Thought Experiment: Sustainable Russian Military

[eckherl]

National guards and american army system in general is sort-of conscript army, where many soldiers serve 3 or at most 5 years and never return again. Members of National Guards reserve can be drafted to real service against they will - true, they signed an agreement with such possiblity in mind earler - but nonetheless...

True, such "conscripts" initially go to army willingly due to various preferences. But such system still do not make them professionals much faster than true conscript learn in other armies - after all, he still need 1-2 years to master the basics. And then after 3-4 years he is back to civilian life... How is it THAT different from conscript system in Russia, where only 15% jungs are drafted?

You will find that the majority of soldiers that serve in the National Guards seem to stay around alot longer than 4 - 5 years, matter of fact alot of regular soldiers when they ETS out will more than likely join a National Guard or Army Reserve outfit if it is close by their home. This is a all volunteer Army, and they are informed that in case of a national emergency with in the country or abroad that they will be obligated to go, including war. They take a oath and sign on the dotted line. Units spend one weekend out of each month working together and two to six weeks (depending on the unit) out of the year deploying to a training center, so the majority of the time they are already civilians. I used to cringe everytime that I had to evaluate one of the armor units that I was assigned to evaluate during their annual live fire tank gunnery qualification, (Table 8) those guys from Arizona were crazy.:shudder
I would also like to state Chrom that the National Guard units that deploy to Iraq continue to do a outstanding job and deserve more recognition.

 

[Chrom]

You will find that the majority of soldiers that serve in the National Guards seem to stay around alot longer than 4 - 5 years, matter of fact alot of regular soldiers when they ETS out will more than likely join a National Guard or Army Reserve outfit if it is close by their home. This is a all volunteer Army, and they are informed that in case of a national emergency with in the country or abroad that they will be obligated to go, including war. They take a oath and sign on the dotted line. Units spend one weekend out of each month working together and two to six weeks (depending on the unit) out of the year deploying to a training center, so the majority of the time they are already civilians. I used to cringe everytime that I had to evaluate one of the armor units that I was assigned to evaluate during their annual live fire tank gunnery qualification, (Table 8) those guys from Arizona were crazy.:shudder
I would also like to state Chrom that the National Guard units that deploy to Iraq continue to do a outstanding job and deserve more recognition.

But THIS IS the essence of conscript system - when (for relatively short time) trained soldiers go back to civilian life, maintain they skills throught 1-2-3 weeks per year training, and could be drafted against they will in case of emergency!!!

Conscript system is not all about untrained jung soldiers going stright to battle, it is also about such (relatively) experienced and matured mans drafted to military service!

 

[Jon K]

Lol what im confussed , Russian army is supposed too go from 29 divisions too 24 brigades???

From 17 SSN's they should go too 6? Whats wrong with Akula? They have a much longer life span and most were updated not long ago..
CV is not a waiste of money , it projects power.

Air force estimations are quite good but you several times reduced the army and navy yet Russian economy will be much greater at that time , makes no sense at all for me..

Current Russian Armed Forces are almost entirely based on stuff made during Soviet era, and buying replacement equipment has been going on only very slowly. The most optimistic GDP predictions for 2020 predict a GDP of current combined French-UK-Italian GDP, not half of the US economy. Even the French, UK and Italian armed forces are mostly equipped with cold war leftovers.

And yes, CV is a waste of money unless the goal is to use it as a status symbol, not a tool of war, as with future UK CVF buy. To use carrier as a tool of war one also needs a massive number of escorts and supply ships, and escort for those supply ships too.

 

[Jon K]

Population decline is getting so much better if you would have any information or educated yourself prior you would know that birth rate is rising.
From 8.7 births per 1,000 people in 2000, Russia has gone to 10.4 in 2004
Germany had 8.3 births and UK had 10.8.
They are also working too increase it and stop the decline in population , and soon that will be history.

And they will have economy half size of the US.

The problem with Russian population isn't the lack of birth rate, but gargantuous death rate combined with lack of immigration. To have economy "half of the size of US" in 2020 Russia should have something like 30% more GDP per capita. Besides, the increase of birth rates is a very short time phenomena, as birth rates in 2004 are impacted by compartively large age cohorts of late 70's. The rock bottom will be somewhere during 2020, when age cohorts of early 1990's are in child bearing age.

 

[Chrom]

The problem with Russian population isn't the lack of birth rate, but gargantuous death rate combined with lack of immigration. To have economy "half of the size of US" in 2020 Russia should have something like 30% more GDP per capita. Besides, the increase of birth rates is a very short time phenomena, as birth rates in 2004 are impacted by compartively large age cohorts of late 70's. The rock bottom will be somewhere during 2020, when age cohorts of early 1990's are in child bearing age.

