Lithuanian Annual Strategic Review

Back in 2008 a majority of experts tended to take Russia’s military reform as a potential failure and an adventurist step by the Russian political leadership. At that time proclamations about its fast failure were quite popular, but today a majority accepts that the prognosis of failure was premature. In actual fact, today it is becoming evident that the reform is not only succeeding but is already starting to affect the entire state’s military system. The actions of the reformed Russian armed forces in Crimea and eastern Ukraine, a strong willingness to continue with changes in their defense forces, and an extension of the reform into other state institutions show that the Russian political leadership is dedicated to finish what has been started and there are no signs of any changes in course. All this raises the following questions: why is Russia ready to sacrifice huge resources and to go to such effort to create an essentially new military and to create an effective mechanism to run the state in wartime, and what situation would be the most suitable for the use of those assets.