Russia to beef up defences with $650 bn spend

www.bbc.co.uk...

Wouldn't it be great if they spent it on renewable energy technology, ending world hunger, medicines and space exploration instead?

War is such a waste of money.

Originally posted by GodForbid
Wouldn't it be great if they spent it on renewable energy technology, ending world hunger, medicines and space exploration instead?

War is such a waste of money.

edit on 26-2-2011 by GodForbid because: (no reason given)

This is kinda necessary for Russia. It will most likely bring about reforms and updates to the depleted military. According to one cable, Russia's military is pretty awful. Not to mention, the U.S. continues to get closer to Russia's doorsteps.

reply to post by GodForbid


agreed, all countries in the world spend approx. 1.5 trillion dollars on defense. Imagine the good that could be done.
en.wikipedia.org...

Yes especially considering the need their for infastructure and agricultural programmes.
Ok so it will keep some people in jobs in the rocket factories and shipyards,but they just dont seem cabable of growing outside of their traditional industries-and the people who have tried have never been allowed.
Russia still predominantly relies on outsiders for that.
Its rumoured that billions are lost in corruption from defence dealings.
The irony is that most Western Countries have made big cuts in defence spending and scrapped programmes,in part because they have become unaffordable,but mainly because the Russian threat was considered not what it was.
Russia appear to also be relying on its revenues from Oil and Gas for its defence income since it knows it has cards to play.
Its reasonable to assume that there will be a conflict of interest here since pricing will be manipulated for targets.
Its also interesting that the announcement comes less than 12 months after the last review in which they said that they would be increasing their spend by only 60% -but a lot has happened in the last year.
It will not be wrong to expect some reviews from Western governments - of course too late for Ark Royal Nimrods and Harriers though..............

"Ten divisions equipped with the new S-500 anti-missile system are set to become the backbone of the country's missile defences."- From the article.

Did the news report make an error or something? I did not know that the S-500 was finalized yet... S-500 is supposed to be twice as capable as the S-400, which is already the top SAM system in the world (in my opinion anyways).

Impressive if true.

Yes this is some mean weapon.
The report I think is in consideration of capability by 2020.
The S500 is due in production in 2014.

en.rian.ru...

Originally posted by GodForbid
Wouldn't it be great if they spent it on renewable energy technology, ending world hunger, medicines and space exploration instead?

War is such a waste of money.

Okay lets say that Russia spends the same amount on renewable energy technology, ending world hunger, medicines and space exploration instead of defense. Then where will it stand when there is a war? Also a weak defence calls for a war.

Originally posted by dec23

Originally posted by GodForbid
Wouldn't it be great if they spent it on renewable energy technology, ending world hunger, medicines and space exploration instead?

War is such a waste of money.

Okay lets say that Russia spends the same amount on renewable energy technology, ending world hunger, medicines and space exploration instead of defense. Then where will it stand when there is a war? Also a weak defence calls for a war.

They are spending so much to keep up with American defense spending. The Americans are investing in everything from a new nuclear weapon generation to space weapons. In fact, if the Americans would just stop developing nuclear weapons and re-sign all of the non-nuclear aggression treaties they dropped out of, AND stop provoking Russia with ABM facilities along the Russian border, then maybe Russia would not have to beef up their forces in such a significant manner.

But the fact is that the US is the provocative force in the world. If countries like Russia and China slow down in their defensive development, then the US will walk all over them. Look at the US military industrial complex now; they say they are building weapons to counter the Chinese military threat when the fact is that China is developing weapons to counter the American threat in their region.

We still live in an age of empires, which is in my opinion better than living in an American world.

Yes it is still an arms race.
The cold war never ended it just thawed for a little.
China test fired a missile not too long ago into space it is well reported.
The US have probably done the same although the rumours of them testing and knocking out a satellite were denied.
After a nuclear war you still need people.
For all of its size Russia still only has a population of 147 million much of them ageing or unfit to fight.
Compare that to say tiny UK with a population of around 62 million.
In the 80s Russia continued to provide for survival after a Nuke attack with projects like Yamatu mountain complex 30,000 workers and estimated to be 1000s of km.
Reports are that Putin has extended transport links there with a metro line from Red Square.
More recently Moscow announce the building of new nuclear shelters in Russia which I posted on with a link.
Some evidence then that Russia is preparing when most Western governments sold off their bunkers.
Having followed these things for a few years now,I have to say that with so much going on its become very difficult to know what to think new democracies comes at a price and maybe the old saying-better the devil you know is not so bad after all ....................

