Lecture
In the modern world, so long as potential sources of military danger exist, every state has the right to defend itself and to ensure its security by appropriate military-technical means and by individual and collective forces. To this end a system of military security is created and functions within the state, and military policy itself is fundamental to that system, determining its structure and content.
The legal foundation of military policy consists of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, federal laws and other normative legal acts of the Russian Federation, as well as the international treaties of the Russian Federation in the field of ensuring military security. The provisions of these documents define the powers of state bodies and officials in the sphere of defining and implementing the military policy of the Russian Federation.
The distinctive features of the military policy of the Russian Federation are determined by changes in views on the character of the wars of the present epoch. In new military-political approaches and concepts, an ever greater place is occupied by the judgement that war and military force are not the most effective instrument of policy, and that security cannot be ensured by military means alone. For this reason the main emphasis in resolving conflicts and contentious problems should be placed on political means and diplomatic efforts.
The leadership of the Russian state, as before, views its military policy in the context of building a democratic law-governed state, carrying out socio-economic reforms, affirming the principles of equal partnership, mutually advantageous cooperation and good-neighbourliness in international relations, consistently forming a common and comprehensive system of international security, and preserving and strengthening universal peace.
In determining the main directions of its military policy, the Russian Federation proceeds above all from its national interests and from the need for a balanced approach to the tasks of ensuring military security; priority is thereby given to developing military, military-political and military-technical cooperation with the states parties to the CIS Collective Security Treaty. In doing so, the Russian Federation proceeds from the need to consolidate efforts to create a single defence space and to ensure collective military security on the principles of equality, mutual benefit and good-neighbourliness.
In line with these approaches, the principal aim of the military policy of the Russian Federation today and for the immediate future will remain the provision of favourable conditions for stabilisation and for the reliable protection of the individual, society and the state.
Proceeding from the conceptual directions for ensuring the military security of the Russian Federation set out in the National Security Concept and the Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation, the principal content of military policy at the present stage is:
maintaining the country's defence potential at a level adequate to existing and potential military threats, taking into account the country's economic capabilities and the availability of human resources;
preventing large-scale military clashes on the world stage, contributing to the cessation and prevention of armed conflicts, and promptly neutralising any military provocations;
defending Russia's independence and ensuring the security, sovereignty, inviolability of borders and territorial integrity of the Russian Federation, and deterring the unleashing of wars directed against Russia;
fulfilling the international obligations of the Russian Federation to render military assistance to countries allied with it and to take part in peacekeeping operations;
supporting the actions of the UN Security Council and other international organisations to maintain or restore international peace and security at the earliest possible stage in the development of a threatening situation or conflict.
Military-political practice in the field of military development and the implementation of military reform is built in accordance with guidelines of a doctrinal character.
The principal content of military policy connected with the conduct of military-political activity, chiefly in the sphere of the foreign policy of the Russian Federation in peacetime, is the support, where necessary, of Russia's political actions by carrying out appropriate measures of a military character, and the exercise of control over the mutual fulfilment of obligations in the field of the limitation, reduction and elimination of armaments and the strengthening of confidence-building measures. At the same time, the possibilities of political and diplomatic ways and means of military-political activity should not be exaggerated.
It is well known that in the practice of interstate relations they are realised, as a rule, by overcoming deep contradictions, complex problems and serious disagreements, over a long period of time, and with various limitations, conditions and so forth. Nor should it be forgotten that one often has to deal, on the one hand, with manifestations of political and military inertia and destructiveness, and on the other with national egoism and military-political adventurism.
The contradictory tendencies and factors in the development of the military-political situation, and the possibility of its destabilisation owing to the existence of sources of military danger, on the one hand confront the world community and international organisations — above all the UN and the OSCE — with the need to consolidate efforts aimed at preventing military conflicts and at coordinating collective action and political and other non-military measures for the settlement of crises. On the other hand, they confirm a well-known regularity, the essence of which is that peaceful means of ensuring military security can be effective only if they are backed by and rest upon military might sufficient to defend the country and its vital interests.
