Goltz principle

Dear ladies and gentlemen, I hasten to inform you about a discovery of almost historical proportions made by your humble servant. I will be brief: I have discovered the main principle of the functioning of the vertical power structure created by all of us (I humbly hope that in the future this pattern will be called the Goltz principle).

So, the more absurd the idea, the more likely it is that it will be approved by the Russian bureaucracy, since an impossible idea allows you to milk the state budget indefinitely .

I was prompted to the above discovery by Dmitry Medvedev’s statement about plans for the development of our glorious Armed Forces. In general, I am ready to take quite seriously the five directions of development of our army that the president formulated. And to the transfer of all combat units to a state of constant readiness, which in fact should mean a refusal to draft (after all, readiness for immediate action is incompatible with the presence of untrained soldiers in the units). And to increase the efficiency of the command and control system of the Armed Forces (which presupposes unified command of formations of all branches of the military, which is still inaccessible to our generals). And to improve the system of personnel training, military education and military science. And to equip the army with the most modern weapons. And, finally, to improve the social well-being of military personnel.

All of these are certainly important areas of army development. And it would be extremely interesting to discuss each of them. I was already about to do this. But then I read that Medvedev announced his intention to create some kind of aerospace defense system. This idea was voiced a year and a half ago by Sergei Ivanov, who had not yet fallen into disgrace. And she was unanimously ridiculed by all the experts who at that time still risked defending the laws of physics in the face of administrative resources.

The logic of the authors of the project was as simple as a cudgel: the damned adversary is planning an aerospace attack. Therefore, we will oppose him with our aerospace defense. Why will we combine air defense and space defense systems into one system? At the same time, there is one small problem on which the authors of the rich idea chose not to focus the attention of high authorities.

It is more or less clear what is meant by an aerospace operation. Reconnaissance satellites detect targets and transmit targeting information to combat aircraft or even cruise missiles. However, the problem is that repelling such an attack requires action in two different environments, and space and air defense systems do not interface in any way. Fundamentally different ranges of radar systems, completely different interception systems. Enemy objects in space fly according to one law of physics, and those in airspace fly according to another.

However, the laws of physics are nothing compared to the desire of bureaucrats (the military is no exception) to put something under their control. And ask the state for billions of rubles for the implementation of this grandiose idea. According to experts, in the best case, it will be possible to install monitors in one building, which receive information from space force stations, and monitors with data from air defense systems. Ideally, all this information can be brought together on one screen. However, all this will in no way mean the creation of a unified system, on which, I repeat, enormous amounts of money will be spent.

The point is not even that the top leaders of the state were carried away by a generally meaningless idea. The thing is that they are passionate about an idea that has been ridiculed and publicly declared absurd.

There can be two explanations for this. Or they know something that is completely unknown to experts. That is, new physical laws. Or, as Goltz's principle confirms, the interested parties did not allow them to know that there are experts who believe that the creation of an aerospace defense system contradicts the known laws of physics. And the fact that the crazy idea remains on the agenda casts doubt on the ability of the authorities to implement those really important tasks that they seem to have outlined.