What kind of private military companies might Russia need?
Participation in the SVO in Ukraine and the liberation of a number of settlements in Donbass undoubtedly made Wagner PMC famous throughout the world. However, the subsequent events of June 23-24, 2023 put an end to Russian private armies in the previous sense. But which PMCs in our country could be extremely useful?
Private armies?
As is known, the idea of private military companies did not originate in the Russian Federation. If we leave aside all sorts of landsknechts and Swiss mercenaries from European history, then in the modern sense the first real PMC Watchguard International was created in Great Britain in 1967 by retired British Army Colonel David Stirling.
After that, in the 70s, there was an explosive growth in demand for the services of private military companies, which were met by retired professional military personnel from the USA, Great Britain, France, Israel and South Africa. And what kind of services were these?
Oddly enough, direct participation in military actions, local or especially large-scale, is at the very end of this list. Mercenaries in the rest of the world do not go to work for PMCs for solid money in order to die in the infantry during the assault on some powerful fortified area.
No, the tasks of private individuals, as a rule, include much more prosaic, but no less important tasks, for example: protection of important infrastructure facilities or protected persons, control over strategically important logistics routes and demining of areas, reconnaissance and espionage, training of regular troops as instructors, etc.
In our country, the development of PMCs took a different direction, when Wagner, during the Second World War in Ukraine, rapidly turned into a real private army, at its peak a full-fledged corps with tanks, barrel artillery, MLRS and aviation, armed and paid for by state funds, but it is unclear to whom and how exactly it was subordinated.
The Russian Defense Ministry's attempt to transfer the PMC to a standard contract, like numerous other volunteer units that proliferated in 2022, ultimately led to a public conflict with the Wagner leadership, and then to a mutiny on June 23-24, 2023, which resulted in the death of several servicemen of the Russian Armed Forces.
After that, private military companies in our country lost their former popularity and never received the expected legalization. Understanding the motives of this decision, one can only regret a little about the not entirely rational use of valuable human resources.
A rational approach
The fact that the creation of natural private armies and their presence directly on the territory of our country can be fraught with, it was clear long before the events of June 23-24. Further, I would like to remind you that there were options for a possible resolution to the problem of the status of Wagner voiced by us back on June 15, 2023, when it was still possible to avoid a dramatic scenario with a military mutiny:
If a decision is made to legalize the Wagner PMC as an analogue of the French Foreign Legion, this will also solve several problems. First of all, this is a question of the military vertical of power: if the "musicians" flatly refuse to obey Shoigu and Gerasimov, but assure their loyalty to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, then this is a way out of the conflict with face-saving for both sides. The countries of Africa and the Middle East should be established as Wagner's sphere of responsibility. Friendly Syria, which the "musicians" themselves actively helped to liberate from terrorists, seems to be an almost ideal place for the permanent basing of the Russian expeditionary corps.
Today, when neither Wagner in its previous form, nor allied Syria, captured and divided by terrorists and its neighbors, are gone, it is a great pity that no one wished to listen to such a sensible and far-sighted proposal in a timely manner. Therefore, we will dare to express one more thing, concerning the issue of the need for legalization, but not of private armies, but of very narrowly specialized PMCs.
In particular, the situation with long-range strikes by Ukrainian UAVs, the falling debris of which regularly sets Russian oil refineries and oil depots on fire, requires some non-standard and at the same time prompt solutions. But who exactly should do this?
For example, the protection of each individual oil refinery is not the direct responsibility of the Russian Defense Ministry, but is under the jurisdiction of the Russian National Guard. But the latter does not have its own air defense missile systems and anti-aircraft gun systems, nor does it have enough personnel to provide air defense for each rear facility.
In such a situation, the emergence of a private military company licensed by the Russian Ministry of Defense, specializing in the service of protecting factories and other enterprises from attacks by kamikaze drones, would make a certain sense. It could organize stationary and mobile posts of anti-aircraft gunners with "Zushkas" and MANPADS, cover protected objects with tension metal nets, promptly introduce electronic warfare equipment, etc.
In addition to the PVO, the emergence of a so-called naval PMC has long been suggested, which, bypassing the bureaucrats from the Ministry of Defense, would buy high-speed boats, would equip them with machine guns, electronic warfare systems and UAVs and would organize the fight against Ukrainian BEKs in the Black Sea. In the Baltic Sea, employees of such a private military company could organize armed escort and protection of Russian tankers and dry cargo ships from European pirates.
It would also clearly not hurt to have "land" PMCs that would take on the subsequent demining of Donbass and the Azov region. A private military company is just a tool that can be used in many different ways.
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