Meeting of the Military industrial commission/ Photo: kremlin.ru
The Military-Industrial Commission of the Russian Federation is celebrating its anniversary. Sixty years ago, on December 6, 1957, the State Commission of the USSR Council of Ministers on Military-Industrial Issues was created. Portalprofiok.com talks about why the countdown begins precisely from this date, although the management of the defense industry in our country began to be built much earlier.
Before the war: mobilization at any cost
War always presupposes special clarity and coordination of actions. It is no coincidence that the first body that managed the defense of the state on a national scale appeared precisely during the war. In 1915, during the First World War, the so-called Special Conference on Defense appeared (literally the name was: “Special meeting to discuss and consolidate measures for the defense of the state”). This government body, which included industrialists and representatives of government agencies state power, headed by the Minister of War. A special meeting on defense resolved issues of supplying the army and coordinated activities industrial enterprises for the production of the necessary products. Enterprises, by the way, were not always domestic: there were special Russian divisions in Japan, the USA and Great Britain, which placed orders from manufacturers in these countries. In modern terms, the Defense Conference placed and managed the execution of the state defense order (SDO). There were also military-industrial committees- structures that ensured the production of necessary weapons at private enterprises.
After the events of 1917, a number of changes took place in the management of industry, including the military. After several reorganizations defense enterprises found themselves subordinate to the Supreme Council national economy(VSNKh). Actually, no one thought much about defense then: factories were mastering peaceful production, armed forces were reduced, military spending even more so. This continued until the early 1930s, when the smell of war was in the air again.
Since 1932, defense enterprises came under the control of the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry, from which the People's Commissariat was spun off in 1936 defense industry. In 1938, the Military-Industrial Commission (MIC) was created under the Defense Committee of the Council of People's Commissars, consisting of military leadership, as well as heads of security and industry agencies. This commission, for example, included Kliment Voroshilov (People's Commissar of Defense), Mikhail Kaganovich (People's Commissar of Defense Industry), Nikolai Yezhov (head of the NKVD) and Nikolai Voznesensky (Chairman of the State Planning Committee). The main task of the military-industrial complex was to prepare defense and non-defense enterprises to carry out orders from the Defense Committee. Simply put, this meant the mobilization of all the country's industries to accomplish a common task.
The military-industrial complex considered mobilization requests, checked calculations, compiled a summary mobilization plan(comparing it with the State Planning Committee of the USSR!), distributed tasks between the People's Commissariats of the USSR and union republics, controlled the distribution of orders between specific enterprises and their execution, proposed measures to increase production capacity, ensured distribution labor force(including engineers and technicians), monitored the accumulation and storage of mobilization reserves, as well as the use of various technical inventions in production. If disagreements arose between various departments, the final decision was up to the military-industrial complex.
During the Great Patriotic War took over the leadership of defense production State Committee defense
Post-war period: gradual formation of the system
After the end of the Great Patriotic War, the tasks of restoring the national economy came to the fore. Therefore, at first, the country’s leadership did not create any single body to manage the military industry, and the development of industries was managed by separate industry bureaus - for shipbuilding, aircraft manufacturing, mechanical engineering, and so on.
They started talking about restoring systemic management of the defense industry in 1948. One of the initiators of raising this issue was Dmitry Fedorovich Ustinov, who at that time held the position of Minister of Armaments. In his opinion, coordinating the work of all branches of the defense industry and creating new types of weapons and military equipment should have been handled by a single body. As a result, in 1951, under the Presidium of the USSR Council of Ministers, a Bureau for Military-Industrial Issues appeared, which dealt with the removal and commissioning of certain types of products, planning research work, and discussing plans for military orders. True, it was an advisory body: the final decisions were still made by the Council of Ministers.
In 1953, another series of reorganizations followed: sectoral bureaus were eliminated, and the coordination of the activities of various branches of the defense industry was carried out by the deputy chairmen of the USSR Council of Ministers, as well as the Bureau of the Council of Ministers.
On December 6, 1957, the Commission on Military-Industrial Issues (MIC) was created under the Presidium of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. This body worked for 34 years - until its collapse Soviet Union. Today we can say that the heyday of the Soviet defense industry occurred precisely during the existence of the military-industrial complex.
The Military-Industrial Commission coordinated work on the creation of new types of weapons and military equipment, together with the State Planning Committee was engaged in the development of defense industries, was responsible for the implementation of plans, for increasing technological level production, for the quality and cost of products, participated in the development of weapons programs, proposed figures on the USSR's expenses for the development and production of weapons and military equipment. All this happened as follows: first, the Commission carefully studied the materials and prepared government decisions, and after their acceptance, monitored their implementation.