Originally posted by martin3030
Yes it is still an arms race.
The cold war never ended it just thawed for a little.
China test fired a missile not too long ago into space it is well reported.
The US have probably done the same although the rumours of them testing and knocking out a satellite were denied.
After a nuclear war you still need people.
For all of its size Russia still only has a population of 147 million much of them ageing or unfit to fight.
Compare that to say tiny UK with a population of around 62 million.
In the 80s Russia continued to provide for survival after a Nuke attack with projects like Yamatu mountain complex 30,000 workers and estimated to be 1000s of km.
Reports are that Putin has extended transport links there with a metro line from Red Square.
More recently Moscow announce the building of new nuclear shelters in Russia which I posted on with a link.
Some evidence then that Russia is preparing when most Western governments sold off their bunkers.
Having followed these things for a few years now,I have to say that with so much going on its become very difficult to know what to think new democracies comes at a price and maybe the old saying-better the devil you know is not so bad after all ....................

Russia has much more expansive underground networks designed to survive WMD warfare than what the Americans could even dream of. In fact, the majority of American bunkers that I've ever heard of were for politicians and military leadership. I've heard that there's dozens of bunkers and superbunkers in most major Russian populated areas.

Mt. Yamantau is just an example of a super-hardened military command structure, designed to operate after suffering from a nuclear strike (and to carry out the deadhand protocol).

Russia's military is pretty well up there. Not only do they have cutting edge equipment, but they also have a lot of older yet still efficient Soviet equipment. Oh, and they also have a lot of hard combat experience with troop rotations and equipment testing in fighting against rebels in the Caucasus. In the Georgian conflict, the Russians sent in their Caucasus troops who were not as well equipped as say those around Moscow, but still managed to basically decimate Georgia's forces.

Even after looking at independent photos taken during the brief Georgian conflict, one can clearly see that modernized Georgian hardware (including American supplied equipment) didn't stand a chance. Days into the conflict, the Russians didn't even bother to put camo nets over their foward artillery positions because they deemed the Georgian airforce capacity to be no longer existent. Photos of Georgian ports show their warships burning in the harbour.

And all they did was slaughter 17 Russian peacekeepers and bombed thousands of Ossetians/Abkhazians. You can bet your ass that Russia has a very powerful conventional military force.

BTW, I think you got your information about ASAT missile tests a little mixed up. The US conducted a highly publicized ASAT missile test from a ship a few years back, which was successful (decades before, they did this from an F-15 too, I think). China has also conducted a successful ASAT missile test, and was criticized by the West because apparently Chinese ASAT tests cause space debris while the American ones don't

//// Georgia's population is less than 4 million ppl...And they were hardly rocking state of the art american made equipment.

If we wanna go that route, than America walked all over Saddams predominantly Russian supplied military with relative ease. Hell, pretty much every conflict the US has been in, has been against adversaries who used russian equipment...which was always bested by US equipment.

Now I dont know If I am reading this right,but seems they complain about potential lost trade to Libya for prev done deals which now are in the balance.
Not to worry..Belarus will probably be happy to oblige through the back door.
Besides,why should Putin be worried-Russian Nukes still surpass US stockpiles by around 4k

www.upi.com...



www.blatantworld.com...

Originally posted by Janky
//// Georgia's population is less than 4 million ppl...And they were hardly rocking state of the art american made equipment.

If we wanna go that route, than America walked all over Saddams predominantly Russian supplied military with relative ease. Hell, pretty much every conflict the US has been in, has been against adversaries who used russian equipment...which was always bested by US equipment.

edit on 5-3-2011 by Janky because: (no reason given)

Not even close.

The US had military advisors training Georgian troops to fight the Russians, supplying them with modern weapon systems and tactics too. Not only that, but something happened there where Saakashvili got it ingrained in his head that the US would back up Georgia if Russia retaliated against them.

Iraq was a whole different story. The Russians weren't in Iraq training the Iraqis, nor did they ever supply the Iraqis with first-rate or Russian assembled weapons (in fact, most of their equipment were parts assembled by the Iraqis themselves which losely resembled the original Soviet/Russian designs). Secondly, the Americans, in both Iraq wars, engaged Iraqi forces mostly at night because they had far better night fighting capabilities.

