Actually they are not, and why remove the United States from NATO to try and make the point?
Russia’s rebuilding has helped them in a few elite units that suffice for things like invading Ukraine, but their main military is incredibly weak.
The Navy is weak, the air is weak, and the Army still depends mostly on poorly trained, poorly equipped, 1 year draftees, and the structure and equipment is not geared for attack on a massive scale and sustained attack with long supply lines.
Some think that the Army may actually be more like 250,000 men, this is not the massive 6.4 million pointed spear of the old 1980s Russian military, that was designed around 7 Airborne divisions, great numbers of Airmobile and bridge building units and the swift overrunning of Europe.
“According to the International Institute of Strategic Studies’ “Military Balance” publication — a widely-used and well-respected unclassified compendium of information about the world’s armed forces — in 1989, just before the collapse of the Warsaw Pact, the Soviet Union deployed a total of 64 divisions in what was then known as its “Western Theater of Military Operations.” These are the Russian forces that would have been hurled at NATO in an attack on Western Europe. They would have been reinforced by another 700,000 troops from the USSR’s three frontline Warsaw Pact allies, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. In all, more than 100 divisions would have been available for a drive into West Germany and beyond. The six countries committed to defending NATO’s front lines — West Germany, the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Belgium and the Netherlands — meanwhile deployed only 21 or so divisions in Germany. While NATO divisions were generally somewhat larger than their Warsaw Pact counterparts and reinforcement would have been forthcoming from the United States, the disparity along the East-West frontier was nonetheless huge.
Consider the situation today. East Germany no longer exists, while Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and every one of Russia’s other erstwhile Warsaw Pact partners are now members of NATO. So are Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, which in 1989 were parts of the Soviet Union itself. In 1989, the Red Army had almost a half-million troops and 27 maneuver divisions (plus enormous quantities of artillery and other units) on the territory of its three main allies. Today, it has a total of seven divisions in its entire Western Military District, all of which are based on its own territory. Indeed, the entire Russian army today boasts about 25 divisions, fewer than it had forward deployed in its Eastern European allies during the waning days of the Cold War.
Today, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Germany alone field more divisions than Russia has in its Western Military District. These countries are backstopped by the rest of NATO, including, of course, the United States. And this raw count doesn’t take into account the general deterioration of Russian forces since 1991, a quarter-century that saw little equipment modernization. By the late 1980s, NATO already enjoyed a significant qualitative advantage over the Warsaw Pact, and that edge has only increased since then.”
I dont dispute any of that.
My concern is that is fighting the last war. I would imagine that they are working on new tactics. I would ot put it behind them to use tactical, low yield nukes to intimidate and then move forward.
I would also think that cooperative agreements would work with Germany. Since the Russians are not commies anymore, I think they would be willing to create an economic zone, rather than invade. Total war is so 20th century.
Can there really be any discussion about war between NATO and Russia without the use of tactical and strategic nuclear weapons? Every Russian white paper stresses the use of nuclear weapons if Russia’s interests are threatened in it’s sphere of interest. Of course, the papers don’t usually describe what that interest is.