Lecture
The functions, role and place of each structural element of the state's military organization in ensuring national security are far from identical, since they possess different capabilities, forces and means.
The military organization of the state as a whole is intended, above all, to ensure reliable national security, to defend the country against external military aggression and against various attempts to violate the inviolability of its state border, its territorial integrity and its sovereignty, and also to protect the country's constitutional order and the lives and health of its citizens against internal destructive, illegal armed formations.
A society and its state that possess, for the protection of all their interests, a system of armed formations adequate to the given historical situation—and above all a state military organization adequate to all military dangers and threats—are not attacked; nor is their tranquillity or their state border violated, for all understand that otherwise a resolute, crushing rebuff and inescapable retribution will follow.
Alongside the general purpose of all the military and paramilitary structures of the state's military organization (as a whole), each military structure performs its own particular, specific functions and accordingly occupies a definite place in the system of ensuring Russia's national security, and each of them develops its own specific interests.
The specification of the place and role of each element of the state's military organization in ensuring the country's external and internal security is determined by decisions of the organs of state political power: federal laws, decrees of the head of state, regulations, statutes and other legal and normative documents; and for this reason the entire administration of the state's military organization is political in character.
The law of the Russian Federation "On Defence" stipulates that the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation are a state military organization constituting the foundation of the defence of the Russian Federation and are intended to repel aggression directed against Russia, to defend by force of arms the integrity and inviolability of its territory, and also to carry out tasks in accordance with the international treaties of the Russian Federation. The involvement of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in carrying out other tasks, including those of a domestic nature, is effected in accordance with federal laws. Federal laws also define the purpose of, and set the tasks for, all other troops, military formations and bodies belonging to the system of the state's military organization.
The federal law "On the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs" stipulates that the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation are intended to ensure the security of the individual, society and the state and to protect the rights and freedoms of the human being and citizen against criminal and other unlawful encroachments. Together with the internal affairs agencies, they take part in safeguarding public order, ensuring public safety and maintaining the regime of a state of emergency; they guard important state facilities and special cargoes, take part in territorial defence, assist the border agencies of the FSB in guarding the state border, and perform certain other tasks dictated by the particular military-political situation.
The Civil Defence Troops are brought into action from the moment a state of war is established, hostilities actually begin, or the President of the Russian Federation introduces martial law throughout the territory of the Russian Federation or in individual localities, and also in peacetime in the event of natural disasters, epidemics, epizootics, major accidents and catastrophes that endanger the health of the population and require emergency rescue and other urgent operations.
The military formations of special communications and information are intended to provide state bodies with reliable, uninterrupted communications with all troops, military formations, military bodies and all other actors and forces ensuring national security, and with timely and reliable information on military-political situations.
The corresponding state acts (laws, decrees, regulations and others) determine the place, role and functions of other structures of the military organization (services, agencies and the like). The essence of the purpose of the military formations is already indicated in their very names (engineering and technical, road construction, aerospace search and rescue units and others, as well as special military formations in wartime).
Military bodies perform specific functions. Thus, for example, the foreign intelligence agencies are charged with the tasks of protecting the security of the individual, society and the state against external threats using the methods and means defined by the federal law "On Foreign Intelligence" (obtaining and processing information affecting the vital interests of the state concerning the actual and potential capabilities, actions, plans and intentions of foreign states, organizations and persons, and rendering assistance in implementing measures undertaken by the state in the interests of ensuring its security).
The bodies of the Federal Security Service in the Russian Federation are intended to ensure the security of the individual, society and the state within the limits granted to them by federal law; in particular, they carry out counter-intelligence work, the fight against crime and terrorist activity, intelligence work, border activity, the provision of information security and certain other lines of activity.
The border agencies of the FSB of the Russian Federation carry out the defence and direct guarding of the State Border, and also detect, prevent and suppress crimes and administrative offences in the sphere of compliance with the regime of the State Border, the border regime and the regime at crossing points on Russia's State Border, and the protection and defence of the economic and other lawful interests of the Russian Federation within the border area, the exclusive economic zone and the continental shelf, as well as the protection, beyond the exclusive economic zone, of stocks of anadromous fish species originating in the rivers of the Russian Federation.
It is also important always to bear in mind and take into account that the military organization, as an integral system of troops, military formations, bodies and other military institutions, is also subdivided according to the character of the military-specialist activity of its various components.
Within the system of the military organization, three main functional components (subsystems) are distinguished on the basis of the character of their service-combat and military-specialist activity: the combat component (combat employment), the support component (the so-called "rear" component) and the command component.
The combat component is a system of those military structures (troops, military formations, bodies) that are professionally trained and employed for direct or latent armed engagement (battle) with the enemy for the purpose of destroying him, taking him prisoner, driving him back from designated lines, or thwarting his aggressive attempts.
