Soviet military academies provided higher education to higher officers and officers of specialized kinds of armed force (engineering, medical, etc.). All able-bodied male students of civilian universities and many other institutions of higher education were subject to mandatory training at the military departments (Russian: военная кафедра) within these institutions to become reserve officers (although not all civilian institutions had military departments). Training at military departments of civilian institutions of higher education was mandatory also for all able-bodied female medical students. Soviet professional military education was also available for persons from the Soviet satellite states and from the perceived Soviet sphere of influence among the Third World countries.[1]
Soviet military education was aimed at training of officer-specialists in narrowly-defined military occupational specialties, and it differed greatly from American military education system in which newly-qualified second lieutenants receive particular specialties in the framework of their "career branch" only after graduation from military academy or ROTC.[2] Students of Soviet civilian universities having military departments could not choose military occupational specialty because each civilian specialty taught by university was attached to particular military occupational specialty taught by military department of the same university by the rector's order, and it also differed from American military education system in which student can choose between available types of ROTC.
In addition, there were 2 other ways to receive officer rank in USSR: junior officers courses and special assessment at the conclusion of conscript service. Junior officers courses were open to persons completed secondary school and finished their military service as conscripts. Persons graduated from civilian institutions of higher education without military departments and drafted into military service as soldier/sailor could pass special exams at the end of their conscript service; such persons were demobbed with officer's rank. Unlike graduates of military schools and military departments within civilian universities, persons who used these ways were promoted to junior lieutenant as first officer's rank, but not lieutenant.[3]
After several years service, officer could get into military academy of branch of service to deepen his military occupational specialty knowledges. Graduates of such academies could be promoted to colonel/captain 1st rank and to appointed to a position of the commander of regiment/first-rate warship.
Teaching staff of military academies was prepared in adjunctura established in 1938.[4] Adjunctura was a military analogue of graduate school. Officers enrolled in adjunctura were called adjuncts. They wrote theses in the military field and got academic degree of candidate of military sciences after successful defense. Officer with such degree could be appointed to a teaching position in military academy but also he could continue to serve in military units.
Warrant officers schools were established by the Minister of defense Order of 20 December 1980 №365.[5] Only enlisted personnel and non-commissioned officers, finished their military service as conscripts, could be accepted to enter warrant officers schools. The period of training was ten and half months.
Enlisted personnel and non-commissioned officers training
All able-bodied males obtained basic and specialized military training during obligatory 2-3 year male draft. There also existed schools for non-commissioned officers, often part of the draft service for distinguished soldiers, as a step towards the professional military career. Reservists were subject to periodic training exercises of duration 2–6 weeks once in several years.
Military secondary schools and pre-conscription preparatory courses
Suvorov Military Schools for boys of 14-17 (established in 1943) delivered education in military subjects. Nakhimov Naval Schools were similar to the Suvorov ones, specializing in Navy subjects. Civilians could receive military-related training in military-support organizations DOSAAF (initial name was OSOAVIAKHIM).
"The Educating of Armies", by Michael Dawson Stephens (1989) ISBN0-333-43447-1 (about philosophy and practice of the training of soldiers in Britain, America, Cuba, the USSR, China, Indonesia, Israel and Sweden.)