Fulltext search in archive

The practice of a company sending work to outside factories to reduce production costs is called outsourcing. Outsourcing is one of many methods that might help defence department to fulfil a number of various tasks that either can't be accomplished within the armed forces or such work or services can be obtained at low-costs in civil sector. The authors propose several practicable techniques using dynamic outsourcing model to identify prospective services to support given transformation process.

The primary aim of the method Hazard & Impact Index (H&I Index) is to enable the commander to evaluate possible negative impacts of military exercise on environment, and quickly and in an operative way interpret whether intended military activities can be a threat to the conditions or surroundings, in which the units are employed. The authors propose several tables for the comparison of environmental groups (soils, forests, climates) with forces movements. The method still undergoes the development. The evaluated numbers are set only for a mechanized company of the Army of the Czech Republic in our local surrounding. But in the near future the authors predict its extension to all organic units of NATO stationed in European continent. The article is a sequel to the article by the same authors in Vojenské rozhledy, No 1 /2006.

UAV specialists predict that within ten years, half the aircraft flying will be unmanned. They also foresee conflicts where a few soldiers will dominate stateside battlefields. The UAV Center of Excellence is going to draw the unmanned part of the Air Force, to study the best ways to use UAVs. The Air Warfare Centre at Nellis, Nevada, develops tactics for the use of aircraft and directs combat training. The UAV center would take on a whole range of issues from airspace control to various kinds of systems. Unmanned aircraft are to expect to play a key role in delivering directed-energy weapons to battlefields. Stealth will become a standard in UAV fleets just as it is in manned combat aircraft today. A number of additional improvements are expected to increase the capability of Predator squadrons. UAVs may have to specialize in strike or intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. Source: articles by David A. Fulghum, Aviation Week and Space Technology No 12, 2005.

The China's impact on world affairs is growing and will grow further in decades to come. Those years will be critical for Taiwan, and for its relationship with other states. Three related factors determine the texture of this interaction: the policies evolving in Beijing, internal developments on Taiwan, and the international environment. Beijing has offered Taipei several proposals for reunification. The proposals, including the recent "one state, two systems" proposal, allow Taipei to maintain its social and economic system, its armed forces and its unofficial ties with foreign countries. China's grand strategy is to make war while avoiding the battle. Therefore, Taiwan is to be persuaded that the acceptance of "One China" principle is vitally important for preventing the Taiwanese independence. Otherwise, People's Armed Forces will open an invasion to Taiwan by three successive attacks: (1) high precise medium-range ballistic missiles DF-21C with the aim to suppress air defence; (2) the second stroke would be massive attack with short-range precise missiles; (3) the last stroke ought to be done by cruise missiles. This essay is adapted from articles by Mary C. Fitzgerald and Eric A. McVadon, Armed Forces Journal 11/2005.

In the near future, all joint deployments (activities, operations in which elements of two or more "branches of arms" participate) will be characterized as combined deployments (i.e. with forces or agencies of two or more allies). In view of those facts, Commanders (Army) Academy in Hamburg introduced a new concept of military schooling of GSOs, with regard to combined and multinational deployment and employment. Schooling and training are not mere matters of skill and proficiency. It is also the question of taking over responsibility, "action competence". GSOs must be able to react quickly, be capable to operate even in multinational agencies. This type of instruction underlines two main levels: firstly, the lessons must offer overall view not only on armed forces, but also on security, political, social development of forces, tied with their further advance. GSOs have to see problems and tasks in proper context, to "see the whole by eyes of its individual parts". This will give them a surprising sense of coherence. At the top of this schooling lies combined joint Euro-exercise, at operational level, being prepared in cooperation with military academies from allied European nations.

