[captain_dave]

Sounds like the problem we’re having here in the USA. The answer is to arm up enough to defend yourself but not enough to impoverish yourself, then focus on building up the economy to make yourself wealthy.

[MichaelCorleone]

Let’s bomb Moscow - NOW! Putin’s a bad guy. All Ruskies are bad!

What do you think, Rosie? Shall we do the deed on Easter Sunday?

[Alas Babylon!]

It argues that Russia must re-arm because it is “surrounded by enemies” who may attack at any moment” because “the threat of such action is growing.

This is just typical Russian paranoia.

I think a rational, non-participant just can't see it.

You could make a case for anything, but how is an imminent attack really probable?

Who would attack Russia?

--Finland? The Baltic states. LOL!
--Belarus? Ha!
--Poland. Just no.
--Slovakia? Hungary? Romania? Moldova? No, no, no.
--Turkey? Very remote possibility, but they do not have the power. Yet...
--NATO overall? I don't see it. NATO is a DEFENSIVE Pact, and the Europeans are too timid.
--The Ukraine? This one is possible but only because Russia has had forces in it killing Ukrainians and making a mess of their country the past several years. The Ukrainians started messing up their country years ago, and didn't need the Russians help, and the Russians are making things far worse. So you could say this is a very low-level fight Russia is already in but they can chose to end it immediately. So, still no.

Who's left?

--The Caucasus Republics? Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan? Come on, the Russians already taught the Georgians what war with them looks like!
--Iran? No, they're buddies, for now.
--The old Soviet Republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kirgizstan, etc.? They are all Muslim, after all. But still no. They aren't flaming fundamentalists and still respect and fear Russia.
--China? Some day, China will need the vast resources of Siberia but as Aragon said in Return of the King, today is NOT that day.
--North Korea. Yeah, right!
--Japan? Japan's aging population means she'll never be the aggressor again, unless we're talking sex robots with guns. But still, see Aragon's quote above.

That leaves the USA. WE. DON'T WANT WAR. Not with a big power. Things may someday spiral out of control, especially with new-found democrat Russia-hated, but once again, as Aragon said.

[PIF]

As someone noted elsewhere, Russia make some marvelous hardware, but the problems arise when they try to make more than one ...

[Mariner]

Whether this is accurate, or not, I highly doubt a blog writer is privy to the internal deliberations of the closed regime of Russia.

Certainly he does not know where Putin takes his counsel, if anywhere.