Russian Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

Zool

Junior Member
Russian boots on the ground at Matua of the Kuril Island Chain, conducting exploratory work for potential to operate a full naval base in the region. This follows
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about the same.

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Published time: 27 May, 2016 04:27
5747b403c46188123b8b4575.jpg

Large landing ships "Admiral Nevelskoi," foreground, "Nikolai Vilkov" and Varshavyanka-class diesel-electric submarine © Vitaliy Anko / Sputnik

Some 200 members of the joint expedition by the Russian Ministry of Defence and the Russian Geographical Society are currently on Matua reviewing the state of infrastructure on the abandoned Soviet military base there.


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Russia builds up, modernizes military on disputed Kuril Islands

“The main goal of the expedition is to study the possibility of basing Pacific Fleet forces there,”commander of the Eastern Military District, Colonel-General Sergey Surovikin said at a meeting with the district’s senior commanders.

The expedition forces have built a mobile camp on Matua and are assessing three wartime runways to estimate the condition of the airfield and prospects of restoring them.

During World War II, the volcanic island near the center of the Kuril Islands chain in the Sea of Okhotsk belonged to Japan and was called Matsuwa. The island had a number of airstrips and was garrisoned by up to 8,000 men, who surrendered without resistance during the last weeks of the war.

The Soviet Union claimed sovereignty of the island and stationed a small contingent on Japanese-built military infrastructure. Last of Russian military forces left the currently uninhabited islet more than a decade ago.

However now, the commander stressed, the entire Far East including the chain of the disputed islands is becoming vital for national security. To reinforce this“outpost”of Russia, Surovikin said that the Eastern Military District will be provided with some 700 units of military equipment and weaponry in 2016.

“In order to stave off any, even minimal, threats, unprecedented steps are being taken by the Russian leadership and the Defense Ministry aimed at developing military infrastructure, planned rearmament of military units, and enhanced social protection of all military personnel and their families,”the commander noted.

The rearmament plan also includes 60 new aircraft and helicopters, in addition to three vessels and over 20 drones. Furthermore an extra 22,000 contract troops have been deployed in Russia’s Far East over the past year, now totaling 65,000 people, Surovikin said.

In late March the Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said that the Kuril Island naval base would be developed along with Russian Arctic bases. Setting up new bases or revitalizing old ones is being carried out within the framework of the Defense Ministry program until 2020 aimed for improvement of the composition of forces stationed in the Arctic and the Far East areas.

Earlier Shoigu announced plans to deploy a missile defense complex in the Kuril chain.

“The planned rearmament of contingents and military bases on Kuril islands is under way. Already this year they will get Bal and Bastion coastal missile systems as well as new-generation Eleron-3 unmanned aerial vehicles,” Shoigu
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in March.

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov made clear in April that Moscow will protect the Kuril Islands and will continue to develop their infrastructure.

And just last week, speaking at the third ASEAN-Russia summit, Russian president, Vladimir Putin made clear that Russia is not and will not engage in any negotiations in order to“sell” control over the islands at a “better price.”

“We are ready to purchase a lot, but we aren’t selling anything,” Putin told journalists.

The post-war fate of Kuril Islands was sealed during the Yalta Conference in 1945, where in exchange for Soviet entry into the war against Japan after battles in the European theater ended, the Soviet Union was designated the Kuril Islands and southern Sakhalin, parts of which had been lost in the Russian-Japanese war in 1905.

Days after the Soviet-Japanese War of 1945 started on August 9, Joseph Stalin sent a personal message to then-US President Henry Truman,
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him that after the Japanese surrender “all the Kurile Islands which according to the three-Power decision taken in the Crimea, are to pass into the possession of the Soviet Union.”

The US was at first reluctant to grant Soviet forces sovereignty over all of the Kurils, wanting to keep one of the islands“preferably in the central group ”for themselves for a permanent military base. Stalin, however, reminded Truman that “demands of this kind are usually laid either before a vanquished country or before an allied country that is unable to defend a particular part of its territory.”
 

Equation

Lieutenant General
Has anyone read this book yet? It is a work of fiction but the scenario is quite interesting to say the least.o_O

A new book by
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, NATO's deputy supreme allied commander for Europe from 2011 to 2014, evokes a potential scenario that leads to a devastating future
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.