Over time, the scope of the Commission's activities expanded. Since the early 1960s, the military-industrial complex has controlled the formation and approval of R&D plans for the creation of weapons and military equipment; since the late 1960s, it has coordinated the development of chemical and nuclear weapons; since the 1970s, laser weapons and the creation of so-called unconventional weapons. Under the leadership of the Military-Industrial Commission, high-tech samples of military equipment were created in the USSR, which provided our country with a confident position in the international arena.
The Military-Industrial Commission oversaw the activities of nine ministries that ensured the development of various branches of the defense industry. The legendary “nine,” which, it must be said, is still periodically sighed by representatives of the domestic defense industry, included the ministries of defense, aviation, shipbuilding, electronics, electrical engineering, radio and chemical industry, as well as general and medium mechanical engineering. At the same time, the military-industrial complex had the right, if necessary, to attract the resources of all civilian departments related to the production of military products. The decisions made by the Commission were binding - just like the decisions of the Council of Ministers.
The Military-Industrial Commission included representatives of the governing bodies of the Soviet Union, as well as representatives of research institutes, design bureaus and military-industrial enterprises, Ministry of Defense. It is important that these were not just, in modern terms, managers. These were engineers, scientists, representatives manufacturing sector, who are well aware of the specifics of their institutes and industries and are ready to make proposals worthy of implementation.
A scientific and technical council was also created under the military-industrial complex, which included more than a hundred famous scientists, including academicians and corresponding members of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Meetings of the Military-Industrial Commission were held, as a rule, weekly and always in the same place - in the Oval Hall of the Kremlin.
Throughout the 34 years of the existence of the military-industrial complex, not a single important decision related to the defense sector could be made without it. Management of the development of the Soviet defense industry from single center allowed the USSR to create new types of weapons and military equipment that were not inferior in quality foreign analogues. As a result, strategic parity was achieved with NATO countries and the United States of America. Nuclear weapons and a space-rocket defense system developed, shipbuilding and aviation developed, industrial production The most daring design solutions were introduced.
Revival of the military-industrial complex in modern Russia
After a rather long failure in managing military-industrial production in the 1990s, the country's leadership again remembered integrated approach to the leadership of the defense industry. Apparently, decisions were made on the basis of studying the experience of the USSR, which means that it was decided to preserve and continue historical traditions. In the summer of 1999, a Commission on Military-Industrial Issues was created under the government, and in 2006, by presidential decree, it was transformed into the Military-Industrial Commission under the Government of the Russian Federation.
For several years, the military-industrial complex was headed by Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, Minister of Defense Sergei Ivanov, then by Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin (from 2012 to 2014).
On September 10, 2014, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree according to which the Military-Industrial Commission came under his direct leadership. Dmitry Rogozin took the post of deputy chairman of the military-industrial complex and chairman of the military-industrial complex board. This reform ensured an increase in the status of the military-industrial complex - which means that issues related to the defense industry began to be resolved even more clearly.
Today, the Military-Industrial Commission solves the problems of creating new types of weapons and military equipment, coordinates the implementation of the state weapons program and the state defense order, oversees issues of military-technical cooperation, implements import substitution programs in the defense industry, monitors the modernization of defense industry enterprises and helps them solve problems related to with diversification of production.
“The defense industry has really changed beyond recognition in the last few years,” says the Deputy Director of the Center economic development and certification (CERS INES) Yuri Smyslov. – The systematic approach works wonders: enterprises finally feel like they are part of a single whole, gaining confidence that the state will not abandon them to their fate as the volume of state defense orders decreases, as happened in the early 1990s. It is important that system management leaders of the military-industrial complex see not only purely managerial tasks, but also, for example, in the management of applied scientific research. More recently, the institute of general designers and general technologists was introduced into the military-industrial complex, which makes it possible to consolidate efforts to create promising weapons systems.
It is important that the military-industrial complex board devotes a lot of effort to the formation human resources industry. With the active participation of the Deputy Chairman of the Board of the Military-Industrial Complex of the Russian Federation Oleg Ivanovich Bochkarev, INES developed a special course for managers of military-industrial complex enterprises “Strategic Management”, within the framework of which several hundred leaders of the domestic defense industry improved their skills. Oleg Ivanovich Bochkarev is happy to meet not only with directors of enterprises, but also with promising young specialists - for example, he personally attended the finals of the All-Russian competition “Young Analyst”. When defense workers see that they are not just being “managed”, but are trying to build a dialogue, the work is much more productive.
