Inside The Soviet Army

by Viktor Suvorov

  In principle, therefore, an officer's appointment opens the way for his promotion, but promotion only follows after the completion of a certain number of years' service spent in the preceding rank. If you have ever been held back, and have lost some years in one particular rank, you will never catch up. When you are eventually promoted, you will still have to serve for the prescribed number of years in your new rank before you become eligible for the next one.

  1 This rank is given only to those who have undergone a shorter course of training.

  3

  Here is another example from life. In August 1941, General Major A. M. Vasilyevskiy was appointed to head the Operational Directorate of the General Staff. At the same time he also became deputy to the Chief of the General Staff. The Operational (or First) Directorate of the General Staff is responsible for producing war plans.

  This post is one of enormous importance by any standards, not only those of the Red Army. It is enough to say that it is in this Directorate that the Soviet Union's 5-year economic plans originate; thereafter, the Council of Ministers and the State Planning Commission decide how the requirements of the General Staffs are to be met, before proceeding, with the highly secret military plan as a basis, to draw up the All-Union Plan, in both its secret and open variants.

  The German intelligence services concluded that the appointment of a mere colonel to such an august position was an indication that the role of the General Staff was being reduced in importance. The reason that they made this mistake was that the Germans did not understand the Red Army's simple principle — seniority is not determined by rank, but by appointment. Rank follows appointment, slowly but surely, just as infantry follows tanks which have suddenly and forcefully broken through into the rear of the enemy.

  In fact there was nothing particularly astonishing about the appointment of the General Major to such a high post: the explanation was, quite simply, that the Supreme Commander decided that this particular officer would meet the demands of the job better than anyone else. This Vasilyevskiy did — within eights months he had become Chief of the General Staff.

  Since he had risen to so high an appointment, the way to considerable further promotion was open to him. Stars rained down on his shoulderboards. He passed quickly through the hierarchy of generals, wearing the four stars of a General of the Army for a mere twenty-nine days before being promoted to the rank of Marshal. After the end of the war with Germany he carried out a brilliant operation in Manchuria, becoming Commander-in-Chief of the Far Eastern Strategic Direction.

  But we must not be misled. The Red Army is an enormous organisation and not everyone can succeed as Vasilyevskiy did. I have met hundreds of senior lieutenants who will stay at this rank for the rest of their lives.

  Military Academies

  1

  In order to achieve high rank you need an appropriately senior appointment: in order to be considered for such an appointment you must have completed a course of studies at a Military Academy.

  It will be recalled that Higher Military Training Colleges provide a higher general education but only a medium-level military one. Higher military education is the province of the Military Academies, of which there are 13 at present. Among these are the Frunze All-Arms, Armoured, Artillery, Engineering, Military-Political, Naval, two Air Force, two Rocket, Air Defence, and Chemical Warfare Academies. Officers spend three years at an Academy, which may be headed by a Colonel-General, a General of the Army, a Marshal of one of the arms of service or even the Chief Marshal of a particular service.

  The road to an Academy is a hard one. First, one must have commanded at least a company. Secondly, the sub-units under your command must achieve excellent ratings for two years (which means that you must lay in enough vodka and proceed to pour it into the commissions which come to check you until they are afloat with it — assuming, of course, that they consent to drink with you at all). Thirdly, approval for your application for entry is required from all your superior officers up to and including your divisional commander. Any of these officers has the right to stop your application from going on to his immediate superior. If one of them does so you will have to wait until the following year and your battalion or company will have to maintain its excellent record. Finally, you will have to pass examinations, a medical commission, and interviews and, thereafter, succeed against the competition within the Academy itself.

  Unless an officer manages to secure a place at an Academy, he will never command more than a battalion. If he is successful, he has three years of intensive work on a very wide-ranging and detailed curriculum. After graduation, wide horizons stretch before him. Quite young majors are frequently made regimental commanders, or, failing that, deputy regimental commanders, as soon as they have completed the course. Whatever happens the path upwards is now open.

  2

  Towering above all the Academies is the General Staff Academy. Entry to this is tree of all the competition, examinations, applications and other problems involved in admission to the others. Everything is done for you by the Administrative Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU. The Central Committee selects those who will head the Red Army in the immediate future from among all the colonels who show promise and who are truly dedicated to the regime.

  Of course, all the entrants to the General Staff Academy have already studied at a Higher Military Training College and then at the Frunze Armoured or Air Academies, or at one of the others.

