/ world today news/ So far, the Russian army has used its air power very limited. Above all, because of the fear of large and unjustified losses of planes and pilots. However, the situation is changing: step by step, the Russian Aerospace Forces are untangling the tangle of problems and tasks that prevent Russia from launching a devastating air offensive.
Russia continues to rebuild on a military basis. At the end of last year, Tsarigrad wrote that a major transformation of the armed forces has begun in the country, the purpose of which is to prepare for new threats from NATO.
“Yesterday there was an event that has been expected in military aviation for many, many years. All air forces of Laos have been transferred to the direct subordination of the Aerospace Forces. The light at the end of the tunnel has become a little brighter,” the administrator of the channel.
An uninitiated person may wonder: what do we care about military reforms in a distant Southeast Asian country, and why is the author so happy?
In reality, everything is simple: Laos, and sometimes Barbados, some patriotic bloggers writing on sensitive topics call … Russia.
This happens not because of excessive assertiveness or an intention to offend our country, but only because of the unwillingness to fall under the criminal article for discrediting the army, which, in addition to huge fines, also provides for real terms of imprisonment.
In other words, such a euphemism is just a crutch, relying on which caring patriots can direct the public’s attention to the troubles and problems in the armed forces that need to be solved, but which for some reason are not solved in a normal regime.
Information plus reflection
And here we must include the inner Stirlitz. Because official comments on this topic have not been received and are unlikely to be received in the near future.
So in our further discussions we will have to rely only on the data that can be found in open sources and on the understanding of the general patterns of organization of the armed forces.
Currently, Russia has four air armies:
– 4th Red Banner Air Force and Air Defense;
– 6th Leningrad Red Banner Army Air Force and Air Defense;
– 11th Red Banner Army of the Air Force and Air Defense;
– 14th Red Banner Army of the Air Force and Air Defense.
Each of them is a powerful operational formation, including air defense divisions consisting of anti-aircraft missile regiments, mixed aviation divisions, army aviation brigades in helicopters, separate helicopter, assault and transport regiments.
In all this, as far as can be judged from the available data, each of the armies is subordinate to the military district within which it is deployed.
In early June, the head of the main organizational and mobilization department of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Colonel-General Yevgeny Burdinsky, confirmed that Russia will create two new military districts, general and air armies, as well as 26 brigades and five divisions.
Commenting on this announcement, an informed source in the Ministry of Defense told “Izvestia” that this army will consist of several fighter regiments, a bomber regiment and an army aviation brigade.
“It has not yet been decided which military district this unit will belong to,” the publication’s interlocutor said.
This comment rhymes well with the recent news circulating among the military about the subordination of the air forces to the leadership of the Air Force.
Winged untied from the ground
The dilemma of whether to include particularly effective weapons in line units or separate them into separate elite units has dogged militaries since states learned how to raise and arm armies.
The problem here is that there is no single correct approach. At the beginning of the 20th century, through trial and error, it was established that machine guns should be integrated into infantry formations and not reduced to separate batteries, and three decades later the Germans proved in practice that tanks should be collected in divisions and corps with a high degree of autonomy rather than distributed evenly throughout the land army.
The same choice faced our leadership: the subordination of air armies to the command of the districts should in theory ensure a high degree of interaction between the air and ground components.
The logic here is that victory is achieved mainly on the ground, and the structure has a general command – and therefore it will watch carefully so that aviation is not detached from solving mundane tasks.
But that’s in theory. In practice, this is not always the case.
On the other hand, subordinating all aviation to a single command, again in theory, will allow for greater maneuverability of forces and the conduct of large-scale operations to penetrate enemy air defenses, gain air dominance and enforce it.
The time has come
The redirection of the armies of the Air Force and Air Defense to the command of the Air Force suggests that at the very top it has been decided that the time has come for aviation to have a more important say in the course of the SVO. But so that its activation does not lead to an unacceptable increase in losses, it is given more independence.
Commenting on the situation in front of Constantinople, Reserve Major General Vladimir Popov noted that the situation of dual subordination is quite typical for the domestic armed forces.
On the one hand, they are subordinate to the districts, on the other hand, to the command of a type of troops.
“It was, and then it was rejected. We periodically have this sinusoid – the influence of the administrative apparatus. You know, according to the principle of ‘whoever is older, he will add tension to this management program,'” he said.
“Either it goes directly to the district commanders, or it goes to the professional leadership of the Air Force, and now the Air Force,” the general noted.
According to our interlocutor, the concentration of aviation under the leadership of the native authorities, firstly, increases the efficiency of its use, and secondly, leads to a reduction in losses.
The expert also emphasized that in the past the need to subordinate aviation to the headquarters of infantry and tank formations was largely due to the technical weakness of communications. At the current level of technological development, this problem is no longer relevant, Popov is sure.
“Aviation will carry out all the tasks that will be assigned to us through the infantry commanders. And we will support the divisions, and we will scout, and we will strike, everything will be the same,” he says.
“But with a high degree of efficiency in terms of losses and efficiency in terms of results,” he adds and continues: “Because the “red commanders” (the command of military districts and general military formations. – Ed.) do not fully know the capabilities of aviation and they stick it in every hole”.
“And to prevent this from happening, you need professional guidance,” the expert is sure.
Making inferences
It has been repeatedly noted that the main problem of our aviation in the special operations zone is the Ukrainian air defense system. Without its radars and launchers, Ukraine’s armed forces would have long ago been stretched thin by rocket and bomb attacks.
Both the West and our command understand this circumstance. The enemy is trying with all its might to maintain the gradually degrading air defense shield of the “independent”; our army is looking for means to overcome it.
In the spring of this year, the bomber aviation began to receive commercial quantities of aerial bombs equipped with universal planning and adjustment modules.
The Air Force has acquired a tool that allows it to strike without entering the Buk air defense system. As a result, the intensity and effectiveness of blows to the enemy’s close rear increased many times.
The air offensive played an important role in interrupting the summer “counter-offensive” of the armed forces of Ukraine. Attempts by the Ukrainians to bring more long-range S-300 systems to the front line led to the fact that they fell victim to the Lancets.
Now on the agenda is the issue of creating intelligence in the operational rear of the enemy and maximally speeding up the processes of issuing target indication.
The first task is solved by gradually increasing the use of drones; the second could perhaps be solved by unifying all air forces under the single command of their own Air Force Command.
The elimination of the enemy’s air defenses will open the way for the full use of aviation against ground targets and will in fact mean a war won.
Translation: SM
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