Kremlin grows concerned with military opposition

Kremlin grows concerned with military opposition

The Defense Ministry’s personnel policy may be subject to revision in the near future.

In the near future, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will sign a number of decrees appointing army commanders to the Armed Forces. A high-ranking official in the Defense Ministry has informed Nezavisimaya Gazeta (NG) that these appointments are associated with a rotation of cadres declared by the Defense Ministry. At the same time, he says that personnel decisions regarding a number of generals of the Defense Ministry’s central command, including three high-ranking senior officers who wrote their resignation letters due to their disagreement with the course of army reforms (read NG 07.05.11 issue), have been “frozen.”   

This applies to the head of the Main Operations Directorate (GOU) and deputy chief of the General Staff, Lieutenant General Andrey Tretyak, the head of the Main Staff and first deputy commander-in-chief of the Ground Forces, Lieutenant General Sergey Skokov, and the head of the Electronic Warfare Directorate (REB) of the General Staff, Major General Oleg Ivanov.   

These military commanders submitted their resignation letters to Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov. NG’s sources say this was possibly done due to their disagreement with the military reform decisions that are currently being made by the chief of the General Staff, Army General Nikolay Makarov. NG’s publication of the news has received widespread attention, including from foreign media. Some of them even suggested the emergence of a so-called military opposition in the Defense Ministry. For example, Italy’s TMNews argues that “the uprising against Russia’s military reform has reached a high level.”      

The Defense Ministry tried disproving NG’s report by announcing that the generals were retiring due to poor health. This has raised confusion among many in the expert community: Why are young, promising generals who previously successfully passed the required standard medical examinations suddenly falling ill – and all three at once? NG’s source in the Defense Ministry says that, “in the near future, the generals who have submitted their letters of resignation will be interviewed by HR representatives from the presidential administration, in order to reveal the true reasons for the young, promising leaders’ retirement from the army.”     

Meanwhile, NG’s source in military law enforcement argues that the Defense Ministry’s personnel policy has long raised questions in the Main Military Prosecutor’s Office.

“Competent officers are retiring, while various offenders who have had to deal with representatives of the military justice system are being promoted to higher-ranking positions,” the source said.

For example, an officer in the justice system provided NG, on the condition of anonymity, with case files on the current head of the Central Military District, Lieutenant General Sergey Surovkin. It turns out that Surovikin was under investigation in the State Committee for Emergency Situations (GKChP) case (read NG 07.11.11 issue). In September 1995, Surovikin, then a major, was found guilty by the Moscow Garrison Military Court under Article 218 of the Criminal Code (illegal arms and ammunition trafficking). While studying at the Frunze Military Academy, he was sentenced to one year of probation for trying to sell a gun. In other countries, similar offenses lead to the perpetrator being dishonorably discharged from the army. But in Russia, in 1995, Surovikin was sent into “exile” to the 201st Division in Tajikistan, to serve as the commander of the mountain infantry battalion.   

Now, as it is known, Surovikin is being promoted to the post of head of the Military Police of the Armed Forces. In other words, he will be in charge of law and order in the army and the navy.  

Here is another example: Just recently, a verdict by the military court came into effect sentencing a former head of the Main Indoctrination Works Directorate, Lieutenant General Anatoly Bashlakov, to seven years in prison for bribery. But recall how Bashlakov was appointed to this post. His name is associated with a tragic event in which two of his former subordinate officers beat a soldier at the Plesetsk Spaceport in 2007, leaving him to die in a dog kennel. The soldier died two weeks later in the hospital. Bashlakov was not the one punished, as military leaders had promoted him to become the main disciplinarian of the Russian army. A while later, however, a case was filed for bribery at the Plesetsk Spaceport, and the general was sent to prison.   

Another representative of disciplinary structures who was at one time found to be responsible for various incidents in Moscow’s Military District was also promoted. In July 2010, a mass brawl broke out between conscripts at the training grounds of a tank brigade near Naro-Fominsk. 

The brigade commander who arrived on the scene was forced to separate the fighters by firing machine gun rounds into the air. According to the conclusions drawn by, as they say, “various competent agencies,: among other reasons the incident was possibly due to a lack of proper disciplinary action by the district headquarters, which was under the command of Colonel Vladimir Zharov. Recently Zharov was promoted to deputy troops commander of the Southern Military District.

Personnel agencies gave a similar assessment of the work of the former commander of the Chita Railroad Brigade, Colonel Igor Golygin, who has been held administratively liable for various violations three times. There had also been some serious concerns about the financial and economic activities in his military unit. Despite this fact, in the fall of 2009 he was promoted to general and stationed in Komsomolsk-on-Amur. 

Such examples are numerous. The Main Military Prosecutor’s Office cites a rise in service-related misconduct among officers. Meanwhile, individuals involved in these cases are often promoted. Incidentally, the promotions are given by presidential decrees – though personnel suggestions are, of course, issued to the head of state by the Defense Ministry.  

However, according to NG’s sources, the Defense Ministry’s HR policy will soon be subject to examination on behalf of the relevant structures in the presidential administration of Russia.