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The period of the beginning of the 21st century is typical for the situation characterized by minimization of a global conflict and by decreasing risks of a direct aggression among neighbouring countries. Nonetheless, the occurrence and permanent existence of mass destruction weapons and industrial accidents caused by human beings, natural disasters produced by leakages of toxic industrial materials, are considered as a global problem that determinates not only the activities of national armies, but also activities of civil population. The danger of WMD deployment is especially high at time of danger, when forces are to be used or misused, and terrorist activities might multiply in some world's regions, even in technologically underdeveloped countries.

As a consequence of shrinking military budget, secondary military schools in the Czech Republic were considerably reduced. Actually, there is only one left nowadays. Its future is rather dim, not only due to the Financial Outlook for 2018. The White Paper on Defence 2011 postulated educational scope offered by any secondary military school. But such mission could be easily transferred on other school institutions, without any impact on the national security. Even other Czech state institutions, dealing with national security, very soon will have to answer such to-be-or-not-to-be question. Namely the Ministry of Interior, struggling to economize, runs two secondary schools of its own. This article is a summary of the evolution of secondary schools needed for national security purposes, since 1993. It challenges the conservative point of view saying that in no case their educational capabilities could be substituted.

In 2007 and 2010, this Czech Military Review Vojenské rozhledy published several articles, discussing analytical thinking and analytical methodologies in the field of military intelligence. The authors among others mentioned the methodology ACH, Analysis of Competing Hypotheses. The methodology is not suitable only for intelligence, but it can be used further for solving a variety of military decision-making problems. The article in its first part describes ACH philosophy, including some academic considerations both by supporters and critics to this methodology. The second part demonstrates an example of its implementation and usage during support other problems tied with decision-making in defence planning process. The method is simple to explain, but difficult to introduce to real practice. The article explains both the theory and modifications of ACH and underlines some pitfalls connected with putting methodology into practice.

The control of emergency economic measures, namely state material reserves, is an important part of Czech security system. From the institutional point of view, all is run under the authority of a central institution-the Administration of State Material Reserves (ASMR). This paper deals with its role in the management of state material reserves, reflects problems and consequences resulting from the changes in security surrounding, re-evaluates opinions and views both by experts of state administrations and academic community. Those are the main key questions the study seeks an answer.

The defence of air area was always of vitally importance, both for fighting off an aggressor or enforcing our own goals in offensive operations. The article deals only with one of "pillars" of air defence (AD), namely by active means of its land elements. We do not deal with active elements of flying segments, reconnaissance means and command and control systems of Air Force. The authors not only recapitulate the development of active means of land AD elements on the territory of the Czech Republic with the emphasis on the past 20 years, but at the same time they would like to highlight the importance of this arms for effective country defence.

Its own nuclear program is an important instrument of Iran's domestic and foreign policy. In foreign policy it is used for promotion of its regional interests and it also serves as a guarantee against foreign actor's interference in Iranian domestic affairs. So far, the negotiations between Iran and the international community have not brought about any tangible results. Among other reasons, there are different expectations of both parties. The international community is ready to lift sanctions, supposing Iran accepts the UN resolutions. Iran, by contrast, demands to be recognized as an internationally recognized regional power, with legitimate rights and interests.

The development of C2 theory and practice within force requires an interdisciplinary approach. Commanding army needs not only the familiarity with armed forces and warfare principles, but also the knowledge and understanding of the development of security and operational environments. It is the development of security and operational environments that directly affects the theoretical and doctrinal thinking, the approaches to armed forces employment to deal with contemporary and future crisis situations. This paper is an attempt to project some opinions on C2 issues from the sixties last century to the present. As there are two periods with dozens of common characteristics, we can find a number of similarities. This article aims to point them out.

The article deals with controlling implementation into the mechanism of central institutions and state administrative management of the CzechRepublic (CR), hereinafter state administration. The purpose of this article is to present state administration controlling as an effective control tool, backed by best experiences and practice in the Germany. The authors explain and determine theoretical bases and circumstances to put controlling into practice. They comment the effecitivity of controlling implementation in Czech state administration, using as an example the Defence Ministry of the CR.

