is the area of thinking of a fighter and civilians. This is the area in which commanders’ intentions, doctrines, tactics, and methods of confrontation are formed. The intangible assets of leadership, morale, unit cohesion, level of training, experience, situational awareness and public opinion are elements of this area. According to US military experts, effects in this area pose the biggest challenge of the current decade.
The need to revise the foundations of military science lies in the fact that, as Pentagon military experts note, the recently changed nature of threats has left virtually no time for commanders at all levels to make decisions. Previously existing concepts of confrontation and the armed forces created on their basis are poorly adapted to counter the threats of modern times. According to experts, today it is no longer possible to spend months or even weeks developing plans for the use of troops and their deployment. Instead, it is necessary to use force in the first hours of the crisis. In this case, the first to be used will be those means that affect the targets, the impact on which is capable of producing the desired effects and influencing the further behavior of the enemy. This new American way of war is believed to improve US national security in the 21st century.
A decade after the end of the Cold War, experts say the United States is facing a dramatic change in the nature of its geopolitical environment. The range of new threats, in addition to traditional potential adversary states, today also includes non-state, transnational groups, the exact boundaries of which are difficult to determine. As experts note, threats from such network structures have recently posed a significant danger to US national interests. In addition, demographics and the growing disparity in wealth and resource distribution in a globalizing world create additional pressure to facilitate threats from hostile networks.
According to the authors of the concept of rapid decisive action, today, even among traditional state actors, the distinction between hostility and non-hostility is practically erased, since new capabilities (such as intrusions into computer networks) make it difficult to accurately determine when the line of hostility has been crossed.
Pentagon analysts note that today, despite significant technological, economic and military superiority, a number of regional powers and interethnic coalitions have the potential to threaten US national interests.
It is believed that potential adversaries have learned a lot from the recent actions of the US Army in Yugoslavia and have adapted to new conditions. Under these conditions, adversaries will seek opportunities to achieve the goal before the United States can respond to the challenge. In doing so, the adversary will not attempt to defeat American forces in a symmetrical open confrontation, but rather will attempt to defeat American will by using asymmetrical attacks, denying access, and, if necessary, engaging them in a protracted, low-intensity, and attritional conflict. It is also believed that the enemy will try to block access of American forces to the theater of operations using widely available modern systems weapons. The enemy's goal in this case would be to make the US Army doubt its ability to win within acceptable costs. The enemy will try to counter US high-tech capabilities through camouflage, stealth, and dispersal of their forces. He will also use sophisticated information activities to influence the national and coalition will to win.
American experts note that the actions of the US Army in Serbia and Kosovo showed an example of how the enemy will confront the US armed forces in possible conflicts of the new century: actions by distributed small units, wide application mobile air defense systems and the massive use of camouflage, camouflage and shelters, information actions of the Serbs were aimed against the will to win, as well as to destroy the existing coalition. They acknowledge that American troops were forced to resort to suboptimal methods of attack due to the need to minimize their own losses.
Against this background, the profound changes that have occurred in computer science, biology, space research, as well as in a number of other areas of science make it possible to approach the development of military science from a fundamentally new position. Parrying new threats created the latest technologies, could be quite a challenge for Cold War militaries. Pentagon experts stress that we are now entering an era in which there may be no clear lines between hostile and non-hostile or political and military actions. Enemy actions will extend far beyond open hostilities and may include acts of terrorism and attacks on computer networks. At the same time, the perpetrators of these actions will be very difficult to detect. Even after they are discovered, they can mix with civilians, making it very difficult to retaliate. Under these conditions, it is necessary to operate in a continuum of multidimensional political-military-economic-social-infrastructure-information space, in which both the goals themselves and the intensity of interactions with potential adversaries can quickly change.
In this regard, Pentagon experts note that today's joint forces, with their overwhelming superiority in a conventional conflict with a peer enemy, do not have the means with which it is possible to dominate the new operational environment. The American military notes that, starting from the fall Soviet Union, The United States has changed the size of its Cold War military and created a smaller version of it. However, most Cold War doctrines, principles of operation, planning and construction of armed forces remain unchanged. The United States managed to increase the effectiveness of individual components of the armed forces with the advent of the benefits of the “revolution in military affairs,” but failed to increase the effectiveness of the use of military force as a whole.
According to some experts, the limitations of the previous force include significant dependence on location; lack of strength to meet increased demands; insufficient level of strategic mobility for the rapid deployment of powerful but heavy forces; insufficient ranges of weapons, etc. In addition, it is noted that today the United States has an unsurpassed ability to collect information about the surrounding space, about the enemy and about its own armed forces, but lacks joint planning and control to use this information to achieve a superior decision. It is also noted that the US Army, while having precision weapons that are capable of hitting a target with great accuracy, lacks the ability to consistently produce the desired operational effect and force the enemy to make decisions beneficial to the United States. Today, the army must be prepared for a rapid transition from a relatively peaceful process of confrontation to intense combat operations. At the same time, quickly and decisively achieve strategic goals. It is believed that US military power, in conjunction with other instruments of national power, must develop the ability to respond quickly and decisively and resolve conflicts as quickly as possible. a short time. At the same time, the United States plans to do this without losing the ability to win in the event of a large-scale regional conflict involving the use of heavy weapons.
