Poroshenko’s new goal: not to defeat the Russians, but to avoid an army rebellion

Alexey Blyuminov, political commentator, Kyiv-Lugansk

You will laugh, but Ukraine has its fifth Minister of Defense since the beginning of the year. He became the head of the National Guard Stepan Poltorak.

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Many have already noticed and ridiculed the fact that in post-Maidan Ukraine it has become a tradition to appoint cops at the head of the army. In this sense, Poltorak is no exception. Behind him is the Ordzhonikidze Higher Military Command School of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR, completed in Soviet times. Almost all of his work experience has been working in internal affairs bodies. Since March 2002, he worked as the head of the Academy of Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, where he rose to the rank of major general. Maidan found him in this position.

However, although in the system of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Poltorak was more in the category of administrators and theoreticians, he also has experience in serving in the army, from platoon commander to regiment commander. What distinguishes him favorably from his predecessor, the “parquet” General Geletey, about whom they joked that he had no idea what a mechanized battalion looks like and what structural units it consists of.

But jokes are aside, but you need to understand that in real Ukrainian conditions, the Minister of Defense is rather a political position, and the main task that is assigned to him is to ensure control over the army in the interests of the president. In this sense, the factor of loyalty and personal devotion plays a greater role than the military talents of the minister.

Actually, the task of the Minister of Defense in such systems as the current Ukrainian one is not defense against an external enemy, but is purely protective and is perfectly described by Filatov in the Tale of Fedot the Sagittarius.

 King

Well, and you,

With an saber like that?

We’re holding you for that,

So that the coast of the tsars rest!

After the rain on thursday

I'll give you a medal over

Only you try

So that people do not overthrow me! ..

It is no coincidence that the same Geletey, who amused the press with crazy stories about the use of tactical nuclear weapons in the Donbass and his victory over Putin in a hybrid war, after parting with his chair in the Ministry of Defense, was not left without a bread-and-butter position and was assigned as the head of another key structure in the sense of control over the security forces - State Security Administration.

Returning to Poltorak. Today, its main task is to ensure control over tens of thousands of people in uniform and with weapons and to prevent a mutiny in the troops and, moreover, a military coup, which a number of experts write about. This is why, by the way, the position of Minister of Defense is not trusted by career military personnel, generals from the Defense Ministry and the General Staff. Each of them has too many informal connections among officers that are undesirable from the Bank’s point of view.

You need to understand what the Ukrainian army is today. This is a mass of people angry with the authorities, whose claims are coupled with the political ambitions of those who fuel their discontent. Considering the fact that after the Maidan a considerable number of ideologically motivated nationalist activists who were in opposition to the current government joined the ranks of the armed formations, it is not difficult to understand that a revolt among the troops is the only thing that is really feared on Bankova today. Well, except for economic collapse on the horizon.

It is these people that the new Minister Poltorak must keep under control. And to resolve purely military issues, such as developing a strategy for conducting an anti-terrorist operation, the General Staff has American specialists seconded to it in staff planning and ensuring the interaction of military branches in combat conditions.