Translated material
The burden of militarism
If in the field of the political and economic organization of the company there was a refusal, partial or even complete, from the legacy of the USSR, then the Russian armed forces to this day are even a reduced three times, but an exact copy of the Covet.
The mass mobilization army, which the military department has already been preserved for a year and a half, has not been consistent with either the needs of defense or the capabilities of the country. The state spends huge funds for an institute, which is decisively unable to fulfill its functions.
However, the leaders of the country, and most of the Russian elite demonstrate a striking trust in the general, which, using this, actually sabotes military reform. “Society and parliament are still in captivity in captivity of traditional admiration for the sacred cow of“ defense and security ”. The position of any ministry, industry and individual official can be criticized and revised, but not the plans of the Ministry of Defense and other “power” departments (the defense budget annually changes the Duma by no more than 0.5–1%). Officials in uniform are perceived not just as civil servants who may well be mistaken or haunt narrow -minded interests, but as priests who are openly the Sacrament of Truth, inaccessible to civilians, ”said Alexei Arbatov, who held the post of deputy chairman of the defense committee of the State Duma in 1995-1999 [1] .
The eyes of high -ranking military are looking at the Russian leadership not only at his army. Everyone, even an internal crisis, any extraordinary incident, it seeks to connect with a certain mythical global military confrontation. Let us recall how, after the tragedy of Beslan, Vladimir Putin said that we “showed weakness. And the weak - beat. Some want to tear off a piece of “fatter” from us, others help them. They help, believing that Russia-as one of the largest nuclear powers of the world-still poses a threat to someone. Therefore, this threat should be eliminated. And terrorism is, of course, only a tool to achieve these goals " [2] . Failures in foreign policy are also written off on the machinations of a global adversary, in which the United States and NATO can easily guess.
Unfortunately, with this feeling that the West and America are only thinking about how to destroy Russia, many of our citizens live. Hence the readiness (though now in many respects speculative) to admit that in order to strengthen the notorious defense capabilities, the state has the right to demand any sacrifice from the people.
In the current conditions, when even the military understands that the West has no reasons for us, all this may seem strange. But when for three centuries everything in the state is subordinated to the needs of war and the army, is it worth it to be surprised that the militaristic spirit penetrated all layers of society.
The genealogy of militarism
The term "militarism" entered into use in the middle of the 19th century. Then it began to be used to characterize the Napoleon III regime in France [3] . At the end of the century, Herbert Spencer, one of the founders of scientific sociology in the “principles of sociology”, divided the types of state system into two classes. One Spencer called "industrial." Laws and institutions in the states related to it are aimed at peaceful economic development for the good of society. We would now define another as a militaristic one, although Spencer used the term “warlike”. He included countries in it in which everything is subordinated to preparation for war. “Modern Dagomei (current Benin. - A. G.) and Russia, as well as ancient Peru, Egypt and Sparta - in the social system of these countries, the life, freedom and property of a citizen belong to the state whose purpose is war” [4] .
Scientific and technological progress, in particular the rapid development of the railway network, made it possible to conduct mass mobilization in a short time. The number of armies in the second half of the 19th century began to grow rapidly, and this greatly influenced the state structure of many countries.
Engels was the first to indicate the connection of the militarization of societies with a change in the nature of the military organization and the war itself: “The army became the main goal of the state, it became an end in itself; Peoples exist only to supply and feed the soldiers, ”he wrote in“ Anti-During ”. - Militarism dominates Europe and devours it. " [5] .
Karl Liebknecht in the work of 1907 “Militarism and Antimilitarism” made an important observation regarding the change in the consciousness of citizens in a militaristic society: “Militarism acts ... as the army itself ... And outside the army, covering the whole society through a network of militaristic and half -liter institutions ... then it acts as a system of impregnation of all public and private life people with a militaristic spirit " [6] .
Opening the era of universal, global wars, the First World War shocked Europe to the ground. A huge country appeared on the map with a hitherto unheard of social structure. Along with traditional reasons for confrontation: sales markets, disputed territories, trade routes, mineral deposits, ideology began to play a huge role. All this could not but lead to some rethinking the concept of “militarism”.
For obvious reasons, Soviet ideologists declared his generic disease of the Society of Operation. Militarism from their object of research turned into a political shortcut.
Meanwhile, Western science continued to actively study this phenomenon. In the 20s of the last century, the American political scientist Garold Lassville released the classic "notes on the Garnison State." In them, he described the structure of the modern militaristic society: “In the Garnison State, a specialist in the use of violence is at the top, and the organization of economic and social life is systematically subordinate to the needs of the armed forces. This means that in society those who use violence dominate. " [7] .