As for the experience of the USSR, it is truly invaluable and it can really be used - of course, adjusted for modern conditions. Not long ago we held a seminar for students of the special course “Strategic Management”, where Georgy Dmitrievich Kolmogorov, who in Soviet times occupied the post of chairman of the USSR State Committee for Standards, spoke. The continuity of traditions was felt directly during the dialogue: it was noticeable that the current defense industry and the representative of the Soviet defense industry understood each other perfectly. However, nothing strange: by and large, their tasks are similar.
Hence the wishes of today's military-industrial complex: unity of goals, clarity and fidelity to traditions. The leaders of the Russian defense industry have someone to look up to.”
Managers with a capital letter
Dear colleagues! Dear veterans! Friends!
I congratulate you on this significant date – the 60th anniversary of the Military-Industrial Commission. Thank you for your great and very responsible work, for your contribution to solving the most important, without any exaggeration, strategic tasks.
Special words of gratitude to the veterans, to everyone who stood at the origins of the military-industrial complex and established its complex, multifaceted work. In different historical eras, you created, strengthened and preserved the domestic defense-industrial complex, the enormous potential that continues to serve Russia today.
Today, the Military-Industrial Commission deals with key issues in the development of the defense industry, equipping the army and navy, and ensures close interaction between the Armed Forces, enterprises in various industries, design bureaus and research centers. All this requires a deep understanding of the nature of current and future challenges in the field of defense and security, trends in the development of science and technology, a thorough knowledge of all aspects of production, and the ability to find verified, informed management decisions.
And of course, you need to pay special attention working with people, with personnel, to do everything to ensure that young, well-trained specialists come to enterprises and the military-industrial complex, so that professional traditions continue.
You know that we are already entering the implementation of a new ten-year State program weapons, including taking into account the experience of using our weapons and equipment during the successful anti-terrorist operation in Syria. It is necessary to effectively build and continue this work, to ensure almost one hundred percent fulfillment of the state defense order, and these are the indicators that have been achieved in recent years.
In addition, the defense complex has been tasked with expanding the production of high-tech civilian and dual-use products aimed at exporting - I just spoke at a brief meeting with veterans and young specialists - the share of these products by 2030 will be general production should be half, 50%.
The Commission is obliged to take all these plans into account in its work, to achieve high-quality, balanced, effective development of the country’s defense-industrial complex, which, let me remind you, unites more than 1,300 enterprises and organizations employing two million specialists of various professions.
Now they were only talking about the fact that re-equipment had been carried out in recent years defense complex, defense industry enterprises, a lot of money has been invested - three trillion rubles. These are serious resources, and it is imperative to ensure that they work effectively.
Three years ago, the status of the Military-Industrial Commission was significantly increased, and, as its chairman, I expect that your work will continue to be result-oriented, will serve Russia, and will serve reliable defense national interests, life, safety of our citizens.
Of course, I wish you success, health and all the best to you and your loved ones. And of course, let me congratulate you on your upcoming New Year's holidays. All the best to you. Thank you for your work!
History of the military-industrial complex
On December 6, 1957, by resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR No. 1350-639, the Commission of the Presidium of the Council of Ministers of the USSR on military-industrial issues was formed, which was entrusted with the management and control of work on the creation and rapid introduction into production of missile and jet weapons and other types of military equipment, as well as coordination of these works between industries of the defense complex (hereinafter referred to as the Military-Industrial Commission).
The Military-Industrial Commission continued the activities of the Third Main Directorate of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Special Committee of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, which made a significant contribution to the creation of the Moscow air defense system and nuclear weapons.
Under the leadership of the Military-Industrial Commission in the Soviet Union, samples of military equipment were developed in the most high-tech areas of weapons systems, thereby ensuring nuclear missile parity and control over strategic arms.
On March 20, 2006, the Military-Industrial Commission under the Government was formed to implement state policy in the field of the military-industrial complex Russian Federation(Decree of the President of the Russian Federation No. 231).
On September 10, 2014, by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation No. 627, in order to implement state policy in the field of the military-industrial complex, military-technical ensuring the country's defense, state security and law enforcement activities, the Military-Industrial Commission under the Government of the Russian Federation was transformed into the Military-Industrial Commission of the Russian Federation under the chairmanship of the President of the Russian Federation V.V. Putin. The working body of the military-industrial complex of the Russian Federation is the Collegium. It is headed by Deputy Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation D. O. Rogozin.
At the end of 2017, the military-industrial complex board plans to hold a number of anniversary events in connection with the 60th anniversary of the Military-Industrial Commission.
