Glen Grant: We need to change ZSU management structure if we want to reform the ZSU and win
We are now at a vital stage of the war. One thing stands out in the Ukrainian Armed Forces above all others. It is not the outstanding combat actions of the soldiers on the front line, which rightly deserve worldwide praise, but the fact that the system itself is dysfunctional on many levels, from political to military.
I have not written seriously about war for a long time. My last large piece about policy changes for the defence forces was 18 months ago.
I have been asked to update this many times from the military to businesspeople, but to be honest little has changed.
Now we are at a vitally important point in the war. One thing stands out for the ZSU above all others. It is not the outstanding fighting of the front line soldiers that rightly earns worldwide praise, but that the system itself is dysfunctional on many levels, from the political to the military. The problem is that fundamental things wrong with the ZSU are not being fixed. One key reason for this is that the upper levels of the system are not working as they should. Much of this is poor personnel policy, but the vast majority is structural. The jobs and tasks do not match the requirements. The system itself is not designed to be efficient and until this is changed the inefficiencies will continue to severely damage the war effort. I shall try to explain.
The most senior military post in a defence force is the Chief of Defence, or in Ukraine Commander in Chief. His task is to make sure that the whole system functions as it should to deliver the political directives of the President. I shall not cover all of the Chiefs tasks now as they were already published in Censor.net in June 2020 (note the date)
The major problem at the moment is that the Commanders in Chief, past and present have concentrated too much upon the operational matters of fighting the war and not enough on the strategic imperative of designing a system to win the war. We are still fighting with a Soviet structure and Soviet people. It is strange that the President, he of all people from showbusiness, should not recognise the difference between the roles of the director and producer and that his selection for Chief, General Sirskiy, has placed himself firmly in the director role whilst the producer’s slot lays bare and empty. This is not a criticism of the General, he is doing what he knows and does best – fighting. But whilst he is fully engaged in this, the dysfunctions of the system continue and even grow. What do you mean by this I hear you ask?
Well, the role of Commander in Chief is to manage the overall war strategy and create a system for winning tomorrow. Read about General AlanBrooke who supported Churchill in WW2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Brooke,_1st_Viscount_Alanbrooke
Commander in Chief is a full-time job and is why most countries have a totally separate Chief of Operations to manage the fighting. You cannot do both jobs. Activity and geography limit the available time of fighting commanders, and they are left with little energy for other vital matters. What needs changing in the system to win? The list is huge and to cover just a few: creating a war strategy, the ZSU political relationships with the government and ministries, working with VR to get vital laws changed and create close ties with volunteer NGOS, and allies. We need to fix mobilisation, the command structure of the divisional level, the officer and NCO education systems, personnel processes - especially selection of COMBRIGS and COMBATS and the rights of servicemen and women. We need: a doctrine for modern battle using drones and robots, proper honest public communications – especially about casualties and missing, awards and medals, logistics, especially food and personal equipment, the structures and equipment of units – we are still totally broken as far as soft vehicles are concerned and this affects supplies, medical and SOF operations, additionally the supply of front line drones is still heavily dependent upon volunteers, the technical aspects and business relationships for future EW and drone warfare appear not being grasped by the MOD or GS at all (tell me I am wrong if I am), international training, collective training, medical training, the management and command of the broken TCC, and so on and so on and so on. Many of these tasks are in the province of MOD but they need clear guidance from the Commander in Chief to make sure that the tasks are coherent and the main priorities for the budget come first.
Noone is suggesting that the Commander in Chief has to fix these things himself, he cannot, but he has the oversight and power to direct the system to change things. But to do this he needs a full-time strategic focus and a clear vision of the future army and war. He must also have quality time. So put simply, if our current chief stays firmly operational and focussed on fighting and believes that he is the best man to do this (and he likely is) then he should step down and take over the role of Joint Commander (the director) or perhaps commander of the Kursk or eastern direction battle only. The President should then select another officer as Commander in Chief (the producer) to drive changes towards a better system where military professionalism, intelligence, moral courage and brutal honesty count for more than Soviet style slavish loyalty. Or failing this our Commander in Chief must start to trust and delegate others to run the battles with his guidance but not interference. If neither of these things are done, we will continue to limp along trying to play Mozart and Bach with an orchestra that has half a strings section and untrained wind players. Instead of beautiful music we will continue to have a cacophony of sound. The management structure of the ZSU must be fixed if we want to win the war.
Glen Grant, military expert