US Army military experts believe that to respond to the changes that have occurred in the geostrategic space at the beginning of the 21st century, the United States must transform the way joint operations are conducted today. Today it is important to know how to conduct military operations in conjunction with other instruments of national power. Analysts note that the basic characteristics that describe the fundamental differences between future and today's combined activities are knowledge-based and effect-based.
Knowledge based. Possession of superior knowledge will enable the US military to transform future joint operations. The power of complex future information systems will enable unprecedented knowledge creation and sharing in understanding the enemy, the U.S. Army's own capabilities, the environment, and the battlespace. Improved situational awareness will enable solution excellence, reduce operational risk, and exponentially increase the pace, connectivity, and efficiency of operations. It is believed that the more one knows about the enemy, environment and about oneself, the more accurately one can direct one's own abilities to produce the desired effects.
A continuously updated understanding of the enemy as a complex adaptive system will allow the US military to more accurately coordinate the application of the full range of national capabilities.
Effects based. Effect-based Operations (EBO) is a philosophy of warfare that focuses on obtaining a desired strategic outcome or "effect" in enemy behavior through the application of a full range of military and non-military measures at the tactical, operational, and strategic levels. "Effect" - a physical, functional or psychological result, event or consequence that follows a single action or set of actions . Effects-based actions are designed to integrate advanced concepts of precision strike, dominance maneuver, and information operations across the battlespace, providing the ability to create effects and cause changes in enemy behavior.
It is believed that the joint force of the future, based on comprehensive situational awareness provided by sophisticated surveillance and intelligence systems, will be better able to identify the effects that will create the required changes in adversary behavior that in turn serve the American national interest. This will be facilitated by knowledge that will help determine the critical points of the enemy’s infrastructure (center of gravity), their critical vulnerabilities and causal relationships.
A clearer understanding of the causal relationships between means and the effects they produce will make it possible to choose exactly those means that produce the desired effects and avoid those that create undesirable effects.
The greatest importance in the creation of the joint forces of the future is given to information operations. According to Pentagon experts, an information operation is the information equivalent of maneuver and fire. An information operation is especially effective when it is implemented in its target area (in the information sphere). It can also be used to support fire and maneuver in other areas of confrontation.
Information operations are implemented in two main areas of information effects: electronic effects and influences. Electronic effects are achieved primarily through electronic warfare and attacks on computer networks. Influence effects are achieved through psychological operations, disinformation, public relations, operational security and special information operations.
Information operations have unique characteristics that allow them to be used in both peacetime and wartime. These characteristics include low collateral damage to physical infrastructure, low deployment requirements, relatively rapid response to mission, low risk to personnel, and potentially large impact with low effort and target specificity.
Thus, the approaches to building joint armed forces developed during the Millennium Challenge 2002 exercises will allow the US administration to approach US foreign policy in the 21st century from a fundamentally new perspective. The basis of such a policy will be a set of, first of all, non-military measures aimed at creating “effects” leading to a change in the behavior of a specific subject. international relations in a direction beneficial to the United States.
Sergey Grinyaev
The book by Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences A. A. Kokoshin, 6th Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, who also held the posts of First Deputy Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, Secretary of the Defense Council of the Russian Federation, examines a number of political-military and military-strategic problems of national security of Russia. These include conceptual issues of the relationship between politics and military strategy, long-term problems of ensuring strategic stability, assessment of trends in the development of general-purpose forces and means, issues of non-nuclear (pre-nuclear) deterrence in Russian defense policy, etc. For undergraduates, graduate students and teachers of civil and military universities, as well as for everyone interested in political-military and military-strategic issues.
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by liters company.
On decisions in strategic management in the military sphere
A kind of focal point of the entire management process is the decision. According to the focal point strategic management is a strategic decision. Strategic decisions have an impact on large-scale processes, on the outcome of the war, on the fate of individual government leaders of the high command, the armed forces, and ultimately - depending on the scale of the war - on the fate of the country and the people as a whole.
The difference between decisions in the military sphere in general and in strategic management in particular from management decisions in other areas, it is precisely that they determine issues of life and death for hundreds of thousands, millions, and in modern conditions of the nuclear age - hundreds of millions, and maybe even billions of people. There are irreversible decisions that set in motion mechanisms that cannot be stopped. Therefore, decision-makers on defense and national security issues have a special responsibility, and increased demands should be placed on them in terms of training, selection of personnel, and constant testing of their qualities. Here, constant intellectual work and theoretical understanding of the decision-making process must be indispensable and mandatory. For the most part, decisions on military issues are made in the absence of complete information. It is compensated by the experience of managers, the experience of the staff, the presence of a strong institutional memory, and imagination based on deep knowledge of the subject.
