the current state of the russian military
Renowl
thru force.
Posted on Fri, Mar. 05, 2004
Russian military withering, violent without training, support
By Mark McDonald
Knight Ridder Newspapers
MOSCOW - With sky-high popularity ratings virtually assuring his re-election on
March 14, there seemed to be little need for Russian President Vladimir Putin
to stage a dramatic campaign stunt.
But there he was, all dressed up like a naval officer, standing on the swaying
deck of a nuclear submarine in the frigid Barents Sea, ready to witness the
firing of a Russian ballistic missile.
And things were about to go terribly wrong.
Putin has made the modernization of the Russian military one of the three main
priorities of his administration, along with alleviating poverty and doubling
the size of the nation's economy. But military reforms have stalled, and the
armed forces, once the only rival to America's, have become a national
embarrassment.
Gen. Anatoly Kvashnin, the chief of the general staff, has called the situation
"beyond critical."
Soldiers and officers are so demoralized and poorly paid that they often hold
other jobs or resort to extortion, corruption or theft. Chechen guerrillas
hiding in the mountains have more sophisticated Russian-made weapons than the
Russian forces they're fighting. The army can't afford the new T-95 tank, even
though it's made by Russian contractors. The navy hasn't commissioned a new
submarine in a dozen years.
Putin promised last week to unveil a new generation of long-range weapons, even
though the government is already two months behind on payments to weapons
manufacturers. The balance due is a reported $600 million.
Every branch of the military is in dire straits.
The remnants of the Soviet Navy rarely venture into blue water any more; most
of the submarine fleet sits rusting in berths. The tragic sinking of the
nuclear submarine Kursk in August 2002 cost 118 lives, and nine more sailors
were lost in the fall when another nuclear sub, the K-159, sank while being
towed to a scrap yard.
There's so little housing for naval officers' families that wives and children
are forced to live in old, dry-docked submarines. Alcoholism and drug abuse are
so rampant that the navy has asked for U.S. assistance in providing
sobriety-testing kits.
"The navy is dying," said Adm. Eduard Baltin, the former commander of the
Northern Fleet's nuclear submarines. "We already hear that there will soon be
no oceangoing navy and that our coasts will be guarded by the (fast, lightly
armed) so-called corvettes."
In the Air Force, pilots get barely a 10th of the necessary training time in
the air, only a handful of hours per year, because of a lack of money for jet
fuel. Six weeks ago, an air force general forgot to lower his landing gear and
slid his MiG fighter across an airstrip in Rostov. Russia's fleet of Blackjack
long-range bombers was grounded for three months after one of them crashed last
fall.
The million-man army is blighted with alcohol abuse, defections, suicides and
hazing so brutal that it amounts to ritualized torture. Even grizzled senior
officers were alarmed last spring when a member of the elite Kremlin Regiment
was found in a toilet - inside the Kremlin - with his wrists slashed. He
reportedly had been badly beaten, apparently by his fellow soldiers.
Dozens of young soldiers were hospitalized in January when their unit was
forced to stand outside at attention all day in freezing weather. The soldiers
were being disciplined because two members of their unit had deserted. In the
latest incident, on Wednesday, a Russian soldier serving in Chechnya shot and
killed three fellow troopers.
"Look, we need a completely new army," said Andrei Kokoshin, a member of
parliament and a former deputy minister of defense.
The army is about to begin its annual conscription drive. Forty percent of last
year's recruits were high school dropouts, 7 percent were felons and only 30
percent were physically fit enough to undergo any field training. The rate of
HIV infection among recruits is 27 times higher than it was five years ago.
"They come in drunk and disorderly, and there are no professional sergeants to
train them or discipline them," said Pavel Felgenhauer, a military analyst in
Moscow.
Against this backdrop, Putin ordered "Security 2004," Russia's largest set of
war games in 20 years, as a display of Soviet-era nuclear force.
Kremlin campaign managers hoped the missile launch would showcase Putin as a
can-do commander-in-chief delivering on his promises to streamline and
modernize the military.
Putin waited and waited on the deck of the submarine Arkhangelsk, but the
missile was never fired.
The following day, Feb. 18, Putin tried again, this time dressed up as an
officer in the Strategic Rocket Forces. An RSM-54 missile was launched, but it
soon veered wildly off course and self-destructed after 98 seconds.
Not exactly the kind of campaign footage the Kremlin had in mind. Earlier this
week an embarrassed Putin ordered investigations into what he tersely called
the "shortcomings."
Congenital Kano
"Renowl" <ren...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20040308040351...@mb-m16.aol.com...
> you can criticize the old ussr system but they did accomplish some stuff
> thru force.
Whaaaaaaa?
Mussolini made the trains run on time. Imelda Marcos cleaned up Manila.
You are the guy who opposes the use of force. Here you have a system that
systematically and intentionally starved millions to death under Stalin, who
sentenced dissidents (i.e., poets, musicians, scientists, writers) to hard
labor in gulags, who killed opposition leaders and stamped out religion.
They enslaved entire countries, splitting families apart.
But they accomplished some stuff with force.
You don't want the US to remove Saddam by force after he invaded two
neighbors, financially and logistically supported terrorism, gassed his own
people and defied the UN. But the USSR gets a thumbs up because they
accomplished some stuff with force.
Sheesh!
