What kind of the army Ukraine needs

This issue of The Day offers the reader the article “What Kind of the Army Ukraine Needs” by a well-known Russian historian and political writer, Boris Sokolov, on the basic foreign national defense patterns and their relationship with Ukrainian conditions and realities. The newspaper thus conti­nues a series of publications on this topic. Earlier, the Ukrainian-language version Den has printed expert opinions on reformation of the Ukrainian army and analysis of foreign experience in the organization of national defense. Among them are “The Problems of a State’s Defense Capability” by Ivan YAKUBETS (No. 161 of September 2, 2014, and No. 162 of September 3, 2014), “Three in Favor” by Yurii RAIKHEL (No. 89 of May 20, 2014), “What Kind of Army We Need” (No. 144 of August 7, 2014) and ”Are We Prepared?” (No. 179 of September 26, 2014) by Valentyn BADRAK.

Judging by the statements of some Defense Ministry officials, Ukraine may opt for the formation of a 200,000-strong militia-type army patterned on the Israeli-Swiss-Norwegian system. Leaving aside the army’s overall strength which only depends on the state budget expenditure, I must say that the selected model does not seem to suit the concrete Ukrainian con­di­tions. And here is why.

Now and in the foreseeable future, Ukraine is going to face only one serious mi­litary and political threat – Russia and separatists inside Ukraine, who draw support from the former. It would be wrong to think, though, that pro-Russian sentiments are ty­pical of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts only. They occur, to one extent or another, in all the eastern regions of Ukraine and even on the Dnipro’s right bank, although their bearers never make a majority there. Besides, many Ukrainians just do not want to go to war. What is more, this quite often applies to what seem to be the most “loyal” regions, as proves a notorious story of Prykarpattia Battalion from Ivano-Frankivsk. Let us not delude ourselves: as Ukraine has a conside­rable share of Russian and Russian-speaking po­pulation, a part of the residents will inevitably interpret any conflict between Russia and Ukraine as civil war.

Historical examples are a click away. Recalling the 1920 Soviet-Polish war, Jozef Pilsudski noted that the Polish troops’ payroll strength was about 200,000, but nobody, even Pilsudski himself, knew how many people were there in reality. This was caused by the fact that many servicemen were always away on leave or temporary duty. The marshal joked: “I can say we had a volunteer army, for only those who want to fight go to war in our country.” Meanwhile, the Soviet-Polish war was in fact part of the civil war in the former Russian Empire. The Bolsheviks had the Polish Red Army being formed on their side, while a number of Russian White Army formations fought on Pilsudski’s side, including Captain Vadim Yakovlev’s Cossack brigade, not to mention the Ukrainian National Republic’s army allied to the Poles. There were also a lot of Ukrainians fighting in the Red Army’s ranks.

The countries after which Ukraine wants to pattern a militia-type army are distinguished for a high motivational spirit of the entire population to defend their fatherland, which – let us not indulge in wishful thinking – is not the case in today’s Ukraine. Yet, for example, in Israel Palestinian Arabs, who are Israeli citizens, are not drafted into the army. But the rest of the servicemen are highly motivated to defend their homeland. For this reason, it is considered disgraceful in Israel not to serve in the army, and even women are subject to the draft. A similar picture is in Switzerland, where people uphold a centuries-old tradition to defend independence by means of cantons’ militias. In Norway, with a territory just one and a half times smaller than that of Ukraine and a population nine times lesser, the militia-based territorial defense allows controlling at least in some way a large area in a critical period. All the more so that Norway is, like Switzerland, a mountainous country, and small groups of mili­tiamen, who know the location very well, can effectively resist the most up-to-date armies. Incidentally, Norway has never had serfdom, which has undoubtedly produced a far-reaching effect on the mentality of the Norwegian armed forces, including territorial militia. Nor have ancestors of the pre­sent-day residents of Switzerland or Israel ever been serfs.

