Posted on 08/16/2008 9:42:43 AM PDT by maclay
Russia’s Army may soon have more money at its disposal, after an analysis of the military campaign in South Ossetia and Georgia. As the Vedomosti newspaper reports (Rus), Russia’s Ministry of Finance has delayed presenting the country’s financial plan through 2023, in connection with new requests from the security agencies for additional allocations.
In the words of a Defense Ministry employee, the current budget requests were prepared before the war in South Ossetia, and now need to be amended.
Combat has apparently shown some deficiencies in the Russian armed forces, with military officials saying their forces had inferior equipment to that used by Georgian troops.
The military leadership also plans to equip Russian combat vehicles with night vision instruments, tactical communications equipment and reconnaissance assets, including unmanned drones.
Reports said that 74 Russian soldiers lost their lives in the war, and 171 were injured.
At a Wednesday briefing, Anatoly Nogovitsyn, the Deputy Head of the Russian General Staff, acknowledged that four Russian planes had been downed in the conflict. Calling this a serious problem, the Colonel-General said that the Georgian Air Defense, which was trained by Ukrainian specialists, posed a major threat to the Russian Air Force. Ukrainian experts were familiar with Russian technology, Nogovitsyn said, which hadn’t changed significantly since the days of the Soviet Union. Nogovitsyn also acknowledged the difficulty of air reconnaissance in smoky conditions, and the low efficiency of Russian electronic warfare, which similarly remained unchanged since the collapse of the USSR.
According to Igor Korotchenko, a member Defense Ministry’s Public Council, outfitting Russia’s troops in the Caucasus with the proper equipment would cost at least 50 billion rubles.
If Russia plans on invading Ukraine, they will certainly need to spend a lot more money on their Armed forces...
Ukraine , Poland and the Baltic have to become a fortress impenetrable from ground or air. It is only a question of time when mad Vlad has another fit of lust for conquest.
No doubt Russia will upgrade its military, IF the oil money keeps rolling in at $100+ per barrel levels.
A few times, I’ve encountered an only partially tongue-in-cheek statement about: How Sheik Yamani Won the Cold War. Most credit Ronald Reagan with being the primary winner of the Cold War by creating arms programs the Soviets couldn’t financially compete with.
But as Saudi Oil Minister, for whatever reason, Sheik Yamani never allowed OPEC to manipulate supply to drive up the price of crude during the 1980s. Every time they tried, he opened the spigots in Saudi and stopped any big price spikes, and the price stayed down all during the eighties and beyond. In those days, the Saudis had an excess production capacity of 3 millions barrels per day or more, and could control the supply fluctuations just about singlehandedly.
So, whether or not it was intended, the Saudis denied the Soviets billions of additional dollars in oil revenue during the 1980s, the period leading up to their downfall. Otherwise, they might have had the money to compete with the US. That probably played some part, but who knows how great a part.
But, now, there is no doubt that the sky high price of crude is strengthening Russia and many other nations that don’t mean us well. And Russia will have much revenue to use for military modernization and other expansionists (again) goals.
The importance of the US becoming more energy independent, and producing enough domestically to keep international prices within reason, is even more apparent after the past few days. Yep, to deny some nations billions in accidental revenue, some of which will be put to trouble making purposes, is another reason to get serious about domestic energy production.
It is important for the average Russian to get the message that this escapade has been an international disaster for Russia, and a huge embarrassment to their nation, from which they will take years to recover.
Undoubtedly the owned Russian media is going to beat the patriotism drum over this, and try to portray it both as a huge success and an example of how many enemies Russia has, and how they are ganging up against Russia.
This twists the truth, in that even invading a little country like Georgia, Russia had a lot of casualties and has had its military exposed as undisciplined and unprofessional. Even with a planned sneak attack, its execution has been haphazard, their military accompanied by irregulars intent on pillage and rapine. While wearing Russian uniforms. Humiliating.
Far more seriously, this has exposed Russia not as a strong, responsible nation, but as an abusive and arrogant one—a bully and a shrimp.
