#3
Moscow Times
March 21, 2002
Army Pay, Same Old Story
By Pavel Felgenhauer

President Vladimir Putin has announced that military pay will be drastically increased this year in two stages and that by next January officers' pay should be almost doubled.

Of course, as always in Russia there are hidden drawbacks. Together with the pay hike, the military will lose nearly all of the benefits it previously enjoyed, such as zero income tax, a 50 percent discount on utilities payments and so on. Putin has ordered his government to create a system for adjusting military pay in accordance with inflation, but when indexing will actually kick in is anybody's guess. Russia has had double digit inflation (or more) since the demise of the Soviet Union and no previous military pay hikes have been indexed.

But even if military pay truly increases twofold in real terms (which is highly unlikely), the result would not be as grand as it sounds. A lieutenant-colonel battalion commander who today takes home (all included) some $115 a month will make about $200, according to government plans. A company chief noncommissioned officer that today makes $100 a month will make some $130 -- assuming the government actually finds money in the budget to finance the planned hike.

Such a pay rise is unlikely to attract the nation's best and brightest into the ranks to risk their lives. Retailers at Moscow's outdoor markets, for example, reportedly make up to $1,000 a month.

Of course, Moscow is a special case and economically it's well ahead of the rest of the country. In the Russian provinces $200 a month is a very decent salary and many unemployed enlist to be contract soldiers for $60 to $70 a month.

As a result we have an army of paupers. It is increasingly difficult to move units or post them to war zones. Most contract soldiers who enlist for meager pay in the provinces immediately resign if their unit is moved into battle. Many officers also prefer to resign instead of going to Chechnya.

Legally, the war in Chechnya is not a war, and under Russian peacetime law any contract soldier or officer may resign from service at any time and leave his unit. By law, only conscripts can be deserters in peacetime and may be prosecuted. Contract soldiers and officers who resign to avoid war in Chechnya may later re-enlist in other units or in any other of Russia's many forces, such as the Interior Ministry troops or the Tax Police; or they can take up civilian, administrative positions.

There are well over 2 million people in active military service today, of which some 800,000 are conscripts; the rest are officers, contract soldiers and noncommissioned officers. In 1999-2000, the Kremlin managed to send a mere 120,000 men into Chechnya, including contingents from all regional police forces -- although they are not officially classed as men in active military service. Military chiefs told Putin that they couldn't possibly send more men.

The armed forces today are not a standing but a sitting army that effectively rebuffs any attempt to make it fight in earnest.

With millions on the payroll and up to 100,000 lieutenant colonels and colonels in active service, it is impossible to give everyone a decent salary that will induce capable people to join and pursue a long-term military career. Even minute pay hikes bleed the budget dry because of the grotesque enormity of the armed forces, while professionalism and morale continue to plummet.

Military chiefs have been deliberately sabotaging all attempts at serious reform of the armed forces since 1992. They still think they are preparing to fight a major war in which the West is the main potential enemy. And given that this is the case, they will never cut back the size of their forces; they will only pretend.

The disintegration of the military directly threatens Russia's national security. Putin has over and again stated publicly that military reform is of paramount importance, but all "reforms" up to now have been as superficial as the new pay hike will most likely be.

It was recently announced that the 76th airborne division in Pskov will be made up entirely of volunteers by 2003-04 and serve as an "experiment" in preparation for reform of the army as a whole. Russian generals pretend that the recipe for a decent military is some dark secret that requires much research.

What they want and will get is a reprieve to do nothing for two more years.

Pavel Felgenhauer is an independent defense analyst.

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