Ukraine is predominantly a flat-ground country with a different kind of military traditions. The vast majority of Ukrainians had been part of the Russian Empire for more than 200 years, while the minority had been part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and then Poland and Czechoslovakia for 130 years, before they reunited in the Soviet empire after World War Two. In these states, the armed forces were first manned by means of compulsory recruiting and then via the universal military duty in a regular army. Yet, in the late 1920s, the USSR had a mixed territorial-regular army which comprised a few regular divisions and a lot of territorial divisions with a limited number of career officers and a large number of militiamen who received military training on a part-time basis. The objective of this setup was to save on military expenditures as much as possible at a time when there were no real external threats to the Soviet Union. But as soon as in the early 1930s, owing to an increasing external threat and, what is more, the growing expansionist plans of Stalin, all territorial divisions began to be turned into regular ones. This process ended in 1939. The former territorial divisions showed very low fighting efficiency in the battles of 1938-41.

It is a futile attempt to form a militia-type army in Ukraine, as long as the armed conflict continues on its territory. A militia-type army is only effective if the skills that militia reservists have acquired in a relatively short period of training and retraining are sufficient enough to successfully conduct military operations. The experience of the two world wars that rocked the 20th century shows that reservists received the best training in Germany and the worst in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. The visual proof of this is the ratio of losses in dead. In World War One this ratio bet­ween the Russian and German armies was 7:1, and in World War Two the ratio was 10:1 between the German and Red armies – in both cases it was in favor of the Germans.

As the Ukrainian army is a successor to the Soviet army, there should be no illusions about the training level of reservists. The attempt to form a militia-type army, moreover, on a territorial basis, will in any case result in considerable expenses which will go down the drain because no battleworthy army will be created. It will be large and formidable on paper only. The Ukrainians have a totally different mentality and experience of national defense construction than the Swiss and the Israelis do. Territorially, the loyalty of militias will greatly differ one from another. Although the vast majority of Ukraine’s residents, including ethnic Russians, favor its independence and many Russians are heroi­cally fighting in the counter-terrorism operation, the region-wise ratio of the supporters and opponents of independence differs greatly. It is no secret that most of the pro-Russian separatists reside in Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kharkiv oblasts. As a result, the regions that will come under the greatest Russian threat will have the least reliable territorial formations. Besides, as part of territorial militia, a considerable part of potential se­pa­ratists will be trained at the expense of the Ukrainian budget. It may be recalled that Austria-Hungary lost World War One and broke up also because its army was formed on a territorial basis. As a result, the Czech, Slovak, Rumanian, and Croatian regiments proved to be of little military worth and often sided with the enemy.

In the current conditions, the most rea­listic scenario is gradual formation of a professional army, with conscription being temporarily kept intact. Besides, all the conscripts who take part in the counter-terrorist operation should be automatically made vo­lunteers or sent to serve in the rear. All the battleworthiest volunteer battalions should be inducted into the regular army. Forming a fully professional army is, above all, a question of financing. On the one hand, a professional soldier should be paid a salary that will make it possible to achieve the required strength of the army, while expenditures per soldier should be sufficient enough to ensure his effective training and equipping. So, there will be a gradual transition to a salaried (volunteer) army, depending on the allocation of funds. At the same time, all the combat units taking part in the hostilities should be given professional status as soon as today. New units should be formed in such a way that they will immediately become battleworthy. To do so, one should not form a lot of new units at the same time, dissipating resources. And the army should be trained on the basis of American or British, not Israeli or Swiss, regulations intended for a professional army – naturally, with due account of Ukrainian specifics, i.e. the existing structure of the armed forces and the weaponry, equipment and gear which the Ukrainian army has at its disposal. Ukraine has a successful combat experience of volunteer formations – be it the Ukrainian legion in the Austro-Hungarian army, the 200,000-strong UPA, or volunteers in the current war. And the Ukrainian army should be formed on an exterritorial basis, which, given a relatively small size of the territory, will not much increase military spending. This will effectively make the army the hub of a united Ukrainian nation.