The question was widely discussed in the scientific world - where is the border between militarism and the natural desire of the state to ensure its security. The American researcher Alfred Wagts in his famous “History of Militarism” answered him like this: “This difference is fundamental, determining in nature. The military approach is, first of all, the desire to concentrate human and material resources in order to most effectively solve specific problems. Militarism is a combination of customs, ideas and interests, which, although they are related to wars and armies, are invariably more claiming much more than just satisfying military needs. Refusing the scientific approach, militarism relies on the Castle and Cult approach, on power and faith. The army, arranged in such a way that it does not serve the goals of preparation for a possible war, but the interests of the military, is inherently militaristic " [8] .
Wagts emphasized that the carriers of militaristic thinking are by no means necessarily military: “Civil militarism should be defined as the unconditional adoption of military values, manners, principles and relations. Priority is given to military considerations. The heroic is found mainly in military service and in military operations, in preparation for which the main interest of the state and which should be spent on the main resources ... Like the militarists in military uniforms, civilian civilians despise civil policy, parliamentarism, party, etc. ” [9] .
Unfortunately, such civilian militarism through the efforts of all Russian rulers - autocrats, general secretaries, and now the presidents, have taken deep roots in our society.
In the gymnasium, Soviet, and the absolute majority of modern textbooks, Russia is represented by a state, doomed to live forever in the enemy environment, to conduct grueling defensive wars. Hence, and for centuries the idea of the army as an institution that has the right to unlimitedly use all the resources of the country - material, intellectual, human [10] . Meanwhile, elementary logic suggests that the state, which occupies such an extensive territory, is unlikely to take exclusively defensive wars. The General Staff in the memorandum of Alexander II proudly reported that in 1700-1870 Russia participated in 38 military campaigns, and with the exception of two they were all off -off [11] .
Due to the continuous wars, the role of a service class has increased exorbitantly, the content of which was increasingly done, according to historian Alexander Kornilov, “the dominant interest in the Moscow state, which absorbed all other interests of the country” [12] .
Peter, having shutting his reforms, also cared exclusively about the interests of the army, and not about the comprehensive modernization of Russian society. In many ways, we owe him to the fact that the country until the end of the last century remained a kind of service appendage of a huge, sucking all juices from the people, the army. Vasily Klyuchevikh wrote on this subject: “Military reform ... is very important for our history - this is not just a question about state defense: the reform had a deep impact on both the warehouse of society and the further course of events ... The war was the main driving lever of the transformative activity of Peter, the military reform - its initial moment ... The transformation of the state defense began to transform the state economy, it was directed” [13] . We find the same thought with the scientist and politician Pavel Milyukov, who issued capital work on the history of the Peter's reforms: “All state reorganization as a whole is the product of the military-financial needs of the state” [14] .
The recruitment system, borrowed by Peter from Sweden, for two centuries provided Russia with cannon fodder. If most other European sovereigns contained hired armies and were forced to measure their number with the financial capabilities of the country, then Russian emperors could not limit themselves. In particular, because the treasury of the soldier cost almost nothing. It was essentially an inexhaustible resource, which in the era, when success depended primarily on numerical superiority, provided an advantage over any enemy.
“Just what has made Russia backward, less developed than Western Europe - autocracy, serfdom, poverty, - paradoxically turned into a source of military power,” writes the famous American historian William Fuller. - The autocracy could completely mobilize the Russian economy for warfare. The non -freedom regime made it possible to unlimitedly pump human and material resources from the village. " [15] .
If you do not know that we are talking about serf Russia, these words can be completely attributed to the Bolshevik period of our history.
Declaring a course for industrialization, Stalin was least thinking about the good of the people. His goal was to turn the country into a huge weapon production plant. For the sake of this, he robbed the peasants, forcing them to work on a collective farm for "sticks", and so that they would not run away, deprived of the right to leave the village. All this could be attributed to the characteristics of the personality of the Generalissimo, but even after his death, up to the collapse of the USSR, the country remained a huge military camp. Education and education in it were aimed at the formation of not a free person, but a soldier (it was no coincidence that such education was called and continued to be called military-patriotic). The population was harassed that the country was surrounded by enemies. The economy almost all worked for the military-industrial complex.
The people, in a terrible war, broke the ridge to fascism and German militarism, so saturated with a militaristic spirit that, having said goodbye to totalitarianism, continues to consider the army, according to Peter Struve, "a lively embodiment of state being in Russia." Moreover, the elite is infected with militarism, even to a greater extent than the people it takes care of. “What is Russia, if not the army and the Russian language,” the Kremlin political strategist Gleb Pavlovsky pathetically asks for pathetically [16] .
