The hottest time for guys from 18 to 27 years old is spring and autumn. Alternative “letters of happiness” fall into the mailboxes - summonses from the military registration and enlistment office. How to legally hang out from the army, what can be transferred if your friends are already serving, and is there a way out - we are preparing a sled in the summer and in the new issue of The Trial we explain everything you want to know about the army.
What is military service?
According to the definition given in the law, this is service in the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus.
You can go through regular military service, or be in the reserve service, or learn to hold a weapon in your hands at the military department at the university.
Since 2016, an alternative civilian service has been operating in Belarus.
Who serves in the army?
The target audience of the military registration and enlistment office is men who are fit for health and physical development to perform military service.
Origin doesn't matter social status how much money you have, your nationality, religion, occupation, political beliefs if you are between 18 and 27 years old.
Girls can also serve in the Belarusian army if they meet the requirements and have received special training in the specialties necessary for the Armed Forces and other military formations.
How to legally mow
You can avoid conscription if you have diseases that can prevent you from doing military service. A complete list of them is in the Disease Schedule, which is published every year by the Ministry of Defense in conjunction with the Ministry of Health.
You can legally avoid the army if you are a father of many children, completed alternative service, or served in the army in another country. If you have been in prison or have a criminal record, then you also become unconscripted.
If your close relatives were in the military and died or were disabled, then you may not serve in the army. Orphans and people without guardians are also not called up.
Citizens of other countries and conscripts who are not registered in Belarus are also not drafted into the army. That is, you can safely register in Russia through the migration department and forget about the agenda (glory to the Union State!).
If you do not have a higher education, then you must serve for a year and a half. If you have a specialist diploma in your hands, you enter the army regime only for a year.
The military department also does not save completely - you will have to spend 6 months in the barracks.
How to get a deferment?
If you have a serious illness or are studying at a university, graduate school, graduate school or college, then you get a deferral for the duration of your studies.
You can also get a deferral for family reasons. For example, if your wife is pregnant, your child is under three years old, or your spouse has a disability.
If your parents are retired or have a disability, then again you get a deferment from the army. If you have a brother who falls under the draft, then at the request of the parents, a deferral is given to one of you.
Deputies also get the benefit of a reprieve.
I got a summons. What to do?
If you were sent a summons by mail, you found it under the door, or you got a call from the military registration and enlistment office, you have the right not to respond. But you have this right exactly until the moment when the summons is handed to you personally or in the form of a registered letter with a signature or it is recorded in writing that you refuse to receive it.
According to Article 27 of the Constitution, your loved ones are not required to sign anything or tell anything about you.
But be careful: in addition to the military registration and enlistment office, you can be handed a summons at the place of work, study, in the passport office, employees of executive committees, district police officers, representatives of housing and communal services, even janitors and plumbers.
As soon as you received a summons, contact the military registration and enlistment office at the appointed time. If you already have the necessary medical papers about unsuitability, take them with you. If not, then the employees of the military registration and enlistment office will send you to the medical board.
If you have received a summons and you do not have the right to delay, prepare required documents and show them to the recruiting office. For example, if you study at the university, then contact the military department so that they prepare the necessary paper for you.
How to get to the military department?
First, check at the university if there is such an opportunity. They serve at the military department for two years: in the second and third years.
Not everyone can get into the military department, but only those students whose average score corresponds to the established minimum (each university has its own). Still have to pass a medical examination.
Most of the time in the military department you will study theory in your specialty, for example, intelligence, cartography or artillery. In addition to theory, there is also practice, where you are directly taught to fight.
After graduating from the military, the student receives officer rank: from junior to senior lieutenant. .
How to get into the reserve?
The service in the reserve differs from the usual urgent one in that the "reservists" are only three times a month in the barracks. It turns out that you have to serve only one month a year for three years.
People who are subject to conscription for military service can get into the reserve.
