Russian Air Force 1

1. THROUGH WARS INTO A SUPERPOWER AIR FORCE

Military pilot training was started in Russia in Sevastopol and St. Petersburg in 1910. However, by the time the World War I began, the readiness was not yet at a level such a major war requires. After the war broke out, Russia tried to expand and modernize its air forces. During the duration of the war, the Russian aircraft production is estimated to have risen to about 4,700 aicraft (1).

When the revolution began, also the organization of Imperial Air Force collapsed. However, pretty soon the Bolshevik Administration started to pay attention to rebuilding of the air forces. Many of the leaders of the revolution, including Lenin, saw in the air forces an opportunity to strengthen their positions against both domestic and foreign enemies. Since the spring of 1918 the central government of Moscow started to supervise and prepare the operations of the Workers' and Peasants' Air Fleet.

The total number of aircraft rose from 140 in the year 1918 to 400 by the fall of 1922. Mostly they had been imported from Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and England. The types of aircraft included Junkers, Savoija, Ansaldo, Balilla, Fokker, de Havilland, Avro, Martinsyde and Vickers.

In the 1930s the development of the air forces continued and very often it got the priority when resources were allocated, as Russia tried to attract international attention through different world record flights. Foreign assistance was bought whenever possible, especially from Germany, but also from the United States.

The name 'Air Fleet' was changed to Air Force and the organization started to gain more importance under the Red Army control. Until the year 1928 the air force organization was a subject to numerous experiments and changes so that the previous changes had only been partially carried out when the next ones were already being introduced. Squadron became the basic air force unit although its strength varied a lot because of wide variety of aircraft. In numerical terms the Soviet Air Force was about as strong as the British Royal Air Force.

Domestic aircraft production increased significantly in the early years of the 1930s and towards the end of the decade the Soviet Air Force could introduce I-15 and I-16 fighters and SB-2, SB-2 BIS and DB-3 bombers.

War experience the Soviet Air Force gained in the 1930s for instance in the Spanish civil war by assisting the republican war effort with huge concentrations of aircraft, depot materiel and expert advice. High numbers of aircraft gave air superiority to the republicans in the initial phases of the conflict, but it crumbled after the German units supporting the nationalists got in service the new Bf 109 fighters in the end of 1937. In accordance with its military doctrine the Soviet Union attached the air forces to the army as an auxiliary. Thus the Soviet Union was unable to take the kind of advantage from the war experience that actual aerial warfare would have required. Among other things, the Soviet Union continued to use the outdated, close three-aircraft section as fighter tactical basic formation.

In the year 1931 the quantity of aircraft was 1,300, and by the end of the decade, the number had already risen to over 5,400 aircraft. Of the total about 4,200 were considered up-to-date in the year 1937. In 1938 the Soviet Air Force had almost sixty air force brigades and the Navy had eight (1).

When the Soviet Union attacked Finland on November 30, 1939, it concentrated almost half of its aircraft to the operation in question. Bomber missions were the primary form of operation in the Soviet Air Force, and that is why half of the full bomber capacity was focused to the Finnish front.

The 7th Air Army operated with the Karelian Isthmus as its focus area and its strength was approximately 700 aircraft. The 8th Air Army answered for the Olonetsian Isthmus with 500 aircraft. The Baltic Navy had at its disposal 470 aircraft. Also long-range bomber group Kravtshenko with its 300 aircraft supported the offensive (2).

The main types of aircraft were Polikarpov fighters I-15 BIS, I-153 Tchaika and I-16 Rata, Tupolev SB-2 and Ilyushin DB-3 bombers and Polikarpov R-5 and U-2 and Beriev MBR-2 reconnaissance aircraft.

The Soviet Air Force launched its operation by bombers on sixteen cities in Finland. The bombings came as a surprise to the civilian population and for example in Helsinki almost 100 people were killed and 200 wounded. The bombings did not have any military consequences or results.

In the early stages of war, the Soviet bombers flew without fighter escorts. They could often operate quite freely in the Finnish airspace without meeting any countermeasures when the relatively small Finnish fighter force was active in the point of main effort on the front. However, whenever the Finnish fighters came within interception range, the casualties were always so high that the Russians started to use fighter escorts. Often the Russian bombers also dropped their bomb loads ahead of time and turned back when they saw Finnish fighters approaching their formation (3).

