Russia’s Armed Forces Undergoing 'Unparalleled' Transformation

In the aftermath of the Russia-Georgia war of August 2008, Russia's political and military elites embarked on a highly ambitious program to reform and modernize the armed forces by 2020.

That program envisages abandoning the mass-mobilization principle in favor of forming mobile, permanent-readiness forces, capable of reacting to the order to deploy within "one hour."

In April 2009, U.S. Director of National Intelligence Denis Blair said in unclassified written answers to the Senate Intelligence Committee that the ongoing reshaping of Russia's ground forces will enable it to "militarily dominate" most of its neighbors.

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