L’armée russe, point de situation
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
The Russian army, an update
Sunday 31 march 2024
A good strategy should combine objectives and capabilities as closely as possible. As the latter are harder to change than the former, strategy is often based firstly on what can actually be done to deal with the enemy, and then on how the means might be modified. Trying to estimate Russia's intentions therefore means first looking at what its army is currently capable of doing.
Numbers and people
Despite the heavy losses of the war, 315,000 killed and wounded according to a recent document from the US Defense Intelligence Agency, the Russian armed forces as a whole have grown from just under a million men at the end of 2021 to 1.35 million today, with the hope of reaching 1.5 million by 2026. This increase is the result of a slight rise in the volume of conscription, the call-up of reservists at the end of 2022 and, above all, a major campaign to recruit contract volunteers. In December 2023, Vladimir Putin and his minister Shoigu announced that 490,000 soldiers had been recruited on contract during the year. This is a colossal figure - it's like recruiting 195,000 new soldiers in France when we're struggling to recruit 26,000. It should therefore undoubtedly be translated as "contracts" rather than "recruitments", and thus include renewals, sometimes imposed, for soldiers already on the line. However, by playing on patriotism and, above all, historically unprecedented financial incentives - a salary representing three times the average wage plus bonuses and personal or family allowances in the event of injury - as well as recruiting prisoners or foreign workers in exchange for Russian passports, the volume of enlistments was very high indeed.
If we add the recruitment of the various provincial and corporatist militias or the reinforcement of the security services, we are nevertheless approaching 1% of the population, which corresponds, empirically, to the maximum that can be recruited on a voluntary basis to bear arms and risk their lives. Beyond that, conscription is necessary. This tax on time and possibly blood is generally very unpopular if it is not based on good reasons and if it is not shared by everyone. When the country's existence is not really threatened, when there are many ways of avoiding service and when you are concerned about your popularity, you avoid it. The memory of the unfortunate involvement of Soviet conscripts in Afghanistan in the 1980s, or that of the Americans in Vietnam twenty years earlier, is not very encouraging in this respect.
Russia's ambition was to completely professionalise its army following the reforms introduced by Minister Serdioukov in 2008-2012, but the contradiction between the size of the workforce deemed essential - which would correspond in proportion to 450,000 in France - and the small number of volunteers to enlist and even fewer operational reservists who could supplement them meant that a proportion of conscription had to be maintained. This mixed system of professionals and conscripts has been maintained since the start of the war in Ukraine and there are now around 290,000 conscripted soldiers in the Russian army. These conscripts have not been enlisted in Ukraine, except very discreetly and on an ad hoc basis, out of a concern not to move from the tax of time to the even more unpopular tax of blood. This is one of the paradoxes of this Russian-style war, in which the fatherland - and henceforth also the occupied territories - is declared to be under attack by all the forces of the world, but the country does not dare to enlist all the men it needs to defend it. It is therefore an enormous asset which also absorbs many military resources for its management, equipment and day-to-day life, but which is not used directly in the war. This conscript army at least serves to hold the rear and fulfil all the missions other than the war, while serving as a base for recruiting volunteers and as the ultimate reserve.
All in all, the Russian armed forces are using around half of their human potential in the war in Ukraine and a third in the 12 armies of the Ukraine Task Force (GFU). This is enough to achieve numerical superiority at the front, but not enough to be decisive.
If the maximum proportion of volunteers likely to enlist in a modern European country with an average age of 40 can be estimated at 1% of the population, the maximum number of men (80-90%) and women who can actually be mobilised to serve in the armed forces can also be estimated at 5%. This is more or less the case in Israel at the moment, although it is unlikely to remain so for long, while Ukraine is at around 2.5% and Russia at 0.9%. In order to hope to have sufficient mass to win outright, Russia is undoubtedly obliged to mobilise its reservists a little more, but at the same time to spare the susceptibility of the population. In fact, after the renewal of Vladimir Putin's mandate by acclamation, the introduction of the word "war" into the landscape and even the instrumentalisation of the jihadist attack in Moscow on 22 March, everyone is expecting a new call-up of several hundred thousand men to the armed forces.
A new Russian army
At the beginning of 2023, the GFU and the two army corps of Donetsk and Luhansk represented around 360,000 men after the reinforcement of reservists mobilised from September 2022. At the time, this was still a very heterogeneous group formed in a hurry after the crisis of autumn 2022. It was then gradually consolidated with the formation of a specific structure of training corps in camps far behind the front. Despite persistent losses, the size of the forces was then gradually increased, with 410,000 men by the summer of 2023 and 470,000 by the beginning of 2024.
