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Soviet Union [USSR] Premilitary Training
Military and physical fitness training began at the age of ten
in the Pioneers. Their activities emphasized military-patriotic
indoctrination, marching, and discipline. The Pioneers also guarded
Soviet war monuments and participated in military sports games held
every summer since 1967. In the games, children were divided into
commanders, staff, and troops for maneuvers that simulated partisan
warfare behind enemy lines. Teenagers, age fourteen and older,
participated in more sophisticated military games.
When the terms of service for soldiers and sailors were reduced
by one year in 1967, the government introduced general
preconscription military training. The institution of
preconscription training was designed to compensate for the reduced
length of military service by providing basic military training
prior to induction.
DOSAAF organized and conducted premilitary training for young
men and women between the ages of sixteen and eighteen. In
principle, every secondary or vocational-technical school, factory,
and
collective farm (see Glossary) in the Soviet Union had a DOSAAF
organization. Millions of Soviet teenagers received 140 hours of
instruction in military regulations, small arms, grenade throwing,
vehicle operation and maintenance, first aid, civil defense, and
chemical defense. This training enabled them to learn advanced
military skills more quickly after conscription. The Soviet press
has claimed that each year 75 million people are involved in over
300,000 DOSAAF programs nationwide. DOSAAF also had its own
publishing house and monthly journal.
Each union republic had a DOSAAF organization headed by a
chairman and a central committee. DOSAAF worked closely with the
ministries of education and the state committees for physical
culture and sports in the union republics; it also maintained close
relations with the deputy commanders for premilitary training in
the military districts. The Premilitary Training Directorate within
the Ministry of Defense supervised DOSAAF, yet the DOSAAF budget
was separate from that of the Ministry of Defense.
The best DOSAAF clubs were found in the Russian Republic, which
includes 51 percent of the people and 75 percent of the territory.
The clubs offered specialist training, such as skiing, parachute
jumping, scuba diving, motorcycle driving, seamanship, flying, and
radio and electronics maintenance, which were not available in
other republics. Yet many DOSAAF organizations throughout the
country lacked qualified or full-time military instructors.
Providing time and facilities for DOSAAF training was an added
burden on schools and factories. In 1989 the southern Soviet
republics were often criticized in the military press for having
poor premilitary training programs and sending unprepared recruits
to the armed forces. One Western observer estimated that only half
of Soviet troops actually received prescribed DOSAAF instruction
prior to induction. Approximately one-third of all inductees,
however, possessed a technical military specialty that they had
learned in a DOSAAF club.
Data as of May 1989
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