Large share of the bombing capacity was focused on close support on the front in February 1940, but the Soviet Union also continued to bomb the towns and for example Vyborg was bombed with exceptional force (4).

In the very last stages of the war, in early March, Soviet fighters had to take defensive positions when the Finnish Air Force used both their fighter and bomber units to attack the Soviet flank operations across the ice on Gulf of Estonia and Gulf of Vyborg.

After the war effort that ended at Finland's defensive victory the Soviet military command, weakened by Stalin's purge, came under severe criticism. For instance the air force operations were judged as failures. In spite of their thirty times higher numbers, the 44,000 bomber sorties of the Soviet Air Force could not paralyze the Finnish warfare capability or collapse its economy. The war ordeal only strengthened the people's morale.

Also the Soviet fighter tactics proved outdated. The tight three-aircraft formation, where the wing planes tried to fire simultaneously with the leader, contained all the disadvantages of formation tactics. The formation had to rely almost solely on the observation capability of the leader, and the formation itself was visible from afar since together the three aircraft formed quite a large target. The wing planes could take hardly any initiative and it was practically impossible for them to hit the same target as the leader. In the Winter War air combat the winning features turned out to be the modern loose section and finger four tactics that the Finnish Air Force had, as the first in the World, used already since 1935, as well as flying and firing skills emphasizing personal proficiency.

In this light it was understandable that there were very few proponents for strategic bombing doctrine in the Soviet war councils of that era. However, the conclusions drawn by the councils show how little the Russians understood aerial warfare; the baby was thrown out with the bath water. The reasons for poor success were disorganized command system, the status of the air force as an auxiliary unit to the army and, largely, poor standard of training resulting from these two factors. Now the disappointment was released so that it further strengthened the factors that had caused the poor success in the first place.

Because of the criticism following the Winter War, the Soviet Union launched several reform programs within the defense administration. However, due to the inertia caused by large size of the organization and party hierarchy, the reforms were only in their initial stages when Germany launched its eastern operation on June 22, 1941. Even though Stalin had received much intelligence about Hitler's plans, he still relied on his own judgement and expected Germany and the Western alliance to wear each other out before his own move. Thus the Germans met totally unprepared Russian defenders and made important territorial conquests causing massive personnel and materiel losses to the Soviet Union.

Even after the Winter War Russia continued to pressure Finland. When Molotov visited Germany, he announced that the Soviet Union had not changed its plans concerning Finland. Thus Finland had started military cooperation with Germany by letting it operate in and through Lapland. Soviet bombers attacked, suffering serious losses, against several air defense targets in Finland on June 25, 1941 and Finland declared a state of war. The Continuation War began.

On the Finnish front, the situation soon stabilized into trench warfare after the Finns had advanced to advantageous defense positions along waterways in East Karelia. During the advance stage the Finns maintained air superiority and, in spite of their superior numbers, the Russians still tried to avoid air combat.

During trench warfare the Soviet Air Force significantly improved its material situation, but during air combat on the Gulf of Finland it gradually started to suffer from occasional lack of pilots (5). The Finnish fighter tactics and personal skills of the pilots compensated effectively for the disadvantage of smaller number of planes.

When in the summer of 1944, before the race to Berlin, the Soviet Union tried to take over Finland, it concentrated an air force of about 1,500 aircraft on the Karelian Isthmus. However, the old doctrinal sin, using the air forces as an army branch, revenged itself again. The air power was engaged to tactical duty as long-range artillery on the front. Thus it failed to fulfil its strategic tasks, such as offensive counter air and interdiction missions. The Finnish Air Force was able to concentrate its interception and bombing capacity to the point of main effort and, in fact, it could strengthen its fighter force all the way through the defensive action. Thus the necessary army reserves could be transferred to critical defense positions and in July the situation was such that the Soviet Air Force started to avoid air encounters (3). After it became clear that Finns had achieved a defensive victory, the Soviet Union started to move its units to the Central European front.

