Russian Nuclear Weapons: Past, Present, and Future - Strategic ...

employment will be effective when they are trained
to preempt the enemy, deliver surprise attacks, and
execute swift maneuvers, and when they have high
protection and survivability. 44
It is also worth highlighting in passing the way in
which the authors utilized the legacy of World War II
as a basis to advocate changing the TOE rather than
retaining the pre-existing structures. The experience
gained during the war, in their view, had exposed the
inadequacies of the TOE and compelled its displacement
in order to meet new requirements. Thus, Vorobyev
and Kiselev centered their argument on the
often unifying legacy of the Great Patriotic War and
simultaneously advocated restructuring the TOE. 45
CGS Makarov has already lamented the low quality
of brigade commanders, saying that many of those
appointed in 2009 have been sacked because they were
simply not up to the task. If Vorobyev and Kiselev’s
model were adopted, which would certainly contribute
to mobility and maneuverability, it would actually
result in the basic building block of the new look
becoming the battalion rather than the brigade. Consequently,
the training burden would expose deeper
problems; since finding suitable brigade commanders
is clearly proving difficult.
As the reform concept is reconceptualized, moving
from a uniform brigade size towards perhaps three
basic types and determining their mission type and
operational utility, it is equally possible that the claim
regarding permanent readiness brigades may also
require adjustment. The likelihood is that in future
there will be a stratified approach to readiness levels
on differing strategic axes. Equally, these structures
need to be optimized to suit the development and
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