20 October 2003 17:31
Russian paper sees armed forces` manpower shortage down to low birth rate
Yesterday [15 October], Maj-Gen Viktor Kozhushko, chief of the draft section of the Main Organization and
Mobilization Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian armed forces, said that after the autumn draft for military
service the army is going to face as much as a 5-per-cent shortage of soldiers.
Specialists have been warning that Russia will face a deficit of mobilization resources in 2003 since as early as
last year. In the opinion of Col-Gen Vasiliy Smirnov, chief of the Main Organization and Mobilization Directorate of the
General Staff, the shortage of draftees has come about as a result of a fall in the male birth rate in the country in
the late eighties. And now, during the current autumn draft, the demographic problem has shown how serious it really
is.
The General Staff had planned to send 213,000 draftees into army service in autumn, in order to fill the staff posts
of compulsory service soldiers and sergeants who had been transferred to the reserve. However, just the very first weeks
of the current draft have revealed that it is unlikely they will manage to assemble the required number of new recruits.
"In reality, just 175,000 men will be joining the troops," Viktor Kozhushko said. So this year and next year
the army will face a shortage of soldiers and sergeants of up to about 5 per cent.
Of course, this figure is not such a terrifying one. After all, the military managed to get by in the early 1990s,
when certain units had draft servicemen shortages of up to 15 per cent. However, it is worth pointing out that at that
time the armed forces suffered severe cuts and whole divisions and even armies were amalgamated or disbanded. Now the
situation is completely different.
The army, Defence Minister Sergey Ivanov said recently, is going from a situation of contraction to one of expansion.
But this means that every soldier's post will matter. And if the troops do not get hold of up to 38,000 young men,
this may really affect their manning and the combat training of personnel. A kind of chain reaction will take place,
whereby they begin regularly substituting people from the sentries' and guards' sections, as well as those in
management posts, and as a result platoons, companies and battalions end up going out to training grounds and firing
ranges undermanned. [Passage omitted]
[Rossiyskaya Gazeta] |
RUSSIA IN FACTS
