SPETSNAZ - THE SOVIET SPECIAL FORCES

The Inside Story Of The Soviet Special Forces

Spetsnaz And Gru

Chapter 2 Page 2

Even this short list must lead to the conclusion that Soviet military razvedka (the GRU) and its integral spetsnaz is something more than the `eyes and ears of the Soviet Army'. As a special branch of the GRU spetsnaz is intended primarily for action in time of war and in the very last days and hours before it breaks out. But spetsnaz is not idle in peacetime either. I am sometimes asked: if we are talking about terrorism on such a scale, we must be talking about the KGB. Not so. There are three good reasons why spetsnaz is a part of the GRU and not of the KGB.

The first is that if the GRU and spetsnaz were to be removed from the Soviet Army and handed over to the KGB, it would be equivalent to blindfolding a strong man, while plugging his ears and depriving him of some other important organs, and making him fight with the information he needs for fighting provided by another person standing beside him and telling him the moves. The Soviet leaders have tried on more than one occasion to do this and it has always ended in catastrophe. The information provided by the secret police was always imprecise, late and insufficient, and the actions of a blind giant, predictably, were neither accurate or effective.

Secondly, if the functions of the GRU and spetsnaz were to be handed over to the KGB, then in the event of a catastrophe (inevitable in such a situation) any Soviet commanding officer or chief of staff could say that he had not had sufficient information about the enemy, that for example a vital aerodrome and a missile battery nearby had not been destroyed by the KGB's forces. These would be perfectly justified complaints, although it is in any case impossible to destroy every aerodrome, every missile battery and every command post because the supply of information in the course of battle is always insufficient. Any commanding officer who receives information about the enemy can think of a million supplementary questions to which there is no answer. There is only one way out of the situation, and that is to make every commanding officer responsible for gathering his own information about the enemy and to provide him with all the means for defeating his own enemy. Then, if the information is insufficient or some targets have not been destroyed, only he and his chief of staff are to blame. They must themselves organise the collection and interpretation of information about the enemy, so as to have, if not all the information, at least the most essential information at the right time. They must organise the operation of their forces so as to destroy the most important obstacles which the enemy has put in the way of their advance. This is the only way to ensure victory. The Soviet political leadership, the KGB and the military leaders have all had every opportunity to convince themselves that there is no other.

Thirdly, the Soviet secret police, the KGB, carries out different functions and has other priorities. It has its own terrorist apparatus, which includes an organisation very similar to spetsnaz, known as osnaz. The KGB uses osnaz for carrying out a range of tasks not dissimilar in many cases to those performed by the GRU's spetsnaz. But the Soviet leaders consider that it is best not to have any monopolies in the field of secret warfare. Competition, they feel, gives far better results than ration.

Osnaz is not a subject I propose to deal with in this book. Only a KGB officer directly connected with osnaz could describe what it is. My knowledge is very limited. But just as a book about Stalin would not be complete without some reference to Hitler, osnaz should not be overlooked here. The term osnaz is usually met only in secret documents. In unclassified documents the term is written out in full as osobogo nazhacheniya or else reduced to the two letters `ON'. In cases where a longer title is abbreviated the letters ON are run together with the preceding letters. For example, DON means `division of osnaz', OON means a `detachment of osnaz". The two words osoby and spetsialny are close in meaning but quite different words. In translation it is difficult to find a precise equivalent for these two words, which is why it is easier to use the terms osnaz and spetsnaz without translating them. Osnaz apparently came into being practically at the same time as the Communist dictatorship. In the very first moments of the existence of the Soviet regime we find references to detachments osobogo nazhacheniya -- special purpose detachments. Osnaz means military-terrorist units which came into being as shock troops of the Communist Party whose job was to defend the party. Osnaz was later handed over to the secret police, which changed its own name from time to time as easily as a snake changes its skin: Cheka -- VCheka -- OGPU -- NKVD -- NKGB -- MGB -- MVD -- KGB. Once a snake, however, always a snake.

It is the fact the spetsnaz belongs to the army, and osnaz to the secret police, that accounts for all the differences between them. Spetsnaz operates mainly against external enemies; osnaz does the same but mainly in its own territory and against its own citizens. Even if both spetsnaz and osnaz are faced with carrying out one and the same operation the Soviet leadership is not inclined to rely so much on co-operation between the army and the secret police as on the strong competitive instincts.