A Brief Overview of Russian Army Structure & Weapons

No sooner had the ink dried on my previous article about Russia being unable to mount any large offensive operations for the foreseeable future, Putin goes and announces (as of January 17, 2023) a restructuring of the Russian military.

This includes creating new commands and divisions on the border with Finland as a response to what Dimitry Peskov calls “NATO aggression.”

Last month, Putin approved Defense Minister Shoigu’s plan to boost the size of his military from the current target level of 1.15 million. But the Kremlin hasn’t said how fast that will take place.

If you read my last article, then you know what I think: It won’t be anytime soon.

Shoigu also said the expansion will be spread across all branches of Russia’s military and will be coordinated with the delivery of new weapons to equip them — again, without saying where precisely they planned to acquire these weapons.

In all, Russia will create three new motorized-infantry divisions and two airborne divisions.

In my previous life, I analyzed the Russian military for weaknesses that the US and NATO could exploit.

And here’s the thing: strategic force structure choices can be decisive, and Russia’s force structure reveals a lot about its military, its assumptions of what wars it plans to fight, and how it plans to fight them.