The militarism of the upper reaches
This skew in the minds of those in power was reflected in the structure of our government. The power block in it clearly prevails over civilian. The ministers who are responsible for the social sphere are subordinate to the prime minister, and the leaders of a dozen military and militarized departments are included in the Security Council and obey the president directly. A similar "binary" office existed only in Prussia and in the German Empire.
Civil militarism is fully inherent in Russian President Vladimir Putin. He periodically demonstrates the ardent love of the army (there is nothing reprehensible in this), but to a greater extent to military paraphernalia, the military style of life and management.
The president loves to fly on a fighter, climb on board the submarine, and impress in military uniform. One gets the impression that in the civilian world he feels uncomfortable and would be happy to leave him for the sake of the male world that is close and close to him. With perseverance worthy of better use, Putin builds the so -called vertical of power - a tough, essentially military, hierarchical system of government. The principle of separation of powers with such a system is not combined in any way, therefore, the parliament is fake, and the judicial power is basmanny.
The deputy director of the Moscow Center of Carnegie Dmitry Train, called “securitization”, the deputy director of the Moscow authority, “securitization”. The presidential and most of those who surround him to the intelligence or military community determine their attitude to information. First of all, they strive to limit access to it, secondly, to “out” to issue it in a cut and distorted form and, thirdly, they consider valuable mainly the information that comes through special channels, that is, they obviously doom themselves to the one-sidedness of the judgments. “I do not look at the statements made by our partners for the press. I rely on the information that appears during our personal discussions " [17] , ”our president recently noted.
The conviction of our officials generated by the militaristic consciousness that the principle of military organization is ideal for society as a whole, led to the fact that in recent years there have been many retired officers in the authorities of all levels (until recently, from seven presidential envoy in federal districts, generals). Sociologists even spoke about the onset of the “militocracy” era [18] .
Former owners of shoulder straps do not demonstrate any special efficiency and principles. It is known, for example, that corruption in the regions headed by ex-generations Viktor Kazantsev and Vladimir Shamanov bloomed with a magnificent color.
Militarism and public consciousness
The current government, calling itself democratic, persistently, like all previous ones, introduces the militaristic stereotypes into the consciousness of citizens. For ten years, the share of positive answers to the question "Does Russia have enemies?" increased from 13% to 77%, and the main growth came precisely on the Putin's five -year period [19] . The existence of a global conspiracy against Russia today is convinced by 45% of respondents. Great, respectively, confidence in the armed forces. The army stably occupies the third (after the president and the church) a place in the relevant ratings [20] .
Looking at these numbers and mindful of how crushing the Russian army is subjected to society in society, it is difficult to disagree with the former head of the General Staff Anatoly Kvashnin, who believes that the consciousness of our citizens is initially militarized. However, the current civilian militarism is not at all the same that it was three decades ago, when people lived with the confidence that there is no stronger than our army in the world. “The army today,” says sociologist Lev Gudkov, “seems not so much an effective and capable institution as the embodiment of the most important national symbols, key values for mass consciousness, the supporting moment of mass identity” [21] . Gudkov’s colleague on the Levada Center Alexei Levinson during a round table organized by the Liberal Mission Foundation expressed a similar thought: “The worse the idea of the real army, the faster in recent months a positive attitude to some imaginary ideal army has been growing. The discrediting of the existing army and its military defeats in paradoxically lead to a rise in the image of the army in the eyes of society. That is, the ideal becomes cleaner and lighter, the worse its implementation in practice. " [22] . This amazing duality is demonstrated by all sociological studies. So in a survey conducted by Romir-Monitoring among students, each fourth respondent spoke out in favor of canceling the deferral from the call, but at the same time more than half of this group said that they were ready to use any means, just to evade the service in the Armed Forces [23] .
The holistic picture of the world, formed for decades, collapsed, and people are trying to build a new one that is expensive for them, which they do not want to abandon. And this is primarily the glory of Russian weapons. Власть умело этим пользуется, чтобы навязать народу некий эрзац национальной идеи. Сводится она все к тому же — Россия обречена противостоять сонму врагов [24] , и в этом противостоянии ее историческая миссия. Как справедливо отмечает Гудков, мысль, что кто-то стремится нанести нашей стране вред, странным образом поднимает россиян в собственных глазах. В самом деле, если мы объект неких «поползновений», стало быть, есть в нас что-то притягательное, заставляющее вынашивать коварные планы [25] .
