#6
The Russia Journal
December 7-13, 2001
Kursk firings should not be military’s last
A massive shake-up is needed if Putin is serious about military reform
By ALEXANDER GOLTS
Two weeks ago, President Vladimir Putin thanked Northern Fleet Commander Adm. Vyacheslav Popov for successfully raising the Kursk. It looked as if Popov would soon be awarded a medal, but instead, he and half a dozen other top officers were dismissed from their posts.
Anatoly Kvashnin, the head of General Headquarters, and Navy chief Vladimir Kuroyedov, meanwhile, insist that the officers were not being punished for the Kursk disaster itself, but for the lamentable preparation of the training maneuvers that were being carried out when the Kursk sank, and for the badly organized rescue operation.
There’s no question that the admirals got what they deserved. They never did give a clear answer as to why the alarm was sounded only 12 hours after seismological laboratories hundreds of kilometers from the disaster site registered the explosion on the Kursk. There’s no way the ships taking part in the maneuvers couldn’t have picked up the explosion with their own echo sounders.
The Navy chiefs’ attempts to find excuses only created an even worse impression of the frightful disorder that reigns in the Navy. Recently, for example, head of Northern Fleet Headquarters Mikhail Motsak (also subsequently demoted) said the alarm was sounded so late because the Kursk’s commander could have missed his target during firing and not wanted to report the event. In other words, Motsak suspected the commander of the Russian Navy’s best submarine of having committed an unforgivable breach of discipline.
This is the same Motsak who voiced the theory that not only was the Kursk hit by a foreign submarine, but that that submarine then made radio contact several times using the Kursk’s radio code. But if this story were true, the first thing to do would be to fire the officers who let a foreign submarine enter unnoticed into the very area where the Russian Navy was carrying out its exercises.
Putin’s decision to demote the Navy bosses is not without mysteries of its own. After all, Putin could have seen that the admirals were responsible without having to wait for the Kursk to be raised. So why did he wait all this time?
One explanation is that Putin doesn’t like to look as though he’s just playing to public opinion. This is why he first made the admirals raise the Kursk and then dealt them out exemplary punishment just when no one expected him to come down so harshly on them.
Perhaps this is the case. But what’s interesting is that Putin punished the admirals at precisely the moment when mutual tension between the generals and the Kremlin became evident. Having waited over a year and seeing that the military reform plan he approved in August 2000 wasn’t working, Putin appears to have decided to push ahead with his own plans.
No sooner did Putin approve the plan to go over to a professional army, than the generals, once over the initial shock, attempted to delay the plan’s implementation. The generals figured they’d spend the time until the end of 2004 just drawing up a federal program for implementing the reform. But after meeting with Putin, Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov said the federal program’s deadline was for no later than the middle of next year.
The generals say their reluctance to abandon the conscript system is because a professional army would deprive the country of the so-called mobilization resource. In other words, in the event of a major war, the army wouldn’t be able to call up millions of already trained soldiers. But at the same time, many people realize this whole mobilization issue is no more than an illusion, because even if the draft offices found the required number of men, the problem would arise as to how to outfit them and arm them all.
A mobilization army has to be backed up by a militarized industrial system. When the moment came, a macaroni factory, for example, would switch to producing ammunition. However, this militarized economic system collapsed along with the Soviet Union (some prominent economists think it was one of the causes of the collapse, as the focus on defense production had a negative impact on the quality of civilian goods). The country has already used up its strategic reserves, and Russian industry’s mobilization capacity today is close to zero.
Several days after the decision to abandon the draft, Putin held a Security Council meeting on the country’s mobilization capacity. The meeting was held behind closed doors, but Putin’s opening words left no doubt as to its main aim. "Our country’s economy and the way we organize our defense has changed a great deal. Our economy is no longer a command economy, but our mobilization rules are as old as the hills. This is why we now have a lot of changes to make," Putin said.
Just at this moment, rumors began circulating in Moscow that Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov, a close Putin ally, doesn’t have authority with the generals. The rumors also said that contradictions had emerged between Ivanov, who strictly follows the Kremlin line, and other Putin appointees from the so-called Petersburg team.
It’s hard to say at the moment how serious these rumors are. But it is a fact that not all is in order in the top rungs of the military. A few days ago I spoke with one of Russia’s top generals, who hastened to assure me that he couldn’t imagine a better minister than Ivanov. Conversations like this wouldn’t have taken place at all a little while back – in army tradition, subordinates do not discuss their superiors’ qualities or faults.
Putin chose this moment to give the military a public dressing down. Unlike former Defense Minister Gen. Igor Rodionov, who was fired by then President Boris Yeltsin, these military bosses, whose responsibility is obvious, can’t claim that they have fallen victim to intrigues. Putin, it seems, kept them in reserve with a black mark against their names, waiting for the right moment to show the Army just how tough he can be. Now the moment has come.
But if Putin is serious about military reform, it won’t be enough to just fire those guilty of violations. He will also have to fire those who attempt to block change in the armed forces, and this will be a far more serious undertaking.
(The writer is a correspondent for Yezhenedelny Zhurnal.)
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