There are no exact criteria, corresponding to which you will absolutely fall into the reserve. Usually these are citizens of Belarus who work in government bodies, with young children or in a difficult financial situation. It can also be highly qualified specialists from government agencies or teachers who are in great need at the place of work.
What do they do in the army?
What you will do in the army depends primarily on the unit itself and its specifics. Maybe you will rush around the field with a machine gun and regularly run marathons. Or maybe you have to clean the road and clean the grass near the part.
The choice of a military unit depends on the state of health, physical parameters(for example, tankers do not take high ones) and even from a specialty.
As soon as you get into the army, you need to choose how you will live: according to the charter or hazing.
“According to the charter” means that you will have to be in outfits a lot, and there will be much fewer opportunities for “humps”.
What to take with you to the army?
In the army they provide clothes, but in general you can take with you a change of pants, a shirt and a few T-shirts.
Do not forget about hygiene products: toothbrush, paste, razor, aftershave gel, soap, band-aid - this is not given out in the army.
You can not take medicines, as there will be a first-aid kit in the unit, where you will find essential medicines.
Mobile phones are formally prohibited, but as long as the commander does not see them, they can be used in most units. In order not to be cut off from the outside world, take your smartphone and charger with you.
What can parents and friends send?
Correspondence is not prohibited, so parents, friends or a partner (s) can send you parcels, letters, and postcards.
A soldier can have a lot of free time, but with the telephone and the Internet, this is part of the problem. Put the books down so that your friend doesn't turn sour there at all.
Do not send perishable food. It's better to put sweets or dried fruits in the parcel - with sweets in the army it's tense.
It is important to write letters or send parcels. People away from loved ones really need support, and correspondence - good way to express it.
Previously, the academic year in the Armed Forces began on February 1 and ended on November 30. This year it will start on December 1st and end on October 31st. next year, Colonel Sergei Kuprik, head of the main organizational and mobilization department - deputy chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, told reporters on May 20.
Accordingly, the timing of the recruitment campaign also changes. If earlier the call-up events were carried out twice a year, in October-January and April-July, since 2011 they have been postponed to February-May and August-November. The terms for sending drafted citizens to the troops change from January to May and from July to November, and for service in the reserve - from July to November.
For a systematic transition to new terms of conscription in accordance with presidential decree No. 200 of May 18, 2011, this summer the conscription will be carried out to recruit internal troops Ministry of Internal Affairs, border service, state security and individual units of the Armed Forces. In total, about three thousand people will be called up for service. The next conscription of citizens to serve in the Armed Forces and in the reserve will take place in November 2011. During this period, it is planned to send about 10 thousand people to the formations and units of the Belarusian army.
As Kuprik noted, the change in the terms of the academic year and the conscription of citizens will have a positive effect on the preparation of the Armed Forces. According to him, this will make it possible, in particular, to make more efficient use of the training material base, including for training troops in combat operations in winter conditions, as well as to optimize the system for transferring weapons and military equipment for autumn/winter operation.
Regarding the observance of the interests of citizens, Kuprik highlighted several points. Firstly, innovations will lead to the fact that the admission of citizens to educational institutions will not coincide in time with conscription activities. Thus, young people will have more time to prepare and pass final exams, as well as to prepare for university entrance. At the same time, there will be no need to grant a deferment to graduates of secondary and secondary specialized educational institutions until September 1.
Secondly, conscription events will not distract university graduates from preparing and passing state exams and defending theses, and graduates of universities and colleges subject to conscription, having completed their studies in June-July, will be able to find a job, including in the areas of educational institutions, get work practice, which will ensure their guaranteed employment in former place work after leaving the army.
Thirdly, servicemen who have served the established terms of military service will have time to enter educational institutions immediately after their dismissal (in May, as well as in November, in agricultural educational institutions).
Kuprik called important the fact that January is the most unfavorable month for the adaptation of new recruits to the conditions of military service. The entry of recruits into the troops during this period, as a rule, coincided with the rise in the incidence of acute respiratory infections, so, according to him, sending drafted citizens to the troops in November will reduce the incidence of military personnel.