As the EU is conducting its third military operation, the EUMS has become a key player in the development of the European Security and Defence Policy. In order to provide political control and strategic direction in a crisis, the European Council (Nice, December 2000) decided to establish new permanent political and military structures within the Council of the European Union: PSC-Political and Security Committee, EUMC-European Union Military Committee, EUMS-European Union Military Staff. The EUMS is responsible for peacekeeping tasks, tasks of combat forces in crisis management (including peacemaking), and further tasks identified in the European Security Strategy, such as joint disarmament operations, support for third countries in combating terrorism and security sector reform. As the only permanent integrated military structure of the EU, the EUMS has become the military linchpin of the EU. (Truppendienst, Bundesheer,

Antiballistic defence systems could be defined as a secondary defensive response to ballistic threats, against existing, projected or planned ballistic military hardware. In a way, it is a sort of deterrence weapon, because such defence discourages opponents form the development of offensive missiles. The author of this article, the former deputy defence minister, Maj-Gen. (ret), specifies three relevant antimissiles system: ALTBM-NATO Active Layered Theatre Ballistic Missile Defence; NATO MD-NATO Missile Defence; and USA MD-USA Missile Defence. The purpose of American antiballistic defence is to counterbalance potential strokes by limited numbers of ballistic missiles, blasted off from both enemy and rogue states and those launched by accident. Allegedly, the Iranians are developing ballistic missiles with the range of 4,000 km. With the reference to the fact that the distance Prague-Teheran is about 3,400 km, and such missiles could constitute an eminent danger even for the Czech Republic, not only for the continental United States, this issue is widely discussed in Czech mass media.

One of key attributes of the military professional is fitness. This article would like to open a discussion over women' physical potential. Are physical qualities of man and women equal? Is it possible to set those norms in military rules and tables? What about the risks factors for training-related injuries among men and women in combat training? Can we compare muscular strength of man and women? Does women's strength/power affect the occupational performance? The Committee on Women in NATO Forces (CWINF) asks to create the equal conditions for occupational performance both for men and women. The same was introduced by the Order of the Czech Minister of Defence No 29/2002, MoD Bulletin; similar annotations can be found also in US Army Field Manual 21-18. For us, it is necessary to specify unbiased profiles, entrance tests for woman soldiers, taking into account physical capacities but disregarding gender.

Mr. Koutný belonged among those who went through the fire of World War II and lately became victims of despotism of the so-called "class laws". In fact, Col. Koutný was not a soldier, but the journalist. At the beginning of war, Mr. Koutný was sent to Poland to inform about Polish practices to return Czechoslovak refugees back to the "Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia". At Poland he joined the Czechoslovak Military Group; lately he experienced Soviet labour camps. In a small city of Buzuluk, where the first Czechoslovak Field Battalion was formed, he became the chief of recruiting commission. There he met people returning from the NKVD's camps (i.e. Soviet Secret Police's detention camps). Many his reports to the Chief of Czechoslovak Military Mission Heliodor Pika were preserved in archives. Nowadays they bear witness on those fearful camps. As a press officer he laid down the foundation of the Czech army daily "Our Army in the USSR". He worked at the Czechoslovak Headquarters in Russia, as a liaison officer at the Command of the 1st Czechoslovak Army Corps in the USSR, as a political and military advisor to the commander of armour brigade Lt.Col. Janko. In his liberated country he helped to establish the military publishing house Our Army (Naše vojsko). Shortly after the communist coup d'etat, in 1949, he was imprisoned. He died in a communist jail in 1960.

Even after the Cold War, our world is full of local and international conflicts. There were dozens of wars, fringe clashes between local opposing groups in Africa, Asia and so on. Among them there were four wars of lager size, with more than thousands of deaths in each of them that could be characterized as international wars: Desert Storm 1991, Iraqi Freedom 2003, Allied Strength 1999, and Enduring Freedom 2001. Now we can look at them from a distance ...217 Problems tied with those large-scale wars have several levels: supranational (international) level and military level, being accompanied by paradoxes: international and political paradoxes and military ones. This influenced structures and methods of training and preparation of Australian, Britain and US forces. The lessons were embedded into their military concepts, rules and regulations, e.g. Complex Warfighting (Australia), Future Land Operating Concept (UK), Field Manual: Interim Counterinsurgency Operations (US). New roles of military forces, global and local implications, ought to be embedded also into the structures and concepts of the Army of the Czech Republic, concludes the author.