Quantity allows quality to increase. This increased volume and the reduced Ukrainian offensive pressure mean that more rotations can be carried out between the front line and the rear regeneration-training structure. Regiments and brigades can be withdrawn from the front before they fall below the casualty threshold, which would also imply an implosion of collective skills. New recruits can also be received and assimilated in rear camps rather than directly under fire, which is often psychologically disastrous.
This reorganisation was an opportunity for the GFU to regain political control, especially after Wagner's rebellion in June. Wagner was disbanded and its soldiers 'nationalised', while there was no longer any talk of disgruntled generals. The risk here is that disgruntled generals or suspects may have been replaced by loyalists, a criterion not necessarily associated with competence. For the rest, the Russian army is continuing its gradual return to the organisation of the Soviet army based on the simple model of armies-divisions-regiments rather than the current jumble of structures. The limiting factor is undoubtedly senior management. The Russian army is cruelly lacking in competent officers to form the staffs necessary for its proper organisation.
While the Russian army is tending to return to its traditional structures of large units, the lower echelons have been radically transformed to adapt to positional warfare. The mobile manoeuvre battlegroups (known by their English acronym BTG) combining a combat battalion (predominantly armoured or motorised infantry) with an artillery and support battalion no longer exist. The complex use of these groups has been simplified by separating the two elements, manoeuvre and support, whose battalions are now grouped into specific entities and coordinated at the higher echelon. With the switch from movement to position warfare two years ago, and the reduction in the number of combat vehicles, the manoeuvre battalions have in fact become 'melee' battalions, almost in the rugby sense of the term, where the emphasis is on shock rather than movement. Forget the great armoured-mechanised breakthroughs and air or amphibious assaults, the Russian army is now a largely infantry-based "trench army" with a much higher ratio of human flesh to steel tonnage than at the start of the war.
In coordination with the indispensable support of the Russian artillery, which has lost many pieces and has a shortage of shells, but has increased its skills and diversified its action, the Russian infantry is conducting a retro-combat with units that move on foot into contact with the enemy, carrying with them the maximum amount of portable firepower - light mortars, machine guns, grenade launchers, drones - over a limited distance and within the framework of a rigid plan. The tactical value of these battalions, which varies greatly, depends almost entirely on the number of junior officers, from sergeant to captain, who have managed to survive and have learned from the war. The best battalions were described as "assault battalions", while the worst were devoted to defending the front.
All in all, the form of combat has not changed much since the start of the war of positions in April 2022, but, to put it in economic terms, the increasing Labour component now outweighs the decreasing Material and Technical Capital, because destruction and wear and tear out outweigh production. The third factor of production, Innovation, is on the rise, with more emphasis on human development (new skills, methods or structures) than material development, apart from small items such as drones, but on balance the TCI combination is producing a rather diminishing return. The Russians of 2024 will need to spend more blood and time than they did in the summer of 2022 to conquer every square kilometre. Russian offensive operations may still be as numerous as they were at their peak in the summer of 2022, but on a much smaller scale.
Melting steel
Apart from the partial human mobilisation of September 2022, it was the industrial mobilisation that undoubtedly saved the GFU and enabled it to cross the otherwise declining "strategic intensity curves" in its favour once again, thanks to the melting of Capital. This melting of Capital was first and foremost a melting of steel. Nearly 3,200 battle tanks and 4,100 armoured infantry vehicles were lost out of an initial fleet of 3,400 and 7,700 respectively. The Russian air force has also lost more than a hundred various aircraft, not counting those damaged, and 135 helicopters, while 36,000 tonnes of the Black Sea fleet are at the bottom of the sea.
To compensate for these material losses and pay its soldiers, Russia is making a major financial effort, representing 6 to 7% of GDP and 30% of the federal budget. Russia can therefore spend between 10 and 13 billion euros on its army, much of it on its defence industry or imports. By way of comparison, France spends €3.6 billion a month on its armed forces, including two billion on equipment purchases, which are considerably more expensive. However, this effort can hardly be considered a war effort. During the 1980s, the United States in a "warm peace" made the same defence effort as a percentage of GDP, and the Soviet Union much more. Ukraine, which is effectively a war economy, spends a quarter of its GDP on defence.