Sergei Kuprik emphasized that the transfer to the reserve of servicemen who have served the deadline will be carried out in a timely manner, BelaPAN informs.
Archival photo site
A little more than a month is left before the new conscription of young military personnel. Getting an education, family reasons, health problems by law entitle Belarusian children to receive a deferment from service or the right not to serve at all. Kirill Petrenko, a representative of the Conscript's Rights Center, explained how the law on military service works in Belarus.
Belarusian citizens who receive secondary, vocational and higher education are entitled to deferment from military service. In addition to Belarusian universities, you can enter foreign ones. In this case, the law also provides a deferment for the period of study. Undergraduates, graduate students and doctoral students in the year of study also do not fall under the call.
The law does not in any way prevent children from receiving various levels of education, any number of times, in any institutions and enrolling at a time convenient for them.
“But there are many cases when a conscript has the right to a deferment, but military registration and enlistment office employees create obstacles. For example, a clash with the requirement to enter immediately in the same year in which he received a preliminary diploma or to receive a second higher education without delay”, Kirill Petrenko says
As for education abroad, problems of a different kind may arise here. If the university where the potential conscript is studying is non-state, then the Belarusian military registration and enlistment office may not like the certificate from there.
“The draft commission will have to determine whether the foreign institution, from where the recruit brought the certificate, is actually educational institution. Taking into account the current legislation, this task is fundamentally difficult to accomplish, there are no instructions in this regard and we can only hope for common sense. And if this is not a university, not a college or academy, but, for example, a theological seminary, then problems begin. And a student needs to go abroad, live there, he does not have time to constantly go to the military registration and enlistment office and prove something, ” told in the Center for the Rights of the Conscript.
There is a so-called "schedule of diseases" with which it is impossible to serve in the army. The list is wide, it includes the famous flat feet, vision problems, and mental disorders. But unfortunately for the conscripts, in the current years, the number of guys in Belarus is unimportant. The current call is for men born in the 90s, when the birth rate was falling. And the military registration and enlistment offices must fulfill the plan.
“To fulfill the plan, doctors in the draft boards are increasingly ignoring health complaints, and even those records that are already on the card are not sent for examination,”- says Kirill Petrenko.
The Center for the Rights of the Conscript advises you to undergo all medical examinations in advance, to know all your health problems, to have certificates on hand and to insist on your own in the military registration and enlistment office:
“If a psychologically and legally savvy conscript rebuffs them in words and actions (for example, he complains, write statements), then he will be able to achieve results. After all, it often happens that representatives of the authorities see in front of them an intimidated, legally unprepared guy who can be twirled as they please.
If the conscript has parents who have reached the age of incapacity, or have a disability of I and II groups, regardless of age, and the conscript does not have native able-bodied sisters and brothers, you can get a deferment for supervision of parents.
But since 2017, the retirement age has been raised in Belarus, which by 2022 will reach 58 years for women and 63 for men. So far, in the law on military service, the disabled age of parents, which provides for a deferment, is prescribed as 55 years for the mother, for the father - 60 years. But, most likely, situations where parents have reached the age of disability, but have not yet reached retirement age according to the new terms, can cause clashes in the military registration and enlistment offices. But not the only one at this point.
“There are problems when able-bodied brothers or sisters are required to take care of parents living abroad. If the military registration and enlistment office fails to prove with international documents that sisters and brothers cannot physically take care of their parents, because they live far away, then the guy will not receive any delay, ” Kirill Petrenko says
If there are three children in the conscript's family, he is exempted from military service. If there is a wife and a child, then the conscript has the right to deferment until the child is 3 years old. When the wife is pregnant, too.
The Center for the Rights of the Conscript reported that in last case during pregnancy, wives often require a certificate from the antenatal clinic at the place of registration, where the wife may not be registered. Information from private medical centers, or from another city may not be accepted.
Fathers of children with disabilities, fathers who raise children without a mother, or when the mother has a degree I or II disability are also entitled to a deferment from service.