Even though many activities related to intelligence and intelligence network after the end of Cold War were released and have become commonplace, classified matters are still in the centre of public's interest. In discussions, experts use various terms tied with espionage or counter-intelligence, but real differences are not too high. In the armed forces (in the frame of NATO) this question was solved by issuing the manual AJP-2, Allied Joint Intelligence, CounterIntelligence and Security Doctrine (NATO 2003). This article summarises key and basic terms used in intelligence services, including new theoretical concepts from this field. As the author writes in the introductory chapter, many experts, namely in civilian and academic fields use the same terminology, but their explanation differs. They use different definitions reflecting diverse circumstances under which they came into existence. The article was written namely as a contribution to interagency communication, among civilian and professional experts, in time when the overall security concept is changing, when military power is not the only tool to avert wide spectrum of security threats of 21st century.

On 13-17 March, 2006, the Directorate of Centre of Simulation and Trainer Technologies Brno ran experimental computer-aided exercise dealing with combat activities of a Battalion Task Force (BTF) in urban area. It was outlined as a double-sided opponent procedural exercise, with the use of computer potential, in attendance of staff and personnel from Special Force Command, Support and Training Force Command, Training Base Vyškov, Military Academy Vyškov, designated unit commanders from Special Force, namely 72 Mech Bt. This experimental exercise proved right some factors that are prepared in accordance with NATO operational concept USECT (Understand, Shape, Engage, Consolidate, Transition). In the first place, the experiment demonstrated the practicability of manoeuvre attack by BTF on fully prepared opponent's defences and subsequently occupying his positions and locations, even though at the cost of relatively higher losses of combat vehicles. The article is accompanied by the Table of Exercise Summary.

The professionalization of armed forces is a process causing qualitative changes in the personnel structure of the armed forces. This process should form the armed forces as a professional institution, where the most of soldier is not enlisted for a life-long career of soldiering, but enrolled only for certain amount of time (Soldat auf Zeit). The U.S. Armed Forces (all-volunteer service) and the Royal Armed Forces serve as an example of a kind of professional armed forces in the NATO. There are two contrasting models of professional armed forces: the US-inspired armed forces and the lifelong-careerof-soldiering armed forces. Both models served as an inspiration for application in the Czech Armed Forces. The Czech Act No 211/1999 "Career Soldiers" defines military service of Czech professional soldiers in terms of all-volunteer forces. As there were some problems with the unification of career officers and volunteer soldiers, nowadays we gradually return to the concept that again differentiates between those groups.

Established methods of warfare are out of use in urbanized regions, western technological and arms potential must be amended by new equipments, materials and weapons of XXIst Century WarriorCity Guerrilla Fighter. Urbanized areas are divided into separated sectors with changed dimensions: dominating tall buildings, impenetrable barriers. Reinforced concrete, narrow streets, fight inside buildings prevent us from using global position systems. So, dismounted infantry are being equipped by inertial movement units, portable lasers, noctovisors, and bolometers (i.e. instruments used to measure tiny amounts of radiant energy). Bolometers in combination with low light level videos enable to identify friends of foes, to set risky targets. The socalled reconnaissance hand grenade to get image and sounds of enemy soldiers are being developed, it is anticipated the wide employment of unmanned aerial and ground vehicles. Many arrangements are done to prevent "collateral damages", unintentional killing of civilians as a result of military action.

This article examines depth in the nonlinear battlefield and how planners might develop operational effects to defeat insurgencies. The former field manual stated that depth was the extension of operations in time, space and resources. This is a decidedly linear construction of the battlefield based on industrialized warfare between conventional enemies. The Global War on Terrorism operating environment is both nonlinear and non-contiguous. The enemy has no national borders or traditional infrastructure. If we understand cognitive depth, we can develop ways to paralyze the insurgent system or produce operational shock. Colonel John A. Warden III, an architect of the Persian Gulf War air campaign, introduced Five Rings Model as a methodology for successfully attacking and paralyzing a conventional enemy system in depth. An adaptation of this model depicts tangible targets that together constitute depth in the insurgent battle space. Source: Is There a Deep Fight in a Counterinsurgency by Lee K. Grubbs and Michael J. Forsyth, Military Review, July-August 2005.