The support component is a system of those military structures (military formations, bodies and institutions of materiel and technical, financial, cultural and recreational, and educational and training support, of military registration and the retraining of reservists, and others) that are professionally trained and engaged in the comprehensive provision and servicing of military structures with everything necessary for combat activity (engagements, battles).
The command component is a system (subsystem) of those political, military-administrative and public structures (actors) whose combined activity is directed at ensuring unity in the aims and character of the activity of all structures of the military organization, the effectiveness of their interaction, and the productiveness of their diverse methods, forms and modes of action.
The subjects of the administration of the state's military organization are distinguished (classified):
by level of authority: supreme—the highest bodies of state power (the President, Parliament, the Supreme Court); departmental—federal ministries and the bodies of the various military federal services; territorial—the command bodies of military districts and of the regional military formations of federal services (commands, directorates, sectors); local—the command bodies of formations and units;
by mode of governance: legislative (the parliaments of the federation and of the constituent entities of the federation); executive (federal and those of the constituent entities of the federation); judicial (federal, those of the constituent entities and others);
by character of governance (influence)—political (military-political), military-administrative, and public;
by the principle of managerial decision-making—collective (collegial): the Council of Ministers, a committee, a main directorate, a staff, a board and the like; and personal (individual): the President, the Minister of Defence, the Chief of the General Staff, a commander-in-chief, a commanding officer, a commander (chief) and others.
In the context of the present chapter we shall dwell in detail on the administration of the state's military organization according to the character of the subjects' influence on the object: political (military-political) administration (leadership); military-administrative, service-combat administration (command); and state and public oversight.
Political (military-political) administration, like any other form of social administration, presupposes a definite order of action among the various elements of the military-social process (the subjects of administration—socio-political bodies; the requisite system of methods, means and instruments of their managerial influence upon the object—the military-social structure), linked into a single, logically consistent chain (mechanism) of interaction, whose final, output link is the intended result (the "product"): an ordered, more perfect and effectively functioning object of administration.
The effectiveness of the military-political administration of the state's military organization depends on many factors: a clear definition of its place and role in the system of the political administration of society as a whole, the qualitative condition of the subjects of administration, the methods and means chosen, and so on.
At the same time, of the greatest importance in this whole process is the correct determination of the principal characteristics of the given object of administration: its essential definiteness, its outer contours (boundaries), its structural elements, the character of their formation, their place and role in the process of functioning and interaction, and other aspects. At the basis of the effectiveness of the military-political administration of the state's military organization lies the clarity and precision of the strategic vectors of Russia's general and military policy.
A distinctive feature of the military-political administration of the state's military organization is that it is carried out in indissoluble unity with, and as part of a complex (system) of, the administration of all military-social institutions, movements, currents and processes.
At the present historical stage, the following military-social structures are subject to military-political administration at the national, state level: military-social processes in society; the military organization of the state as the totality of the state's military institutions; military-patriotic organizations and movements; and international military-political structures, their military bodies and forces, of which the given state is a full member.
The principal military-political processes in society include: the formation of the military-political consciousness of the people and of the personnel of the power structures; forecasting of the military-political situation; monitoring the emergence and development of military-political conflicts and their management; the formation and management of public opinion on military matters; the military-defence training of the people; and military development within the state.
Military-political organizations and movements include: military-defence societies such as the Russian Defence Sports and Technical Organization (ROSTO), movements for the creation of military-patriotic public museums in schools, higher education institutions, work collectives and elsewhere.
International military-political structures include: the military bodies and forces of the UN (the Security Council, of which Russia is a permanent member; the committee on political and security questions; the Military Staff Committee; the UN Armed Forces, made up of troop contingents assigned by UN members, which in the twentieth century were successively called the "UN Guard," the "Emergency Armed Forces," the "UN Field Service," the "UN Legion," the "International Political Forces," and today the "Peacekeeping Forces" (the "blue helmets")); and the military bodies and forces of regional international military-political structures (for example, in the CIS—the Council of Defence Ministers, the Staff of the Joint Armed Forces, the Council of Border Troop Commanders, the Anti-Terrorist Centre, the Staff for the Coordination of Military Cooperation, the Coordinating Committee on Air Defence Matters and others).
An analysis of domestic and foreign experience in administering the state's military organization shows that:
First, the military-political administration of the state's military organization is understood as the purposeful influence (impact) of various bodies of state power, local self-government bodies and socio-political movements and organizations upon the conduct and functional activity of both the organization as a whole and its individual military structures, by means of formulating particular decisions, setting tasks and creating the conditions necessary for their implementation. At the same time, the military organization as a whole and its components are not subjects of politics or of political activity; they cannot take independent decisions on military-political questions. The functions of political and military leadership in the highest echelons of power are exercised at three main levels: the analysis and formulation of the principal tenets of the state's military policy is determined collegially by the highest political organs of power; their practical implementation, under the oversight of the political leadership, is carried out by the military leadership of the various power departments; and the activity of all elements of the military organization is strictly regulated by the state's legal and normative acts.