There is no mobilization rule in Belarus, when all guys of draft age must arrive at the military registration and enlistment office on a certain day and time. The principle of the agenda works, which must be given to the conscript personally against signature. If this does not happen, the conscript is not required to go to the military registration and enlistment office. But this option to reschedule is becoming increasingly difficult. Military registration and enlistment offices go for tricks, calculate recruits in in social networks, they call the police as if because of some kind of administrative offense and take them straight to the military enlistment office. You can’t hide under the bed for 10 years, not answer the phone, not open the door, beware of every letter?
“Some manage to do just that and at the age of 27 come to the military registration and enlistment office for a military ID. And they won’t do anything for it, at most, they can give a fine in the exchange of several basic ones for not reporting something during this time, for example, about a place of work or about marriage, ” they say in the Center for the Rights of the Conscript.
But if the agenda was handed over personally to the conscript under signature, it is still better to appear at the military registration and enlistment office, otherwise Article 435 of the Criminal Code may threaten for evading military service.
At the same time, intentional infliction of harm to one's health is punished even more severely according to part 2 of the same article - up to five years in prison.
“There was a case when a guy agreed with the doctor to pinch off a piece in his stomach to make it look like an ulcer. After the examination, he was given a deferment, then he served, but it worked out and he was brought to justice for evading military service, ” says Kirill Petrenko.
Exempted from military service, according to the law on military service, are also citizens with a criminal record. But the Department of Defense recently stated that 4% of recruits in current years have criminal experience. " In the early 2000s, having a surplus of conscription resources, there were no persons in the army whose convictions were expunged or extinguished”, - h in connection with the reaction to cases of hazing.
However, from legal reasons not to serve in the Belarusian army, it remains to leave for permanent place residence abroad, serve in the army abroad, or even change citizenship.
Or else... become a deputy.
Military age in the Republic of Belarus is established by the first part of Article 30:
Call for military service, service in the reserve are subject to:
for urgent military service, service in the reserve - male citizens aged 18 to 27 years who are or are obliged to be registered with the military and are not in the reserve (hereinafter referred to as citizens who are not in the reserve);
for the military service of conscript officers - male citizens under the age of 27 who have completed training programs for reserve officers at military departments or faculties, who have passed state final exams, are enlisted in the reserve and have the military rank of an officer (hereinafter referred to as citizens enrolled in the reserve with the assignment military rank officer).
As can be seen from the above quotation, only those under the age of 27 can be called up for urgent military service, service in the reserve. That is, as soon as a young man turns 27, he will no longer be able to be drafted into the army. Despite the obviousness of this fact, there is a widespread misconception that they are allegedly called up to the service until the age of 28 (they try to explain this by independently adding the word “inclusive”, which is absent in the law). A person who knows how to read laws and is familiar with the basics of mathematics will easily come to the conclusion that “up to 27 years old” is the period of time that precedes the onset of the age of 27 years, but cannot extend after this event. The simplest way check this - remember paragraph 41 Rules for the sale of certain types of goods and public catering, according to which the sale is prohibited:
minors under the age of 18 alcoholic and low-alcohol (with a volume fraction of ethyl alcohol not more than 7 percent) drinks, beer, tobacco products, playing cards, erotic products, products containing elements of eroticism, violence and cruelty, products for sexual purposes;
To buy alcoholic drinks or tobacco products, a citizen needs to wait until the age of eighteen, and not nineteen, as required by the wording "up to 18 years."
In addition, according to the second part of Article 36 of the Law "On military duty and military service":
The decision to call up citizens for military service, service in the reserve can be taken only after they reach the age of 18.
Another interesting remark regarding the military age in Belarus. Article 30 of the Law "On military duty and military service" regulates only the age of conscription for military service, service in the reserve - that is, up to sending to the place of service in a military unit. It does not at all follow from this that an ordinary soldier called up for service shortly before his 27th birthday will be dismissed from service immediately after his birthday. Sadly, the entire expected service life will have to be fully completed.
