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Successful protection against Weapons of Mass Destruction and Toxic Industrial Materials is a permanent and current challenge for the Czech Armed Forces Chemical Corps units and formations. Technical and technological improvements of the equipment and material as a result of defence development projects mostly contributed to enhancement of operational capabilities. In some cases, however, the required capability has not been changed or has been worsened. The paper deals with principal results of the study which the authors have elaborated in 2015.

The article discusses the operational adaptability, which will be needed, in accordance with US, in future armed conflicts. The capability of operational adaptability has a significant impact particularly on the operations of land forces, which are still considered as a paramount military power. One of the prerequisites for achieving operational adaptability is effective influencing the dynamics of the human environment in armed conflict. Current development and emphasizing technology over the course of armed conflict detached too fare the War from its intangible political, cultural and psychological context. Human, psychological, political and cultural dimensions of armed conflict create a lot of uncertainty, which land forces should deal with in the future military operations. A partial solution applicable for Czech Armed Forces also outlines this article.

This article discusses political and military issue of Islamic State, since establishment of the anti­IS alliance in summer 2014 until March 2016 in Iraq and Syria. The article describes each step made during this period separately or in alliance, while the terrorist attacks in Paris are considered as a turning point. That is the reason why the article is the comparison of French policy before and after the attacks. Furthermore, the crucial part is to resolve Syrian crisis in which France is actively involved in order to settle down the events in Syria and transform it into democratic country without President Assad.This article discusses political and military issue of Islamic State, since establishment of the anti­IS alliance in summer 2014 until March 2016 in Iraq and Syria. The article describes each step made during this period separately or in alliance, while the terrorist attacks in Paris are considered as a turning point. That is the reason why the article is the comparison of French policy before and after the attacks. Furthermore, the crucial part is to resolve Syrian crisis in which France is actively involved in order to settle down the events in Syria and transform it into democratic country without President Assad.

This text sets its aim in analyzing the current state of active reserve in the Czech republic. The function, current state along with future plans as envisioned in the Concept of Active reserve from the year 2012 and relevant public anouncements of certain military and ministry officials will be described first. The ammendment to the conscription act will be briefly introduced along with its effects on the function of Active reserve, its perspectives and on the requirements on the recruits. Then the possible issues that may arise during the implementation of reforms will be analyzed. These lay mainly in the personal level and training. Several possible solutions for these issues will be put forward.

This article describes the doctrinal determination and definitions of the term Actionable Intelligence and the impact of this specific intelligence concepton commander's decision-making process. The part of this report deals with the position of Actionable Intelligence in intelligence branch, concretely in connection with the intelligence disciplines and particular stages within intelligence cycle. There is also the accentuation of interconnection to the importance of intelligence information sharing, early warning systems and force protection on tactical level. The next part of this article is focused on the impact of intelligence support on commander's decision-making processes.

The article discusses the process of risk management introduced in 2015 as a result of inconsistent implementation of law no. 320/2001. The authors show the way to identify and analyze a risk, using identification and analysis of assets, followed by threats, thanks to their influence on the assets. They demonstrate the approach to defining risks with second and first level targets in the department of Ministry of Defence, while using risk shifting and aggregation of dependent risks. They describe the application of the risk management process outcomes during goal managers' decision-making in the process of medium-term and annual planning of the department of Ministry of Defence in relation to changes in these processes.

One of the objectives of the project for organization development titled "Trends in development the Armed Forces of Czech Republic in relation to the development of the security environment", is to identify trends in career management and life-long education in the MoD. The article presents partial findings of the substudy focused at proper use of management methods to execute primary data collection and to construct complete problem formulation for both preparation and implementation of Career Order as a part of human resources management in the Ministry of Defense. There is summary of methods and tools used for problems formulation in the first part, the second part shows how these methods are applied in practice. Based on results, the conclusion is then formulated depicting the primary problem of preparation and implementation of the career system.

Islamist territorially anchored violent non-state actors (ITAVNSAs) seeking to change the status quo of the current international system constitute one of the greatest challenges the international order based on mutual respect of equal sovereign states. These actors in areas without the presence of power states use explicit cross-border violence to achieve their objective in accordance with universal Islamist ideology - the construction of a caliphate. The paper presents in the theoretical and modern historical perspectives methods of reduction of anarchy in the international system - power, economic, legalistic and normative - and highlights the reasons why face to face of these actors, these heretofore functional ways, be it on a regional or system level of analysis, fail.

The article deals with the contemporary form of terrorism, introduces selected issues and discusses the psychology of terrorism. Various forms and typologies of contemporary terrorism which occurs in different geographical and cultural areas and uses large scale of methods and tactical and strategic approaches are introduced as well.The main goal of this article is to describe psychological aspects of terrorism with the emphasis on the motivation and group dynamics of terrorist organizations. The staircase metaphor which allows thinking about the process of recruitment of terrorists is introduced as well. The article derives especially from theoretical socio-psychological and political findings.

