Over the past few years, military departments around the world are increasingly paying attention to e-sports and are trying to work with its audience.

Over the past few years, military departments around the world are increasingly paying attention to e-sports and are trying to work with its audience. But the armies in the countries are different, which means that the methods of this work are different. In honor of Defender of the Fatherland Day, we talk about how the military interacts with gamers and computer sports.

USA

It is not without reason that the US Army is considered the strongest in the world – the country’s military budget is comparable to all other countries combined. A huge number of American soldiers are serving in different regions of the world, but there are still not enough recruits. The thing is that in the USA the army is not draft, but voluntary, and the youth does not really want to spend time on the drill, it has to be lured. Including due to eSports.

Active work in this direction began the same year – the US Air Force signed a partnership agreement with Cloud9, and then announced that it would become a sponsor of ELEAGUE Major 2018. In addition, the Pentagon has allocated money to create e-sports teams that are made up of soldiers and reservists. The first experience of the US Army Esports club was a performance at Tekken 7 at PAX South 2019. For esportsmen, they opened a special training base in Kentucky, where they are located to this day.

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For several months, the club has also collected squads for Call of Duty, Rainbow Six Siege, League of Legends, Fortnite and Overwatch. US Army Esports rosters did not achieve much success even in local tournaments and minor leagues. But for the military, the results in the e-sports field are not the main thing, because even the simple presence of the squads and their participation at least somewhere where young people gather is already helping the army demonstrate the involvement and sharing of interests of American teenagers. And it is precisely these moments that raise the prestige and authority of the armed forces in their eyes.

The Pentagon did not stop there. Army recruiters are well aware that young people are watching less and less on the Internet and more and more. For this reason, it was decided to redistribute the advertising budget of the armed forces – in 2023, 97% will be spent on e-sports and YouTube, and only 3% will be on television.

The first e-sports announcement has already taken place – the US Navy will sponsor at least two American tournaments from DreamHack – in Anaheim and Dallas. In addition to standard advertising banners at the broadcast and venue, the fleet command organizes a special area at the venue in which visitors can compete in naval officers and veterans in various titles.

Other NATO countries

The United States is the leader of the North Atlantic Alliance, but other NATO members also need to fulfill obligations to the military bloc. To attract new recruits, they also resort to cooperation with e-sports associations and organizations.

The biggest job after the USA in this direction is being done by Denmark. They started a campaign to attract e-sportsmen at about the same time as the United States, in 2017-2018. Major Anders Beh said that in 2017, for the first time, the military began to recruit recruits at sites “that gamers often visit,” which allowed them to increase their inflow.

In order to verify the suitability of e-sportsmen and gamers for military service, the Danish armed forces invited players for test trials Astralis. They visited a military training base, where they had a young fighter course and offered to pass an obstacle course.

Apparently, the command turned out to be quite the outcome of this collaboration. Major Beh noted that gamers are able to make better and faster decisions in stressful situations, work well in a team and give an account of their actions. ” In his opinion, it is these skills that are one of the key for recruits, and everything else can already be achieved in the process of training and military training. The immediate plans of the Danish army command are to begin cooperation with the local eSports Federation. At the same time, Beh said that all gamers are not needed by the country’s armed forces, and according to statistics, only every 40 contestants are suitable for contract service.

In addition to Denmark, the Netherlands began to attract e-sportsmen to serve in the army. The command of the Royal Navy of the Netherlands noted that already in the army drones are used, the management of which is very similar to computer games, and gamers are great for these purposes. The first step in attracting e-sportsmen to serve in the Navy was the creation of our own CS: GO team – KM Esports (from the Koninklijke Marine – Royal Navy). The team has already participated in a local tournament, but performed there unsuccessfully. Navy officer Peter van der Berg noted that the squad did not expect to win, and speaking at competitions was only the beginning of all the work. He promised that KM Esports would be much better prepared for future tournaments.

