General Zolotarev told how Americans train soldiers and officers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine
The United States and other NATO countries have begun training the Ukrainian military. According to the press secretary of the US Department of Defense John Kirby, the trainings are held in Germany. In addition, according to media reports, training is carried out in Poland, Slovakia and other Eastern European countries. What is taught to the servicemen of the Ukrainian army - in the material of "Gazeta.Ru».
"The United States has begun training the Ukrainian armed forces to use key weapons systems at US military bases in Germany," Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby said.
According to him, such trainings take place not only in Germany, but "in about three places," but he refused to specify where exactly. The training process includes the use of artillery guns, training in the handling of new radar stations and armored vehicles, which were recently included in the American package of military assistance to Kiev.
Earlier, the American newspaper The Hill, citing sources in the Pentagon, reported that 20 Ukrainian military personnel had completed a week-long training course in the use of Phoenix Ghost barrage ammunition in the United States.
Deputy Head of the Institute of the USA and Canada of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Reserve Major General Pavel Zolotarev believes that working with intelligence and targeting systems occupies a special place in training.
"The effectiveness of military equipment is not related to the fact that it is loud and shoots far away, but to the fact that it is coupled with intelligence systems that give target designation, and with systems that allow these target designations to strike. This is the most difficult," Zolotarev said.
In turn, Vladimir Evseev, a military expert at the Institute of CIS Countries, believes that outside the country, the Ukrainian military can be trained to handle more serious weapons than those that are now officially supplied to Kiev by Western countries.
- I told the newspaper.En" Evseev.
According to him, in total, several hundred Ukrainian soldiers and officers are being trained in foreign training centers, who will then have to transfer the acquired knowledge and skills to other Ukrainian military.
In addition, Evseev claims, Western instructors work on the territory of Ukraine itself, and some of them perform the functions of operators of foreign weapons systems, in particular drones.
"If combined-arms training has been going on for eight years, now we are talking about training to work on Western equipment. Instructors, curators, operators-gunners of UAVs. All of them are regarded by Russia as mercenaries," Evseev said.
The expert stressed that despite the efforts of Western instructors, most of the Ukrainian military "can hardly use Western equipment."
"Three waves of mobilization have already passed. Each subsequent mobilization will produce the worst human material. It is not very clear how they will use Western weapons. To act as part of a tank company, you need to study for at least six months. And if the battalion is together with artillery, even longer - because this is already interspecific interaction. There are problems with the use of even those weapons that have already been delivered. If more sophisticated equipment appears, then with the current quality of personnel training, it is not very clear how this one will work," the expert noted.
Pavel Zolotarev, on the contrary, believes that the training of Ukrainian military instructors by NATO can be carried out "with a high efficiency index" and in a relatively short time.
"One month is enough for foreign instructors to train Ukrainian operators of Western combat systems. This is quite enough to "train". Their teaching methods are always focused on practical skills. Minimum theoretical load - there is no special depth here, there is no need to understand the processes that take place inside there, the most important thing is ownership, to be able to use it," the general stressed.
Political scientist Valery Volkov believes that part of the training programs for the Armed Forces of Ukraine is not a help, but only an imitation of it.
"The USA imitates assistance in the part of training programs that are related to the operation of complex systems. They can train to shoot from MANPADS or M777 howitzers. At the same time, the United States will not train the Armed Forces to handle complex and expensive weapons. They do not supply such weapons to Kiev, but only hint at supplies. Training Ukrainians to fly the F-16 or control the RQ-4 Global Hawk attack drone is just an advertising picture," Volkov believes.
Denis Telmanov