The polemic by Mr. Luboš Dobrovský in his essay in Military Review, No. 2, 2013, is based upon a critical idea that even though the Czech government approved conclusions and goals set by the White Paper on Defence, the MoD and the General Staff began to fulfil their duties, the government did not carry out its obligations. The author came to the same conclusion same time ago. But he didn't agree with the proposition that the army in a state of emergency. Such a verdict is rather exaggerating, the author believes, as Czech defence department is still able to fulfil both its Alliance commitments, missions abroad, or home assignments, e.g. support to integrated rescue system. What's missing is a critical reflection over economical management. Data, numbers, and facts are attached.

The Military Technical Institute of Ground Forces (VTÚPV) Vyškov was established in 1978 as a research authority and its activities have covered both requirements of the Army of the Czech Republic as well as the civilian sector. The VTÚPV Vyškov Division specializes in equipment, material and technologies of the ground forces. It solves tasks ranging from theoretical analyses and applied research and development to the prototype production phase, testing and validation, and small series production. It is an accredited testing laboratory for testing products and systems; it operates as an accredited certifying body for a large number of products. Since 2003 it is a part of the military repair shop VOP-026 Šternberk, s.p. (state enterprise) founded by the Ministry of Defence. The article enumerates its activities, namely just finishing semi-anechoic hall EMC (electromagnetic compatibility), the most important and most expensive investment project since the late 80s.

The paper deals with the risk assessment of professional exposure to the non-ionizing electromagnetic fields caused by radars in the selected military unit. The measured values of electric field or power density in the indication zones where the staff is exposed to the effects of the radar's non-ionizing electromagnetic field was used for the risk assessment with the acceptance of national and European standards. The principle of preliminary precaution was applied concurrently with the risk assessment according to the valid standards. The authors discuss the values of measured outcomes. They used the Checklist Analysis for qualifications of risks and for quantitative risk specifications they use the so-called brainstorming.

The purpose of this study is to analyse system of economic control at a level of expense institution of the ACR in comparison with theoretical approaches and experiences of civilian company economics and the practice of NATO armies. The author wants to postulate necessary prerequisites widening the space for rationale economy behaviour and decision-making of leading army management. He creates an economic model constituting methods, proceedings, tools of economic control in all phases of budgeting and accounting processes, behaviour of the whole economic system of defence department. The case study is based upon the presentation delivered at the international conference on economy, logistics and ecology in armed forces taking place at IDET 2009 trade fair. Proposed methods should be used for sources allocation, value based management costing transparency, resulting in saving sources and increasing personal responsibility.

The beginning of the second decade of 21st century is tied with distinctive dynamics and changes in global security environment. Among those changes belong security re-orientations of the United States from Transatlantic area to that of Pacific, East and Southeast Asia resulting from a new American military strategy proclaimed in January 2012. The US drew down from Iraq and Afghanistan, political and security movement in Arab world, after decades of "status quo" were awaking. The author concludes that the EU should be prepared for negative scenarios in the development of security situation, or to have at its disposal effective police and military forces with proper humanitarian background to counter possible instability, e.g. massive migration influxes, economy disorders.

The purpose of this analysis is to trace contemporary position of recent war veterans, members of missions abroad after 1989 after they retired. Above it concentrates on their problem on home labour market, eventually on psychic disorders, negative after-effects or syndromes, possible assistance and support on the part of state, eventually of Czech Ministry of Defence. The article is divided into two parts. The first one analyses accessible statistical data concerning participants in foreign missions and at the same time collected data serve for drafting hypothesis tied with a research segment of this paper. The second part of this study evaluates results reached, based upon anonymous questionnaires completed by retired new war veterans in the period from December 4, 2009, till January 25, 2010

Mr. Prchlík would have been ninety years this year. He started his career as a professional soldier. Among others he was Deputy Defence Minister, then he assumed the position of the director of the Main Political Directorate, and finally he was elected Member of Parliament. In 1967-68 he opposed to military coup d'etat in favour of the former Czechoslovak president Novotný. In 1968 he became a head of Administrative Section, Central Committee, Communist Party. He had under his control all military and police activities in the country. The Soviets asked to be disposed from this position and finally he was even arrested. When released from prison, till his death, he was employed as a manual worker. He took part in military section of political dissent.