On the central and southern front, a significant part of the Soviet Union fell under German occupation, and the Soviet Union came very close to losing Moscow too. However, the hard winter and the fact that the Germans had made a serious miscalculation when believing the war would be over soon started to have an effect. After the catastrophe of Stalingrad, the German offensive had turned into a retreat. The Soviet Air Force got significant lend-lease aircraft assistance from the West, especially the United States. In addition, the domestic aircraft industry managed to produce new types of aircraft in large series. The most important Western types were Airacobra, Tomahawk, Spitfire and Hurricane. The best examples of domestic production were La-5, Yak-9, Pe-2 and Il-2.

Even on the German front, the Soviet Union maintained the tactical principles in air force use. From the sorties of the Frontal Aviation 46.5 % were used for direct support of the army units and even the Long-Range Aviation used 40.4 % of its capacity for the same purpose (83). It made things easier for Germans when the pressure was getting higher for Germany to transfer its fighter units from the eastern front to national defense after the Americans had launched their daytime bombing operations. With its weakening forces, Germany was unable to maintain its long defense lines, and when the war ended, the Soviet troops were already in Berlin.

The strategic status of the Soviet Union had changed significantly after World War II. It had failed its goals on the Finnish front, but it had occupation armies in Eastern European countries and, of former superpowers, only the United States was ahead of the Soviet Union.

Emergence of nuclear weapons on the war scene in the end of World War II lead the Soviet Union to vigorous efforts to create strategic air forces equipped with nuclear weapons (1). One of the first measures was to copy the U.S. bomber B-29, which made an emergency landing in the Soviet Union during the war. It was given Soviet designation Tu-4. It became the Soviet Union's first nuclear bomber.

After the war the number of aircraft in the Soviet Air Force dropped momentarily. However, in the last years of the 1940s the Soviet Air Force had approximately 18,500 aircraft while the number of air armies was between fifteen and eighteen. About 1,000 of the planes were jet fighters (1).

The Soviet Union arrived at the jet age with German JUMO-004 and BMW-003 jet engines, but especially access to English Rolls-Royce Nene I and Derwent V engines in the years 1947 and 1948 meant major progress in Soviet aviation engine technology. Both of the English engines were copied and improved. In series production especially the MiG-15 profited from this new technology. In the Korean War it showed better climb and curve performance ratings than for instance its American opponent Sabre F-86.

The MiG-15 was followed by the faster MiG-17 and MiG-19 with similar swept wing configurations and then by delta wing supersonic MiG-21, which reached over Mach 2 maximum velocity.

Sukhoi first developed the swept wing Su-7 attack aircraft and then the delta-winged Su-9 fighter. Later the research and development lead to fighter types Su-11 and twin-engined Su-15, the basic fighter of the Soviet Air Defense Force. The swing-wing Su-17 with its four-ton weapon load and Mach 2 top speed is an example of the development of attack aircraft.

The most successful among the early versions of jet bombers was Ilyushin's light twin-engine bomber Il-28, which entered series production in the early 1950s. Heavier bombers comprised Myasischev's four-engine M-4 and Tupolev's twin-engine Tu-16. About 2000 Tu-16s were manufactured as bombers, maritime reconnaissance aircraft and electronic warfare duties for both the Air Force and the Navy. The M-4 was mainly used in maritime reconnaissance and flight refueling.

Long-Range Aviation aimed at an aircraft, which could attack to the United States with a bomb load of five tons and operating range of 16,000 km. The requirement was too high for the Russian jet engines of the 1950s. Their high thrust performance ratings could be achieved when the specific fuel consumption was high and operating cycles were short (6).

Tupolev concluded that the goal could be achieved by using turboprop engines. In an air show flyby in 1955 it displayed seven large Tu-20 "Bear" aircraft equipped with four turboprop engines. Very few experts expected the type in question to beat the M-4 jet. However, the NK-12 engines with 14,795 shaft horsepower provided the aircraft with maximum speed of 800 km/h, and operating range of 6,400 km with 11-ton weapon load. This was recommendation enough to keep the "Bear" in production for 38 years, and to extend its range of operations to cruise missile launching, anti-ship and anti-submarine operations, aerial and electronic reconnaissance and operation as relay stations for ocean communications of submarines. Until the end of the cold war the latter versions of the aircraft, the Tu-95 MS "Bear" H planes made simulated missile attacks across the Atlantic to North America.