Care to point out exactly where American equipment faced equal Russian equipment and beat it?

Hell, the Cubans in Angola were using Katyushas (1940s tech) and they beat down the US-backed South Africans and Angolan militias.

Originally posted by Dimitri Dzengalshlevi
Not even close.

The US had military advisors training Georgian troops to fight the Russians, supplying them with modern weapon systems and tactics too. Not only that, but something happened there where Saakashvili got it ingrained in his head that the US would back up Georgia if Russia retaliated against them.

What modern weapon systems and tactics did the US supply Georgia with? Georgia hardly matters to the US. So I fail to see the importance of supplying Georgia with frontline state of the art US weaponry.

For christ sakes, look at the Georgian air force... They were absolutely defenseless.

Iraq was a whole different story. The Russians weren't in Iraq training the Iraqis, nor did they ever supply the Iraqis with first-rate or Russian assembled weapons (in fact, most of their equipment were parts assembled by the Iraqis themselves which losely resembled the original Soviet/Russian designs). Secondly, the Americans, in both Iraq wars, engaged Iraqi forces mostly at night because they had far better night fighting capabilities.

"The Iraqi Army was a replica of the Russian Army, and its defeat was not predicted by our generals," says Vitaly Shlykov, a former deputy defense minister of Russia.

"The key conclusion we must draw from the latest Gulf war is that the obsolete structure of the Russian armed forces has to be urgently changed," says Vladimir Dvorkin, head of the Russian Defense Ministry's official think tank on strategic nuclear policy. "The gap between our capabilities and those of the Americans has been revealed, and it is vast. We are very lucky that Russia has no major enemies at the moment, but the future is impossible to predict, and we must be ready."

Last week, the independent Council on Foreign and Defense Policy - a group of top Russian military experts and former policymakers, including Mr. Shlykov - met to assess the implications of the US triumph in Iraq for Russia. Their conclusion: The Kremlin must drop all post-Soviet pretense that Russia remains a superpower, and make rebuilding and redesigning the nation's military forces a top priority. "We cannot afford to postpone this any longer," Boris Nemtsov, head of the liberal Union of Right Forces, told the meeting.

www.csmonitor.com...

The article actually is relevant to this thread, and it addresses basically what Russia needs/needed to do to reform its armed forces. Iraq was a wake up call for them, and big reason why Russia has decided to boost military spending over the next 10 years to reform its military..

It seems Russia took it quite srs. They did not expect the US to be successful in defeating the Iraqi military. And yes, Iraqs military was trained by russian advisors. And the majority of the Iraqi military was Russia era equipment. It didnt stand a chance against the US military might.

Care to point out exactly where American equipment faced equal Russian equipment and beat it?

I already did, the Iraq military was trounced in a matter of 2 weeks... Let that one soak in a bit more.

Originally posted by Janky
www.csmonitor.com...

The article actually is relevant to this thread, and it addresses basically what Russia needs/needed to do to reform its armed forces. Iraq was a wake up call for them, and big reason why Russia has decided to boost military spending over the next 10 years to reform its military..

It seems Russia took it quite srs. They did not expect the US to be successful in defeating the Iraqi military. And yes, Iraqs military was trained by russian advisors. And the majority of the Iraqi military was Russia era equipment. It didnt stand a chance against the US military might.

Your source is the "Christian Science Monitor". You really think that's credible?

Your source is garbage. If Russian defense officials ever did claim these things, then you have to understand that Russia's government is run by ex-intel operatives. The things they say do not have obvious meanings.

And pray tell, why would Russia be worried about the US running over Saddam's army? The Iraqi armed forces were most certainly NOT the same as Russia's. It was archaic and even the heavier equipment itself (ie tanks, aircraft) were sent to Iraq in pieces and assembled by Iraqi engineers. The finished equipment was so inferior that the Iraqis even gave them special names to make them look like they were customized or something.

The simple fact is that the Americans had good intel there, knew that the Iraqi tanks were not equipped with thermal or night vision optics and so they battled the Iraqi army at night and with weapons that were well out of range to begin with.

Trying to say Saddam's forces are the same as Russia's is pure garbage. An Iraqi T-72 "Lion of Babylon" is a piece of crap compared to a real Soviet T-72. And guess what? T-72s are nothing compared to the T-80UM or T-90M, both of which are equipped with 125mm cannons, Refleks ATGMs, new generation ERA (like Kontakt-5/Relikt, which has been tested over a decade ago to stop an Abrams' 120mm APSFDS rounds), effective thermal optics (Agava-M1), etc.

