FSB Reform: Changes Are Few and Far between
By Andrei Soldatov (www.agentura.ru - special to The Moscow News)
The
three months that President Putin gave the Federal
Security Service (FSB) to reform itself are coming to an end. Vladimir Putin signed off on a decree launching the reorganization
of the FSB on July 11, 2004, but the subsequent course of
tragic events apparently shifted the focus away from the reform.
Under the July
decree, the FSB director is allowed to have only one first deputy (the head of
the Border Service with the rank of first deputy) and two deputies. In
addition, FSB departments were abolished and replaced with services.
According to
informed sources, the organizational and T/O changes in the FSB have already
been made, as have all the principal personnel appointments. This is what is
known as of right now.
Staying Put
Many of the FSB
subdivisions got away with just a facelift. For example, the structure
responsible for the FSB's personnel policy only lost
the word "department" in its title, emerging as the Organizational
and Personnel Service. Even its chief is the same - Yevgeny
Lovyrev.
Aleksandr Bezverkhny,
head of military counterintelligence, whom this past June the President
personally congratulated on his promotion to the rank of colonel-general (a
three-star general), also kept his position. Ditto for Aleksandr Bortnikov who this past
summer replaced Yury Zaostrovtsev
as head of the Economic Security Department, now the FSB Economic Security
Service. Vladimir Anisimov and Vyacheslav Ushakov, who in the
fall of 2003 was appointed state-secretary, remain FSB deputy directors. The
FSB first deputy director is still Sergei Smirnov,
who is widely tipped as the next FSB director should Patrushev
become deputy prime minister. Viktor Komogorov stays
on as head of the FSB think-tank - the Analysis, Forecasting, and Strategic
Planning Service.
The
Counterintelligence and the Border Services have also retained their bosses:
Oleg Syromolotov and Viktor Pronichev
have kept their respective positions. It is noteworthy that reform of the
regional structure of the latter department is still in progress: The FSB
Border Service is moving from the linear principle of border protection to
point/area protection. What this means in practice is that instead of the ten
regional border directorates that Russia has today there will be seven
(according to the number of the federal districts); each will have two or three
territorial directorates.
Fighting Terror
The most
far-reaching changes have been made at the FSB's
antiterrorism subdivision - the Department for the Protection of the
Constitutional System and the Fight against Terrorism.
First of all,
the new structure got a new boss: Aleksandr Bragin. His entire experience in combating terrorism is
limited to his brief stint in Moscow. He was appointed to the FSB central
office in June 2003, as deputy head of the Counterterrorism Department. Prior
to that he led the FSB Chelyabinsk Oblast Directorate
and displayed unshakable loyalty to the President. Thus, in an interview with
the Yuzhnouralskaya panorama daily, on May
25, 2000, Bragin said, in particular: "I voted for him. In my
time, I had participated in a number of working conferences that he chaired as
FSB director. He - Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin - was always distinguished for a highly objective,
pragmatic and at the same time, humane approach to issues at hand."
Bragin hails from Saransk, prior to Chelyabinsk serving for years in Mordovia,
a region that is far away from the south of Russia.
Furthermore, the
Department for the Protection of the Constitutional System and the Fight
against Terrorism now has a new subdivision: the International Terrorism
Control Directorate. It seems that this innovation comes in response to the
ongoing search for an external enemy. Perhaps, it has never occurred to anyone
before to create what is, essentially, an "internal" security service
- a subdivision on fighting international terrorism. Presumably, this
directorate will be responsible for "wiping out militants abroad,"
the task that Vladimir Putin set in the wake of the Beslan hostage drama.
This directorate
is now headed by Major General Yury Sapunov with the status of deputy chief of the service, who
was moved to Moscow from Astrakhan where he was chief of the FSB Astrakhan
Oblast Directorate. Before his appointment to the Astrakhan Directorate, he was
first deputy of the FSB's famous Current Operations
and Coordination Directorate for the North Caucasus (OKU). The directorate is
famed for its relentless use of force in the Caucasus. The OKU comprises a special task
service that locals have dubbed "death squads."
All the
indications are that FSB tactics in the North Caucasus will not undergo any serious change. The
regional Antiterrorism Operation Headquarters (ROSh)
is still under the command of an FSB official, although the ROSh
is formally part of the Interior Ministry structure. True, as of September 16,
this is no longer Rear Admiral Yury Maltsev (who, a year ago, was moved from the FSB
Directorate for Coordination of Counterterrorism Operations to the Interior
Ministry with the rank of deputy minister), but Arkady
Yedelev.
Before his
appointment to the ROSh, Yedelev
was head of the OKU where Yury Sapunov
was serving. Despite the apparent similarity of the names of the two FSB
directorates, these are two distinct structures. Even so, the similarity of
their names reflects the FSB's general problems in
the Caucasus both in conducting special operations
and in coordinating them.
Internal Security, Counterintelligence and Investigations
Aleksandr Zhdankov, who
headed the antiterrorism department before Bragin, is
still with the FSB. Moreover, he has received a very important post in the new
structure as head of the FSB Control Service, formerly the FSB Inspectorate -
in effect, its internal counterintelligence agency. This directorate served as
a springboard for at least one federal minister: Before he became RF interior
minister, Rashid Nurgaliyev was in charge of it.
Just before the Beslan hostage drama, Zhdankov
was opportunely moved to another subdivision. This is why he did not have to
come to the hostage contingency headquarters and formally has nothing to do
with the tragedy.
The FSB
Investigation Directorate will most likely be headed up by its current acting
chief, Yury Anisimov. Anisimov's appointment marks the end to a bizarre story
with the directorate's leadership, which was rather unpleasant for the special
service. The fact is that after Sergei Balashov (he supervised the Edmond Pope case), the
Investigation Directorate was briefly headed by Viktor Milchenko,
who, to the horror of FSB personnel officials, happened to hold a Ukrainian passport.
It is still a mystery how Milchenko had landed this
key position not being a Russian citizen.
Thus far the changes in the Federal Security Service (except for the appearance
of T/O fighters with Osama bin Laden) has admittedly been, rather,
cosmetic. The key figures in the FSB leadership have stayed in their places
while the general principle of its organization has remained virtually
unchanged.
True, this is
only logical: Nikolai Patrushev has been FSB director
since 1999. For five years now the principal objective of the
service itself, as well as of its head has stayed immutable - to serve as the
main buttress of support for the President. Presumably, they have done a
good job in this respect.
FSB structure (main divisions) after reform
Director - Nikolay Patrushev
- First
deputy - Viktor Pronichev
- First
deputy - Sergei Smirnov
- Deputy
- Vyacheslav Ushakov
- Deputy
- Vladimir Anisimov
Services:
- Counterintelligence
service - Oleg Syromolotov
- Service
for the Protection of the
Constitutional System and the Fight against Terrorism - Aleksandr Bragin
- Economic
Security Service - Aleksandr Bortnikov
- Border
Service - Viktor Pronichev
- Organizational
and Personnel Service - Yevgeny Lovyrev
- The
Analysis, Forecasting, and Strategic Planning Service - Viktor Komogorov
- Control
Service - Aleksandr Zhdankov
- Science
and technical service - Nikolai Klimashin
Directorates:
- Military
counterintelligence - Aleksandr Bezverkhny
- Investigation
Directorate - Yury Anisimov
See also in Agentura.Ru:
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