The strategic reconnaissance planes of the U.S., especially the SR-71A reaching top speed of over Mach 3, gave the impact to develop specialized high-speed fighters. For this special purpose Mikoyan first produced the MiG-25 and then its successor the MiG-31.

When the wars and conflicts in the Middle and Far East clearly showed the importance of tactical air forces, the Soviet Union started to develop a new generation of swing-wing aircraft. Thus were born the MiG-23 "Flogger B" fighter, MiG-27 "Flogger D" attack aircraft, Su-24 "Fencer" bomber/attack aircraft and Tu-22M "Backfire" bomber. The design philosophy of the last-mentioned was later extended to a four-engine strategic bomber Tu-160 "Blackjack", but so late that it did not reach high production rates before the end of the cold war (6).

Following the NATO example, the Soviet Union developed the kind of air force support services that are needed in global projection of force. These included in-flight refueling as well as airborne control and command systems. Also following the Western example, more attention was paid to air combat capabilities of fighters and also tailor made attack planes. The results included MiG-29 "Fulcrum" and Su-27 "Flanker" fighters and specialized Su-25 attack aircraft.

Development of transport aircraft, always observing also the needs of the paratroops, lead to development of, for example, the four-engine Il-76 "Candid" and An-124 "Condor". The latter is the biggest aircraft ever in series production worldwide with its effective load of 150 tons (6).

In the years 1978-1980 what had been the tactical air armies of the Soviet Union were reorganized into air forces, subjected either to military districts or occupations armies. Each comprised of tactical bombers, attack aircraft, reconnaissance aircraft and liaison planes. The intention was to divide the forces between the areas of operation, which were the northwestern, western and southwestern areas, the Middle East and the Far East. For example, the strength of the former 16th Air Army stationed in East Germany was about 300 planes (7).

The normal number of aircraft in fighter and attack divisions was 126 aircraft. A division usually consisted of three regiments and each regiment usually of three squadrons. Furthermore, each squadron had three flights (7).

Main part of the Soviet Air Force was concentrated on the eastern operation area to counter NATO. This concentration of power included the troops in East Germany and Poland, as well as the military districts of the Carpathians, Baltics and Belarus.

In the year 1987 the number of tactical combat aircraft in different operation areas was approximately 8,000. The air force resources were placed in different military organizations as follows (8):

Air Defense Force

1210 interceptors

420 MiG-23 Flogger

305 MiG-25 Foxbat

240 Su-15 Flagon

5 Su-27 Flanker

80 Tu-28/128 Fiddler

65 Jak-28 Firebar

95 MiG-31 Foxhound

AWACS aircraft

7 Tu-126 Moss

1 Il-76 Mainstay

Soviet Air Force

165 strategic bombers

150 Tu-95 Bear

15 M-4 Bison

550 medium bombers

155 Tu-22M Backfire

260 Tu-16 Badger

135 Tu-22 Blinder

2780 fighters

490 MiG-21 Fishbed

1570 MiG-23 Flogger

105 MiG-25 Foxbat

260 Su-15 Flagon

20 Tu-128 Fiddler

20 Jak-28 Firebar

275 MiG-29 Fulcrum

30 MiG-31 Foxhound

10 Su-27 Flanker

2835 attack aircraft

130 MiG-21 Fishbed

830 MiG-27 Flogger

895 Su-7/17 Fitter

770 Su-24 Fencer

210 Su-25 Frogfoot

50 tankers

30 M-4 Bison

20 Tu-16 Badger

658 tactical reconnaissance and ECM aircraft

65 MiG-21 Fishbed

195 MiG-25 Foxbat

165 Su-17 Fitter

65 Su-24 Fencer

195 Jak-28 Brewer

260 strategic reconnaissance and ECM aircraft

115 Tu-16 Badger

15 Tu-22 Blinder

4 Tu-95 Bear

102 Jak-28 Brewer

24 MiG-25 Foxbat

3050 helicopters

1500 trainers and training helicopters

576 transport aircraft

55 An-22 Cock

210 An-12 Cup

310 Il-76 Candid

2935 civilian and other transport aircraft

Navy

340 bombers

120 Tu-22 M Backfire

190 Tu-16 Badger

30 Tu-22 Blinder

145 fighter and attack aircraft

75 Su-17 Fitter

70 Jak-38 Forger

70 tankers

70 Tu-16 Badger

200 reconnaissance and ECM aircraft (Tu-16, Tu-95, Tu-22, An-12)

