300,000 Troops and 900 Tanks: Russia’s Biggest Military Drills Since Cold War

[saltwn]

LINK

The exercises, ...will also include units from China for the first time. They will start on Sept. 11.

In a separate display of military power, Russia was reported on Tuesday to have assembled a large flotilla of warships off the coast of Syria. Russian news media outlets, citing unnamed defense ministry officials, described it is as Russia’s largest naval deployment in the area since Moscow first intervened in Syria’s civil war in September 2015.

The move follows a flurry of claims by Russia, unsupported by evidence, that the West is preparing to stage a fake chemical weapons attack inside Syria as a pretext for an assault on the forces of the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.

Known as Vostok-2018 or East-2018, the September military exercises, involving land and air units, will begin near Russia’s eastern border with China and Mongolia. Both have agreed to join a series of regular exercises that used to be restricted to Russia and countries that were either once part of the Soviet Union or Soviet allies.

The participation of China, which will send helicopters and about 3,200 troops from the People’s Liberation Army, signals a significant reshaping of military exercises that began in the Soviet era. For decades they were aimed primarily at preparing the Red Army for a possible attack by or on China.

The Soviet Union and China clashed repeatedly along their long border in the late 1960s, nearly tumbling into all-out war. They remained bitter foes until the Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev normalized relations with a visit to Beijing in 1989.

President Vladimir V. Putin, his ties with the West severely strained by Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and military incursions into eastern Ukraine, has put a premium on developing ever closer ties with China as a counterweight and insurance policy against the United States.

The enemy of my enemy...

[mr wonder]

A weak economy has caused Russian military spending to plunge.

...Moscow spent 3.9 trillion rubles ($61 billion) on defense in 2017, a 17% decline from the previous year and the first annual drop since 1998, according to new data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)....

https://money.cnn.com/2018/05/02/new...ending-plunge/


U.S. military budget inches closer to $1 trillion mark, as concerns over federal deficit grow

....The U.S. Senate on Monday voted to give the military $716 billion for 2019, approving one of the biggest defense budgets in modern American history despite concerns from some economists and lawmakers about the rapidly rising federal deficit.
The 2019 military budget, approved by an 85-to-10 vote, gives America's armed forces an $82 billion increase from 2017....

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.4f03cfc2ac63


Seems to me that Russia having "big" maneuvers shouldn't bother us to much. And Working with China, which has no intentions of fighting a hot war with it's best customer, shouldn't be a military concern.
What they plan to do to or for other countries needs to be known as far as possible.

[mr wonder]

[saltwn]

Originally Posted by mr wonder

A weak economy has caused Russian military spending to plunge.

...Moscow spent 3.9 trillion rubles ($61 billion) on defense in 2017, a 17% decline from the previous year and the first annual drop since 1998, according to new data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)....

https://money.cnn.com/2018/05/02/new...ending-plunge/


U.S. military budget inches closer to $1 trillion mark, as concerns over federal deficit grow

....The U.S. Senate on Monday voted to give the military $716 billion for 2019, approving one of the biggest defense budgets in modern American history despite concerns from some economists and lawmakers about the rapidly rising federal deficit.
The 2019 military budget, approved by an 85-to-10 vote, gives America's armed forces an $82 billion increase from 2017....

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.4f03cfc2ac63


Seems to me that Russia having "big" maneuvers shouldn't bother us to much. And Working with China, which has no intentions of fighting a hot war with it's best customer, shouldn't be a military concern.
What they plan to do to or for other countries needs to be known as far as possible.

I really feel sorry for the people of Russia. First a bad emperor conscripting them into the army and starving them, then a glimmer of hope gave way to a dictator. Later another glimmer of hope with glasnost, only for that to be wrecked by an ex spy-mast for the KGB. Rigged mock elections, burdened under that same kgb dictator ...