In recent years all this has introduced major corrections both into the established views and concepts on this question, into the decisions adopted, and into the concrete content of the military policy of the Russian Federation as a whole. And so long as the non-use of force has not become a norm of international relations, the national interests of the Russian Federation require the possession of military might sufficient for its defence.
One of the most important tasks of the military policy of the Russian Federation in ensuring international security is strategic deterrence in the interests of preventing both conventional and nuclear war, and of fulfilling allied obligations. Of fundamental importance in this regard is the provision that the military security of the Russian Federation is to be ensured by the entire aggregate of the forces, means and resources at its disposal.
To this end the Russian Federation must possess a nuclear potential capable of reliably guaranteeing the infliction of a specified level of damage on any aggressor (a state or a coalition of states) under any conditions. Nuclear weapons are thereby regarded as a factor of deterring aggression, of ensuring the military security of the Russian Federation and its allies, and of maintaining international stability and peace.
Of particular significance is the doctrinal proposition that the Russian Federation reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in response to the use against it and its allies of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction, and also in response to large-scale aggression employing conventional weapons in situations critical for the national security of the Russian Federation and its allies.
Understanding the concern of other states regarding the use of nuclear weapons, Russia:
scrupulously fulfils the international treaties of the Russian Federation on strategic offensive arms and anti-ballistic missile defence, and is prepared for the further reduction of its nuclear weapons on a bilateral basis with the USA, as well as on a multilateral basis with other nuclear states, down to the minimum levels consistent with the requirements of strategic stability;
advocates making the regime of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons and their means of delivery universal in character, decisively increasing the effectiveness of that regime through a combination of prohibitive, verification and technological measures, and ending and comprehensively banning nuclear tests.
A most important element of the content of military policy is the building of an effective military organisation of the state, designed to provide guaranteed protection of the national interests and military security of the Russian Federation and its allies.
The principal path to achieving the goal of building an effective military organisation is to give it optimal characteristics in terms of numbers, combat composition, organisational and staffing structure, command and control systems and all types of support. One indispensable condition is optimising the expenditure of material resources and funds allocated to ensuring military security and raising the effectiveness of their use on the basis of the interconnected, coordinated reform of all components of the state's military organisation.
This vitally necessary task is addressed by the doctrinal guidelines on unified principles, priorities and directions for the development and training of the military organisation, and on bringing the scope and content of its tasks, and the structure, composition and strength of its components, into line with the real requirements of ensuring military security and with the country's economic capabilities. The same goal is served by measures to improve strategic planning on the principles of unity in the employment of the Armed Forces and other troops of the Russian Federation.
Ensuring Russia's military security requires the pursuit of a unified state policy in this field, the consolidation of the efforts of all branches and bodies of power, and the concentration and rational use of the forces, means and resources allocated.
The core of the military organisation is the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, which constitute the foundation of the country's defence. They are intended to repel aggression directed against the Russian Federation, to defend by force of arms the integrity and inviolability of the territory of the Russian Federation, and to carry out tasks in accordance with the international treaties of the Russian Federation. Contemporary Russia needs Armed Forces that have every capability to respond adequately to modern security threats and that are able to fight simultaneously at the global and regional levels and, if required, in several local conflicts. Under any scenario of their development, the Armed Forces must guarantee the security and territorial integrity of Russia.
In the military policy of the Russian Federation a special role is played by the human factor and by the social and state status of the serviceman. For this reason the following tasks come to the fore: implementing a set of measures for the social protection of servicemen, raising the prestige of military service, shaping public consciousness in the spirit of the need for the armed defence of the country's national interests, and mobilising the efforts and capabilities of the state, society and citizens for carrying out military reform.
Military policy is an important constituent part of the general domestic and foreign policy of the state and is directly connected with the creation of the military organisation and with the preparation and employment of the means of armed violence to achieve particular political goals. Military policy defines the basic aims and tasks of the military security of society and the state.
In recent years the country's leadership has introduced substantial corrections into the concrete content of the military policy of the Russian Federation, above all into established views and concepts and into the decisions adopted. And so long as the non-use of force has not become a norm of international relations, the national interests of the Russian Federation require the formulation and conduct of a military policy consistent with the realities that have taken shape in the world.
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