480 anti-submarine aircraft

60 Tu-142 Bear F

100 Mi-14 Haxe A

60 Ka-27 Helix

115 Ka-25 Hormone A

95 Be-12 Mail

50 Il-38 May

465 transports and trainers

In international comparison, the Soviet air forces potential represented quite an impressive air power. However, it was still riddled by the same weaknesses experienced in the previous wars. The Soviet Union stubbornly held on to the ideology that had been rejected by the international experts ages ago, according to which the ground forces were the main arm of defense. Its needs dictated also the solutions used in the air forces. This resulted in both disorganized command structure and qualitative weaknesses.

Western specialists were naturally well aware of the Soviet thinking based on army as the main arm of defense. Consequently, they estimated that the Soviet armed forces had fallen from the track that led to military technical reforms, even though the Soviet Union together with the Warsaw Pact possessed quite impressive amounts of aircraft and flying units. NATO calculated that in a war against the Warsaw Pact, the Western Alliance could achieve air supremacy with help of its qualitative superiority and centralized air force command structure. Just like in the World War II, the victory would then be just a matter of time (17).

NATO had observed in quite a different manner what crucial role qualitative factors play in aerial warfare, and how critical meaning airspace supremacy has when it comes to the final outcome of a war. Thus it had developed the total defense according to the actual demands of warfare instead of traditional hierarchy. In World War II the Americans divided their air forces regionally between the ground force echelons after the landing to North Africa. The result was a collapse of total effectiveness, as each command echelon wanted to maintain the units subjected to them even in cases when the general situation would have called for concentrated group effort against Rommel's supply routes and nothing was happening in the echelon's own area of responsibility. The mistake was corrected, and after that the principles of aerial warfare were followed, which meant centralized command and decentralized groupings. Also the results of warfare were taken into account in a realistic manner. Thus the investments in the air force component were in keeping with the decisive role this particular component was expected to play in future conflicts.

In the Middle East systems based on Soviet ideology landed in crucial test several times. The result development was always close to what the expectation values concerning a major war fought with conventional weapons predicted. The basic explanation for poor success was the poor ability of the allies to take advantage of Soviet equipment, which as such was said to be up-to-date. The situation reached its climax in the Gulf War, which divided the Soviet opinions. On one hand the traditionalists were reluctant to acknowledge the effectiveness of the allied air forces, and, on the other hand, the professionals aimed at bringing their own doctrinal development up to date.

Iraq was an important buyer of weapons for the Soviet Union, and this close relationship became visible in the early comments after the U.S. had started to transfer its flying units and troops to Saudi-Arabia. On August 8, 1990, Reporter V. Lobaschenko pointed out in Moscow television that the U.S. could hardly concentrate enough forces to the area in the near future to facilitate successful operations against the Iraqi army. Journalist A. Buschujev wrote in Raboschaya Tribuna on August 8, 1990: "Iraq has an army of million men. The West can hardly manage to get into the area more than 150,000 men against it. We must not forget the combat experience Iraq has gained in the war against Iran either."(9)

As the operation Desert Shield advanced, the comments became more cautious and the first estimates taking the air force component into account started to emerge.

After the operation Desert Storm had begun, the Soviet Union immediately increased its reconnaissance readiness and started systematic collection of data. The objective was to acquire as comprehensive a picture of alliance tactics and weapons impact as possible. At the same time data was also collected about performance of own weaponry and equipment delivered to Iraq.

Statements after the first night of the operation were mainly positive. TASS' military expert Vladimir Chernyschev pointed out that the first phase of the operation had been carefully planned and skillfully executed. According to him, it had also changed the traditional roles of the arms of defense. The strategic strikes and attacks with decisive impact had been carried out by the air forces (9).

The first official statement was given by Foreign Minister Alexander Bessmertnykh. He brought up for instance the accuracy of allied air operations. The first military comment came up in an interview of Commandant of the General Staff Academy, LTG V. Gorbachev in Izvestiya, January 21, 1991 titled "Tanks will not save the day". He named, among other things, the efficient reconnaissance operations of the allied forces and their great professionalism in execution of operations.