A decision is first of all a choice, a choice between action and inaction, and then between two or more options for action. Decision-making in war is a complex thought process with the active invasion of emotions, all kinds of accidents, and absurdities that violate strict formalized logic. As Clausewitz wrote, in war, “the leader of a large whole is constantly under the blows of waves of false and true reports, mistakes made due to fear, negligence, haste or stubbornness, manifested on the basis of right or wrong views, out of ill will or from a false or genuine sense of duty.” , due to laziness or overwork; he is surrounded by contingencies that no one could have foreseen.”
The decision-making process as such is immaterial, but the execution of decisions and their direct and indirect consequences can bring into play enormous material resources.
In addition, preparation for decision-making is a process that requires certain material costs, sometimes quite significant, for collecting and processing information, including technical means, for conducting various sociological surveys and other purposes.
Clausewitz rightly noted the particular complexity and difficulty of making decisions at the strategic level compared to decisions at the tactical level. “It may seem strange that making an important decision in strategy requires much more power will than in tactics; but this is beyond doubt for those who know the war from this side. In tactics, the moment itself carries you away with irresistible force; the actor feels that he is being carried away by a whirlpool of events, against which he cannot fight without risking the most disastrous consequences; it suppresses the doubts that arise in itself and boldly continues to dare. In a strategy where everything happens much more slowly, there is much more scope for one’s own and others’ opinions, objections, ideas, and therefore also for untimely regrets about the past.
And since in strategy you don’t have to see at least half of everything with your own eyes, as in tactics, but only guess and assume, then views can be less stable.”
As a result, according to Clausewitz, “most commanders, where they should act, mark time amid imaginary difficulties and hesitations.”
Like decisions in other areas, strategic decisions are made in certain management systems, consisting of organizational structures, management personnel, persons preparing decisions and monitoring their implementation, procedures regulating the interaction of various governing bodies and management objects, equipment that ensures the management process .
The key role is almost always played by strategic decisions of the highest political level: the identification of the main military threats to the country's national security, their relationship with other types of threats, the identification of probable adversaries, probable (and desired) allies and partners, the depth of allied or partnership relations (consisting in practice in the degree coherence, coordination of military-strategic actions and military-economic policy in case of war, etc.).
An obvious “product” of the strategic decision-making process is also decisions on the strategic concentration and deployment of troops, on the outbreak of war and on the conduct of large-scale military operations, including the choice of the direction of the main attack, etc. However, behind many decisions of this kind, aimed at Determining the outcome of the war depends on decisions in the economic and military-technical spheres.
This became especially noticeable in the last quarter of the 19th century, during the era of steam and steel, which radically changed the material basis of warfare (before that, it had evolved relatively slowly over several centuries after the appearance of firearms in Europe). Even then, the top leadership of the leading states of Europe had to, for example, pay increasing attention to shipbuilding programs, programs for re-equipping ground forces with artillery, etc. Miscalculations in these areas, made by the Ministry of War of the Russian Empire several years before the start of the First World War, had tragic consequences for our country.
Decisions of the German Reichstag on the creation of a “high seas fleet” at the end of the 19th – beginning of the 20th centuries. largely determined the composition of the parties in the future First World War, pushing Great Britain into an alliance with France and Russia and thereby making even more problematic the chances of Germany and its allies to win in this coming gigantic confrontation. These decisions had a huge impact on politics and created mechanisms that increased the likelihood of a new world war.
Such decisions include the decision on the US missile defense system and the withdrawal from the 1972 ABM Treaty, made by US President George W. Bush in the fall of 2001. It radically changed the main parameters of the system for ensuring strategic stability that had developed since the early 1970s. s, when the first Soviet-American Treaty on the Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms was concluded (in 1972) and the aforementioned Treaty on the Limitation of Anti-Ballistic Missile Defense Systems.
Of course, the sphere of strategic decisions includes the entire range of issues related to such a large-scale enterprise as military reform. Therefore, the category of strategic decisions includes the adoption in France of the 1996 Law on Military Reform and a series of decisions of the President and the Security Council of the Russian Federation in 1997–1998 and 2000–2001. on reform
The Armed Forces of Russia, including the adoption of the “Fundamentals (concept) of state policy in the field of military development”, approved by the President of Russia on August 3, 1998.
Having analyzed the main military reforms in modern and recent history (Moritz of Orange, Gustav II Adolf, Peter the Great, G. A. Potemkin, G. Scharnhorst and A. Gneisenau, D. Miliutin, M. V. Frunze, etc.), the author believes it is possible to identify the following main components of military reform: a) a change in the recruitment system (for example, the transition to a system of universal conscription in Russia during the Milyutin reforms of the 1870s); b) changes in the military education system; c) modification of the strategic management system (the creation, for example, in the USA and Great Britain after the Second World War of a single Ministry of Defense instead of the ministries of the three branches of the armed forces; d) transformation of organizational structures at the level of military strategy, at the operational and tactical levels (for example, the introduction of corps organizations by Napoleon in France, and then by M.B. Barclay de Tolly in Russia, the transition to a modular principle of constructing tactical units in the USA in the 1970s–1980s); e) development and implementation of new combat regulations, instructions on strategic actions, preparation and conduct of operations (the introduction of a new combat manual, borrowed from Sweden, was one of the most important, for some reason almost unnoticed by most historians, elements of the military reform of Peter the Great , which ultimately gave outstanding results).
