Russia’s Military Revival

Bettina Renz

Overview: Russia’s invasion and subsequent annexation of Crimea followed by its military intervention in the Syrian civil war appear to signal Russia’s return to the world stage as a significant military actor. Furthermore, many in the West view Russia’s willingness to use force against Ukraine and in Syria, coming just a few years after its war with Georgia, as proof of the Kremlin’s revanchist and expansionist tendencies. Renz, an Associate Professor of Politics and International Relations at the University of Nottingham, sets out to put Russia’s recent military operations abroad and the country’s clear military revival in context. Through an analysis of the Russian elite’s “Great Power” thinking, Moscow’s military capabilities, and Russian strategic thought and behavior throughout the post-Cold War era, Renz concludes that what we are seeing is not a sudden Russian military resurgence nor the opening campaigns of a broader war of aggression against its neighbors and the West. These events, together with the emergence of Russia’s clearly more capable military machine, are consistent with Russia’s broader historical development and its military and foreign policies. The US and its allies cannot ignore Russia’s seemingly newfound military capabilities or the Kremlin’s willingness to use them. However, the author argues, we should not overestimate Russia’s strength nor inflate the “threat” currently emanating from Moscow. She concludes that we should continue to take reasonable steps to reassure allies and partners neighboring Russia and uphold international principles and norms of behavior. In so doing, though, we must be careful to avoid creating a self-fulfilling prophecy in the form of a security dilemma brought about by mutual suspicion and misunderstanding.

• Introduction: The author argues that Western political and military leaders are over-reacting to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its involvement in Syria based on “three misguided assumptions regarding the timing, purpose and scope of Russia’s military revival” (11): first, that Russia’s desire for a powerful military is a “paradigm shift;” second, that Russia pursued this military revival to pursue an expansionist and aggressive foreign policy; and third, that Russian non-nuclear military capabilities now rival those of the West. The book’s five chapters were written to stand on their own and this makes the book a relatively easy one to read and digest. Taken together, all the chapters provide the broader context against which the reader can evaluate the “timing, intentions, and scope of Moscow’s efforts to restore its country’s armed forces and of the implications this has for international security” (14).
• Chapter 1, “Russian Foreign Policy and Military Power,” links the significance of military power to Russian foreign policy throughout history. This is critical, in the author’s view, because the failure to evaluate post-Soviet Russian military power and capabilities in this light “tells us little about Moscow’s intentions to use these capabilities” (19). Thus, this first chapter addresses Russia’s great power status and its quest for recognition of that status; Russia’s “specific understanding” of the concept of sovereignty; Russia’s imperial legacy; and multilateralism in Russian foreign policy (21). Yet if Russia’s military revival is “simply” a part of a larger drive to re-assert the country’s great power status, can it be dismissed as something rather benign? Should the US simply recognize a Russian “sphere of influence”, even at the expense of our principles and the interests of friends and allies? In other words, while this context may explain behavior, does it make it any less threatening to US interests and values?
• The remaining chapters analyze and further illuminate the points raised above. Chapter 2, “Reforming the Military,” is a fairly straightforward examination of the factors that led to the demise of Russia’s armed forces after 1991 and the factors that enabled President Vladimir Putin’s regime to rebuild the country’s military might. The author argues that “having a strong military has always been central in Russia’s self-perception as a great power” and that this power fulfilled several functions in the Kremlin’s foreign and defense policy. “This did not fundamentally changed after the end of the Cold War” (51). In the immediate aftermath of the collapse of the USSR, many in Russia’s elite assumed Russia would keep the Soviet Union’s status as a global military superpower. Why did that not come to pass? Russian authorities before and even after Putin’s rise to the presidency made several attempts to reform and rebuild the country’s military. How was the Soviet legacy more a curse than a blessing? Why did the latest round of reform, beginning in 2008, produce relative success when previous attempts failed? What challenges remain? How does the “re-built” Russian military compare to that of the US, NATO, and other major powers?
• Chapter 3 examines Russia’s “other” armed forces and “power structures”: the Interior Ministry, Ministry for Civil Defense and Emergency Situations, the Federal Security Service (FSB), and several others, each with significant paramilitary and even combat roles and capabilities. What does the size and structure of these institutions say about the regime’s overall threat perception, especially its concern for domestic order and stability? Would one say they complement or compete with the state’s more “conventional” armed forces?
• Russia has actually wielded military power quite frequently since the collapse of the USSR in 1991. Chapter 4 summarizes the most significant of these operations, including the 2008 war with Georgia, the invasion of Ukraine and Russia’s ongoing intervention in Syria. Long before “little green men” turned up in Crimea, Russian forces intervened in a number of trouble spots and civils wars that flared up across the territory of the former USSR. Russian troops and bases remain in many of these areas. The author explains that the motivations for these operations, including those in Chechnya and elsewhere, reflect Russia’s imperial legacy, the role of “chaos, chance, and contingency” (128) and the Kremlin’s sense of strategic vulnerability. How might the West’s reaction to Russia’s most recent acts of aggression (sanctions, enhanced deterrent posture in NATO, aid to Ukraine), spark an unintended and even more hostile reaction from Moscow, especially if the regime feels threatened? While the motivations the author examines may explain Russian behavior, do they excuse it? Where should the US “draw the line”?
• The book concludes with a relatively short chapter entitled “Russian Military Thinking and Hybrid Warfare.” The author argues that there have been “notable developments” in Russian military thinking and doctrine, but the concept of “hybrid war” (or any one of a number of names attached to such operations) did not originate in Russian circles “nor does it offer an adequate description of contemporary Russian strategy” (161). What, then, is “hybrid war” in this context? Under what conditions might such an approach succeed? Information and influence operations are critical in “hybrid war;” how can free and open societies counter these, without sacrificing the very principles upon which these societies are built?