In the Government House, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the creation of the Military-Industrial Commission (MIC), a gallery of portraits of her was created former leaders. The impromptu exhibition opens with a portrait of Marshal of the Soviet Union Dmitry Ustinov, who was the first head of this body (1957-1963) and ends with the image of the special presidential representative on environmental issues, ecology and transport Sergei Ivanov, who led the military-industrial complex from March 2006 to December 2011. In addition, the gallery presents photographs of Deputy Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers Leonid Smirnov (1963-1985), Deputy Minister of Defense Industry, First Deputy Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers Yuri Maslyukov (1985-1988 and 1991), Deputy Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers Igor Belousov (1988- 1990). The gallery is located in the foyer of the Russian Military-Industrial Complex Collegium.
Strictly speaking, the military-industrial complex itself did not appear 60 years ago: on March 16, 1953, the so-called “Special Committee” was created under the Council of Ministers, headed by L.P. Beria. The Committee coordinated the key defense projects of that time - the work of the First and Third Main Directorates of the Council of Ministers (nuclear project and Moscow air defense project, respectively).
It did not exist, by the way, for long: it was liquidated on June 26, 1953, along with the arrest of Beria. However, this committee is considered the progenitor of the structure that arose a little later, in December 1957, - the Council of Ministers Commission on Military-Industrial Issues (or Military-Industrial Commission). Operational control over the activities of the “nine”—the nine defense ministries of the USSR—was confined to the military-industrial complex. She also made decisions on the allocation of resources for defense programs.
The military-industrial complex was dissolved in 1991, recreated in 1999, and since then has been persistently seeking its place in the eclectic decision-making structure of the post-Soviet defense complex. IN at the moment The Military-Industrial Commission under the Government of the Russian Federation is the main body for coordinating the defense industry, supervised by the relevant Deputy Prime Minister.
In government and not in business
The current state of the defense industry management vertical is characterized by increasing uncertainty and “manual mode” in management as we move from the bottom up. Decisions on key military programs or the reorganization of assets in the defense industry are made by senior political leadership "at on an individual basis" - in each specific case - in its own way, in the process of contacts with lobbyists for certain decisions.
The military-industrial complex, as an important link between industrial and political management, regularly remained extreme in this process, at best passively present in the “resolution of issues.” Therefore, under Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov (2007-2011), who was part of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle and delved quite deeply into military-industrial topics, the military-industrial complex as an institution was largely in the shadows, yielding to direct “resolution of issues” "the country's top leadership with production captains.
Even then, the functions of the commission and the list of topics actually supervised were considered unspecified, and the staff of specialists was considered insufficient. However, this problem was seriously revealed only by the monstrous failure of the state defense order (GOZ) of 2011, the starting year of the new state arms program (GPV-2020).
It was at this moment that the administrative reform of the Ministry of Defense, carried out by Anatoly Serdyukov, reached its apogee, expressed in the direct subordination of two federal services, directly working with military procurement: Rosoboronpostavka and Rosoboronzakaz. The ministry itself started a drastic restructuring of the order system, taking away all rights from the main commands of the armed forces and dramatically loading the relevant department of the military department with work.
In parallel with this, the volume of placement of contracts under the GPV 2020 has sharply increased. However, the tough “tax collector” position of the Serdyukov team, which demanded a sharp reduction in the price tag offered by the industry for the purchased goods against the backdrop of a total rush, led to the fact that the 2011 state defense order was actually a failure.
The military-industrial complex of Sergei Ivanov was unable to do anything about this. Whether she had such an opportunity is an open question. The conflict between industry and the military from Znamenka was at least partially resolved only by involving heavy artillery in the persons of Igor Sechin and Vladimir Putin in arbitration.
At the end of 2011, Sergei Ivanov was promoted (he headed the presidential administration), and was replaced by Dmitry Rogozin, who from the very beginning developed vigorous activity in protecting the interests of industry from the encroachments of the military department. Ultimately, Rogozin received the right to expand the powers of the military-industrial complex and control over Rosoboronzakaz, the key structure ensuring monitoring of the implementation of the State Defense Order.
The question is purely political
The problem of the current military-industrial complex is not even that until recently it had a small staff and unspecified powers. Even if the commission works as it should and becomes what it was in Soviet times (and what Rogozin is now seeking from it), this will simply delegate the problem to a higher level.
Let us repeat once again: the military-industrial complex in its current form, with great difficulty, can become a “tip” of the joint interests of the defense industry and applied specialized science. But it will not be able to become a platform for strategic moderation of the relationship between government officials and the military with the defense industry directors, with the exception of minor technical issues that are already resolved in working order. Conceptual clashes between the customer and the contractor are much more difficult to unravel.
