science

Rear services

Rear services is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Rear services rather than just read about it. In short: Rear services were those agencies in Warsaw Pact and Soviet style military forces concerned with military logistics and support. The Rear Services supplied the armed forces with ammunition, fuel, spare parts, food, clothing, and other material.

Key takeaways

Rear services belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Rear services to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Rear services from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Rear services were those agencies in Warsaw Pact and Soviet style military forces concerned with military logistics and support. The Rear Services supplied the armed forces with ammunition, fuel, spare parts, food, clothing, and other material. They included the Central Military Medical Administration. Usually a deputy minister of defence served as chief of Rear Services for the armed forces. Rear Services encompasses mainly the Rear Services' Staff, several main and central departments and other services.

Structure Major departments were:

Military Transportation which was the primary traffic management organization for the armed forces and was responsible for coordinating and planning supply movements by all means of transport. Food Supply which both procured food from civilian agricultural enterprises and operated a military state farm system to supply troops, particularly those serving in remote areas. Clothing Supply usually had its own clothing factories to manufacture uniforms and specialized gear. The main and central directorates operated post exchange, health care, and recreational facilities for military personnel. The Rear Services also provided financial reports on armed forces activities to party and government organs. The chief of the Rear Services commanded the Railway Troops, Road Troops (ru:Дорожные войска), Pipeline Troops, and Automotive Troops. The mission of these supporting service was to construct and maintain the military transport infrastructure. Automotive Troops trained and provided the drivers and mechanics needed to maintain and drive cargo trucks loaded with supplies from railheads to operational units in the field. Railway Troops, Road Troops, and Pipeline Troops built permanent rail lines, roads, and pipelines between the supply points and units in the field. Formerly divided among independent maintenance, medical, and motor transport companies, the provision of rear services in Soviet and some Warsaw Pact regiments had become the responsibility of unified matériel support units. As in most armies, these matériel support units were subordinate to operational commanders, although they worked with the next highest chief of rear services on technical matters. Traffic Regulators, were generally non-military police military personnel who directed traffic through temporary traffic control zones using signs or flags. They were responsible for maintaining the safety and efficiency of traffic, as well as the safety of road workers, while allowing construction, accident recovery or other tasks to proceed. They used signal flags, hand signals, signalling batons, traffic cones, and warning signs to control traffic movement. In 1984 main components included food supply, fuel supply, Central Military Medical Administration, Clothing Supply, Main Administration of Trade (Voyentorg, military stores & military post exchanges), Rear Cadres (personnel), Railway Troops, Pipeline Troops, Central Administration of Military Communications (VOSO), veterinarian, Motortransport Service (provides vehicles while Automotive Troops provides drivers), Highway Directorate, Chief, Tourism and Excursion Administration, and the Tyl Political Section. The last five departments were all headed by general-majors. Later the agricultural department was separated from food supply. The Rear Services also included the Topographic Troops (ru:Трубопроводные войска). On the dissolution of the Soviet Union much of the former Soviet component became the Rear Services of the Armed Forces of Russia.

Chiefs of the Rear Services

References

Scott, Harriet Fast; Scott, William Fontaine (1979). The armed forces of the USSR. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press. p. 142. ISBN 978-0-89158-276-2. Zickel, Raymond E; Keefe, Eugene K (1991). Soviet Union: a country study. Washington, D.C.: Library Of Congress. Federal Research Division. For sale by the Supt. of Docs., U.S. G.P.O. Большая советская энциклопедия (БСЭ), Третье издание, выпущенной издательством «Советская энциклопедия» в 1969—1978 годах в 30 томах; Военный энциклопедический словарь (ВЭС), Москва (М.), Военное издательство (ВИ), 1984 г., 863 стр. с иллюстрациями (ил.), 30 листов (ил.); Тыл Вооружённых Сил: 300 лет. / Под ред. генерал-полковника В. И. Исакова. — Moscow: Защитники Отечества, 2000. — 336 с. Бочков Е. А. Локальные войны и конфликты с участием Красной Армии (конец 1930-х — начало 1940-х годов): тыловое обеспечение. — СПб., 2007. Булгаков Д. В., Турков А. Г. Тыл Красной Армии в советско-финляндской войне 1939—1940 гг. — М., 2008. — 269 pages Feskov, V.I.; Golikov, V.I.; Kalashnikov, K.A.; Slugin, S.A. (2013). Вооруженные силы СССР после Второй Мировой войны: от Красной Армии к Советской [The Armed Forces of the USSR after World War II: From the Red Army to the Soviet: Part 1 Land Forces] (in Russian). Tomsk: Scientific and Technical Literature Publishing. ISBN 9785895035306.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Rear services

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Rear services claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Rear services before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Rear services ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Rear services

In research: Rear services appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Rear services in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Rear services is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Military logistics, Military units and formations of the Soviet Union, Road transport, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Rear services outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Rear services in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Rear services means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Rear services out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Rear services in simple terms?

Why does Rear services matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Rear services?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Rear services.