Милитаризм и армия
Коль скоро милитаристским духом пронизано и общество и элита, российская армия, казалось бы, должна жить припеваючи — быть сытой, довольной, иметь самое современное вооружение, структурно соответствовать последним требованиям военной науки. Но ничего этого мы не наблюдаем. Времена изменились, и милитаристское мышление сегодня способствует не укреплению вооруженных сил, а их деградации. Даже существенное увеличение финансирования со 109 млрд руб. в 1999 году до 668 в 2006-м не пошло российской армии на пользу — за семь лет ни порядка в ней больше не стало, ни эффективность ее не повысилась.
Это как старый автомобиль — когда-то он был хорош, но сегодня, сколько в него ни вкладывай, с современными на дороге он все равно не сможет конкурировать.
Вот уже полтора века в российских военных верхах идет борьба между «технологами» и «волшебниками» [26] . «Технологи» — это те, кто полагают, что традиционный российский способ воевать, не думая о потерях, рассчитывая главным образом на неограниченные человеческие ресурсы и отвагу русского солдата, безнадежно устарел. «Волшебники», напротив, живут с убеждением, что народ для того и существует, чтобы приносить неисчислимые жертвы на алтарь отече ства, и что против нашей российской удали никакое техническое превосходство не поможет. К сожалению, и в прежние времена и сегодня к «технологам» начинают прислушиваться, когда страна оказывается на грани катастрофы.
Разумеется, современные «волшебники» прекрасно понимают, что никакая удаль против высокоточного оружия не поможет. Но их типично милитаристское мышление устроено таким образом, что представить страну без огромной армии, через которую «прокачивается» все мужское население, они не в состоянии. Да и профессионально российские «волшебники» не готовы командовать компактными высокомобильными частями, оснащенными современной техникой. Все, что умеют наши генералы, — ставить под ружье огромное число людей, организовывать их самое примитивное обучение, а потом заменять перемолотые в боях дивизии свежими. Так Советский Союз воевал шесть десятилетий назад, так российские военачальники намерены воевать в будущем. «Большинство милитаристов, — пишет американский исследователь Альфред Вагтс, — будучи в политике консерваторами, являются по своей философии антиматериалистами. Они всегда предпочитают расходовать людей, экономя на материалах» [27] .
Для России сегодня большая призывная армия — значит отсталая армия. Иметь вооруженные силы, сопоставимые по размерам и насыщенности военной техникой с американскими, и расходовать на их содержание в 25 раз меньше средств, чем США, — это из разряда все того же волшебства. Ведь затраты на эксплуатацию, к примеру, атомной подводной лодки не зависят от того, какой стране она принадлежит. Но даже если бы средства на перевооружение вдруг свалились с неба, овладеть современной техникой массы плохо обученных срочников (три четверти нынешних призывников не имеют даже среднего образования [28] ) все равно не в состоянии.
Массовая мобилизационная армия не может адекватно ответить на главную угрозу безопасности России в лице международного терроризма. После трагедии 2002 года в Театральном центре на Дубровке, когда террористы захватили более 800 заложников, российский президент объявил мировому терроризму войну, как годом раньше это сделал президент США.
Путин повелел внести соответствующие изменения не только в Концепцию национальной безопасности (документ сугубо декларативный), но и в планы применения Вооруженных сил РФ.
Многие эксперты заговорили тогда о смене российской стратегической парадигмы, что это, мол, неизбежно придаст новый импульс военной реформе. Ведь российская армия, массовая и мобилизационная, менее всего пригодна для антитеррористической деятельности. Противопартизанскую войну можно вести только мелкими прекрасно технически оснащенными группами, укомплектованными высокими профессионалами.
Но военное руководство, прекрасно понимая, чем для него может обернуться переориентация на антитеррористические задачи, спокойно проигнорировало приказ президента. В подготовленном Министерством обороны в 2003 году документе «Актуальные задачи развития Вооруженных сил РФ» прямо сказано, что в антитеррористических операциях армия должна играть лишь вспомогательную роль.
Единственное применение, которое сегодня может иметь огромная армия советского образца, — это глобальный военный конфликт. Поэтому генералы, словно забыв о том, что холодная война давно закончилась, продолжают твердить об американской угрозе. «Невозможно отвлечься и от того факта, что США, некоторые другие страны НАТО пытаются использовать угрозу терроризма как прикрытие для решения своих далеко идущих геополитических задач», — пишет президент Академии военных наук Махмут Гареев [29] .