Periodically appearing rumors about a sudden increase in the draft age in Belarus to 29, 30 or 35 years remain nothing more than rumors. To change the draft age, it will be necessary to change Article 30 of the Law "On Military Duty and Military Service", which is impossible to do without attracting public attention. Significant amendments to the Law are always vigorously discussed in the media. Moreover, there is no need to increase the draft age when it is possible to quietly and imperceptibly change the Schedule of Diseases, lowering the bar of fitness for service.
When comparing armies different countries, then each of them has its own peculiarity. If we talk about the army of the Republic of Belarus, then it has its own zest. The term of military service in it is tied to the presence of higher education. And speaking specifically, it turns out that if the conscript has a higher education, he serves for 12 months, if the education is lower, up to 18 months. If a young man graduated from an institute with a military department, then the period is reduced to 6 months.
In 2014, the Ministry of Defense of Belarus stated that there was no need to change the terms of military service. It adheres to this line to this day. In the coming years, 2017-2018 There will be no changes related to the terms of military service. As employees of the General Staff said, the country's needs for conscripts are fully met.
The current conscription campaign has fully fulfilled the conscription plan. If you suddenly have to reduce the service life, then this will reduce the grounds for deferment. And this will hit university students first. educational institutions. Although not in one country, the term of service is not tied to the presence of higher education from a soldier. In addition, a Belarusian youth has the right to learn a military specialty, while being in the reserve. Conscripts in the reserve are specialists in their profession, who are valued and respected at work. They have the right to go to military training periodically, without leaving their main place of work. The list of professions included in the reserve includes more than 10 specialties.
The service period does not include:
A soldier of the Republic of Belarus is serving on military positions: soldier, sailor, foreman, sergeant, warrant officer, officer and midshipman.
The military has the right to occupy strictly one position. The President of the Republic of Belarus appoints and dismisses the Minister of Defense and other heads of state bodies.
In connection with the demographic situation in the Republic of Belarus, the number of conscripts is decreasing. Therefore, deferrals from military service were canceled for students who were studying abroad, for correspondence students or young men in distance learning. As a result, the military registration and enlistment offices fulfilled the conscription plan.
In Belarus, the recruitment system of the Armed Forces, which includes conscripts and soldiers who have signed a contract, does not change either. Recently, more and more soldiers, transferred to the reserve after military service, conclude a contract for further stay in the ranks of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus. Now their number has exceeded 5 thousand soldiers and sergeants.
In June 2015, the Law “On Alternative Service” was adopted in the Republic of Belarus. It entered into force in July 2016. The main law of the BR is the Constitution. It spells out all the rights of citizens, but, in addition to rights, there are also duties. According to the BR Constitution, the protection of the state is the sacred duty of a citizen. Due to various circumstances and different state health, not all young men have such an opportunity, someone does not serve for family reasons, and someone simply evades military service. Among the deviationists there are physically developed young men who, for their moral reasons, cannot deal with weapons and military equipment. This goes against their religious principles. For this layer of citizens, the Government of the Republic has introduced an alternative service in the army.
When transferring the agenda, such a young man has every right to apply to the military registration and enlistment office 10 days before the end of the draft campaign. It is considered by the commission directly in his presence.
The draft commission makes a decision on the basis of the testimony of the conscript, the oral information of witnesses, materials and documents confirming his religious direction. And also the law lists the grounds under which there is a refusal in alternative service.
The conscript will have to do alternative service in the territories where he will be sent by the Ministry of Labor and social development. He will have to temporarily change his place of residence, where temporary housing and a place of work will be provided. The passage of this service will be at the facilities social sphere. The working week will be 48 hours, and the term civil service will be twice as high as the current one. That is, if the conscript has a higher education for two years, and if not, then for three whole years. So when deciding to serve on an alternative basis, the conscript needs to weigh the pros and cons.
Thus, it became clear that the term of military service in the army of the Republic of Belarus would not change. It will remain at the same values in 2017-2018.
