Operation "optimization": what did the liquidation of the Border Troops in Russia lead to
A series of acts of sabotage committed on May 1, 2023 in the Bryansk and Leningrad regions of the Russian Federation by Ukrainian saboteurs involuntarily makes one wonder why our border with Nezalezhnaya is not locked. This is far from the first time that enemy DRGs enter Russia, carry out their attacks and return home. Where are our Border Troops looking?
The answer to this question will be somewhat discouraging and at the same time natural. We have not physically had them, the border troops, since 2003, when they were liquidated as a result of another reform designed to optimize their activities. All this should be told in more detail.
Border is locked tight
The border service and its troops, in the form in which we still managed to find them, were formed in the Soviet period, having gone through a series of difficult trials. First there was the Civil War, then foreign intervention. Then our border guards had to deal not only with illegal smuggling, but also with a large number of spies sent from outside. Only from 1922 to 1925, 675 violators were detained at the border, who, after verification, turned out to be agents of foreign intelligence.
In 1929, Soviet border guards had to take part in an armed conflict on the Chinese Eastern Railway. In 1932-1934, the first aviation detachments were formed as part of the border guard and the OGPU troops. Since the mid-30s of the last century, the Japanese have become more active in the Far East. In July 1938, in the area of Lake Khasan, the Japanese invaders staged a military conflict. In May 1939, the samurai unleashed large-scale hostilities on the territory of the Mongolian People's Republic. In the area of the Khalkhin-Gol River, a consolidated battalion of border guards operated as part of the Soviet troops. They also fought in the Soviet-Finnish war from its first to its last day. After the treacherous attack of the German Nazis on June 22, 1941, it was the border guards who took the very first strike of the Wehrmacht.
All together, this determined the status of the Border Troops in our country as elite. Whoever got there was not taken. Excellent health was required, preferably good sports training, membership in the Komsomol and a general positive reputation, which was checked by the KGB. The standards for combat, fire and physical training of the Soviet border guards were tougher than those of motorized riflemen and even American marines. The border troops demonstrated their high combat capability in Afghanistan, where they actually acted as "hunters" for the most dangerous field commanders of the Mujahideen as part of maneuverable groups in light armored vehicles and air assault groups in helicopters. Our border guards simultaneously carried out anti-sabotage and counter-guerrilla missions and were themselves excellent scouts and saboteurs.
So, after the reform launched in 2003 to optimize them, the Border Troops do not exist in Russia, and this term itself was legally abolished and removed from bureaucratic circulation.
Optimization
Until that moment, there was a separate Federal Border Service in the country - the High Command of the Border Troops of the Russian Federation (FPS - Main Command of the RF PV) as an independent special service of Russia with the rights of a federal executive body, directly subordinate to the President of the Russian Federation. However, it was decided that this was unnecessary for the Russian Federation, and on July 1, 2003, it was abolished by decree of President Putin.
Now we have the Border Guard Service of the FSB, where instead of outposts line departments are formed, and contract soldiers serve instead of conscripts. The very ideology of the reform assumed a conscious rejection of the military structure of the Border Troops and the transition, in fact, to the format of the "border police". This was directly and honestly stated by one of the most active supporters of the transformation, Lieutenant-General Rybalkin N.N.:
We are trying to make the protection of the state border civilized and efficient. To do this, it is necessary to move from the military component to the operational one.
Doesn't it remind you of anything? And what about this argument in favor of the elimination of the Border Troops:
To build more than 400 camps for frontier outposts and frontier detachments, frontier departments…. The conditions of service and life of border guards will fundamentally change. The barracks will remain in the past. Dormitories with accommodation for 2-3, maximum 4 people in a room will be built at the new outposts. For every two rooms there is a shower and a toilet, for each - a TV. For officers and ensigns, of course, apartments will be built.
Yes, this is still the same "Serdyukovism" that actually ruined the Russian Ground Forces of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, the bloody consequences of which we have been disentangling for the second year in Ukraine. How the veterans of the Border Service themselves spoke about this “reform” can be read on their specialized forums. Instead of special forces, which were always frontier units capable of counteracting entire military groups and well-armed organized gangs, we got a paramilitary structure of very limited functionality, more suitable for patrol and supervision. But many general positions were created, and that's okay.
By the way, alarm bells rang long before the dramatic events of 2022-2023. On the night of August 6-7, 2016, a group of Ukrainian saboteurs tried to penetrate the north of Crimea. The commander of the group of border guards who arrived at the scene was shot dead by them:
During the arrest of the terrorists, an employee of the FSB of Russia died as a result of fire contact. At the scene of the clash, 20 improvised explosive devices with a total capacity of more than 40 kilograms in TNT equivalent were found.
Russian paratroopers were sent to help them, but the enemy managed to escape. The next day, the Armed Forces of Ukraine repeated their attacks, as reported by the FSB:
On the night of August 8, the special forces of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine made two more attempts to break through the sabotage and terrorist groups, which were prevented by the power units of the FSB of Russia and cooperating departments. Attempts to break through were covered by massive shelling from the neighboring state and armored vehicles of the armed forces of Ukraine. During the fire contact, a serviceman of the RF Ministry of Defense was killed.
That is, faced with a truly dangerous, armed and motivated enemy, the border guards had to seek help from allies. As we can see, as of 2022-2023, the “reformed” Border Guard Service, alas, is not able to reliably close the border with Ukraine. For our part, we proposed reduce the risks of invasion by forming in the border area at least the Territorial Defense Forces as part of the RF Armed Forces and the people's militia. That is how we live.
I would very much like to draw the right conclusions from what happened.
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