Not every military reform meets all the parameters mentioned. An activity that covers three or four of these components can be considered a reform.
Erroneous strategic decisions regarding the allocation of resources between military and civilian tasks, between certain types armed forces and branches of the armed forces in certain weapons systems adopted in peacetime are extremely difficult, and sometimes impossible, to correct directly in the pre-war period, and even more so after the start of the war. And this is understandable: decisions of this kind have a huge degree of inertia due to the nature of industrial production, existing restrictions on qualifications and the amount of available work force, not to mention the financial restrictions that are always and everywhere present, even in totalitarian states.
Any strategic decision is preceded by a certain period of preparation, which can often last for years - both justified and unjustified from the point of view of the “higher logic” of ensuring the country’s defense capability.
Persons preparing and making decisions are usually exposed to a wide variety of influences, including those that do not appear to be directly related to a specific military-political, operational-strategic situation. Thus, among the most important factors that determined the nature of the thoughts and actions of the overwhelming majority of the senior command staff of the Red Army and the Red Army on the eve of the Great Patriotic War, there was fear of punishment for the slightest mistake. He accepted huge scale in the conditions of the most severe Stalinist repressions against the command staff of the Soviet armed forces in 1937–1938, which continued in subsequent years. Not everyone was able to overcome this powerful barrier and act in the interests of the state, people, army and navy, ignoring the threat to their own career and physical survival.
In conditions of domestic or international crisis, decisions are made by political leaders, as a rule, under stress, which often significantly limits the range of decision options considered. And as many studies in social psychology show, under stress the vast majority of people think worse, take into account fewer factors, and consider them in simplified combinations. The thought process has its own time parameters, and they are different for different people (it’s not for nothing that there is such a thing as “slow-witted”). In the domestic scientific and memoir literature, in journalism concerning the problems of strategic management, such factors are clearly not sufficiently studied and taken into account.
There are two main components, large blocks that determine decisions - these are assessment of oneself and assessment of a potential enemy. At the same time, assessing oneself, obtaining knowledge about the real state of affairs in one’s own armed forces, in the defense industry and science is a task no less difficult than obtaining information about the enemy. It does not come down to assessing the number of one’s troops, available and usable weapons, the number of combat-ready formations and units, etc. You need to know well the strengths and weak sides its command staff at all levels, its ability to solve tactical, operational and strategic tasks, manage complex military equipment. The top government leadership must have an extremely sober understanding of what its own armed forces are capable of and cannot do. A sober assessment of one’s capabilities should also be a very important limiter in setting realistically achievable political goals for the war.
Such a sober understanding was present, for example, in Mao Zedong in the 1930-1940s (which will be discussed in more detail in the chapter on the strategic management system in China), when he tried, during the war with the Japanese, to avoid head-on collisions with a more powerful enemy, and after winning the Chinese Civil War, he avoided major military action (which he failed to do during the Korean War of 1950–1952).
As for actions at sea, here too Peter I avoided in every possible way a squadron battle with the Swedes, knowing full well both the technical shortcomings of his ships (of which he was at the same time very and justifiably proud), and the lower level of preparedness of the crews of sailing ships compared to Swedish. The sailing ship fleet acted primarily as a means of covering and ensuring the high activity of the Russian galley fleet, which at a certain point in the Northern War repeatedly landed troops of the Russian army on the Swedish coast. The latter ravaged not only ports and property warehouses, but also peaceful settlements, approaching closer and closer to the capital. It was these actions that ultimately forced the Swedes to make peace on the terms that Peter sought.
After the Narva defeat in 1700 during the Northern War with the Swedes, Peter I demonstrated not only outstanding energy in restoring lost military power, reorganizing the army, and creating a fleet, but also the highest realism, the sanity of a mature statesman. Recognizing the superiority of the Swedish army and its art on the battlefield, Peter I chose active strategic defense as the main line of conduct. And at Poltava in 1709, where Charles XII, due to the strategy imposed on him by Peter, found himself in a weakened state (especially after the defeat of A. Levenhaupt’s corps near Lesnaya), Peter resorted to defensive tactics, despite the fact that he had a numerical superiority over the Swedes , A Russian troops significantly strengthened after the Battle of Narva.
Conscious and purposeful comparison of one's own forces and means with the forces and means of the enemy in peacetime and in wartime includes many positions, both amenable to quantitative measurement and not amenable to quantitative measurement. The complexity of such comparisons is also caused by the presence within the military department, in the armed forces themselves, of strong group interests that prevent an objective assessment. Therefore, in any strategic management system it is necessary to have special units, as unrelated as possible to the interests of certain branches of the armed forces, branches of the armed forces, industrial enterprises, in order to give a balanced, impartial assessment. Both domestic and Foreign experience shows that creating such units is a very difficult task.
