The Future of Russia's Military: Part 1
August 27, 2012 | 1045 GMT
Stratfor
Editor's Note: This is the first installment in a five-part series on Russia's military modernization.
Russia has been struggling to reform its military since the fall of the Soviet Union and the ensuing crisis in Russia. Some progress was made after Vladimir Putin came to power, though Russia had no viable and specific plan for its military until 2010, when Moscow drew up its first serious military doctrine in years. Reform has progressed since then, but the next few years will be a true test. Russia's goal is to create a military capable of facing the country's main challenges domestically, regionally and globally. Though the Kremlin has moved forward with its plans, major constraints could slow this progress if not stop it altogether.
Russia's drive for military modernization and reform is not new. After the crisis of the 1990s that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian military was left with a disorganized, underfunded and -- as the Gulf War and Operation Allied Force demonstrated -- unsuitable doctrine for next-generation warfare. Given its geographic and funding pressures, Russia's military has emphasized recalibrating its weaponry and adopting a more flexible and versatile force structure that allows it to rapidly deploy across the country.
The Russian military maintains large stockpiles of equipment and weaponry, an overwhelming majority of which is dated. The military budget for the armed forces has increased substantially year-on-year during the last decade (between 4 and 24 percent every year compared to the previous year). However, the vast quantities of materiel requiring replacement means that even with more funding, it would take the military decades to replace the equipment on a one-to-one basis. Overall, the military needs a substantial budget increase specifically meant to replace the aging equipment en masse, improve training and command structures, raise the quality of life for the soldiers and maintain, if not improve on, its combat level.
Ground Forces
While the ground forces have very large stockpiles of materiel left from the Cold War, the equipment is on the whole not well-maintained and requires significant upgrades. The bulk of the equipment used by the ground forces is obsolescent if not already obsolete; most of the army's current equipment was designed or built by the Soviets. Moreover, the army is particularly lacking in precision-guided munitions and modern Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance systems.
A good example of the Russian army's vast but aging inventory is its armored vehicles. The army's inventory consists of tens of thousands of these vehicles, which translates into a very high ratio of armored vehicles to number of personnel. However, these numbers do not tell the whole story; it is estimated that more than 70 percent of its armored fighting vehicle holdings are in storage and non-operational. Additionally, almost all types of vehicles used -- aside from some, such as the T-90 -- were first produced during the Cold War. Even the T-90 is in essence an evolution (from Soviet-designed vehicles) rather than a revolutionary design.
Air Force
The Russian air force has an estimated 4,000 aircraft in active service, but -- as with the army's equipment -- vast numbers of these are aging platforms first built during the Cold War. Current Russian production rates are not enough to prevent a gradual decline in the inventory of fielded aircraft. Unlike the army, however, the air force has placed considerable emphasis on producing new equipment, with a flagship design being the new generation stealth PAK-FA. The Russians are also seeking to produce a number of the effective Ka-52 and Mi-28 attack helicopters to supplement the existing force of Mi-24 gunships. Overall, the Russian air force is slightly better off than the ground forces in terms of the levels of modernized equipment available, but the more technologically advanced aircraft are slowly entering service in low numbers.
Navy
The Russian navy is not as powerful as it used to be. Vast numbers of ships suffered from lack of maintenance and upkeep after the Cold War, particularly in the 1990s. Russia currently maintains a sizable number of warships, but once again, most are obsolescent designs. The Admiral Kuznetsov (Russia's sole aircraft carrier), all the cruisers and at least half of Russia's destroyers were first launched by the Soviet Union. The Russian conventional attack, nuclear attack and cruise missile submarine forces are in better shape than the surface fleet in terms of levels of modernization. However, the Russians have encountered considerable problems in developing and building Lada and Yasen class submarines, which are supposed to replace older conventional attack and nuclear attack submarines respectively.
An Aged Arsenal
Russia has a very sizable arsenal that is laced with deep structural problems associated with age and lack of upkeep and modernization. As the equipment continues to age, maintenance becomes more expensive, taking up more of the defense budget. The equipment will also be retired at an ever-increasing pace as it becomes obsolete.
The Russian military therefore is dependent on increased military funding if it wishes to maintain its current combat potential, much less increase it. At the current pace, and even if funds were increased, Russia will have to make choices about which defense sectors to prioritize.
Editor's Note: This is the second installment of a five-part series on Russia's military modernization. This installment examines Moscow's national security strategy.
The Kremlin has focused more on the need for a strong and modern military in recent years. Russia's previous military strategies since the fall of the Soviet Union were not really focused on strengthening the military; they emphasized trying to keep the country afloat.
Russia's military doctrine is one of the best ways to gauge Russia's intentions for military development. Over the decades, that doctrine has shifted according to the perceived threats and types of war that Moscow believes it will face. For example, the military doctrine and strategy under Josef Stalin following World War II was to create large land forces able to once again face a protracted large-scale, yearslong land war. This military doctrine shifted under Nikita Krushchev because the Soviet Union's development of nuclear weapons made nuclear war more likely as Russia settled into the Cold War with the United States. Under Leonid Brezhnev, a more balanced military doctrine was put in place with broad concepts of war to account for various land and nuclear war scenarios. The aggressive military doctrines of these Soviet leaders started to falter in the 1980s as Moscow massively re-evaluated its military doctrine, shifting to a more defensive state as the Russians realized that they were starting to overextend their military potential (particularly financially).