As the air operations advanced and started to work on Iraq's strategic infrastructure, there started to come up comments according to which it was too early to draw any conclusions about the outcome of the war. Marshal Ahromeyev paid attention to Iraq's war experience, gained in 9-year war against Iran, and claimed that Iraq could not be paralyzed by air. He also criticized the Americans for rushing into war without giving peace a chance. For some reason or another, he did not mention Saddam Hussein in this context (9).

Commander-in-Chief of the Soviet Air Force, ColGen Yevgeni Shaposhnikov gave a statement after the second week of air operations. He said that his headquarters had followed the operations closely and, in time, they would draw important conclusions from them. He brought up the paralyzing effect of air operations on besides military targets, also Iraq's economic potential. However, he made a mistake when he estimated that the reason for Iraq's weak air defense was the effort to save equipment for support of land operations (9).

Col Manki Ponomarev wrote in defense administration magazine, the Red Star, on January 25 that the alliance desperately tried to prove right Giulio Douhet's theory formulated decades earlier. Besides being wrong in the issue itself, Ponomarev also interpreted quite freely how Douhet's theory should be put to practice. According to his interpretation the primary target of air strikes should not be military targets but the industry and population centers. In the same magazine on January 31 Director of the Operative and Strategic Research Center, General Staff, MG S. Bogdanov warned that Iraq's resources should not be underestimated (9).

Journalist Stanislav Kondrashov criticized in Izvestiya on January 28, 1991, his colleagues for sympathizing the Americans in their writings. He was especially annoyed about the insinuations according to which the Soviet forces would have succeeded as poorly in a European war as Hussein's forces against the alliance. The biggest bomb was published by war historian MG V. Filatov, who traveled to Baghdad after the war had begun and wrote from there with confidence that the Gulf War will end in a great defeat to the USA. In an interview of Komsomolskaya Pravda on February 1, 1991, he announced that Saddam Hussein is saving his forces for decisive ground warfare. Literaturnaya Gazeta explained Saddam's ineffectiveness in the same manner in the end of January (9).

Supreme Commander of the Warsaw Pact, Gen Lobov, concluded in a Radio Moscow interview on February 1 that the air operations had not had a crucial impact on the destiny of either of the parties, and only when the ground forces start operating some conclusions can be drawn (9).

When the emphasis of air operations shifted from infrastructure targets to constant bombarding of the nationalist guard, even the Soviet observers had to admit that the alliance still held the strategic initiative it had taken during the first days of war. When the war was over more professional analyses were published. Col D. Belski wrote in Sovjetskaya Rossiya on February 28, 1991, that the Gulf War had been the most extensive combat operation since World War II. Iraq had in vain tried to pull the alliance into a major ground war. Instead, the allied air operations had denied the Iraqi troops all mobility and then systematically destroyed its war machinery (9).

Spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Gennadi Gerasimov admitted publicly that he had been wrong about the importance of air operations, but Defense Minister Jazov belittled the alliance's achievements saying that there was nothing exceptional in the operations. Quite soon after the Gulf War the highest command of the Soviet armed forces announced their plan to go through the experiences of the Gulf War. The first meeting was organized in March, but according to the criticism of younger participants, no real problems were handled since they could have put the commanding echelons in a bad light. The next symposium was held in the beginning of July on the announcement of the Chief of the General Staff, Gen Mikhail Moiseyev. Evidently the professional touch was not too deep in this conference either, since the final conclusion was "political means were not enough to prevent the Gulf War, even though there was a chance". However, by collecting statements from different sources it is possible to summarize those topics that have had the most effect on estimates made within the highest command of the armed forces: (9)

expanded air force role in solving the final result of the war

meaning of training and proficiency in using modern weaponry to its fullest capacity

big importance of hi-tech weaponry in multiplying the military power

impact of issues mentioned above and similar topics on Russian defense planning and policy