The text deals with the use of border defense as a means of protection against guerrilla attacks and infiltration, through a combination of principles of modern stationary fortifications and forward area defense. These are discussed on the case study of the Northern Border Security Project of Saudi Arabia. The role of attacker takes quasi-state formation the Islamic State (IS, ISIS, ISIL). The aim is to analyze whether the project would endure distinctive types of asymmetric attacks. Vulnerability prioritization for each component determines the most likely targets and their characteristics. This is a subjective semi quantitative method known as CARVER matrix. Subsequently, based on established premises, the text discusses three selected scenarios that use guerrilla tactics with elements of terrorism against selected targets. Attack scenarios show some of the possible ways of improvement for the project. In conclusion, the author makes recommendations for possible adjustments and assess the potential of using the project as a protection against asymmetric attacks. After reading the text, the reader is informed about the project, its components, as well as recommendations that can be applied in the further use of this type of defense.

The article deals with the integration of outside resources into the process of support Forces in Military operations. The crux of this work lies in the illustration of 'place' and the role of Civil Contracting Supports in the Combat Service system of Armed Forces. It also accentuates the sense and complexity of Combat Service Support. The article analyses the advantages. disadvantages and risks for utilizating Civil Contractors in armed conflicts. The text respects this and acknowledges the benefit from experience of the NATO Armies in this field. In the closing part the authors formulate recommendations for the later boom of 'Combat Service' theory and practice. The effect and benefit of this article lies first of all in its suggestion of criteria for the selection of contractors.

The following thesis focuses on the issues regarding deployment of medical forces within the shifting operational environment. It analyzes its development stages and considers their meaning and influence on current and forecasted developments of military health capabilities in the long run. The authors' fundamental research question is to be whether the changes to the operational environment's dynamics and scope will substantiate as the defining factors for ensuring interoperability with Alliance partners, for the purposes of developing new type of medical capabilities needed. Moreover, the importance of a rarely emphasized role of operational art in military medicine is discussed. Such tool seems to be a key element for the harmonization of strategic objectives with long-term tactical activities.

This text is focused on current situation in Syria and Iraq and so called Islamic State, the one of the biggest threats of contemporary world. The rise of this quasi­state at background of civil war in Syria and still not fully solved conflict in Iraq is the result of involvement of many internal and external actors. The form of their involvement and especially their goals are very different from each other and despite sporadic and declaratory agreements in partial points the main reason the Islamic State still exists in very good shape is disunited attitude of local and external powers against it. The main aim of this text is to explain and to analyze main motives and goals of all relevant actors and sides of mentioned conflict and describe the way they affect its dynamics. Due to that it is possible to increase the knowledge of readers in such a chaotic, unclear and often misinterpreted situation in the Middle-East.

This text presents development of the Ukrainian conflict in the context of contemporary discussion about the extent of Russian intervention in crisis regions. The author explores thesis about application of hybrid war by Russian side, use of new military and strategic methods. He also presents and evaluates the arguments which oppose the idea of considerable changes in character of military conflicts, which were demonstrated during the occupation of Crimea and during the combat clashes in Eastern Ukraine having in mind the state and possibilities of the involved actors.

The aim of the article is to provide the readers information related to the theory of fundamental elements and tools of operational art, which are for the preparation and conduct of military operations, particularly at the operational level of war, critical. The operational level of war depends on methods that will create appropriate conditions to achieve the closing state, set by a superior commander, in accordance with the complex strategy of military and non-military instruments of state power. Although the methods of application of specific operational art components rest mainly in the mind of the English Annotations and with several acts tied with civil emergency preparation.

One of main task while preparing new security documents is to identify, analyze and evaluate newly emerging, self-generating security threats. They menace cybernetic, economy, bank, and religious security. The special menace, as for inner security it is lobbyism. Cybernetic threat is today regarded as more dangerous than nuclear strike. The American lived through those experiences in Iraq. Another example is cyber attacks on Estonia in 2007 that swamped websites of Estonian organizations, including Estonian parliament, banks, ministries, newspapers and broadcasters.The attacks triggered a number of military organisations around the world (including NATO) to reconsider the importance of network security to modern military doctrine. There is a paradigm: the more modern country, the more risks are opened. The situation is complicated by the fact that in sophisticated society there is hard to identify attacking enemy. The author underlines that we are the last member nation in the EU that has no official CSIRT (Computer Security Incident Response Team) to react cyber /terrorist attracts.

The lecture discusses the possible forms and methods for further development of Population protection, focusing on implementation of measures to protect the population at higher crisis status. The aim of the lecture is to analyze possible priorities, resources, and procedures for population protection in serious and large-scale crisis situations using all available forces and capabilities of the State and citizens. The work also deals with the possibility of more effective measures of population protection during announcement of higher crisis status generating additional forces and means and methods for the management of these measures. The aim of the work is among other things to point out the fact that the measures of population protection must be prepared in perspective and comprehensive and must reflect the potential risks, including the large scale crisis, which may be occur in the territory.