Early Post-Soviet Doctrines
The military doctrines that followed the fall of the Soviet Union were an attempt to figure out how to sustain any large military and military industrial complex -- let alone an effective one -- during a time when Russia was feeling the looming threat of NATO near its doorstep and being wracked by domestic separatist threats like Chechnya. The military and its industrial complex in the 1990s was chaotic, top-heavy and lacked any political will from the Kremlin to fix its problems (mainly because of Boris Yeltsin's concerns that the military could overthrow him one day).
The Kremlin's focus on the Russian military and its doctrine started to take serious shape in 2000 under Vladimir Putin. His main focus was to reorganize the Russian military, purge the glut and shift to a tighter and smaller military. The 2000 Russian doctrine was meant to be a period of transition for the military and industrial complex. It set up the Russian military to be defensive in character during this period. By 2006, Russia had started to come up with a coherent plan for its future -- one based on internal consolidation and a future push out into its traditional sphere of influence. This new mindset of a stronger Russia was reflected in its next military doctrine (which took two years to develop).
A New Assertiveness
It is the newest military doctrine (drawn up by then-Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and formalized in 2009 into the National Security Strategy to 2020) that is Russia's first aggressive and proactive military doctrine since the 1970s. It has a clear strategy and definable set of threats. Of course the latest security strategy was drawn up when Russia was feeling militarily stout after two decades of feeling vulnerable and weak. Russia had just successfully wrapped up a five-day war with its neighbor Georgia -- a NATO partner -- and was looking to explain to the world what its strategy from that point on would be. Russia's security policy hinges on five principles that Medvedev laid out:
- "Russia recognizes the primacy of the fundamental principles of international law, which define the relations between civilized peoples. We will build our relations with other countries within the framework of these principles and this concept of international law."
- "Second, the world should be multipolar. A single-pole world is unacceptable. Domination is something we cannot allow. We cannot accept a world order in which one country makes all the decisions, even as serious and influential a country as the United States of America. Such a world is unstable and threatened by conflict."
- "Third, Russia does not want confrontation with any other country. Russia has no intention of isolating itself. We will develop friendly relations with Europe, the United States and other countries, as much as is possible."
- "Fourth, protecting the lives and dignity of our citizens, wherever they may be, is an unquestionable priority for our country. Our foreign policy decisions will be based on this need. We will also protect the interests of our business community abroad. It should be clear to all that we will respond to any aggressive acts committed against us."
- "Finally, fifth, as is the case of other countries, there are regions in which Russia has privileged interests. These regions are home to countries with which we share special historical relations and are bound together as friends and good neighbors. We will pay particular attention to our work in these regions and build friendly ties with these countries, our close neighbors. These are the principles I will follow in carrying out our foreign policy."
Within these points, Russia is saying that it wants to redefine the regional and global system. Russia does not accept the United States' hegemony over the global system. Thus, while Russia wants a productive relationship with the United States and Europe, this depends partly on the behavior of Washington and the Europeans.
Russia is focused on its regional position in two ways. First, it is willing to protect the interests of Russians no matter where they are. This means that Moscow could intervene on behalf of Russian citizens and communities in countries like the Baltic states or Georgia. Next, Russia has deemed the former Soviet sphere as Russia's special interest, meaning that foreign activities in this region that undermine Moscow's position there are considered a threat. Overall, this doctrine does not mean that Moscow is recreating the Soviet Union or Russian empire, but that Russia is the center of gravity in the region. The country's regional power (plus its substantial nuclear assets) allow it to be part of a global system and counter U.S. hegemony.
Based on the Medvedev Doctrine and the National Security Strategy to 2020, Russia has four categories of threats:
1. Terrorism and militancy, which mainly involve Moscow's focus on the Russian Caucasus (Chechnya and Dagestan), as well as domestic militant capability to strike outside of the Caucasus (such as the attacks on the Moscow subways, trains, schools and airport).
2. Bilateral regional conflicts, in which Russia would go against another state in the region (such as the Russo-Georgian War in 2008).
3. Regional conflicts in which Russia would intervene (such as if war broke out in the Nagorno-Karabakh region between Armenia and Azerbaijan)
4. Global threats to Russia and its sphere of influence (such as NATO, or other powers that could result in a nuclear option for Russia).
But to be able to fulfill such an ambitious strategy, Russia needs a reorganized, robust and modern military. This means two major focuses: reforming the military structure and replacing the majority of the military equipment.
Stratfor
Editor's Note: This is the third installment in a five-part series on Russia's military modernization. This installment examines Moscow's modernization and reorganization efforts to date.