If we talk about the moment of decision-making, then it is dangerous both to delay the decision and to make it immature. The decision must be worked out and weighed, and all the arguments for and against must be carefully rechecked. Ease, any kind of automatism in making strategic decisions, for example, simply for the sake of seizing the initiative, are inappropriate and very dangerous. And those who allow this to happen are doing a disservice to their country, their armed forces.
At one time A.A. Svechin said that the commander must bear his decision in agony, must, as it were, suffer through it. This is exactly how many outstanding commanders and generals made decisions - Napoleon, X. Moltke the Elder, A.A. Brusilov, G.K. Zhukov, K.K. Rokossovsky and others. And if the commander sees at the last moment that the wrong decision has been made, then, as Svechin rightly noted, he should not be afraid to cancel it, without fear of losing authority in the eyes of his subordinates and leaders.
Svechin, using the example of X Moltke the Younger, who headed the “Great General Staff” of the German Empire before the First World War and at the beginning of this war, showed how disastrous a refusal to reconsider a wrong decision can be. Moltke the Younger, having made the decision to transfer significant forces from the Western to the Eastern Front in 1914, before sending the echelons, he realized that it would be entirely possible to get by with the transfer of much smaller forces. This would not have led to such a significant weakening of the group of German troops operating against Belgium and France, which was successfully advancing in accordance with the ideas of his predecessor A. von Schlieffen. But Moltke the Younger, who did not have the same significant authority and strength of character as his great uncle Moltke the Elder, was afraid of looking like an indecisive commander and did not reconsider his order. As a result, he lost an important resource that would have allowed the Germans to rely more on success on the Western Front, commensurate with what they had in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871. For the defeat in the Battle of the Marne in 1914, Moltke Jr. was dismissed from the posts of chief of the General Staff and Headquarters.
It is dangerous to postpone a decision until a crisis arises, otherwise, as noted above, it is made under stress. But a number of decisions cannot be made before the crisis. In the overwhelming majority of cases, the decision to use military force is made precisely in a crisis situation, under conditions of stress. And the higher the “stakes,” the larger the potential war, the greater the stress.
Working out a strategic decision, its procedures, formalizing the decision in extremely clear terms, in a uniquely understandable form - these are all tasks that require high professionalism. Since the second half of 1943, such professionalism appeared at the Soviet Headquarters of the Supreme High Command, headed by I.V. Stalin and its working body - the General Staff of the Red Army, as well as the State Defense Committee headed by Stalin, which will be discussed in more detail in the corresponding section of the book. Of particular interest was the methodology for planning military campaigns developed by the Soviet General Staff.
In preparing orders and directives, mastery of words is important. Both senior government leadership and command at all levels need to avoid long, confusing phrases and carefully monitor the logic of the construction of the entire document, especially when it is of an interdepartmental and interspecific nature. The content of not only orders, but also directives must be unambiguous, not allowing for double interpretation of decisions of the political leadership and military command. Double interpretation actually happens quite often.
One of the most important requirements of control documents is a clear definition of those responsible for solving a particular combat or auxiliary, support task. This seemingly elementary requirement in real life is constantly not met, because vague responsibility suits the executors of directives and orders, and they are connected by tens and hundreds of threads invisible to the uninitiated with those officers and generals who prepare draft directive documents for the highest government leadership and high military command .
During the development of documents, in the process of coordination with various departments and their divisions, the main meaning of the strategic decision is often lost. In the overwhelming majority of cases, interdepartmental compromise cannot be avoided, but the process of its development should not be allowed to dilute the essence of the control influence that should arise when making a decision. The task of senior management is to constantly monitor the development of fundamental documents of this kind.
Preparing strategic decisions requires brainstorming by hundreds and even thousands of people who have knowledge of the basic characteristics of military power, primarily in its economic and financial dimensions. Narrowing the circle of persons (to two or three dozen in today's conditions of secrecy) sharply reduces the scale of intellectual and expert potential used for defense purposes and strategic management in this area. This also leads to a decrease in the base of political support for ongoing defense measures and makes the entire system vulnerable financial security the country's military structure in the face of powerful lobbies from other areas fighting for the same limited "budget pie".
Of course, in a number of cases, the interests of the case require, at the final stage, a sharp reduction in the number of persons formulating the decision, preparing this or that document (up to its preparation in a single, handwritten copy).
The United States and other developed countries have long come to the conclusion that, in the final analysis, the managerial benefits from a detailed discussion of the military budget are higher than from classifying it. The US defense budget is one of the cornerstones of strategic management: it is the product of collective wisdom, the collision of many interests. Very often this budget is the product of compromises, and not the most optimal ones even from the point of view of a specific short- or medium-term military or military-political task. But in the end, using such a collective intelligence of thousands of experts, congressmen and senators, and even various kinds of lobbyists gives a very significant strategic effect. In the closed part of the US budget there is a special “black part” associated with the most sensitive promising technologies (primarily technical means of reconnaissance, expenses for special operations, etc.).