Сегодня ни одни стратегические маневры не обходятся без имитационных ударов по территории США и призыва резервистов. В ходе беспрецедентных по масштабам командно-штабных маневров «Щит Зауралья — 2005» их было задействовано аж 57 тысяч! [30]
Необходимостью сохранять и поддерживать «мобилизационный ресурс», от чего большинство развитых стран давно отказалось, военное ведомство оправдывает свое нежелание переходить к формированию вооруженных сил на добровольческой основе. При этом оно скромно умалчивает о том, что российская промышленность в обозримом будущем не будет в состоянии произвести достаточное количество вооружений для тех миллионов, которые предполагается поставить под ружье в случае войны.
Сто пятьдесят лет назад рекрутская система стала одной из главных причин поражения России в Крымской войне. Это было ясно всем, но противникам реформ удалось на целых десять лет задержать переход к призывной армии. То же мы наблюдаем и сегодня. Призывная система безнадежно устарела, никак не отвечает угрозам, с которыми сталкивается Россия, современному уровню военной техники, тормозит экономическое развитие страны. Однако наши военачальники отчасти по корыстным соображениям, а главным образом в силу унаследованного ими от отцов и дедов милитаристского взгляда на мир борются за сохранение этой системы. То, что в этой борьбе они потерпят поражение, сомнений нет. Хорошо бы только стране не пришлось, как это не раз бывало, заплатить на их твердолобость слишком высокую цену.
[1] Independent military display. 2002. № 45.
[2] http://www.kremlin.ru/appears/2004/09/04/1752_type63374type82634_76320.s...
[3] БСЭ. Т. 16. С. 256.
[4] Spencer H. Principles of Sociology. Vol. 2 New York, 1895. P. 602.
[5] К. Маркс и Ф. Энгельс. Соч., Т. 20. С. 175.
[6] Либкнехт К. Милитаризм и антимилитаризм. М., 1960. С. 58.
[7] Essays on the garrison state / Harold Lasswell; edited and with an introduction by Jay Stanley; with a preface by Irving Louis Horowitz. Imprint: New Brunswick, NJ; London: Transaction Publishers, 1997. С. 12.
[8] Vagts A. A history of militarism: [civilian and military. New York] Meridian Books [1959] P. 13–15.
[9] Ibid. С. 453.
[10] См., к примеру: На службе отечеству: Книга для чтения по общественно-государственной подготовке солдат (матросов), сержантов (старшин) Вооруженных cил Российской Федерации
[11] Сухотин Н. Н. Война в истории русского мира. СПб., 1898. С. 113–114.
[12] Курс истории России ХIX века. М., 1992. С. 20.
[13] Ключевский В. О. Сочинения. Т. 4. М., 1958. С. 64–65.
[14] Милюков П. Н. Государственное хозяйство России в первой четверти XVIII века и реформа Петра Великого. СПб.: Типография М. М. Стасилевича, 1905. С. 303.
[15] Fuller WC Strategy and power in Russia, 1600–1914. New York: Free Press. P. 82–83.
[16] Красная звезда. 26.10.2002. «Российская армия, политика»: Материалы круглого стола.
[17] http://vip.lenta.ru/doc/2005/04/24/putinchannel/
[18] См, например: Крыштановская О. Исследования российской элиты: Тезисы выступления, Высшая Школа Экономики, 01.10.2003 [ www.hse.ru/science/yassin/seminar_2003_10_01.pdf] .
[19] Эти и многие другие данные, использованные в этой главе, а также их анализ почерпнуты из выступлений Л. Д. Гудкова в ходе ситуационных анализов, организованных Фондом «Либеральная миссия».
[20] http://www.levada.ru/press/2004092702.html
[21] www.liberal.ru/sitan.asp?Num=537&print=1
[22] http://www.liberal.ru/sitan.asp?Num=555
[23] http://www.ej.ru/comments/entry/1106/
[24] Михаил Юрьев — один из тех, кто претендует на роль идеолога путинского режима, — предельно откровенно изложил эту концепцию в своей статье «Крепость Россия» (Главная тема. 2004. №2). Рассуждения о том, что над Россией нависла угроза «внешнего управления», стали общим местом у представителей кремлевской администрации (см., напр.: Дмитрий Медведев. Россия может исчезнуть как единое государство // Эксперт. №13 (460). 4 апреля 2005).
[25] http://www.liberal.ru/sitan.asp?Num=551
[26] Fuller WC Op. cit. 124–125
[27] Vagts A. Op. cit.
[28] http://lenta.ru/news/2005/03/31/army/
[29] Гареев М. Какие Вооруженные силы нужны России? // Отечественные записки. 2002. № 8.