Posted on 08/25/2022 7:23:58 AM PDT by DUMBGRUNT
Thursday to increase the size of Russia's armed forces from 1.9 million to 2.04 million as the war in Ukraine enters its seventh month.
The last time Putin fixed the size of the Russian army was in November 2017, when the number of combat personnel was set at 1.01 million from a total armed forces headcount, including non-combatants, of 1.9 million.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
“ Putin will expand his military to avoid the many unemployed.”
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Well, even though many munition factories are highly automated I expect there’s a lot of overtime being worked in that Russian industry.
How many volunteers? These young folks are not stupid. They should run to Georgia and look for a country that would take them in. I’m sure Germany would take them over all the muslims they’ve been importing. We should openly encourage it.
Putin’s catostrophic mistake invading Ukraine has severely hurt the Russian nation and has created strategic difficulties that will plague Russia for decades. This invasion has shown that the conventional Russian military is not the juggernaut that the world once feared and respected. The West now knows that Russia could never successfully invade any any territory protected by NATO. More omniously the Chinese now know that Russia cannot conventionally defend its rich underpopulated Asian Pacific territories and the treasure house of Siberia. Comrade Xi and Chinese generals must be wondering if seizing these prizes is preferable to risking an invasion of Taiwan over 90 miles of open ocean. Russia would be much smaller without its nuclear weapons.
Putin should also sign a decree that Russia has won the war against Ukraine.
Problem solved.
That's one aspect.
In the USA, WWII put the country back to work, but that wasn't the purpose.
Not taking sides just observing history. Fully mobilzed, the Neo Red Army could reach 10-15 million. Which is what Putin needs to do if he is serious about winning.
With grade schoolers and pensioners.....maybe
Wiki
There is no reason why Putin couldn't field an army of 5 million OR MORE.
“During the Great Patriotic War, the Red Army conscripted 29,574,900 men in addition to the 4,826,907 in service at the beginning of the war”.
The population decline during the war years themselves was more drastic, from almost 200,000,000 on July 1, 1941...
And the prime age groups are much smaller.
Today ~144 million
That said, how will Putin pay for his expanded army?
Even today conscription is massively unpopular.
And Russian conscripts can NOT be sent into combat unless war is declared, it is a ‘special military operation’!
That said it appears that many conscripts’ records have become lost and are accidentally sent into combat.
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russian-federation/1959-07-01/soviet-population-today
If Russia starts moving a massive force toward NATO then NATO would have to mobilize and go on a full war footing.
That is where Russia had things when Putin was just a Lt. Colonel.
Russia has reversed that to a 1 attacker to 3 defender ratio, and is doing quite well.
You might want to cogitate on that for a little while.
Bring in the Mongols.
It was a lot easier to crank out simple prop driven fighters and t34s than it its t90s and SU27s.
There are many reasons. The population then was over 200 million and most people were young. Today Russia has 140 million (maybe) and most are old. Russia only has about 5 million draftable age men right now. And those men have instant global communication and relative ease of global movement.
More HIV positive alcoholic conscripts from Siberia.
—”Comrade Xi and Chinese generals must be wondering if seizing these prizes is preferable to risking an invasion of Taiwan over 90 miles of open ocean.”
In an article on the China-Russia border, they called it a ‘suitcase’ invasion.
President Xi is smiling!
He gets a large discount on energy purchased and more from Russia. And he knows it is unlikely for any unseemly action on the territory the Russians stole from China.
Hungry Russians will sell it cheaply as they are starving.
Most likely the Russian federation will collapse as the sugar daddy goes broke. Why pay tribute for nothing in return from a toothless tiger?
—”Putin should also sign a decree that Russia has won the war against Ukraine.
Problem solved.”
HEAR! HEAR!
IMO equally likely, Ukraine overplays its hand.
I hope not.
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