American military strategy was preparing long before the US troops left Iraq. The published document reacted to circumstances after the end of Iraq conflict and planning withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014. Pentagton's analysis underlined the fact that in the following years, US forces would not conduct wars similar to Afghanistan and Iraq. Defence secretary Leon Panetta told reporters that American forces were going to be smaller but more effective, innovative and technologically advanced. In spite of budget cuts, military expenditures were planned larger in volume then in the last year of G. W. Bush's presidential term.

Operational art is the use of creative thinking by commanders and staffs to design strategies, campaigns, and major operations and organize and employ military forces. This article is a sequel to the study published in a previous issue of this Military Revue. The author discusses the fundamental pillars of operational art, upon which Alliance countries build their doctrinal and defence documents concerning operational art. A separate section deals with conditions and status of operational art in the Army of the Czech Republic in the last 20 years. The author calls for the need to introduce operational art in several key areas of Czech doctrines. He recalls the necessity to implement those issues in the prepared Doctrine of the ACR.

On May 15, 2012, the Czech Defence Minister decided to establish the Centre for Security and Military Strategic Studies. The institution of this type has been long awaited, with great expectations. The author, director of this institute, presents the survey of similar scholarly institutions founded and finally cancelled in this country after 1989. This article introduces the original intent of its founders, namely Centre's future role in the development of strategic studies as a starting point for strategic management, its place in the system of Czech military education and training. The results reached by this institute ought to be truly utilized by MoD leaders and government officials.

Crime prevention belongs among main and long-term tasks in work with personnel in the MoD Sector. It is organized at three levels: interagency, departmental and local. It is concentrated at decreasing risk factors that usually contribute to criminal behaviour. In the near future, when organizational structure of MoD will be optimalized, current valid documents dealing with crime prevention are going to be reassessed, so they could meet new requirements of command and control system. They will be more directed to problems of extremism, property-related crimes, alcohol addiction, drug and non-drug abuse.

Existing military medical service and health care in armed forces is tied by many official legislative norms by Ministry of Health that are difficult to follow by military structures, military manuals and inner rules. The authors trace current legislative framework that limits medical treatment and respective institutions of military medical care. They identify possible problems and suggest solutions how to overcome emerging troubles. The present MoD regulation No. 285/1999 does not meet reality and must be updated.

In the past, the Common Funding played only marginal role in the NATO strategic decision-making. However, this situation changed significantly when the global economic crisis challenged the national public expenditures and NATO defence policy became a matter of serious reflections. NATO should balance its requirements with limited resources and adjust its future activities within shrinking budgets. NATO must make hard decisions and implement reforms in order to ensure its ability to fulfil its mission and priority tasks in the long run. The reconfiguration of Common Funding is an inherent part of this process. The aim of this article is to introduce Common Funding as a management-supporting tool of the international organisation under currently mounting resource constrains.

During the past twenty years there have been many substantional changes in the field of language preparation. As more and more military professional take part in military missions abroad, we lay emphasis on language drills, so that military professionals could communicate with members of other armies. For teachers at the Centre of Language Preparation this situation constitutes necessity to find out new ways how to language schooling do more and more effective, how to motive students and learners. The article is accompanied by chart with the appraisal of language skills.