Even disregarding changes in birth rate, high death rate is not always bad for economic. Less renters -> less strain on economic, however unhumanly it sounds.

 

[Jon K]

Even disregarding changes in birth rate, high death rate is not always bad for economic. Less renters -> less strain on economic, however unhumanly it sounds.

That's true, but with average male death at age of 58 I would suppose that their last living years have not been very productive. In Scandinavian countries at least, retirement takes place when one is 60-70 years old, and usually those last years at work are the most productive ones as the oldest persons usually are the most skilled and experienced.

But taking these economic arguments aside, I think Russian armed forces are heading for great contraction, how big it will be depends on how much they will appreciate quality over quantity. The biggest problem in any Russian modernisation will be the poor quality of their tactical communications equipment. I don't know how good Chinese and Indian equipment is in that sector, maybe they can buy comms equipment from China and India.

 

[Grandstrat]

Even disregarding changes in birth rate, high death rate is not always bad for economic. Less renters -> less strain on economic, however unhumanly it sounds.

Economics is not that simple, it depends who dies and where, what age and gender. This article in The Economist is interesting on this topic (can't post url's yet so posted the story id):

story_id=9545933

Basically a shrinking population means shortages of labour. This pushes up prices and decreases output. Ecomomies with shrinking populations have big problems to address. In the west the problem is less births and an ageing population, however what is interesting about Russia is that it is the death rate that is the main problem, people aren't really living longer.

 

[swerve]

...
And they will have economy half size of the US.

For Russia to have an economy half the size of the current US economy will take until about 2030 at current growth rates. That would require a new economic growth model, since the current resource-based growth model won't stretch that far.

Doesn't seem likely to me.

Of course, the US economy will have grown by then.

 

[Grand Danois]

Growth is measured in domestic currency. Recalculated at PPP would be slower, but not so much slower that it would make the use of PPP GDP & domestic currency constant price growth less suitable for the comparison than the use of exchange-rate-converted GDP & domestic currency constant price growth.

If you use exchange-rate-converted GDP, you should use predicted nominal growth rates for both countries, i.e. allow for price convergence.

Thanks for the correction. It seems my error tainted my conclusion. The above reply also answered another question/point of clarification.

 

[Ths]

Well, let's get a few things straight:

After the cold war NAto expanded with new members, new territories and new ports. Nato has gained the strategic depth i so sorely needed during the cold war. This means that the Russian attackplan must be substantially different in all aspects:
Russian cannot roll over Western Europe in anywhere near the 72 hours some of their plans suggested during the cold war. The Russian will be facing a broader front, which makes it difficult to cover all opportunities for a counterattack. The new Nato position will give the alliance adequadete time to reinforce Europe - this leaves the Russian Navy with a less crucial role.
Talking of the Russian Navy: It remains very much in doubt, if the fleets will ever be able to leave port - not only the condition of the rustbucket is the issue, but an effective Nato blockade is more than likely.
The question is also if the strategic bomber will have ANY chance of surviving untill the time for weapons launch comes.
As for tactical air: The new generation of F-22/F-35 will be difficult to contend with.
This leaves the ICBM's as the only viable threat; but these missiles are pinpoint located and with PGM against them, they need to get flying VERY quickly.

To be quite honest: I don't really think even Putin is contemplating a return to the bad old days. Putins agenda is domestic: The russian armed forces are much better suited to lean on internal dissent with conventional weapons, as the USA is known to frown on the promicious use of WMD.

The Russian wealth - at the moment - is due to reasonably high oil-prices. These in turn are due to the economic fracas the USA is active in against China. When China collapses the oilprices can be lowered to a much more comfortable level.
As will be evident: I do not foresee the same splendid economic future for China as other observer do: This is due to mainly two factors:

1. China has dumped their lowpriced goods in the West with an underrated currency. Up to now, it has not been possible to persuade the Chinese leadership to progress to volume II of the textbook in Capitalistic Economics. Thye must feel it the hard way: Either they upgrade their currency - and loose their exports and ruin themselves because their dollar assets are worth ziltch - or - they continue with their fantasy and continue to pay dearly for their raw materials and get nothing but a big smile for their goods.

2. China has not a build up a domestic market than can take over as demand, when the exports fail.

 

[jennery587]

Thats not true. They have 140 million and shrinking population. We (U.S.A.) have over 300 million and growing rapidly.

To support an army with half the stregnth of ours, they would have to have an economy half the size of ours. That, they will never have.