The book, "
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," is clearly labeled as a work of fiction.

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delft

Brigadier
Has anyone read this book yet? It is a work of fiction but the scenario is quite interesting to say the least.o_O



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What purpose would Russia have in trying to occupy one or more of the Baltic states? They are pretty useless now and transit trade through them is still decreasing. After being occupied they would be in a much worse state. It would be very different from Germany occupying France in 1940 after which the country made major contributions to German armaments: aircraft and aircraft engines come to my mind.
Military expenditure of the European NATO countries is much higher than than of Russia that also has to defend its Far Eastern coasts and other borders. US military expenditure is much higher still. Russia is therefore acting prudently. Think of it defeating the Georgian aggression in 2008 without occupying the country. Solving the threat to its major Black Sea naval base without killing anyone.
So as the Business Insider article as well as the article it points to as an alternative view in effect say: No, Russia will not start a war.
 

nicky

Junior Member
now ethnic russians are almost half of the population of the two republics - and denied basic human rights for the last quarter of the century.
why worrying: they will never forget ethnic humiliation and sooner or later ... .

it's been announced that two-day joint chinese-russian missile defense exercises conducted in moscow are over.
.
 

Janiz

Senior Member
What purpose would Russia have in trying to occupy one or more of the Baltic states?
And what was the point of occupying the Crimea? It's pretty useless in terms of strategy (talk about Germans when they evacuated from there during WWII and it ended in one ugly pointless mess) aside from naval base (which Russians could evaporate easily using ballistic missiles in case of war). It only turned out to be a black hole for Russian budget and people there aren't too happy now as well. Russians aren't too good with managing things. Now there are more and more voices about normalization talks with Japan about Kuril Islands because it looks like Russians don't have any idea or money to make it thrive and Japanese are good at making something out of nothing.

Why Baltic countries? It's the most exposed scernario because there are lots of ethnic Russians living there. It's also much better idea than Poland or Finland, isn't it? And that's possible thinking about capabilities because it's not that much needed for that. Of course it's impossible when European countries will talk in one voice because it's obvious that they can't stand an open military conflict against entire Europe. Maybe they could in the 70's when all they had to do is breaking through West Germany and France to end up on Atlantic Ocean creating nuclear armageddon on that occasion but not now.

It seems like for now they have to bark from time to time for 'domestic audience' that they still mean a lot but they can't do much without crossing the line.

Oh, if I'm not mistaken there are plans to connect Baltic states with southern Europe through a north-south highway from Estonia, through Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine (or Poland and Slovakia), Romania and Bulgaria to the Turkey and connect Baltic Sea with Mediterranean to increase the transit trade which you pointed out in your post.
now ethnic russians are almost half of the population of the two republics - and denied basic human rights for the last quarter of the century.
why worrying: they will never forget ethnic humiliation and sooner or later ...
Just cool down before speaking about issues that you don't have even the slightest ideas about.
 

FORBIN

Lieutenant General
Registered Member
MOSCOW, May 25. /TASS/. Modernization of Russia’s heavy aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov is planned to be launched in the first quarter of 2017, the corresponding contract will be signed in the short run, a source in the defense industry complex told TASS on Wednesday.

"The works on the vessel will begin after she returns from a long-distance voyage in the Mediterranean in the first quarter of 2017 and will last for two-three years," the source said.

"The Defense Ministry’s contract with the United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC) on the aircraft carrier’s repair with modernization worth several billion rubles
under the technical design of the Nevskoye Design Bureau is ready, it will be signed in June," he added.

The source said that the service contract on the Admiral Kuznetsov with the Northern Fleet command has already been concluded.

The Admiral Kuznetsov composite air wing will include the Sukhoi Su-33 and MiG-29K/KUB fighters, Kamov Ka-27, Ka-31 and Ka-52K helicopters (destined for the Mistral class helicopter carriers).
The Su-25UTG aircraft will no longer be based on the aircraft carrier, the source said.

No official confirmation to this information is available to TASS

The Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier is now at the 35th shipyard in Murmansk.
In summer, the trials of a renewed air group are to be carried out at the vessel, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said.

A military-diplomatic source told TASS that the Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier with new aircraft may depart for the eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea this autumn.

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