The Russian media is correct that other nations are now banding up against Russia, but only because this bad behavior reminds them of the brutal stupidity of the Soviets. Before, Russia had good credit and credibility, but this action has shown them to still be nekulturniy—people who are stupid and crude.
As the Russian saying goes: “What did I do?, sh*t in the soup?”
Yes, they did. An embarrassment to their nation and their people.
The all-inclusive ‘soviet’ labeled KGB leaders have one lesson that they can teach our strategic thinkers and planners:
No matter how boneheaded the underlying motivations, whatever you are going to do in the realm of geopolitics, you do very quickly and decisively.
Present a structured, free modern society with a fait acompli and as long as it doesn't interrupt daily life for the vast majority of it's citizens, they will as a country, whine, bitch and complain randomly and deafeningly - and do nothing of substance to change the new geopolitical reality.
Do it fast and dirty and the resistance going forward will be minimal. Any other way and resistance will be significantly greater to the point most geopolitical goals with empire-building at their heart will be destined to failure.
An antimissile installation in Poland to protect us from a nuclear attack launched from the middle east has the approximate same emotional effect as Russia basing an antimissile installation in a newly independent Republic of Texas, to counter a possible nuclear missile strike from Canada.
Ukraine joining NATO will have the same effect as above, but with Florida and (our)Georgia thrown into a military alliance with Cuba and Venezuela.
These two moves, along with placing the Sec State on the ground in the middle of a new combat zone while our military does ‘humanitarian’ resupply is more than it seems. The response, or lack thereof, to the security bubbles that come with the Sec State and US military was the first test/confirmation that while the Russians are again doing the ‘Quick and Dirty’, they are doing it at far greater geopolitical expense than they previously thought, while seeming to barely be able to exert command and control protocols over their troops in theater.
All in all, not good for the Russians.
When asked what we should do, many people have voiced some version of, “...’em back to the stone ages”. And that's our emotional reaction the the aggression launched against a new democratically elected Republic. That thought will help you when you try to understand the mindset of the old line KGB infrastructure that runs Russia currently. Before that, they ran the USSR. Consider for a moment their losses.
What we have done is stop them in their tracks, and get the Ukraine and Poland to fall our way and exposed the Russians as not quite ready for Primetime.
I for one, can not think of a better time for us to write a Godfather-like ending to the Iranian Conundrum, using the tried and proven tactic of ‘Quick and Dirty’.
Unlike the Russians, as news stories in the coming weeks will expose ...
... we have the technology.
One problem with that, Russia will level Tbilisi if we make a move on Iran. Effectively the Middle game of the Russian Gambit (since we countered well) is to hold the Free People of Georgia hostage. The opening move of the Gambit was to sacrifice world prestige in an attempt to conquer Georgia. That Gambit turned out to be much more costly to Russia, because they stumbled on the board as you pointed out.
Donald Rumsfeld I believe, stated, “You go to war with the army you have, not the one you want.”
Irregulars in this case are nothing more than what we refer to as terrorist cells based in the indigenous populations of Ossetia and Abkazia, and the bordering areas of Russia itself. As we are seeing, exercising military comand and control over these cells is problematic. Russia is seeing this itself, and behind the scenes there is a fair amount of panic at the situation that is gone out of their direct control.
Our experience has taught us that when it is in our interests, we will arm, train, and point what we call resistance fighters at a mutual target. We don't dress them in our military colors and attach them to the command and control infrastructure and then expect them to act as regular military.
Just one example of some ‘boneheaded’ thinking on the Russians part.
Tbilisi might be subject to violence and looting but it will be relatively short-lived and random as opposed to tactical in nature. The Russians need to get some battlefield discipline exerted and soon or withdrawing from Georgia will not be their greatest concern.
The Chinese are somewhat miffed behind the scenes, having been used as cover like they were and are. There is a long term border conflict between the two in the northern China/ Siberia region - a border that is easily as long as ours with Mexico. There have been full military clashes between the two over the decades and a significant portion of the Russian military is based in that region. The Chinese are watching this Georgia situation with peeked interest as they view the Russian territory as resource rich and under the right circumstances, pluckable.
If the Russians stumble in a rather spectacular fashion, the Chinese will be taking notes.
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