  The lowest rank held by entrants is colonel and there are often several colonel-generals on the current list of those attending. Commanders of Armies, Military Districts, Groups of Tank Armies, Flotillas and Fleets are often invited to visit the Academy by the Central Committee.

  Having completed his studies at this Academy, a general will rise higher and higher, leaving his former rivals far behind.

  Generals

  1

  `How fine to be a General' runs a line from a popular song. And, indeed, seen from below, the life led by a general does seem to be a quite sublime existence.

  A Soviet general enjoys a great many privileges. If he wishes, he can acquire his own harem. Soviet ideology will not stand in his way. Every divisional commander, every Army, Front and Military District commander has signal units, communications centres and telephone switchboards under his command, staffed by attractive girls who have been security-vetted. The general is their absolute master. He guards them jealously against the attentions of others.

  While I was with the 24th Division, a senior lieutenant who was a friend of mine, became friendly with an attractive girl from the divisional communications battalion. He was hauled before an Officer's Court of Honour which sentenced him to revert to the rank of lieutenant. The girl was dismissed from the army, immediately. He had to face a charge of having attempted to penetrate the divisional communications centre, in which there were secret command channels and she was accused of complicity. Both were enormously relieved when these accusations were dropped and delighted to have escaped as lightly as they did. This episode served as a lesson to the whole division. During the same period, the divisional commander, in order to ensure that he kept in touch with the girls under his command, organised a number of them into a shooting team. On their days off, he would pack his `markswomen' into his car, take them off to the divisional firing range and train them, personally, there. Imagine the scene — a vast, empty stretch of country in the Carpathian mountains, a huge area, carefully guarded and completely shut off from the world. Thickly wooded mountains, rocky slopes intersected by streams rushing downhill over rapids — without a living soul for miles around. On Sundays, our general was joined at the range by the local Party bosses, who used to bring their own girls from Lvov. He trained them, too. He was quite a man…

  On a rather higher level, the entertainment of generals in the Soviet Army is catered for by professionals. Every Military District, Group of Forces and Fleet has its own troupe of singers and dancers. These are made up of pro
fessional performers, who are under contract to the Armed Services. They are subject to military discipline, for they are employees of the Armed Services just like the Army's doctors, nurses, typists and so forth. The Army is a more generous employer than any others. The girls in these ensembles-singers and dancers — are kept continuously and intensively at work entertaining the command staff. Generals' dachas have long since been transformed into temples dedicated to the worship not of Marx and Lenin but of Bacchus and Venus.

  Athletically inclined young girls, especially gymnasts, are in special demand among our military leaders. The Army's Central Sports Club is one of the largest and richest in the USSR. Girls who have no connection whatsoever with the Armed Services can join this organisation and have all their living expenses paid. Sport in the USSR is an entirely professional affair. Sportsmen or sportswomen are paid, fed, clothed, and given decorations, accommodation and cars for their services — and the better they are the more they are paid. But their free and easy life must still be paid for by the athletes themselves. The girls pay in kind, becoming involved in prostitution while they are still very young. Those who are most amenable, as well as those who are most talented, are led by their coaches to the highest realms of professional sport.

  2

  What more can the generals want from life? Their dachas are huge and luxurious. Marshal Chuykov's dacha, for example, was built for him by two brigades of engineers, each of four battalions. More than 2,500 men were involved and they had the use of the best military engineering equipment.

  Our military leaders fly off on hunting trips in helicopters, which they then use to drive game through nature reserves. They are given everything they need — quarters, cars, and all the cognac and caviare they want. Surely theirs must be a perfect existence? And yet the number of senior military leaders who commit suicide is exceptionally high. Of course, they do not shoot themselves when they become too fat or sated to go on but when rivals seize them by the throat and wrest their power from them.

  During the Great Purge, 33,000 officers with the rank of brigade commander or above were executed in a single year. `But that was in Stalin's day' I shall be told — as if the very name of Stalin explains everything. But even since Stalin's day, generals have not been able to sleep peacefully at night. They are constantly plagued by uncertainty. Although Stalin is dead and gone, generals are still being offered up as sacrifices. The first victim was Lieutenant-General Vasiliy Stalin. He was thrown into a mental asylum immediately after Stalin's death and there he died, quietly and quickly. While his father was still alive, no one had diagnosed any abnormality. He was as strong as a bull; he was the only general of his rank in the whole Soviet Army who flew jet-planes.

