November 18, 2007
BUT IT'S A MYTH THE ATLANTICISTS NEVER CEASE TO FALL FOR:
Experts see decline in Russia's military (The Associated Press, November 13, 2007)
Putin owes his broad popularity to an oil-fueled economic boom that has helped increase wages and pensions, as well as efforts to revive Russia's clout. But critics say that the Russian military is only a shadow of the Soviet Army and that bellicose statements from the Kremlin mask a steady decline of its potential."The revival of Russia's military might under Putin is merely a myth," Stanislav Belkovsky, who head the Institute for National Strategy, said at a presentation of the report. "The Russian armed forces have degraded completely under Putin."
If the current trends continue, the report warns, Russia's nuclear arsenals would shrink from about 680 intercontinental ballistic missiles now to between 100 and 200 missiles over the next 10 years.
"It's impossible to reverse these trends under the current policy," it added, pointing at a steady decline of the Russian military-industrial complex that would make it impossible to increase weapons production without huge investments.
Considering the low levels it's fallen from this is even more embarrassing. Posted by Orrin Judd at November 18, 2007 5:04 PM
ICBMs are last century's relics, 200 are too many already. Why do the Russians need more than a couple to stock their museums?
Posted by: ic at November 18, 2007 6:16 PMPutin doesn't need a first-class military, just enough of one to keep everyone nervous.
Nobody pays any attention to bombast and threats and jeremiads from Hugo Chavez, Robert Mugabe, or even Castro (anymore). But if they had just 2 ICBMs, the UN and the Europeans would cower before them, and they would accorded as equal "partners" by the NYT.
Even if the missiles were unable to fly.
Posted by: ratbert at November 18, 2007 11:26 PMHe doesn't.
Posted by: oj at November 19, 2007 1:26 AMWhich of course is the cause for all the gnashing of teeth and yelling about SDI; the Chinese and Russians are unable to admit that the system ostensibly designed to stop North Korean missles is rapidly nearing effectiveness against their own.
Posted by: Mike Earl at November 19, 2007 12:15 PMThe countermeasure to both the nuclear blackmail threat ratbert writes of, and to
the nuclear counterforce threat against our conventional assets remains credible counter-value deterrence. Pop a nuke on the United States, and it shall be as though your people had never existed. If this bothers us, if it does not quite fit our idea of a "just war," then be ready to fight it out the old World War One way, or be ready to surrender
Massive retaliation is a chilling thing to contemplate, as seen by the story of that college professor living near a SAC base, but its deterrent utility is undeniable. It is a moral mystery, being at once the minimum force available to preserve the peace, that is the threat alone, and at the same time the encompassment of total war.
Posted by: Lou Gots at November 19, 2007 3:37 PMIf we didn't nuke them when they were evil we aren't going to when they're just annoying.
Posted by: oj at November 19, 2007 4:52 PMNext Putin is going to hold his breath until he turns blue.
Posted by: erp at November 19, 2007 6:50 PM