The article aims at highlighting the dangers of long underestimating the need to permanently improve the defense capabilities to deal with current and future security threats. Authors suggest propositions on where to direct the efforts to improve the competence of the Defense to meet the Act Of Defense Requirements. The first part of the article describes, after brief analysis, the options of collective defense and explains the need to solve demanding tasks on own territory under national responsibility in parallel. The second part of the article describes the main thoughts of the theory of "territorial defense", which is missing in current Doctrine of the Armed Forces of the Czech Republic. Theory of territorial defense makes a foundation, upon which the preparedness of the Armed forces of the Czech Republic should be built. In the third part of the article the authors discuss the alternative of implementing the collective defense principle by building multinational joint forces, independent of national armed forces, in transnational responsibility of the coalition of member states, dedicated to the territorial defense of member states and to crisis response expeditionary operations.

Presented analysis of interviews with officers at various level of command from 2004 - 2008 is aimed on their view of the process of command. On the basis of qualitative research we consider the recent way of command of the Czech officers intuitive and individual. It characterizes most common way to command, based just on experience. We consider differentiation in the way of leading and motivation of subordinates among types of forces and military specializations. The reflection of the professionalization, the training system, the perception of learned/natural ability to command and their career is offered to discussion in the context of changes in direction of education of Czech officers and commanders.

The article deals with the international context of the latent war in Ukraine. It explains the recent history of the post-Soviet area in the light of Galutng's theory of positive and negative peace. It continues by the annexation of the Crimean peninsula and its international consequences. At the same time, it examines key features of the debate in the USA as well as other NATO countries. It focuses also the debate about the livraison of arms to the Ukrainian government and explains the arguments of proponents as well of the opponents of this controversial project.

During the Arab Spring Revolution, when the protests against the Syrian government began in 2011, Russia was one of the strongest backers of President Bashar al-Assad's regime, backing its right to use force if necessary to prevent or put down an uprising. Currently, the Russian Federation is the power which has most prominently provided a diplomaticshieldforthe Syrian state and bolstered it witharms supplies, although Moscow talks about the need to "balance" between the warring parties in Syria. The main aim of this paper is to analyze the motives of the foreign and security policy of the Russian Federation in support of Syrian President BasharAssad in the background of Russian interests and influence of norms. At the theoretical level, the paper builds upon a combination of conventional constructivism and rationalism approaches, which in relation to the motives of Russian protection and defense of the ruling regime in Syria reflects a number of fundamental knowledge.

The article deals with the use of military police in combat operations during dominance phase.Itdescribes the place androleofmilitarypoliceas combat support units, analyzes experience from previous and ongoing operations and specifies the possible activities of military police during this phase. In conclusion it gives recommendations for the development of capabilities in terms of the activities performed and possible changes in organizational structures. The content of the article is based on thesis prepared by the participant of the 27th General Staff Course at the University of Defence.

Protection of the civilian population against the Gaddafi regime, it was a clear UN mandate for military intervention in Libya in 2011. Not only a new approach to leading the fight against terrorism after 11 September 2001, but also requires a change in approaches to conducting combat operations coalition forces, as shown by the recent armed conflict in Libya, inevitably required a new perspective on the concept and approach to the process of targeting as the process of selecting and prioritizing targets and responding to them in accordance with operational requirements and capabilities of units, synchronization of NATO forces, particularly with regard to collateral damage with an impact on the protection of civilians. And Unified Protector operation is a clear example.

The accession of the Czech Republic to NATO is reflected in the Czech security system, especially in the political, institutional, organizational and legislative areas. The article describes the ways to achieve the NATO key requirements: political, institutional, legislative, defence, resources, as well as information security and public support. In order to become fully capable to consume benefits of NATO membership and fulfil its obligations, appropriate legislative changes must be adopted. Four North Atlantic Treaty Organization pillars had to be integrated: Washington Treaty, defence planning, information security, mutual solidarity.

This study is based on a paper presented at the conference with the same heading taking place on January 8, 2009. First, the authors enumerate starting points of Czech defence and security polity together with key factors influencing their developments. The whole scale of new threats-from WMD and ballistic proliferation to cyber attack and even non intentional threats like climate change and pandemia-are to be addressed not only in NATO but also in the EU. Existing states of affairs are gradually reflected by Czech security and defence documents: Security Strategy 1999, 2001, 2003; Military Strategy 1999, 2002, 2004, 2008. In this historical context we joined NATO defence alliance and took part in peacekeeping missions abroad. Previous twenty years when we lived in peace could be regarded as a challenge to build Czech statehood. There is no time like a present. Only the future will show us whether we mastered it as much as we could.

The identification of security threats and subsequent risks is the base on which we form security and military strategies. It is also the core of all security scenarios. That's why we must welcome all books dealing with futurology predictions, like The Cognition of Future as a Challenge by Martin Potůček at al, Karolinum, Charles University. He summarizes knowledge and experiences done by CESES, the only scholarly lab dealing systematically with drafting up visions and strategies the Czech state might be confronted with. The CESES is a Czech acronym, which stands for the Centre for Social and Economic Strategies, at the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague.