America's armed forces have embarked upon programs which aim to fundamentally transform the U.S. military to face the new challenges of the 21st century, where previously common cross-border warfare is being superceded by internal wars, peacekeeping missions, and anti-terrorist efforts. America's closest allies, Great Britain, France, and Germany among them, are reorienting their forces to face some of the same challenges. Yet the Russian Federation, since Sept. 11 a closer partner for the U.S. than ever before, is facing totally different military development challenges and is steering a different path. Why is Russia in this different situation, and what measures are underway to reform its armed forces?

 
The Early 1990s: Reform Mired in Efforts to Preserve the Past

Russia's armed forces were formed, with great difficulty, from the portions of the Soviet Armed Forces located on Russian soil when the Soviet Union dissolved. At first there were attempts to preserve the former Soviet Army's unified ground and tactical air forces, but as Ukraine and other former Soviet republics moved toward the creation of their own armies, Russia had no choice but to do the same. In May 1992, a Russian Ministry of Defense was created from the old Soviet Ministry, and a law was signed upon creation of Russian armed forces. Former Soviet armed forces were the last remnant of the mass industrial mobilization army system, with successive layers of readiness each comprising large numbers of divisions. The first published estimates of the Russian Ground Forces in 1992 listed 103 divisions in widely varying states of readiness.¹   The first defense minister of independent Russia, Gen. Pavel Grachev, wished to preserve a Soviet-style army, retaining as much of the Soviet system as possible. Thus the reform plan that was published by the ex-Soviet, now Russian, General Staff in 1992 was a hasty construct to satisfy the public demand for radical changes. Its centerpiece was to be a new service, the Mobile Forces, based upon Grachev's old service, the Airborne Forces. Thereafter, the General Staff became a bastion of military conservatism, which would eventually result in problems. Little actually happened: the only real action was a steady trickle of division disbandments; even Grachev realized that he could not sustain the force at its Soviet levels.

Army Gen. Igor Rodionov replaced Grachev as defense minister after the disastrous first Chechen war, where hastily formed composite regiments drawn from the undermanned divisions and aided by other individual replacements proved inadequate for the challenges they faced. The first Chechen war was a disaster for the Russian military, as it suffered more than 6,000 casualties before their withdrawal in 1996 without restoring central government control over the breakaway republic.²  Grachev survived as long as he did due to his loyalty to President Boris Yeltsin; apart from that, his lack of competence left little to recommend him.³  

However, Rodionov only lasted 11 months as defense minister. He did have ideas for reforming the armed forces, but thought that the general outlook of the Cold War ought to remain; Russia had been, and would continue to be, an adversary of the West, and the threat perception and budget levels should be designed accordingly.⁴  Over the course of his tenure as defense minister, he changed his mind over whether the Armed Forces should be restructured to Russia's new circumstances, or whether Russia should continue in the Soviet style, placing the military above social and economic needs. At the start of his term, Rodionov appeared to be convinced of fitting the Army to the state; eventually he was dismissed because he would not foreswear fitting the state to the Army. His attitude appeared in comments such as: "it is… impermissible to solve society's...problems at the cost of lowering the state's main attribute, the army."⁵  

Rodionov was eventually dismissed both because of this attitude and because he refused to subordinate the Ministry to civilian control.⁶  He had a major dispute with Yury Baturin, secretary of the Defense Council, over whether reform (specifically, unit disbandments without proper compensation to redundant personnel), was possible within the available budgetary resources. Rodionov insisted it was not, and much more money would have to be spent; Baturin argued that the military would have to make do with the spending levels at the time, when increases were fiscally impossible. Neither man was willing to back down, and reform was stagnant. Consequently, Yeltsin fired Rodionov.⁷  A further factor that worked against Rodionov was his close links with the Russian Communist Party, of which Yeltsin disapproved.

Following the dismissal of Rodionov, Strategic Missile Forces Chief Gen. Igor Sergeyev (later promoted to Marshal) was then installed as defense minister. Under his direction armed forces reform finally moved past the trickle of unit disbandments. Sergeyev accepted reform within a limited budget under civilian political control, driven through the new Security Council, which had absorbed the Defense Council in March 1998.⁸  

 
Progress Since 1997

Once Sergeyev was installed as defense minister, some changes began to occur. The Air Defense Forces and Air Forces were amalgamated, and some readiness improvements among Ground Forces formations were evident in the second Chechen war, starting in 1999. The number of military educational establishments was reduced markedly from their previous levels, which had not changed since Soviet times. A number of army divisions were given "permanent readiness" status, which was supposed to bring them up to 80 percent manning and 100 percent equipment holdings. Sergeyev announced in August 1998 that there would be six divisions and four brigades on 24 hour alert by the end of that year. However, personnel quality — even in these favored units — continued to be a problem. Lack of fuel for training and a shortage of well-trained junior officers hamper combat effectiveness. Numbers of formations continued to fall slowly, and the Siberian and Trans-Baikal Military Districts were amalgamated. The Volga and Urals military districts were also merged in a lengthy process that concluded on Sept.1, 2001. However, the former Volga Military District headquarters was re-designated as the headquarters of the 2nd Army, so no units were actually disbanded.

Sergeyev directed most of his efforts toward promoting the interests of his own service, the Strategic Rocket Forces. All military space forces were absorbed into the Strategic Rocket Forces, and the Ground Forces Headquarters was abolished. The Airborne Forces suffered some reductions, while the Naval Infantry only escaped due to their competent performance in Chechnya. Much of the available procurement monies were invested in acquiring new Topol-M ballistic missiles, 24 of which are now in service.⁹  This emphasis on strategic force made sense as a nuclear shield to protect Russia while the conventional forces were rebuilt. Yet in his efforts to build up his former service while chipping away at others, Sergeyev went too far in some respects. Following his replacement in late March 2001 by former secretary of the Security Council and Putin's KGB colleague Sergei Ivanov, two of his most major actions were reversed.

The circumstances of Sergeyev's dismissal illustrate some of the continuing disagreements over military policy that has hampered reform in Russia during the 1990s. Chief of the General Staff Anatoly Kvashnin, a career Ground Forces officer, and Sergeyev had an increasingly open confrontation over the priorities of the various services. In July 2000, Kvashnin suggested merging the Strategic Rocket Forces with the Air Force or disbanding them altogether, while Sergeyev bitterly resisted the idea.¹⁰  A Security Council meeting in August 2001 appeared to produce a resolution of sorts to the dispute, with Kvashnin's proposals to reduce the Strategic Rocket Forces mostly accepted.¹¹  The number of operational nuclear warheads will be allowed to drop to 1,500 as the missiles reach the end of their operational life. (This in contrast to the 1,700-2,200 Russian warheads allowed by the U.S.-Russian Treaty of Moscow, adopted in May 2002.) The Strategic Rocket Forces will gradually become part of the Air Force by 2006, and the funds made available will go to conventional forces. Despite this major setback, Sergeyev remained in office for another seven months, until relieved by Sergei Ivanov in March 2001.

Ivanov's arrival did herald some major steps forward, though they were accompanied by reversals of two earlier organizational changes. Ivanov was widely expected to be more effective in his efforts to reform the armed forces, given his close links to Putin and to the great support he could expect from the president. After his arrival, there were major reductions in the ill-balanced Far Eastern forces, and portentously, the commencement of a trial program to test fully professional manning, concentrating on one Airborne Division. The Ground Forces Headquarters (GFHQ) and the Space Forces were re-established. The re-establishment of GFHQ was an especially important move. The Ground Forces are the most important service for Russia today, faced with numerous small conflicts around its borders. However, with the 1998 GFHQ disbandment, its prestige declined and many sorely needed officers resigned. Its revival is the right move for the service, which will be Russia's most important for the foreseeable future. A further significant change is the appointment of an outsider to scrutinize defense finances. Lyubov Kudelina was appointed as a deputy defense minister and chief of budget and finance, the first woman to be appointed to head a major branch within the Defense Ministry. Arriving from the Finance Ministry, she was expected to impose some order on the near-chaotic financial situation of the Defense Ministry.

A professional manning trial has been the other major innovation of Ivanov's tenure. Professionalizing the military has been a continuing subject of discussion throughout the 1990s, and contract servicemen were taken on beginning in 1992. However, the quality of "professional" servicemen has mostly lagged below that of the conscripts, as pay and conditions have been extremely poor. Before the 1996 elections, Yeltsin pledged to end conscription by 2000, which was widely seen as impossible. Due in part to lobbying by the Union of Right Forces (SPS) party, Ivanov announced in March that the 76th Airborne Division, based in Pskov south of St. Petersburg, was to transition to a professional basis by the middle of 2003.¹²  The entrenched, traditional-thinking General Staff is not a supporter of a professional force, as it remains convinced that the current mass mobilization system is superior. To try to defend the current system, the General Staff has raised the cost estimates to a level of 1 billion rubles ($30 million) in an effort to prove that such a conversion is too expensive. The few reformist thinkers within the General Staff are not influential enough to move reform along — it will have to be imposed from above.

In summary, the Russian military has spent the past decade watching the old Soviet structure decay to the point of virtual ineffectiveness and near collapse. The old Soviet system is totally inadequate for current Russian needs, yet no comprehensive armed forces reform program has been put in place due to lack of funds and disagreements over the right shape for the future military. While Western forces are transforming to meet future challenges, the Russian armed forces have still not fully recovered from the collapse of the Soviet Union, and are having severe difficulties carrying out their present duties. Officers and soldiers alike are poorly paid, brutal hazing is common, and the armed forces are not respected as a profession. Questionable official policy based on former defense ministers' affection for their old services have not helped progress. Combat readiness has improved slowly, but no comprehensive plan has been unveiled which would change the army into a competent, effective force. It remains to be seen whether Ivanov's appointment and the efforts of the Union of Right Forces will succeed and allow the Russian Army to become a fully professional, combat-capable force.

Sources:

¹  International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 1992-93, p.97

²  Army troops suffered 1,568 dead and 4,719 wounded from Dec.11, 1994, to Dec.1, 1995. Committee of Soldiers' Mothers figures cited in CW Blandy, "Chechnya: Two Federal Interventions - An Interim Comparison and Assessment", Conflict Studies Research Centre, RMA Sandhurst, 2000, p.21

³  C.J. Dick, Russian Military Reform: Status and Prospects, paper C100, CSRC, June 1998, p.3

⁴  Alexei G. Arbatov, Military Reform in Russia: Dilemmas, Obstacles, and Prospects, International Security, Vol. 22, No.4, Spring 1998, p.113

⁵  Trud, 11 February 1997, in Dov Lynch, Manoeuvring with the Military, The World Today, November 1997, p.276.

⁶  Dov Lynch, Russian Peacekeeping Strategies towards the CIS, 1999, p.10

⁷  Stuart Goldman, Russian Conventional Armed Forces, CRS Report 97-820F, 1997, p.40-1

⁸  Dov Lynch, Manoeuvring with the Military, The World Today, November 1997, p.276.

⁹  International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 2001-02, Oxford University Press, p.112

¹⁰  Alexander Shaburkin, Vreyma MN, July 15, 2000, via www.wps.ru/digest/defence.html

¹¹  'Kommersant', Moscow, 12 August 2000, relayed by BBC World Service monitoring.

¹²  Jon Boyle, "Elite Troops are Reform Guinea Pigs", Reuters via Moscow Times, March 6, 2002.

Colin Robinson CDI Research Analyst crobinson@cdi.org

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