Apart from its capacity for social coercion, which requires a more intensive mobilisation of its industrial base than in Western countries, Russia's real asset is that it has kept the Red Army's plethora of equipment in stock. Russia's main industrial effort is therefore to reinject regenerated and retrofitted old equipment into its forces. Russian industry is able to "produce" 1,500 battle tanks and 3,000 infantry vehicles a year, but more than 80% of these are refurbished old machines. This limits the reduction in mass, but at the expense of average quality, which inevitably deteriorates with the use of old and worn-out equipment. Stocks are not eternal either, but we can consider that Russia can still use this advantage until 2026. By that time, we will have to make the transition to mass production of new equipment.
Major new equipment is not new either, and impossible to invent in such a short space of time at least, except for "small" items such as drones, which are expanding rapidly. So, despite the economic sanctions, we are largely content to produce the same sophisticated equipment. The Russian industry, for example, continues to manufacture one or two Iskander 9M725 missiles a week, barely hindered by the embargo on component imports, which is clearly poorly controlled. Things are simply a little more complicated and a little more expensive.
The main limitation concerns ammunition, particularly artillery shells, at a time when Russia reached the minimum threshold for organising major offensive operations in December 2022. At that time, the Russian army had consumed eleven million shells, particularly during the Donbass offensive from April to August 2022. To meet the needs of 2023, Russia drew on its stock of old shells, often in poor condition, and above all produced 250,000 shells and rockets per month, half of which were 152 mm shells. It has also called on its allies, Belarus, Iran, Syria (for shell casings) and above all North Korea, which is said to have supplied between 2 and 3 million shells. Russia hopes to produce more than 5 million by 2024, including 4 million 152mm shells, and to continue to benefit from foreign aid. Going beyond that would require major investment in the construction of new factories and the extraction of raw materials. In other words, if nothing changes radically, the Russians will benefit from significant, albeit insufficient, production over the current year and probably the following one, but 2026 is likely to be problematic.
What can we do with this instrument?
There are conquests and there are strikes. The Russian army can carry out both types of operation, but on a small scale each time, hampered by Ukrainian defences and insufficient resources. Its main advantage, however, is that the Ukrainian army is even more hampered than it is, and that it will very probably remain so for at least the whole of 2024. This slight superiority over the long term leaves the hope of obtaining Ukraine's surrender and therefore encourages the continuation of the war until this "desired end state" revolving around the abandonment by Ukraine of the territories conquered by the Russians, probably extending to the rest of the Donbass, Kharkiv and Odessa, as well as the military neutralisation of Kiev and its political subjection. As long as this hope persists, the war will last.
With the resources available now and in the future, Russia's military strategy involves a phase of constant and comprehensive pressure on the Ukrainian front and rear, based on limited but numerous attacks in all fields. The primary objective is not necessarily to gain ground, but to exhaust Ukrainian reserves of men and resources, particularly artillery and air defence munitions. This constant offensive pressure can create holes in the defence which will in turn allow for larger-scale operations, probably in the sky first with the possibility of committing the air force further forward, then on the ground first in the Donbass and possibly elsewhere if resources allow.
In this strategy of endurance, where Russia's relative human and economic effort is three times less than Ukraine's, the year 2025 is undoubtedly seen as decisive. In this Russian theory of victory, Ukraine, exhausted and insufficiently supported by its allies, could then only acknowledge its powerlessness and accept defeat. As usual, this Russian vision is a ceteris paribus projection, but it is likely that things will not remain equal elsewhere.
Let us add that if this strategy were to succeed, Vladimir Putin would be crowned with a great victory and would have at his disposal in 2026 a military tool that would be more voluminous than at the beginning of 2022, but also very different, more suited to a war of positions than to a blitzkrieg invasion. However, after a period of regeneration and reorganisation supported by a strengthened industrial infrastructure, this military tool could once again become formidable for its neighbours and the temptation to use it could remain intact, if not be strengthened.
Sources
- Dr Jack Watling and Nick Reynolds, Russian Military Objectives and Capacity in Ukraine Through 2024, Royal United Services Institute, 13 February 2024.
- Ben Barry, What Russia's momentum in Ukraine means for the war in 2024, International Institute for Strategic Studies, 13th March 2024.
- Pavel Luzin, The Russian Army in 2024, Riddle.info, 04 January 2024.
- Mason Clark and Karolina Hird, Russian regular ground forces order of battle, Institute for the Study of War, October 2023.
- Joseph Henrotin, "La guerre d'attrition et ses effets", Defence and International Security No 170, March-April 2024.
- Douglas Barrie, Giorgio Di Mizio, Moscow's Aerospace Forces: No air of superiority, International Institute for Strategic Studies, 7th February 2024.