Second, the supreme constitutional state authorities (all three branches) determine in concert (by legislative means): the purpose, place and role of the military organization and of each of its elements in the state and in society—all of them are defined as particular instruments for implementing the policy and decisions of state power, while at the same time being restricted in certain rights, as social organizations, in the sphere of political life; their functions, tasks, rights and powers; the procedure for acting to implement military-political decisions; the social composition and status of the officer corps, which reflects the degree to which the various strata of civil society are represented in the military organization and the prestige of military-professional activity in society; and the method of manning the armed forces and other elements of the military organization (by conscription on the basis of universal military service, by contract on a voluntary basis, mixed and others).
Third, the military organization is usually headed by the highest political organ of power—the head of state, who is simultaneously the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the state's armed forces.
Fourth, the most important decisions concerning the state's defence capability and the functioning of the military organization are taken at the level of the president, with the approval of the legislative branch of power.
Fifth, in most democratic states the parliaments have both the legal authority and the real capacity to exercise practical oversight of the government's defence policy and of the functioning of the structural elements of the military organization, especially the armed forces (the elaboration of military doctrine and military strategy, the formation of the military budget and the basic parameters of its expenditure, and others).
Sixth, day-to-day administration of the main structures of the military organization is carried out by the relevant ministers, committee chairmen, directors, commanders and the like, who are directly answerable for this to the President and, in some countries, to the prime minister or parliament. The governing bodies of the military and other power structures have broad powers in the operational command of their forces and means, but are restricted in taking military-political decisions and making military-political statements.
Seventh, in democratic states the military-political administration of the military organization is also exercised through the mechanism of civilian influence and oversight. The formation of systems and mechanisms of civilian influence and oversight in such states proceeds in accordance with the ongoing development of the character of the relationship between the state and civil society and of the balance between external and internal threats to the state's security; as a result, the internal function of the military organization and its openness now narrow, now widen, and the scope for civilian influence and oversight changes accordingly.
The military-political administration of the state's military organization is also built and implemented on the basis of a number of fundamental principles: the creation of a unified system for administering the military organization; adequate consideration of the conclusions drawn from an analysis of the state and prospects of development of the military-political situation; centralization of command; unity of command on a legal basis; correspondence of the scale and structure of the military organization and of its administrative bodies to society's capabilities in the economic, scientific-technical, social, demographic and other spheres; unity of the training and education of personnel; the creation of conditions for the exercise of the rights and freedoms of service personnel and for their social protection; consistency between political and military strategy and tactics; and interaction and coordination of efforts at both the national and the international level in the administration of the forces ensuring national and international security.
It is also important to bear in mind that, depending on changes in the balance between external and internal threats to national security, the functional priorities in the socio-political purpose of the various elements of the state's military organization may be redistributed, and consequently the character of their military-political governance may change. Thus, for example, in connection with the growth of separatism and terrorism within the state, the internal function of its armed forces may be strengthened within their functional purpose, and consequently the importance of interaction with socio-political organizations and movements increases in their military-political governance. As production-economic and trade-financial operations grow within the border zone, the share of oversight and law-enforcement functions performed by border troop structures increases, and consequently the role of financial and economic departments and local self-government bodies is strengthened in their military-political governance.
Military-political governance (leadership) of the military organization of the Russian Federation, by the methods and forms inherent to them, is exercised directly by: the federal bodies of state power (the President, the Federal Assembly – the Parliament, the Government, the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court, the Supreme Arbitration Court, the Prosecutor's Office; the bodies of state power of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation, local self-government bodies and socio-political organizations also take part in this governance.
The structural-functional vertical of military-administrative and service-combat command, as exemplified by the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, which constitute the core of its military organization and the foundation for ensuring military security, appeared as follows at the beginning of 2005: the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces (the President of the Russian Federation), the Minister of Defence, the Chief of the General Staff, the commanders-in-chief (commanders) of the services (branches of arms) of the Armed Forces, the commanders of operational formations, the commanders of formations, the commanders of units, and the commanders of subunits.
State and public oversight of the activity of Russia's military organization is exercised by the President, the Security Council, the Government, prosecutors' offices at various levels, the Accounts Chamber, the Military Inspectorate, the relevant committees, commissions and special commissioners of the Parliament, military councils, committees and other bodies of public movements and organizations (soldiers' mothers, military trade unions, etc.).
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