Maidan army vs collective farm army

The army is always a reflection of the social system.

Ukrainian society and the state are organized as a large Maidan. Ukrainians have an advantage in motivating free people who defend their freedom, in improvisation, and also in initiative. But we lack systematicity, organization, and strategic planning. We need an order and a logic that is clear to all and followed by all. Because war is a complex mosaic, and in order to win, many factors and things must be controlled and used at a specific point and at a specific time. Systematic planning is needed, because we learn quickly, but very slowly and unevenly implement the things we understand.

“Ukrainian society and the state are organized like a big Maidan. Ukrainians have an advantage in motivating free people who defend their freedom, in improvisation, and also in initiative.”

Russia, with its collective farm system, lack of freedom of speech, oppression of individuality, and denial of civil rights, has a centralized state administration. And Russia is trying to gain advantage through its system. They use force and money to force as many people as possible to go to the front. Russia has carried out a mobilization and created an advantage in numbers at the front. Now they are studying in the Ukrainian army and trying to copy the decisions that gave us an advantage in the war. Centralization enables the enemy to quickly scale the decisions made.

“Russia, with its collective farm system, lack of freedom of speech, oppression of individuality, and denial of civil rights, has a centralized state administration.”

To defeat the enemy in such a war, it is necessary to implement an advantage in quality, not in numbers.

So that the front line is defined by rows of sensors, drones, machine vision, and not by the markings of observation points.

So that each soldier has the highest possible level of situational awareness in his area of ​​the front, and there is constant communication.

So that only people with basic training come to the front, and that training does not stop even at the front.

So that each unit promotes the best fighters to sergeants and officers, and provides training for the permanent creation of command personnel.

“War is a struggle between two systems, and first of all, a struggle between state and social institutions.”

So that the operation starts from a single command center that sees the circumstances, has communication and interaction with all forces to avoid chaos.

So that provisioning and armaments are the result of defense planning, and not constant vacillating and empty press releases.

So that there is finally a doctrine, which army we are currently building and which priorities should be implemented, taking into account the available resources.

There are many “so that”...

War is a struggle between two systems, and first of all, a struggle between state and social institutions. Maidan will win faster and with the least losses if it can use our strong qualities.  Order and planning will make us stronger without additional resources.

About the author: Yurii Butusov, journalist, soldier of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

The edition team does not always share the opinions expressed by the authors of the blogs.