In Russia by the beginning of the 21st century. The situation in this area has not improved over the years, but has worsened. Only in 2002 was it possible to achieve changes in the required direction.
When making decisions in both politics and military strategy, leaders who are well prepared to perform their functions directly and indirectly rely on science, on the knowledge of sociology, historical political science, economic science, special sciences in the military sphere, including the theory of military strategy, developed over centuries, as well as natural sciences. The active involvement of science and scientific knowledge does not at all insure politicians and military strategists against mistakes, but it significantly reduces the likelihood of them. A.A. Svechin noted in his “Strategy” that “the conclusions of military theory do not represent indisputable accuracy”; but at the same time, with reference to I. Kant, he allowed “to call science any systematic theory that covers a special area, knowledge, which is ordered according to known foundations and principles.” Svechin gives these kinds of theories the very attractive name of “second-order sciences,” to which he includes the theory of military strategy. Svechin writes that “many outstanding strategic writers paid special attention to affirming the existence of eternal, unshakable principles of strategy.” He rightly called this approach outdated, saying that “nowadays our views on science have become much broader.”
There is always a danger of using pseudoscientific conclusions and recommendations. Their authors, as a rule, have remarkable energy, power of persuasion and an unshakable belief that the advice they give guarantees unconditional success. The military (and military-industrial) sphere, no less than other spheres of social life, is rich in such figures, as I was repeatedly convinced of during my work as First Deputy Minister of Defense.
The fruitful use of science by government leadership and high military command is possible only when the research work of senior command personnel is encouraged in the military department. But truly scientific creativity should be encouraged, and not the desire to formally defend a candidate’s or doctoral dissertation, taking advantage of one’s official position.
Domestic history provides examples of the appeal to science of figures who have occupied a prominent place in the system of strategic management. This applies, of course, to the major reformer of the Russian military system YES. Milyutin, who was awarded high scientific awards for his scientific historical works dedicated to Suvorov’s campaigns. Minister of War General A.F. Roediger wrote (before taking up this post) the work “Recruitment and Organization of the Armed Forces.” The work was recognized as outstanding not only by the Nikolaev Academy of the General Staff, but also by the Imperial Academy of Sciences, and its author was awarded the Makaryev Prize. However, at that time these were exceptions rather than the rule, as the prominent Russian military scientist Lieutenant General N.N. rightly noted. Golovin. In his words, “Russian military science, which counted many outstanding scientists in its ranks... was often likened to a driving wheel without clutch.” This was, according to Golovin, due to the fact that even in the most educated layer of the Russian population, faith in science and “in its necessity for any organization, especially in complex areas of state life” was “extremely weak.”
Golovin explains this by the fact that the Russian intelligentsia has numbered no more than nine generations since the time of Peter the Great - many times less than in Western Europe.
In subsequent years and decades, the scientific work of such prominent domestic military figures as M.N. can be considered very fruitful. Tukhachevsky, B.M. Shaposhnikov, M.V. Zakharov and others. Their works will be repeatedly referenced in this work.
Strategic management after a decision is made primarily comes down to its implementation, which is usually much more difficult than preparing and making a decision. The implementation of a decision is based primarily on monitoring how it is implemented. It should be noted that in the domestic strategic culture this is one of the weakest points. The control system is designed to constantly provide feedback between management (manager) and the object of control, and in such a mode that there is the possibility of additional control influence that can maintain and, if necessary, increase the “strategic impulse” in the chosen direction with the initial, basic strategic decision. The concept of feedback (at least since the time of Norman Wiener) is perhaps the key one in control theory - both for machine and biological systems, as well as for social ones; The latter, of course, includes any military machine of a particular state, as a particularly complex system, which, in turn, is a subsystem in relation to the state and society as a whole.
Implementing the function of monitoring the implementation of decisions is extremely important, especially in international crisis situations fraught with the involvement of the “nuclear factor”. Historical experience teaches that there can always be an “element” of the military machine that will behave in a given case differently than required by the particularly harsh conditions of an acute military-political crisis and as expected by the top government leadership. Particularly noteworthy in this regard is the experience of the Caribbean (Cuban Missile) Crisis of October 1962, when the (unconscious) behavior of a number of commanders, officers, and privates of both sides, who were outside the necessary control, as it turned out, by the top government leadership and civilian leadership of the US Department of Defense, could repeatedly provoke irreversible consequences.
Control as a particularly important category of military control (not only at the strategic, but also at the operational and tactical levels) is also necessary due to the constant presence of “friction of war.” This most valuable and often overlooked concept was introduced by K. von Clausewitz. By this he meant the whole sum of unforeseen difficulties that distinguish a real war from exercises and maneuvers, life practice from armchair ideas. Friction in war, A.A. later noted. Svechin, “reduces all achievements, and a person finds himself far behind his goal.”