From research reports cited in this article, the period of six months seems to be suitable time for the deployment abroad. A soldier should not be redeployed for at least one year, following his previous mission. The majority of soldiers cope with deployments well and without any psychopathology. Most reported mental problems are alcohol misuse, followed by posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and by the depression. Alcohol seems be even the higher risk for soldiers less exposed to combat stressors (e.g. fire), but more to chronic stressors (boredom, isolation, helplessness) than PTSD for a soldier in action. Therefore pre-deployment training of our soldiers should be more devoted to mental health aspects, starting with alcohol overuse.

After several years of service with armour corps he devoted himself to social organizations in the forces, among others he was a head of department for military youth. In 1968 he became a deputy Czech minister for youth, PT and sports. During period of normalization he was released from the army. He made his living as a free lance translator and author. After the Velvet Revolution in 1989 he became advisor to deputy defence minister for humanitarian affairs, later he became assistant to deputy defence minister for strategical control, deputy director of Institute for Strategic Studies, deputy director of Institute of International Relations. After his untimely death, the prize named after him for works in the field of defence was established.

Unlike the real state of affairs, the scenarios for Europe 2010 did not presuppose the rise of financial and economy crises. Political scientists did not perceive the series of terrorist attacks, namely in Great Britain, Spain and Russia. Security questions, home security and defence, came to the foreground more then was originally expected. There are hubs of future power blocks of divided Europe. It is impossible to incorporate all the results and consequences of our presuppositions. Since we want to look into individual, particularly interesting developments, the author recommends to create several teams for individual scenarios, instead of drawing several scenarios by one scholarly team.

In February 2008 the Security Forum took place in Slovakian city Banská Bystrica. The collection of 32 presented papers was issued by Matěj Bél University. This review summarizes main ideas of those papers, in a form of cross-section study. The reviewer finds most inspirative Maersheimer?s neorealistic theory of stability, classifying bipolarity above multipolarity, which is reflected in consequent evaluation of security threats. New security threats ask for the transformation of NATO alliance, in the background of political Islam or the recent Russian-Georgian conflict. The contents analysis of presented papers points to main hidden problem lying behind all security questions: whether the U.S. would be able to continue in its role as a world leader, explicitly owing to American economy difficulties, e.g. today?s financial and mortgage crisis.

The purpose of this essay is to analyze the role of conceptional documents as guideposts supporting decision-making process of ministerial top-management. The key role belongs to visions. They reflect various political targets, whereas prognoses represent the prospective image of goals of department in question. The author offers several matrices of assorted components serving for the creation of predicted variants of normative and nonnormative scenarios. This leads to forming concepts, followed by plans and methods of their implementation. It is necessary to respect this outlined principle, so that titles of individual documents would match their real contents. This highly theoretical article is based upon the Research Project MSM002162084 "The Development of the Czech Republic within the EU: Challenges and Risks", Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University Prague.

The PTSD is an emotional, anxiety disorder that might develop after exposure .to a terribly frightening, life-threatening, or otherwise highly unsafe experiences. Recently, we have witnessed quite inappropriate behaviour of the Czech Army soldiers in Kosovo (KFOR) and Afghanistan (ISAF). The Ministry of Defence came to the conclusions the Czech Army soldiers ought to be immune to PTSD, but so far there has been is no serious psychological research, no survey conducted by Czech Army Mental Health Services and no information how many Czech soldiers returning from the duty in Afghanistan or other missions abroad are suffering from PTSD. It is high time to take important initial steps in the care over Czech army veterans, because competent professional soldiers, with years of experience, can also often break down from accumulated stress. This was illustrated by the events in KFOR and ISAF last year.

Although private military companies like the former Blackwater were regarded as a relatively new phenomenon in international security, their history is not new. The participation of private individuals, and /or groups of private individuals, soldiers of fortune, in "foreign" armed conflicts is at least as old as the history of wars by itself. It is impossible to open a debate about the scope and possible impact of the current use of private military and security companies without knowing and evaluating their long-term historical developments. The goal of this study is therefore to map the history of the use of private military forces, their involvement in various conflicts, services they offer, among others, from the point of international law.