Russia by Donna Welles

AK 47

            In 2000, the Kursk gave us real insight into the state of the Russian navy when on August 12, the Russian flagship suffered an explosion and then sank to the bottom of the Barents Sea. The 118 man crew, indeed the pride of the fleet, ran out of oxygen as they tapped distress signals on the wall, waiting to be rescued. A note was found inside which indicated that many had survived the explosion. Russia refused all offers of international assistance. (Of course!) The problem was that Russia had no equipment to open up the underwater hatch. As Lilia Shevtsova says in her book, Putin’s Russia, “The same country that launched sputnik couldn’t even open up to hatch of its own submarine.” (1)

            So what is the status of the Russian military now? Russia has the 4^th largest army in the world (China leads the race at 2.4 million, there are 1.5 million Americans, and 1.3 million Indians). (2)  Some indicators show that Russia does have a military to be reckoned with. In 2007, Russia “resumed long-range bomber missions after a 16-year hiatus, conducted a military exercise with China, increased defense spending by more than 30%, announced a new rearmament program, and began planning the reclamation of the old Soviet naval base at Tartus, Syria in order to reestablish a Mediterranean naval presence.” (2) Given these advances, one could argue that Russia is back in action. However…..

            Reform:

            The most important factor in delaying substantial reform has been the generals’ steadfast opposition to it. (2)

            Nearly two decades into the post-Soviet era, there has still not been an overhaul of the Russian military. Many decision makers still opine Russia’s defense strategy to be the same as they did during the Cold War in that the Western nations are the primary potential military threat. This is largely due to the internal disagreement between the politicians and the generals as to 1) who is the enemy and 2) what kind of wars should Russia be prepared to fight. I think it is very strange that the same decision makers seem to not feel threatened by China. I’ve been scared of China my whole life.

             There are two fundamental schools of thought concerning the character and size of Russia’s military forces. The first group, consisting primarily Russia’s General Staff, believe that Russia needs a large army with heavy armaments, global capabilities and a large budget. This group includes stark supporters of conscription so as to retain such an army. The second group comprises Russia’s Ministry of Defense and Security Council. They believe in a more defensive doctrine. This means they believe not in a specific strategic enemy but that Russia’s main opponents are armed separation, terrorism, smuggling, and other “soft security threats” and that their nuclear arsenal protects them from World War III. (2) While I was living in Russia, our professors all agreed that the Russian military would be far better off if it had a small, well-trained force that could resolve regional conflict. Virtually everyone is opposed to the draft but I will talk about that below.

            President Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin differed in their view of military reform. The former charged the military with implementing manpower reduction as well as the timely evacuation of troops from former Soviet states including eastern and central Europe. Outside of these assignments, military decision makers were free to do as they saw fit. This led to wide-spread corruption and criminal behavior among Russia’s military elite including selling off Soviet weapons to the highest bidding terrorist. By contrast, President Putin was appalled with Russia’s military dealings with Chechnya and considered wide-spread reform a top priority. His efforts were undercut by Russian Generals who opposed such reform.

            So what has been done?  First, the Russian military shrank drastically from 3 million strong during the Soviet Era to something near 1.2 million as of a few months ago. President Putin promised in 2000 to reduce the number of servicemen and a recent Economist article reported that the military was reduced by 300,000 men. (3) The exact number of military personnel will never be known because military commanders inflate the figures so as to profit on the benefits to non-existent personnel. It is important to distinguish between personnel cut-backs and reform.

            Second, there have been numerous rearrangements among the armed forces since 1991. Some of these are reversals of previous ‘reforms’ or rearrangements. This suggests that there is no overarching master plan. Such reorganizations include “the abolition of the Ground Forces Headquarters, the merging of the air defense branch into the air force, and the reduction of the number of military districts to six with the amalgamation of the Siberian and Trans-Baikal districts and the Volga and Ural districts. The result of all these reorganizations and reversals is that the structure of the current armed forces is actually not very different from what it was in the Soviet Era.” (2)

            Finally, the 1996 Defense Law gave the Ministry of Defense (MOD) and the General Staff equal status. This ensured that the two branches fought for power until 2004 when the Duma modified the Defense Law so that the power of MOD trumped that of the General Staff.

Manpower:

The most important question f the future of the Russian military is whether its manpower is going to be based on volunteers, conscription, or some combination of the two. (1)

            There is widespread public aversion to the draft. In fact, during his 1996 campaign for president one of Yelstin’s platforms was to abolish the draft. Of course this didn’t happen. Actually, the draft has since been expanded.

