Russia
will flex its military muscles and hold the world’s biggest war games since the
cold war era next month, including almost 300,000 troops and 1,000 aircraft,
the defense ministry said, leading NATO to warn of a “more assertive Russia”.
The
Vostok-2018, or East 18, exercises simulating large-scale warfare, which the
Kremlin called “justified”, will be carried out from September 11 to 15 in the
country’s east, with troops from China and Mongolia also taking part.
Defense
Minister Sergei Shoigu said the exercises would be similar in size to those
held in September 1981 by the Soviet authorities, called Zapad-81, or West 81.
Those
were unprecedented at the time in terms of the number of troops and military
hardware, with around 100,000 troops involved, Russian television reported.
“This
will be something of a repeat of Zapad-81, but in some senses even bigger,”
Shoigu said in comments.
The
war games come as Russia is hit by the latest round of US sanctions and faces
even harsher ones over its alleged role in a nerve agent attack in Britain,
with relations with the West at their lowest ebb since the cold war.
NATO
spokesman Dylan White said that since Vostok-2018 would take place east of the
Ural Mountains, Moscow was not obliged to notify the West or invite observers
from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, although an
invitation had been extended to military attaches.
The
planned drill showed “a more assertive Russia, significantly increasing its defense
budget and its military presence,” White said.
Meanwhile
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov defended the drills telling journalists that
spending state funds on the country’s defense capabilities was “justified,
necessary and the only option”, despite the country’s economic problems.
Defense
Minister Shoigu said the drills would be “on an unprecedented scale both in
terms of the area covered and in terms of the numbers” of military forces.
“More
than 1,000 aircraft, almost 300,000 troops and almost all the firing ranges of
the Central and Eastern military districts” would be involved, he said.
“Imagine
36,000 pieces of military equipment moving together at the same time – tanks, armored
personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles. And all of this, of course, in
conditions as close to combat as possible.”
Russian
troops underwent snap checks of their combat-readiness last week and Russia has
already sent around 30 fighter planes to aerodromes in eastern Siberia, the defense
ministry said.
Chinese
troops have also begun arriving by train with their equipment in the region
east of Lake Baikal, the ministry said.