  After Stalin's death, Marshal of the Soviet Union Konev shot Marshal of the Soviet Union Beriya during a session of the Politburo itself. Next, Marshal of the Soviet Union Bulganin lost his rank and was driven in disgrace from his position at the head of the Soviet government. There was also the case of Marshal of the Soviet Union Kulik, demoted to major-general by Stalin, who had then sent him to prison and announced that he was dead. After Stalin, Kulik was released from prison and restored to his rank of lieutenant-general. He was promised promotion to Marshal if he could organise the design and production of the first Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile. He succeeded and in 1957 he again became a Marshal of the Soviet Union, although no explanation of his return from the dead was ever made public. When he received a telegram from the government announcing this and congratulating him, Kulik collapsed and died, from a heart attack, at the rocket range at Kapustin Yar. According to one story, when he received the telegram he shot himself.

  Such has been the fate of various Marshals. The generals fare worse. They are plagued, endlessly, by uncertainty. In one day, in February 1960, Khrushchev sacked 500 generals from the Soviet Army.

  No Soviet general, and for that matter no Soviet officer or soldier — no single member of this enormous organisation-has any guarantee that he will be allowed to retain his privileges, his rank or even his life. They may drive him out, like an old dog, at any moment: they may stand him against a wall and shoot him.

  Conclusion

  Why don't they protest? Why don't they rebel? Can they really enjoy living like this? Why are they silent?

  An excursion guide once showed me an area in a large Western city which he said was entirely controlled by the Mafia. Prostitutes, drug-peddlers, shoeblacks, shopkeepers, owners of restaurants, cafes and hotels — all of them controlled, and protected by the Mafia.

  Once we had emerged, unscathed, from this unhappy district, in our large tourist bus, and felt that we were back in safety, I put these same questions to our apprehensive guide. Why the hell didn't they protest? Everyone living there had grown up in freedom and democracy; behind them lay centuries of freedom of speech, of the press and of assembly. Yet, despite these centuries — old traditions, the inhabitants were silent. They had a free press on their side, the population of the entire country, running into many millions, the police, political parties, parliament, the government itself. And yet they said nothing. They made no protest.

  The society from which I fled is not simply a spacious well-lit prison, providing free medical care and full employment. It, too, is under the control of a Mafia. The difference between Soviet society and the Western city which I visited, is that those who live where I used to live are unable to turn to the police for help, because the police themselves represent the mailed fist of our Mafia. The army is another section — the most aggressive one — of the Soviet Mafia. The government is the ruling body of the Mafia: parliament is the old people's home in which the aged leaders of the Mafia are cared for. Press, television, the judges, the prosecutors — these are not influenced by the Mafia — they are the Mafia.

  Smart tourist buses pass through our unhappy capital. The drivers and guides belong to the Mafia. `Intourist' works for the KGB. `Aeroflot', is controlled by the military intelligence service, the GRU. Foreign tourists sit listening to the patter of the guides and wondering with amazement — why don't they protest? Can they really enjoy living like this? In their place, they think, I would write to the papers, or organise a demonstration. But clearly the KGB has stifled inhabitants so that they are unable to protest. The KGB has driven them to their knees and made them slaves.

  My friend, you are right. We are slaves: we are on our knees: we are silent: we do not protest.

  According to the estimates of demographers, based on official Soviet statistics, the population of my country should have reached 315 million in 1959. Instead, the census showed only 209 million. Only our own government knows what happened to the missing hundred million. Hitler is said to have executed 20 million. But where are the others? You must agree that no criminal organisation in your own country has shown such activity as our Soviet Mafia.

  Having brought my countrymen to their knees, the Mafia triumvirate of the KGB, Party and Army moved on to conquer neighbouring countries. Today they are busy in your country, in your home town. They have stated openly that it is their dearest wish to do to the world what they have done to my country. They make no secret of it.

  I spent thirty years of my life on my knees. Then I got up and ran. This was the only way I could protest against the system. Are you surprised, my dear Western friend, that I did not demonstrate against the KGB while I was living there? Well, there is something which surprises me, too. In your own beautiful country, the KGB, that monstrous organisation, is hard at work at this very moment, the Soviet Communist Party is subsidising a horde of paid hacks and crackpots. Soviet Military Intelligence is sending members of its diversionary units to visit your country, so that they can practise parachuting on to your native soil. The aim of all this activity is, quite simply, to bring you to your knees. Why don't you protest?

  Protest today. Tomorrow it will be too late.

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