DONT FORGET UKRAIN,BELARUS,KAZACSTAN IF THEY UNITED WITH RUSSIA AGAIN

 

[nevidimka]

I'll paste from another thread that i crated n was closed due to similarity to this topic.

>>
With Russia increasingly asserting itself politically,militarily, and growing economic prowess. I'm starting to wonder if the West which broke up the former Soviet Union will be the reason for the emergence of a New Soviet Union?
In my opinion to achieve this new state, Russia will need to form a union with mainly 3 other state, that is Ukraine,Belarus n Kazakstan. Russian is very much close to this 3 states. there was already efforts of forming a union with Belarus. Ukraine has a sizeable russian population who preferes to associate with Russia and Kazakstan has very good relations with Russia. These 3 states have strategic importance to Russia.

With Russia growing economically and being the no 1 world energy producer, it wil surely grow faster n eclips these 3 other states, which would appeal to these 3 others to join up with Russia. Plus Russia binds all of the CIS states with trade n is thier main energy provider. West Europe or America can not claim so.

Plus to form a global wide reach, Russia will have to ressurrect old allies. A strengthtening of connections with Vietnam,Venezuela, India, China n Cuba will help them to gain foothold in those parts of the world. A military installation (ABM) in Venezuela n Cuba will surely put America's ABM back in check.

btw when i checked the internet domain .su is has been reserved for russia.

p/s You would think the city below looks like somewhere in west europe..but wait a minute.. its modernising Moscow!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...-city_plan.JPG <<

 

[nevidimka]

Also i belive you guys have not counted for Russia economy divesifying. Crently they are actively buying up business/market properties in western Europe. They dont seem to want to depend solely on thier energy exports.

 

[Firehorse]

Don't hold your breath about Russia, Ukraine (Population growth rate:
-0.675% (2007 est. ) & Kazakstan (Population growth rate only:
0.352% (2007 est.) becoming one. Ukraine will sooner break up than rejoin Russia- only Eastern & Southern parts are Russified (Russian speaking and ethnicaly mixed). Those 17% of ethnic Russians are out of total Population:
46,299,862 are only 7,870,976 - how many of those are military age and fit for duty? Kazakstan (Population:
15,284,929) ethnic Russian 30%-i.e. only 4,585,478- again, how many of those are military age and fit for duty? It will have more to gain as an independent middleman between Russia & China. So, these numbers tell me that, even if they were to make a strong union, that won't put a dent in the military manning problems in the long term. Russia is on its own.

 

[swerve]

Also i belive you guys have not counted for Russia economy divesifying. Crently they are actively buying up business/market properties in western Europe. They dont seem to want to depend solely on thier energy exports.

Owning firms abroad does not make a country more able to sustain a war with the countries in which its citizens own property. Russians buying chalets in Courchevel (I've met some of 'em there) does not bring any benefit to the economy of Russia.

 

[Ths]

I've noticed the Russian flight of capital into Europe - through Iceland - with amusement. From my perspective it is one huge money laundering operation. And they will suffer losses - big time - in the coming crunch.

 

[Manfred2]

The USSR was the world's last Colonial Empire. It was built at the point of a gun, and that is the only way it can be re-built.

I have to wonder- why is the newest version of Russia doing everything the same old way?
Why do the people seem so eager to trade freedom away for security?
Why are they so fascinated with a military that has such a lousey record?
Why dont they build thier own nation up into a place where people would actualy prefer to live in, before forming alliances and going on all sorts of hare-brained expansionist adventures...

... the world wonders.

 

[KGB]

have to wonder- why is the newest version of Russia doing everything the same old way?
Why do the people seem so eager to trade freedom away for security?
Why are they so fascinated with a military that has such a lousey record?
Why dont they build thier own nation up into a place where people would actualy prefer to live in, before forming alliances and going on all sorts of hare-brained expansionist adventures...

That's why they have/ had empires, instead of being part of them. Also, I recall reading somewhere that despite difficult conditions at home, expat Russians are pronouncedly prone to homesickness. Of course foreign cultures are more fascinating and less threatening when you live far away from them. I'd bet that south east asian cultures, especially vietnam, thailand, etc, have similar misgivings about another, more proxiamal resurgent old imperial power.

 

[Stryker001]

Russia

Russia is on its own.

Just the way they like it.Russia has other methods in place to influence geo-political matters.

Any isolation of Russia from the world community or aggressive action is ill-advised.

 

[f-22fan12]

DONT FORGET UKRAIN,BELARUS,KAZACSTAN IF THEY UNITED WITH RUSSIA AGAIN

Don't be absurd. The Soviet Union has collapsed and is now a part of history.