The Soviet scheme for managing the defense industry with the military-industrial complex under the Council of Ministers required an additional platform for authoritative political arbitration to stabilize. Party structures at the appropriate level have always been such a balancing element for all economic management bodies in the USSR. The pressure of the most powerful defense complex had to be balanced with something, because... The influence of industry in the Council of Ministers only grew, often drowning out even the voice of military customers.
The balancing element for all economic management bodies in the USSR has always been party structures at the appropriate level. The work of the military-industrial complex was closely supervised by the defense industry department of the CPSU Central Committee, which was headed by Ivan Serbin from 1958 to 1981. The functions of the military-industrial complex and the defense department partially overlapped, which sometimes gave rise to conflicts, but the authority of the highest party structure and the administrative rigidity of Serbin, nicknamed “Ivan the Terrible” behind his back, made it possible to influence the decisions of the Council of Ministers commission, which was always closer to the interests of the final production.
But above this department there was another level - the position of the Secretary of the Central Committee for Defense Issues. IN different years this post was occupied, for example, by L.I. Brezhnev, D.F. Ustinov, G.V. Romanov are people of the first echelon of the collective leadership of the times of “developed socialism.”
There are currently no functional analogues to this superstructure, authorized and capable of making strategic decisions on defense issues, in Russia.
Is the defense department shining a light on the presidential administration?
It can be carefully noted that the presidential administration is now a distant analogue of a control system close to the party system. But in her staffing table, designed to work with personnel of the federal executive branch and control over the regions, there is neither a corresponding specialized apparatus (analogous to the defense department of the Central Committee), nor a high-ranking leader (with a rank not lower than the deputy head of the Administration) responsible directly to the head of state.
Meanwhile, the head of the Administration, Sergei Ivanov, noted in his recent interview that, having left the government and the military-industrial complex, he continues to closely monitor key defense programs. That is, we are faced with a continuation of the situation" manual control"with opaque responsibility.
Decisions are made and carried out on the basis of the personal or tacit guarantee of the highest echelon of political leadership, and somewhere one or two steps from the clouds in the void, a middle level of management of the “defense industry” (MIC) suddenly appears, from which the usual hierarchies of the bureaucracy begin to stretch down. But the military-industrial complex itself is open from above to the emanations of the dignitary cosmos, incomprehensible by rational means.
It is difficult to understand what should be done here. It is almost impossible to make the military-industrial complex the de facto top moderation structure. Firstly, it is not structurally adapted to this, being the center of coordination of state military industry. This means it has lobbying potential that is loyal to production workers. Secondly, this will be against all the administrative rules of the era, when the upper levels of strategic decision-making are confined to the president and his staff.
Not to mention the fact that it is almost impossible to manage such a complex sector as the defense industry, saturated with heavyweight lobbyists, from the current level of accountability. Here you need to be not just a deputy prime minister by position, but be included in the short list of influential decision-making associates of the president. (This, by the way, is the case of Sergei Ivanov before leaving for Old Square - in the 2000s he oversaw the military-industrial complex both as Minister of Defense and as Deputy Prime Minister.)
Thus, this does not solve the problem of “manual mode” and does not bring the state closer to creating a transparent system of institutions for regulating the defense complex. What's the alternative?
Create a defense department in the Presidential Administration - for example, improvising on the basis of expanding the office of a specialized assistant to the president? That is, to legitimize the current “manual regime”, at least in some way pushing it from the category of informal “concepts” towards the institutionalization of management and responsibility.
This, firstly, multiplies the bureaucracy and increases control levels (not a key, but significant objection), and, secondly, it again goes against the rules of the era.
After all, how many times has it been emphasized that the Presidential Administration does not interfere in government affairs, but only participates in the preparation of the president’s instructions. If, within the framework of these rules, a control structure is established as part of the Administration, then the military-industrial complex will have to be transferred to Staraya Square, bring together the military, interested ministries and top management of defense monopolies, and formalize decisions with the same instructions from the president to the White House.
These long, tedious discussions are intended to outline the main minefield in which the military-industrial complex can explode in its seventh decade. The issues of debugging the state defense order and pricing in industry are vitally important, but with painstaking work they can be resolved. This was done throughout 2011 and continues to be done now, which has had a positive effect on the current rate of placement of state defense orders.
But in matters of subordination, supervision, resolution of conflicts and balance of interests and powers, there may be a lot of pitfalls. Especially in Russia, where formal titles sometimes mean less than the last name of the person bearing them.
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