For self-realization in the army, a woman needs conditions of "equal opportunities".

The first facts of scientific formulation of the problem of gender equality in society appeared in ancient Greece, including in relation to military activities. Plato, for example, emphatically stated that " by nature, both women and men can take part in all affairs. So, for the protection of the state, both men and women have the same natural inclinations. So, for such men, it is necessary to choose wives such that they live together and together stand guard over the state, since they are capable of this and are akin to guards by nature."

However, during the subsequent social development, feudalism did not open up opportunities for women to participate widely in social activities. The only exceptions were representatives of the ruling strata of society. Although attempts to feminize military service were noted already in this period. So, under Peter I, the right of women to serve in the army was fixed in the Charter of 1716. And in 1787, on the instructions of Prince Potemkin, a special "Amazon company" was created in the Crimea, formed from young wives and adult daughters of officers, under the command of Captain Elena Sarantova.

World Wars were important milestones in the development of the feminization of military activity. The Great Patriotic War was not only a war of men. 800 thousand female servicemen actively participated in it. Only by May 1942, 25 thousand women were mobilized in the Navy, 300 thousand-in the Air Defense Forces. 3 air regiments were formed under the command of Heroes of the Soviet Union M. Raskova, V. Grizodubova, E. Berzhadskaya. 86 women became Heroes of the Soviet Union, 150 thousand were awarded military orders and medals, over 200 people received the Order of Glory II and III degrees. In our history, there are four women-full cavaliers of the Order of Glory... However, in the Soviet Armed Forces, the idea of feminizing military service was still not widely adopted.

The status of women accumulates not only the features of the socio-political structure of the state, the level of its economy, culture, governance, and legal norms, but also responds sensitively to changes in any of these areas. The success of social work with female military personnel largely depends on how timely changes in the status of women are taken into account.

The importance of the issue is due to the fact that in the conditions of shortage of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, women have recently been actively attracted to military service, and, apparently, in the future, the share of this contingent in military organizations will grow. Currently, more than 120,000 women are serving in the Russian Army and Navy. More than 50% of the total number of female military personnel are in command and staff positions, serve in military enlistment offices, financial bodies, about 40% represent engineering and technical personnel, 7% represent medical personnel, and 1.5% are officers of educational structures.

Unfortunately, the Russian defense ministry still does not have a coordinating body that would specifically study the problems of women's military service and develop practical recommendations for its optimization. The peculiarity of the specifics of women's military activities is that they are in the minority. At the same time, the behavior of a female soldier, her practical readiness to perform functional duties on an equal basis with a man, is harmoniously combined with her high self-awareness.

Today, social work in the Armed Forces is based on the principles of "helping women", "improving the financial situation of women", "system of benefits for women", that is, a representative of the weaker sex is considered as an object of "special social protection" and thus is not perceived by society at all as a political, state or military leader. Consequently, addressing issues of social protection for female military personnel could be seen as "shifting the focus from helping women to creating equal social opportunities for both sexes in all spheres." Achieving this goal is possible by developing and implementing a set of measures. The first is to focus the attention of State bodies on compensating for the negative consequences of the economic crisis, difficulties and deprivations in women's military activities. The second is the development and creation of an "equal opportunities strategy" in the Armed Forces in order to increase the role and place of women in society and in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The social policy of the state, therefore, would rely less on compensatory levers and contribute to the realization of the potential of women.

In the context of reforming the Russian Army at the level of the Ministry of Defense, it is necessary to understand the objectivity of the process of feminization of military activity and the fact that a woman is not the worst in comparison with a man, but only a specific serviceman. The whole complex of social problems cannot be solved separately for men and women, family and non-family citizens; they cannot be overcome by providing women with benefits, that is, on the basis of previous patriarchal ideas.

The implementation of the most important social protection issues will serve as a prerequisite for the transition from quantitative expression of the feminization of the Russian Army to the deepening of its qualitative characteristics. The number of female military personnel will continue to grow steadily in the future. Currently, 169 command-only specialties have already been opened for them.

Currently, women serve in the army on a contract basis as translators, deputy commanders for educational work, lawyers, and clerks. The idea of creating women's divisions is gradually making its way. So, in the Kantemirovskaya division, there are more than a hundred women serving under contract. Some of them are located at gun sights, behind the levers of combat vehicles. Since the spring of 1990, a women's company also received the "right to citizenship" at the ensign school near Moscow. There is a special purpose brigade in the Ural Military District. It has contract employees, including more than two dozen women. All of them are part of combat crews, all jump with a parachute, are able to shoot guns. There is a separate motorized rifle brigade, where 140 girls serve with a male commander at the head.

At the turn of the second and third millennia, humanity is entering the era of biarchy. The current stage of development of the world community is associated with the strengthening of the feminization process, which is expressed in the participation of women in various spheres of society, including in the military field. The system of social protection of female military personnel is objectively in demand by society and the state and is increasingly becoming a socio-political institution that serves as a guide and incentive in ensuring women's social protection, thereby compensating for the limitations and hardships of military service.

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