A clear understanding of the control function must be initially included in the preparation of the decision, in the document that draws up this decision. In this case, the staged implementation of the decision included in such a document turns out to be very useful, so that at certain stages it is possible to verify how real things relate to the original plan and whether the original decision needs to be adjusted. In the military sphere, there is nothing worse than leaving in force a directive, much less an order, that no longer corresponds to the situation.
Control over the implementation of a strategic decision under any conditions, and especially in wartime, should cover both one’s own actions and the behavior of the enemy. During combat operations, it often happens that the command knows the position of its troops worse than the position of the enemy troops.
With the advent of nuclear weapons and ballistic means of delivering them over gigantic distances in the arsenals of states, the problem of making military-political decisions on the use of nuclear weapons has radically changed. Among other things, the problem arose of making a decision on the use of nuclear weapons at the moment the other side unleashes aggression or prepares for it, that is, in an exceptionally short period of time before the enemy can disrupt or destroy the control system.
In foreign and domestic literature, various types of combat operations have been repeatedly discussed, requiring certain systems for combat control of strategic nuclear forces, often with difficult-to-compatible characteristics.
It seems that an adequate solution to this problem has not been found to date, although it is not as acute as in the 1960s or early 1980s, when the confrontation between the two superpowers - the USSR and the USA - intensified in the highest political circles Both countries (not to mention the military command) seriously considered the possibility of massive use of nuclear weapons.
At the same time, specific historical experience has shown that in such conditions the decision to use or not to use nuclear weapons is actually in the hands of an extremely small group of people, 5-6 people on each side. And at some point it ends up in the hands of one senior manager each side, as was the case during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, when in the end everything practically came down to J. Kennedy and N.S. Khrushchev.
Thus, even in a country of developed political democracy, which the United States rightfully considered and still considers itself to be, a situation has arisen (and still persists!) in which just one person, even if elected through the democratic will of the people, can make a decision in a matter of minutes, as a result of which tens and hundreds of millions of people will die - both Americans and non-Americans. All attempts to change this state of affairs have so far led to virtually nothing.
The presence of a “nuclear button” (“black suitcase”) remains today one of the highest symbols of power. States that do not agree that this symbol of political and military power should be in the hands of only members of the exclusive nuclear club, whose composition coincides with the composition of the permanent members of the UN Security Council, are striving to acquire it.
And they do, like, for example, India and Pakistan, which officially became nuclear powers in 1998.
In the past, in the pre-nuclear period, strategic management could not be reduced only to formulating the political goals of the war and then achieving their implementation through a certain military-strategic line, a series of operations, battles and engagements. Often the goal was to avoid war as much as possible through a show of force (combined, of course, with skillful diplomacy).
In the presence of nuclear weapons, in a situation of mutual nuclear deterrence, the problem of preventing war is perhaps the most important task of strategic management, the highest strategy, based on three main tools - diplomacy, military strategy and intelligence.
Military doctrine today, no matter how paradoxical it may sound, appears almost in the first place the most important tool preventing a mutually destructive war using nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction.
Military doctrine, which formulates in the most concentrated form, first of all, the goals and objectives for higher strategy and military strategy, the forms and methods of solving these problems, must necessarily be transformed into purely military documents along the entire chain (strategy - operational art - tactics), into instructions on strategic actions, preparation and conduct of operations, and combat manuals. The presence of a deeply developed military doctrine allows us to have base for decision making. The separation of doctrinal provisions from the operational and tactical levels is fraught with the most serious troubles, especially when it comes to the nuclear sphere.
And today, reflections on the content of military doctrine and its purpose, presented in the works of A.A., remain very instructive. Svechina, K.M. Adaridi, A.A. Neznamova, V.A. Apushkina, A.M. Zayonchkovsky, P.I. Izmestieva and others.
The orderliness and unity of plans at all levels - from the highest strategy to tactics - is one of the most important conditions for success in ensuring the country's defense capability. Achieving such unity is a very labor-intensive task, requiring focused work by both government agencies and independent scientists and experts.
In general, there are several main types of strategic decisions.
First, a decision on the priority and nature of threats to the country's security from a military point of view. Closely related to this is the issue of identifying specific carriers of these threats - the most and least likely adversaries, and then potential partners or allies to fend off these threats, to minimally neutralize potential adversaries - either in order to implement a deterrence strategy, or in order to ensure conditions for inflicting military defeat on them on one scale or another.
Secondly, decisions on determining the dominant forms and methods of conducting armed struggle and implementing deterrence for the foreseeable period of time. This includes decisions by top management on the relationship between defensive and offensive (counter-offensive) actions on a strategic and operational scale (meaning direct and reverse connections between operations and military strategy).
The decision on the form of strategic combat operations: an offensive immediately at the beginning of the war, strategic defense or defensive actions with a subsequent transition to a counteroffensive, including crossing the border that separated the warring parties at the beginning of the war - is, of course, a subtype of action. The Soviet leadership actually leaned towards it when strategic offensive actions were postulated, and on an operational scale it was assumed initial stage conducting defensive actions, but with a very rapid transition to the offensive phase on the scale of military strategy.
