Meanwhile Georgian Train and Equip program enters its field training phase. In August the 400 servicemen were selected to create a commando battalion under this program. As the Defense Ministry informs, the selected soldiers have concluded a three-year contract with the Ministry and already received their first salaries. Monthly wages of 400-650 GEL were found be paid to the servicemen from the scarce budget of the Ministry.
Phase III of the GTEP program includes training of four Georgian battalions. Together with the Commando unit, a mountain, light infantry and special task force battalions will be trained as well. In total the American instructors will train 1200 Georgian soldiers.
During the Phase II the National Command Center was created in the Defense Ministry. The Center will be collecting and distributing defense information. The American side spent 350 000 USD to equip the center with modern computers and communication systems.
On August 19 General Dieter Schtockmann, Deputy Commander of the NATO United Armed Forces, visited Georgia. During his meetings with President Shevardnadze and Defense Minister Tevzadze, he discussed ongoing reforms and Georgia’s integration into NATO and European structures.
“Georgia is fulfilling its obligations extremely well. Performance of the Georgian peacekeeping battalion dispatched to Kosovo is a very good proof to this” – said General Schtockmann.
In parallel to the American program, the Turkish Defense Ministry is assisting the National Military Academy of Georgia. Together with the new study program, the Turkish side has repaired the building and supplied textbooks and uniforms.
In spring the Turkish General Staff modernized the Vaziani military base, where NATO program “Cooperative Best Effort” was conducted on June 17-28. Total amount of Turkey’s assistance to Georgian defense system since 1998 already exceeds 28 million USD.
However, repaired buildings and well-equipped soldiers is not all that Georgia needs to defend itself. The Defense Ministry is unable to do anything with Russia’s warplanes bombing the Georgian territory, due to absence of relevant equipment, though on the background of recent aggressiveness of the Russian side, the military forces acquire even greater strategic importance.
Georgian defense expenditures are the least among CIS countries. Defense Ministry’s budget in 2002 is only 38,5 million GEL and it already lacks 4 million in the first quarter of the year. As early as during the budgetary discussion last year, Defense Minister has been stating that at least 71 million GEL are needed just to keep the armed forces.
“Poor financing of the Defense Ministry will lead us to extremely difficult situation in the country”, said Chairman of the Defense and Security Committee of the Parliament Irakli Batiashvili at the Committee meeting on July 18. The next day Commando and elite Kojori Battalions protested and threatened with leaving the bases, which of course would have jeopardized GTEP.
The Defense Ministry always said that these two units were the best in Georgia, but now its officers, headed by the Acting Commander of the Land Forces Nika Janjgava talk about unbearable conditions in the army.
“The biggest problem in the process of army building today is approach of the government and the society to this issue… And this is a source of hard material and social problems in the army that remain unsolved” – says the public defender Nana Devdariani in her report.
The Defense Ministry submitted to the Parliament a legislative initiative aimed at overcoming financial difficulties. A recently adopted law allows a drafted person bail out by paying $100 instead of serving one year in the army.
“One of the main principles that the Ministry is guided with is to make the armed forces small, mobile, flexible, well equipped and trained” – says Harry Johnson, Chairman of the International Advisers Council of Georgia for Security Issues, expressing satisfaction towards the Defense Ministry’s policy.
The problems concerning the armed forces and the whole defense system seems to be natural because of the general conditions existing in the country. And the fact that foreign assistance means more than the money provided by the state budget sounds sad but still promising.
By Salome Jashi, Civil Georgia
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Cooperative Best Effort 2002 Opens in Georgia
Vaziani Military Base Opens with Turkish Assistance
Train-and-Equip Officially Launched
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