With its focus refined, the Russian military has publicly announced several modernization programs since 2008. Most of these reforms have not started yet, and it is doubtful that Russia has the funds or the will to implement every modernization effort announced. Nevertheless, some major reforms -- most of which have centered on command and control structures -- have occurred that have changed the military structure in accordance with the country's military doctrine. This suggests that Russia is designing a conventional force that will project power only within its immediate sphere of influence to defend the homeland, while relying heavily on its nuclear arsenal to discourage superior militaries and coalitions from encroaching upon its regional turf.
The old Soviet military had three main branches: the ground forces, the air force and the navy. These forces were split among six districts, and each branch (in conjunction with its General Staff) was responsible for the operational planning for its own forces. In an effort to streamline the command and control structure, the military has created four districts -- which would have been known as joint strategic commands during wartime -- to replace the original six.
The joint strategic commands have been tasked with operational control and planning of almost all military and security elements within their area of responsibility, regardless of which branch or government institution they belong to (there are three combat branches that do not fall under this structure). This has, in effect, created four smaller militaries that operate independently from one another and have the ability to execute combined armed military campaigns within their immediate districts. This restructuring can be viewed as a prudent command organization in accordance with Russia's first three doctrinal threats, regional power projection and defense.
The Russian military made another major change when it switched from a divisional structure to a brigade structure -- transforming brigades into stand-alone, self-sufficient units of focus -- and reduced the number of brigades in order to man them to near-full capacity. In theory, this makes an army faster and more flexible by cutting out layers of command bureaucracy and allowing for proportional responses to varying threats. By 2009, the Russian military had designated 85 brigades, but some estimates put the number of operational brigades around 64 due to manning and equipment issues. There was also a concerted push to reduce the overall number of military personnel from at least 1.2 million to around 1 million, and to change the proportions of officers, non-commissioned officers and enlisted members, as well as contract soldiers and conscripts. This comprehensive reduction plan has been successful and has, to a point, gone too far, but attempts to adjust the proportions of various groups have had only limited success.
The Russian military has three combat branches that do not fall under the joint strategic command structure and instead report directly to the president and the Defense Ministry. The first branch is comprised of the Russian Aerospace Defense Forces, which replaced the Russian Space Forces and are charged with air and missile defense and the operation of military satellites. The second branch, made up of the Strategic Missile Troops, controls Russia's land-based nuclear weapons. The third branch is comprised of the 35,000-strong Airborne Troops, which are considered the heart of the army and are able to deploy rapidly throughout the country or within the region. By separating these branches from the joint command structure, the president and the Defense Ministry are able to maintain direct control over key structures of the military that would primarily be used to combat an existential threat or as the main deterrent against acts of aggression by foreign militaries.
The Defense Ministry has also undergone some subtle changes in order to cement civilian leadership over the military. The General Staff can now directly report only to the defense minister, as opposed to reporting to the president. There has also been a concerted effort to place civilians in deputy ministerial positions and to increase the number of civilians in the Defense Ministry, which traditionally had been dominated by military personnel. Lastly, the General Staff has been downsized and its current role has been limited compared to what it was during the Soviet era. These measures have helped shift the power balance toward civilian oversight and, in some cases, have helped spur the reform process.
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Editor's Note: This is the final installment in a five-part series on Russia's military modernization. This installment examines the constraints the Kremlin faces in its efforts to reform and modernize the Russian military.
For the first time in nearly three decades, the Kremlin seems to have a viable plan for ensuring its own domestic security and maintaining its power in the region.
Personnel Constraints
One challenge facing the Kremlin is recruitment. Several factors, including negative demographic trends, have undermined the military's ability to recruit and retain a sufficient number of quality personnel.
According to official numbers from the Russian armed forces, the military can currently build an estimated maximum force of 800,000 personnel -- a smaller figure than the 1 million personnel target usually given. In April 2012, the military comprised 160,100 officers, 189,700 contract soldiers and 317,200 conscripts. Taking retention rates and general attrition levels into account, the Russian military needs to conscript around 300,000 people during each of its drafts to maintain target troop levels of 1 million.
However, the military has reportedly fallen short of its conscription goals in recent years, with 280,000 Russians inducted in the fall 2010 draft, 218,720 in spring 2011, 135,850 in fall 2011 and 132,000 in spring 2012. An increasing number of violations associated with the draft is thus unsurprising. During the fall 2011 draft, officials who were under pressure to meet even the lowered targets committed some 6,000 violations in the conscription of Russians considered unfit to serve.
The conscription problems have forced the military to attempt to recruit higher numbers of contract soldiers by raising salaries and improving living conditions. These efforts require considerable funding, but they will be central to the modernization of the Russian military moving forward.
Defense Industry Constraints
Russia also faces major constraints in modernizing its military equipment. Currently, only between 20-30 percent of the country's military equipment is considered modern. The military's goal, per a December 2010 announcement by then-Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, is to increase this number to 70 percent by 2020, or 11 percent annually. Despite Russia's considerable fiscal resources, it might be impossible for its military to update that much equipment in such a time frame.
The Russian defense industry consists of approximately 1,500 institutions that are partially or wholly owned by the state. Estimates suggest that the industry employs as much as 4 percent of the R
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