Take a look at pictures taken during the Georgian conflict. You will see T-72s with full ERA burned extra crispy on Georgian streets. These are the equivalent to the equipment used by the Republican Guard that actually gave the US tanks a challenge around Baghdad airport (though of course the RG would be better trained than Georgian regulars). And the Russian forces that went into Georgia were using older equipment too, the only difference is that they had a lot more experience fighting rebels in Chechnya (they were Caucausus soldiers)... in fact, there were even rebels that joined the fight against Georgia, and fought alongside Russian units.

My point is that modern Russian units are far more advanced than some petty exports that the Soviets sent to Iraq. If you believe that Russia is equipped with what Iraq had back in the 90s (because the Iraqis never recovered since), then maybe you need to start looking at new sources. Or even better, do what I do and look at photo journals of conflicts to get an insider perspective of real conflicts, instead of some biased words.

Originally posted by Dimitri Dzengalshlevi
Your source is the "Christian Science Monitor". You really think that's credible?

lol and that discounts the quotes from Russian officials...

[Your source is garbage.

Just like this entire thread, right? Russia isnt revamping its tired #ty military...amirite?

If Russian defense officials ever did claim these things, then you have to understand that Russia's government is run by ex-intel operatives. The things they say do not have obvious meanings.

Just like Russia putting $650 B into their armed forces over the next decade...there is no obvious correlation between the article I posted, and what russia is doing now. /sarcasm.

Russia has always been known for being boastful...(exaggerated claims, Russia is best, blah blah) what youre saying goes against the very nature we have come to expect from Russia.

And pray tell, why would Russia be worried about the US running over Saddam's army? The Iraqi armed forces were most certainly NOT the same as Russia's. It was archaic and even the heavier equipment itself (ie tanks, aircraft) were sent to Iraq in pieces and assembled by Iraqi engineers. The finished equipment was so inferior that the Iraqis even gave them special names to make them look like they were customized or something.

Im sure you can corroborate all this...oh wait, no, no you cant! Besides, it doesnt matter, you obviously have a self bias towards Russia.

The simple fact is that the Americans had good intel there, knew that the Iraqi tanks were not equipped with thermal or night vision optics and so they battled the Iraqi army at night and with weapons that were well out of range to begin with.

Stop! Its getting cringe worthy reading your hyperbole! You were not there, you were not involved with the ground tactics, neither was I. Its purely speculation at this point. However, the US did accuse Russia of selling Iraq "sensitive" equipment like night vision goggles, etc just before the invasion.

www.heritage.org...

My point is that modern Russian units are far more advanced than some petty exports that the Soviets sent to Iraq. If you believe that Russia is equipped with what Iraq had back in the 90s (because the Iraqis never recovered since), then maybe you need to start looking at new sources. Or even better, do what I do and look at photo journals of conflicts to get an insider perspective of real conflicts, instead of some biased words.

edit on 7-3-2011 by Dimitri Dzengalshlevi because: (no reason given)

Im not going to get into a dick measuring contest here...I really dont care. However, the fact that Russia has deemed it of the utmost importance to invest heavily into its armed forces over the next decade, is telling.

Actions speak loudest.

Oh dear what did I start ?

Its good to hear different opinions but better still if they are kept civil.
I guess it depends on what generation you are from and how much notice you took.
Myself was remembering the 60s through to the late 80s when Russia brought fear to almost everyone I knew.
Their spending on the arms race was attributed in part to the collapse of the USSR as the country was financially bankrupt as well as morally.
Is there a place for the current regime in 2011,who appear to be operating Soviet policies whilst juggling these with FSU smokescreens ?
No suprises that Russia looks to reliance on technology,when its known that there are so many millions of drug addicts,aids stricken,prostitutes and alcoholics.
I read this group to be at around 40 million plus-which is a staggering %
Add to this a few million pensioners and you are left wondering.

Perfect. Now we have to spend more to make up for their spending. Because we weren't in enough debt already.
Thanks Russia

Originally posted by Ford Farmer
Perfect. Now we have to spend more to make up for their spending. Because we weren't in enough debt already.
Thanks Russia

Yeah, because obviously they aren't spending more to keep up with your massive amounts of spending