South Korea

South Korea was the first in the world to recognize the scale and prospects of eSports. Competitions in computer games here have long been gathering a huge audience both on television and broadcast on the Internet, and at venues. Local e-sportsmen and teams show outstanding results at the world level, and players in Starcraft II motivate the football team before going to the world championships.

Unlike most developed countries, in South Korea, the army is not a contract, but a draft. For her, this is a necessary measure – de jure she is at war with the DPRK. Although the South Korean army is loyal to professional gamers and calmly provides them with a respite, as a result, they all must sooner or later serve in the armed forces. And while you practice the drill in the barracks, your opponent is training hard. Therefore, for e-sportsmen, leaving for military service is always a risk of losing their form and never returning it again.

However, the country has the opportunity to combine service and eSports training. At the end of 2006, Korean professional Starcraft players formed the Air Force ACE team, which consisted of South Korean Air Force personnel. At different times, it was represented by StarDust, Boxer, Reach and other famous e-sportsmen, the team even had a slot in the largest team league in Korea – Proleague.

Air Force ACE failed to achieve outstanding results. Firstly, army training took time, and secondly, competitors could assemble the composition they needed, and the Air Force team had to be content only with those players who were in the service. As a result, Air Force ACE never rose above the penultimate place, and most of the stages of Proleague did complete at the last position.

At the same time, the South Korean army itself holds tournaments. Since 2017, the country has held annual Overwatch competitions among ground forces units. Prizes are received not only by winners, but also by finalists: in addition to monetary rewards, soldiers receive additional layoffs and other incentives from the chief of staff.

Russia

There is one key difference between the US and Russian armies – in Russia, most of the personnel are formed on a draft basis. For this reason, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation practically do not work with ordinary e-sports fans – at best, stands with World of Tanks and other military games at defense exhibitions can be added to this. But at the same time, it cannot be said that the Russian army completely ignores industry.

For example, a game complex was opened in the Patriot park near Moscow, where e-sports competitions are regularly held. Usually, pupils of the cadet corps, “Suvorovites”, members of the All-Russian military-patriotic youth movement “Yunarmiya” and active soldiers and officers take part in them. Sometimes the military from the Russian Federation organize local events. For example, in August 2019, the tournament “Cup of the Baltic Fleet Commander in e-Sports” took place at the Khmelevka training ground in the Kaliningrad Region. Of course, you don’t have to expect battles in Dota 2 or CS: GO – mainly World of Tanks or Warthunder become the disciplines.

However, CS: GO once again appeared in the chronicles of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. The female Counter-Strike Russian Forces team, which won WESG 2017, was invited to conduct a master class for students of the Moscow Cadet Corps “Pension inmates of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.” Judging by the photos, the master class was more motivational than gaming, as the future defenders of the homeland did not play in CS: GO, but in Warthunder. But for Ksenia Vilga Klyuenkova, Alena AileY Bordukova and Anastasia Nast1a Evdokina conducted a tour of the Patriot park, made it possible to shoot from real types of weapons, and presented Polite Bears – toy bears in the clothes of a pilot, sailor, and paratrooper.

ESports vs UFO

According to the editors of the REN-TV channel, everything described above is just the tip of the iceberg, and e-sports tournaments are entertainments only for avert eyes. In fact, all the major tournament operators were created with one goal in mind – to seek recruits in order to repel alien invasions. Referring to the “experts”, in the REN-TV special documentary project “UFOs against the military,” they said that this was the only way to fight off an attack from outer space.

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As the editors of REN-TV said, at the time of the release of the special project in 2017, the captain was the main contender for the title of “special agent to combat aliens” North Matthias MSL Lauridsen, CS: GO – “The ideal shooting simulator for fast moving targets.”

Naturally, any sane person understands that the information in the REN-TV plot is absurd a little more than completely. But if you read between the lines, then they conveyed the main essence well: cybersportsmen are not simple nerds for a long time, incapable of physical activity. The interest of the armies of the world in gamers confirms this – more and more countries consider them separately from the general mass of youth and see in them qualities that many lack in military affairs. True, I would very much like that they did not have to be used in real combat and that they continued to fight among themselves only in virtual space.