A decree was signed Monday by Putin to establish a political department in the National Guard (Росгвардия).
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This is in addition to the political directorate established within the regular armed forces in 2018
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-military-politics/in-soviet-echo-putin-gives-russian-army-a-political-wing-idUSKBN1KL1VA
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https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-military-politics/in-soviet-echo-putin-gives-russian-army-a-political-wing-idUSKBN1KL1VA
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The Soviet Union established a political directorate in the armed forces early on, with political commissars starting in the Civil War (see great work by @bdtaylor_SU on this). These commissars monitored the behavior of officers and reported disloyalty to the party
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However, after the collapse of the Soviet Union (and as early as the 1991 coup attempt), the new armed forces of the Russian Federation effectively abolished the commissar system and put these officers under the Ministry of Defense (p. 265)
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511615719
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https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511615719
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Some (half-hearted) reforms to the commissar system had actually started under Gorbachev (see pp. 363-69)
https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300082715/collapse-soviet-military
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https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300082715/collapse-soviet-military
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Probably too soon to tell if this is anything more than an empty shell. Scholars disagreed about whether the extensive commissar system in the Soviet Union really mattered anyway https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674497443
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In my view, commissars were likely more important in the early days of the USSR (when the loyalty of the Tsarist officers was highly suspect) vs. once the regime had built a new army with high party membership. But the secret police probably mattered more.
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Moreover, coup fears in Russia are also dealt with by counterbalancing (lots of different security and intelligence services) and, as @bdtaylor_SU has shown, a surprisingly apolitical officer corps
https://doi.org/10.1177/0010414001034008004
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https://doi.org/10.1177/0010414001034008004
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