S Ossetia Conflict Proves Some Changes In Russian Army Wrong -- General

MOSCOW, September 24 (Itar-Tass) --The latest "Georgian conflict" has proved some of the changes in the Russian Armed Forces wrong, the president of the Academy of Military Sciences, General of the Army Makhmut Gareyev, said.

The conflict exposed "the inexpediency of some main commands of the armed services and the main directorates of the Defence Ministry to take control of certain special, logistical and even combat units and formations in military districts", the general said at a roundtable on strategic deterrence held at the Peter the Great Academy of Strategic Rocket Forces earlier this week.

According to Gareyev, "the removal of army aviation's combined-arms formations from the land forces does not justify itself".

"Front-line aviation should be preserved and should remain to be controlled by troop commanders in critical areas. The Air Force commander-in-chief cannot constantly watch the situation on the battle ground and should not try to control aviation on the battlefield directly. This function should be in the hands of combined-arms commanders," Gareyev said.

He believes that assertions claiming that "tanks, armoured personnel carriers and land forces in general have outlived themselves and that airstrikes alone can win a battle or an operation are wrong".

"Of course, aviation support and airstrikes are important and sometimes critical, but combined-arms units and formations, including tanks, armoured personnel carriers and artillery, remain vital too. They played the main role in repelling the aggression and destroying the enemy in South Ossetia," the general said.

Gareyev is a historian and a military scientist. Former Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Soviet Armed Forces. He is now the president of the Russian Academy of Military Science.

A decorated veteran of the Second World War he had a life-long career in the Soviet military starting as a third lieutenant at the beginning of the war and reaching a rank of a general in the 1970s.

His positions also included serving as the military adviser to the President of Egypt in the 1970s and to President Najibullah of Afghanistan in 1989-1991.

Gareyev has been involved in work on military history since the 1950s. He authored many books, including by himself or as an editor-in-chief of collective works. Some of his books and articles have been translated into and published in English. He is considered to be Russia's most outstanding military theoretician.