Connect the dots Pig
Renowl
Soviet system transformed Russia in 1917 from a backwards country into a
superpower, with massive human costs
Shared superpower status with the USA for 45 years
Did make drastic improvements in the daily lives of citizens, famine and food
shortages
Became a developed nation - had education, medical services, life expectancy,
etc..
before that they were really backward monarchial.
Congenital Kano
> to be fair,the ussr accomlishments included;;
>
> Soviet system transformed Russia in 1917 from a backwards country into a
> superpower, with massive human costs
They stole just about everything that made them a superpower, including
missile technology, nuclear technology, automobile technology and computer
technology. When American astronauts first were allowed access to Soviet
capsules they could not believ how primitive they were. The Soviets had to
develop land re-entries because they lacked the technology to locate and
rescue in the oceans; someone who landed on land could survive the days or
weeks until they located him.
> Shared superpower status with the USA for 45 years
In large part because the US did not confront them. When Reagan did, they
folded like an empty sack. Their economy was a shambles, they could not
provide the basics to the people, their military only were successful in
uncontested actions, their military hardware was shoddy compared to the
American products (American armor has repeatedly beaten the best Soviet
armor manned by crews trained by the Soviets). When the US got hold of a
MiG-25 in 1976 it was considered an intelligence coup because the MiG-25 was
fabled as the most advanced combat plane in the world. We discovered it was
crudely built and incapable of dog-fighting effectively with older American
interceptors.
> Did make drastic improvements in the daily lives of citizens, famine and
> food shortages
Are you claiming that they made improvements in the daily lives of their
citizens, or that they had famine and food shortages? How were their lives
improved? You are right about the famine and food shortages -- there were
shortages of everything outside Politburo members, successful athletes and
scientists. The common people lived drab, desolate, deprived existences,
turning to alcohol like no other modern people. One of our earliest views
of the horrible life under Communism was when the Berlin Wall came down and
Germany was reunited. The same hard working, disciplined and intelligent
Germans in East Germany were an instant drain on the prosperous West
Germany. Many in Germany today still resent the drain taking on their
Eastern brethren caused; I don't believe the east has risen to the economic
level of the west even to this day.
> Became a developed nation - had education, medical services, life
expectancy,
> etc..
Really? As compared to what? Sub-Saharan Africa?
"While West German old-age mortality decreased since the mid 1970s,
comparable decreases in East Germany did not become evident until the late
1980s. However, the East German mortality decline accelerated after
reunification in 1990, particularly among women."
http://www.demogr.mpg.de/general/structure/division1/lab-sl/93.htm
"Yevgeny Andreyev, a demography expert with the Institute of National
Economic Forecasting in Moscow, says that average life-expectancy fell
steadily between 1965 and 1980..."
http://www.cdi.org/russia/johnson/7023-14.cfm
Today, life expectancy in Russia is 10 years less than in the US.
From the Communist Worker's World in 1991:
"The end result is that the U.S. is now sending military planes with food
and medicine to the Soviet Union. What a humiliation."
> before that they were really backward monarchial.
Yup, you know as much about the Soviet Union as you do about the other
things you write about...
Solzhenitsyn Pig
Renowl
resurgence. maybe they think that autoritarians can accomplish more
compared to endless debates.
Renowl
but people vote for polis like erap and now maybe fpj. there is talk that
maybe what the pinas need is more autoritarianism so there will be less hand
wringing and paralizing debate and red tape.
Congenital Kano
> today people like putin who are autoritarian in style are having a
> resurgence. maybe they think that autoritarians can accomplish more
> compared to endless debates.
OK. So I gather you retract your glowing endorsement of the Soviet system?
Jes' checking Pig
Putin on the Ritz
Renowl
strides which you call theft thru the use of forced cooperation. maybe
sometimes some societies need to act collectively like ants to accomplish
something. since when they act as individuals they end up bickering and not
accomplishing much .
just an observation
Congenital Kano
True. Just look how little acting as individuals and bickering has allowed
the US to accomplish. When you contrast that to the wonders achieved under
the Soviet system, you have to mourn the passing of Stalin's experiment in
progress.
*Think* before you write, Rennie! You can only whip and starve so much
creativity out of people. I know; I've certainly tried this for years; the
only reason I stick with it is because it is so much fun. Having them
create based upon freedom and opportunity is much more successful. Like
oppression, anarchy does not promote creativity, but freedom and safety do.
Appreciate what you have, and the system you are blessed to live under.
Don't lionize failed systems just because they are different.
Capitalistic Pig
Renowl
splitting hairs and politicos are stuck by parliamentary delaying tactics.
poor people cant get elected bacause they dont have the money to get nationwide
name recognition. democracy smokascy. bah. hambug.
Congenital Kano
Sooo... that invites a paen of praise for the Soviet system?
Here's an idea. Go to the library. Get a book. Any book. Preferably one
without pictures. Read it all the way through. Then talk about it.
This is the basis of "informed discussion." It will be liberating to your
spirit.
Edycashun is in me bones Pig
Renowl
idea or system. better to mix and use whatever works in the philippine
setting. if a little lee kuan yew style authoritarian style can work use it .
if more socialistic programs work use it. if filipinos prefer to work using
collectivism methods. go for it. mix it all up if need be. just dont use the
same old tired and broken down system we are using now