After having lived for several decades in a culture where the air force did not have an independent role, the Soviet officers had great difficulties in admitting that the air forces had decided the outcome of the Gulf War. Civilian observers, on the other hand, did not usually have such weight of tradition on their shoulders, and thus it was much easier for them to recognize the facts. Also within the Soviet Air Force the events were seen in a professional light. Chief of Staff, LTG A. Malyukov answered in the following manner in Red Star interview on March 14, 1991, to the question whether the Gulf War had been an application of the American Air-Land Battle doctrine: "No, I do not think so. There was no classical air-land battle. Why? Because originally the war had evidently been planned as an air battle meant to wear down the opponent with air strikes, break down his command system, destroy his air defense and deprive the ground forces of their striking force. Judging by the objectives, it was rather a classical air offensive. And these goals were achieved. Generally speaking, this was the first war where the air forces carried out all the main tasks." Malyukov also mentioned Iraq's total incapacity to use their helicopters. (9)

It was much harder for Director of the Operative and Strategic Research Center, General Staff, MG Bogdanov to swallow the facts that were not in keeping with the Soviet doctrine. He underlined the meaning of ground forces and pointed out that in the area there had been over a million men, 80 divisions, 90 separate brigades, about 10,500 tanks and over 12,000 guns and mortars. The fact that these had hardly any meaning when it comes to the final outcome of the war was not included in his analysis (9).

The results of the discussion forum chaired by Bogdanov were published in Voyennaya Mysl newspaper in May 1991. The other participants included Commander of the Soviet Air Defense Force, ColGen I. Maltsev, Chief of Air Force Staff, LTG A. Malyukov, General Staff representative, MG A. Gulko and Radm A Pauk from the Naval Headquarters. Most of the conclusions drawn concentrated on what the allied forced had done wrong and on imaginary expectations that had not been fulfilled. Very little time was spent on handling what actually had been achieved. The debaters also drew the wrong conclusion that the Iraqi defense had forced the alliance to nighttime operations. In fact, the night operations were a calculated choice (9).

The meaning of the standard of training came up in many contexts and, since the defeated party's weaponry mainly consisted of Russian war materiel, the Russians repeatedly had to underline that the Iraqi did not know how to use their equipment. However, as a result of glasnost, also some very direct statements were given. LTC Vladimir Vysotsky was asked in Komsomolskaya Pravda on August 7, 1991, whether the outcome of the Gulf War had been the same had the Russian pilots flown the Iraqi aircraft. The answer was hardly, since Russian pilots had trained the Iraqi pilots. When the journalist pointed out that Russian pilots were surely not that bad, the answer was: "Every pilot with a rational head on his shoulders knows that in case of war the role reserved for him is that of cannon fodder. He also knows that the situation worries very few people in the highest command echelons." When he was asked whether he was worried about getting into trouble because of such statements, he pointed out fatalistically that his worries are quite different; he knew what would happen to his attack aircraft in the first days of war (9).

It was a traumatic experience for the Soviet military command to follow the Gulf War. Old habits die hard, and even now in their statements and opinions most officers carefully avoided the issue itself, when asked what are the requirements modern warfare poses on defense doctrine and structure. Still, quite many representatives of the high command were wise and brave enough to acknowledge the dominant role of the air power in future conflicts. In other words, for the first time in its history, there was opening up an opportunity for the Soviet Air Force to develop as the nature of aerial warfare actually requires. Even Defense Minister Pavel Gratchev pointed out that the next war will be a bilateral air offensive, where the strikes into main targets are made by air (6).

The internal pressure to develop the air force had been kept tightly in check by the party machinery and the army until the attempted coup against Gorbachev. During the new administration the pressure was released and formulated into clear expressions of opinion. CIC of the Air Force, ColGen Pyotr Deinekin pointed out that the Soviet Union had undervalued the air force for over 70 years. It had never been given a chance to develop as the international requirements would have called for. The situation would now change completely. At the same time the party political control system would be eliminated from the organization (10).

In the beginning of the 1990s the Soviet Union had air forces that in terms of quantity fulfilled superpower standards. However, the doctrinal status under the command of the ground forces had gnawed at air force's command system and qualitative foundations in a manner that it had trouble maintaining its credibility in the international forum. Additionally, air forces trained and equipped by the Soviet Union suffered repeated losses in local wars and conflicts.

Back to the Russian Air Force page

Home