End of introductory fragment.
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The given introductory fragment of the book Political-military and military-strategic problems of national security of Russia and international security (A. A. Kokoshkin, 2013) was provided by our book partner -
Strategy is a way of achieving victory in war through goal setting, general plan and the systematic implementation of measures to counter the enemy, taking into account constantly changing circumstances and conditions.
Strategy involves the art of combining preparations for war and successive operations of the armed forces (troops) to achieve the goal of war. The strategy resolves issues related to using both armed forces, and all the country's resources.
In some foreign countries there are separate grand strategy(war strategy in general) and small strategy(issues of planning, preparation and conduct of operations of all types of various scales). In the Russian tradition, small strategy is called operational art.
Strategic forces
The most powerful and effective means of armed struggle are often combined into so-called “strategic forces”, which are subordinated to general view- The Commander-in-Chief of the country’s armed forces and the General Staff, and in the operational staff, independently implement the goals and objectives assigned to them.
For example:
- In the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation: Strategic Nuclear Forces of the Russian Federation;
- In the US Armed Forces: US Strategic Nuclear Forces.
Nuclear triad
Structurally, the Strategic Forces are usually united in the Nuclear triad - the so-called “Strategic offensive (or defensive) armed forces”, which includes three components:
- Strategic aviation with nuclear weapons on board;
- Ground-based intercontinental ballistic missiles equipped with multiple independently targetable warheads with a nuclear warhead;
- Heavy strategic submarine cruisers- atomic submarines, carrying ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads.
Strategic control centers
To continuously monitor the strategic situation in the country, region and world, “Strategic control centers” are created, usually:
- The main strategic center, which serves the country's top military and political leadership;
- Regional centers or Centers by branch of the military or military groupings.
Such Centers of permanent deployment, as a rule, have duplicate structures.
Stationary Strategic Control Centers are created, as a rule, in advance in peacetime and often represent large, extremely protected structures that can function successfully even as a result of the direct use of all types of offensive weapons against such Centers, including nuclear, chemical, biological, climatic, geotectonic and other.
Along with stationary, especially protected Centers, “Operational Mobile Centers” or “Crisis Centers” are often created, which are staffed and begin to function after receiving a special order or on the basis of their own strategic information.
In order to mislead the enemy’s strategic intelligence, false “Strategic Command Centers”, both stationary and mobile, are being created.
Political and strategic goals
The goals of war must be strictly consistent with the means available to achieve it. War, as a rule, is waged so that peace can then be concluded on certain terms.
Consequently, the political leadership, defining the political goal of the war, must outline for its armed forces such goals, the achievement of which will create in the future after the end of hostilities or during them profitable terms to conduct peace negotiations through diplomatic means.
Based on the political goals of the war, a strategic goal is outlined - the final result of military actions on a strategic scale, the achievement of which leads to fundamental changes in the military-political and strategic situation.
The strategic goal may be the destruction of the enemy’s armed forces, the destruction of its economy, the seizure of territory, the retention of territory, and others.
The overall strategic goal determines the entire planned course of the war for the armed forces and the economy of the country, either for a certain period or for the entire campaign as a whole. Particular strategic goals are established for specific theaters of war (theatres of military operations, directions, regions) and for the period of various types strategic operations.
Typically, the general or Main strategic goal is to repel aggression (defeat the enemy), and private strategic goals should lead to the defeat of the enemy’s strategic groupings and the withdrawal of certain states from the war.
Types of strategies
Traditionally distinguished crushing strategy, which is based on achieving victory through the complete defeat of the enemy, the destruction of his armed forces and the destruction of his military-economic base and strategy of attrition, which is based on the calculation of achieving victory by consistently weakening the enemy and depleting his armed forces. Close to the strategy of starvation indirect strategy, which consists of implementing a blockade, disrupting communications, disrupting supply transportation, undermining military-technical potential, psychological impact on the enemy population and its armed forces.
Also often used intimidation strategy- demonstration of military power and its partial preemptive use to achieve concessions from a militarily weaker enemy, forcing him to cease hostilities, accept the put forward conditions for peace or surrender. Close to her limited action strategy- waging war with limited goals, with the deliberate spread of military operations only to a certain territory, using only part of one’s military potential, and striking only at selected targets and groupings of troops (naval forces) of the enemy. An example of such a war is the 1999 NATO war against Yugoslavia.
Also stands out continental strategy, which involves the main efforts primarily on the defeat of enemy ground forces and ocean strategy, in which the main goals of the war are achieved by defeating the enemy’s navy and destroying their bases. An example of the latter is the war in the Pacific Theater of World War II.
Of particular importance is block strategy- the creation in times of peace and war of a wide network of military-political alliances to gain dominance in certain areas of the world, unleash aggression or wage a defensive war against a more powerful enemy. Associated with her coalition strategy- a strategy for waging a coalition war, which involves the coordinated use of the armed forces of several allied states.