            Between 9-11% of young men serve in the military. These men for whatever reason have fallen through the cracks and have not taken advantage of the are many legal ways to avoid it. Of course bribing officials works too but that doesn’t help if you’re poor. The result is that the least desirable of men end up serving. During the 2005 draft, 70% of draftees were medically unfit, 45% had neither held a job nor went to college, 5% had criminal records, 25% never finished high school, 11% were alcoholics and/or regular drug users, and some couldn’t read.

            Those entering the armed forces are brutally treated. Widespread hazing has led many to desert, commit suicide, or commit violent crime. In the first half of 2007, 262 servicemen died. Of these, 37 died in Chechnya, 7 resulting from hazing, and an astounding 147 men committed suicide. In 2006, 6,700 soldiers were victims of battery and 33 of them died. And these statistics only reflect those reported and those filtered out by the usual bureaucratic altering of numbers so the numbers are almost certainly much higher.

            Although Putin has continually raised salaries throughout his term, full colonels are often paid less than bus drivers and there are tens of thousands of officers without decent housing. I had a Russian professor who worked for the State Department before serving as chair of the University of Texas’ Russian program. He once told us that is was very common for military men to star in pornographic films in order to make enough money to subsist.

            There are too many chiefs and not enough Indians in the Russian military. The Russian army is about 20% smaller than that of the US, but Russia employs twice as many officers. The quality of training is also an issue for the Russian military. Instructors are often the same caliber of people as the draftees. Expensive training such as the training of pilots is frighteningly insufficient. In 2003, air force pilots fly just 12 to 44 hours a year, a fraction of the regulation 160 to 180 hours abided by their Chinese and Indian counterparts. It is not surprising that pilot errors were responsible for 7 of the 8 aviation accidents in the first 10 months of that year. Conditions since then have improved- pilots flew and average of 25 hours in 2005 and 40 hours in 2007. However, these numbers are far far below Western standards.

            The military profession was considered one of the most highly esteemed and rewarding in the Soviet Union. Since then, the social prestige of the uniform has plummeted owing to- among other things- the army’s active involvement in the 1991 coup attempt and the October 1993 shelling of the White House in Moscow, the widespread corruption that accompanied the withdrawal from Eastern Europe and elsewhere, the weak performance in the Caucasus, the seemingly unending brutal hazing of fresh conscripts, and a multitude of avoidable accidents that have claimed hundreds of lives annually. Quite simply, even with the recent infusion of funds into the defense sector, it is hard to see why the kind of people the MOD would like to attract would want to become professional officers, NCOS, or soldiers. (2) 

Expenditures:

The idea behind Russia’s military spending is that Russia wants to be able to right one global war, one regional war, and several localized wars simultaneously.

            The theme of Russian military expenditures is “growing budgets and misguided spending.” The low point in defensive spending occurred in 1998 and has since grown by about 10% annually. Defense expenditures in 2007 increased to $28 billion. This is less than 5% of the US’ budget. Also, the money Russia puts into the military is greater than that put into healthcare and education combined. (2)

            During Putin’s presidency, defense expenditures increased by 500%. Unfortunately, most of this money goes to outdated equipment and new technology rather than spending the money on those who serve. In 2006, Russia spent $3,800 per soldier. By contrast, the American figure was $190,000, the British $170,000, the German $94,000, and the Turkish$12,500. (2)

            “At a time when the American and British militaries are increasingly relying on unmanned vehicles, airplanes, and robotics preparing for non-contact wars, the Russian defense industry continues to produce upgraded versions of weapons that were designed in the 70’s and 80’s and are less suited for future wars. These are tanks, infantry vehicles, heavy artillery pieces, and new generations of missiles and planes. These weapons might be in line with the preferences of the generals who anticipate fighting World War III, but they are hardly going to be useful in localized conflicts or anti-terrorist operations. Many of the funds are designated for the modernization of old weapons whose usefulness, even if modified, is questioned by experts.” (2)

My Thoughts: What happens to all those old weapons?

            The Russian army inherited the bulk of the Soviet Army’s arsenal. These are at least 635 ICBMS, 22,800 tanks, 30,000 artillery pieces 14 strategic and 37 tactical submarines, 600 bombers, 900 fighter jes, 7,800 operational nuclear warheads, among a plethora of other equipment.(2) And those are just the figures on paper!     

            Frankly I’m surprised that there has not been a nuclear explosion somewhere in the world as a result of Russian mismanagement of weapons. Russians just don’t manage hard data very well. All of the people who are in charge of keeping these weapons aren’t paid very much so you get people like Tarzan, a Russian man who literally sold a Russian submarine on the black market. The AK 47 has affected more countries than any other weapon I know. It is even pictured on a country in Africa’s flag.

Sources

1)      Putin’s Russia by Lilia Shevtsove

2)      Resurgent Russia? A still-flatering military by Zoltan Barany

3)      The Economist August 2008

4)      The Economist September 2008