Military history of the Russian Federation

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  The military history of the Russian Federation begins on the 25th of December 1991, when the Soviet Union officially ceased to exist. Within days, officers and troops across eleven newly independent republics faced a question no one had prepared them for: whom did they serve? Boris Yeltsin had to build something new from what the collapse left behind. What kind of force emerged from those improvised beginnings? What conflicts would shape and test it? And how did the institution built from those ruins eventually launch a full-scale invasion of a neighboring country in 2022?

• 2. Inherited and Improvised

  ›

  Boris Yeltsin signed the decree formally establishing the Russian Armed Forces on the 7th of May 1992. The path to that moment required months of provisional arrangements. A summit in Kazakhstan on the 21st of December 1991 temporarily appointed Marshal of Aviation Yevgeny Shaposhnikov as military commander of the newly formed Commonwealth of Independent States. Shaposhnikov formally became Supreme Commander of the CIS Armed Forces on the 14th of February 1992. A Yeltsin decree on the 16th of March 1992 had already created a separate Russian command structure, and Shaposhnikov's role quickly became ceremonial. He and his staff were evicted from the Ministry of Defence buildings. They were resettled in the former Warsaw Pact headquarters on Prospekt Mira, on the northern outskirts of Moscow. One by one, the new national governments asserted control over forces on their own soil. On the 15th of June 1993, what remained of Shaposhnikov's staff was formally abolished and replaced by a smaller coordination office. Colonel General Viktor Samsonov held the CIS command role until October 1996.

  In May 1992, General Colonel Pavel Grachev became Russia's first minister of defence and was awarded the rank of Army General upon taking the post. Russia's new military doctrine, promulgated in November 1993, acknowledged the country's changed position: it was now a regional military power rather than a global one. The doctrine called for a smaller, lighter, and more mobile force with greater rapid-deployment capability. Reaching that goal meant confronting a formidable inheritance. One Russian assessment described the system as built on conscription and mass mobilization, with no professional enlisted cadre beyond warrant officers. Officers relied on entrenched hazing called dedovshchina, and the relationship between officers and conscripts was described as resembling that of master and serf. Russian troops in Siberia were reportedly being fed animal feed. Across the force, soldiers were selling weapons and equipment for money.

• 3. The Chechen Crucible

  ›

  The conflict in Transnistria broke out on the 2nd of November 1990 in the city of Dubăsari. It offered an early preview of one recurring pattern in Russian military involvement in post-Soviet disputes. Russian commanders declared official neutrality. In practice, the ROG Parcani sapper battalion, operating under orders from General Butkevich, crossed over to the Transnistrian side. That battalion later destroyed bridges at Dubăsari, Gura Bâcului-Bâcioc, and Coșnița. When Moldovan forces shelled the Russian station at Parcani, they were engaging not only Transnistrian but also Russian personnel.

  On the 21st of September 1993, President Yeltsin attempted to dissolve the Congress of People's Deputies and the Supreme Soviet, powers the constitution did not grant him. Parliament declared his actions null and void, impeached him, and named Vice President Aleksandr Rutskoy as acting president. On the 3rd of October, demonstrators removed militia cordons around the parliament building, seized the mayor's offices, and tried to storm the Ostankino television centre. The army had initially declared neutrality. On the 4th of October, acting on Yeltsin's order, troops stormed the Supreme Soviet building and arrested the resistance leaders. The ten days of conflict became the deadliest episode of street fighting in Moscow's history since the Russian Revolution.

  In December 1994, Russian forces launched an open military campaign against the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, the beginning of the First Chechen War. Russia had previously attempted to covertly overthrow the Ichkerian government before resorting to open force. The Battle of Grozny proved devastating. Russian federal forces failed to hold the mountainous interior against Chechen guerrilla tactics, despite overwhelming advantages in firepower, artillery, and air support. The official Russian death toll was 5,732. Most estimates placed the true number between 3,500 and 7,500, with some reaching as high as 14,000. Estimates of Chechen fighters killed ranged from about 3,000 to over 17,000. Civilian losses were catastrophic: between 30,000 and 100,000 killed, possibly more than 200,000 injured, and over 500,000 displaced. The nearly universal opposition of the Russian public made the war unsustainable. Yeltsin's government declared a ceasefire in 1996 and signed a peace treaty the following year.

  In August 1999, Islamist fighters from Chechnya infiltrated the Dagestan region, declared it an independent state, and called for holy war. Russia launched the Second Chechen War the same month. A winter siege of Grozny ran from December 1999 to February 2000, and Russian forces seized the capital. Russia established direct rule over Chechnya in May 2000. Official Russian casualty figures for the second war stood at around 7,500. The Committee of Soldiers' Mothers estimated 14,000. Unofficial sources placed total dead and missing, mostly Chechen civilians, between 25,000 and 50,000. The military phase of operations ended in April 2002. The counterterrorism operation in Chechnya was not officially closed until the 16th of April 2009.

• 4. The Reform Struggle

  ›

  Pavel Grachev's term as defence minister, from 1992 to 1996, produced little meaningful reform. His successor, Rodionov, served from 1996 to 1997 but did not manage to institute lasting change either. He was eventually dismissed. His own remarks revealed that he believed the state should be adjusted to fit the army rather than the army to fit the state. He reportedly held it was impermissible to solve society's problems at the cost of lowering the state's main attribute, the army. Only under Igor Sergeyev, in office from 1997 to 2001, did any reform take hold, and even then attention focused narrowly on the Strategic Rocket Forces.

  The reform period of 1997 to 1999 established two categories of military units: those at constant combat readiness, manned to wartime standards, and units maintained at 30 to 70 percent of wartime staffing. Total military personnel were reduced to 1.2 million. The Space Forces were incorporated into the Strategic Rocket Forces. The Air Defence Forces were absorbed into the Air Force. The Transbaikal Military District was abolished, with its territory divided between the Siberian Military District and the Far Eastern Military District. Some military academies were closed. By 2003, however, even the fully manned units needed additional resources to carry out their missions properly.

  In 2001, Vladimir Putin appointed Sergei Ivanov as defence minister. Ivanov completed a round of reforms in 2004, establishing volunteer-staffed units while retaining conscription alongside them. By 2003, the Russian Defence Ministry had increased the military budget fourfold. It also issued a white paper naming the United States as Russia's primary security threat.

  Under a Federal Law of the 28th of March 1998, civilian university students could receive officer commissions by completing military department programmes at their universities. At the time of the Soviet dissolution, 241 Russian civilian institutions had retained military departments from the 397 that had existed across the entire USSR. A Federal Law of the 6th of July 2006 then abolished compulsory conscription of reserve officers, making active-duty service obligatory only for graduates of newly established military training centres. By March 2008, 168 of the 235 civilian universities that previously had military departments had lost them. Of the 67 that kept departments, 37 became the basis for the new training centres. A further Federal Law of the 3rd of August 2018 consolidated all officer training into unified Military Training Centres. By 2019-93 civilian institutions of higher education housed these centres.

  As of 2008, only 20 percent of Russian military units were at constant combat readiness. The remaining 80 percent still operated at peacetime strength, a gap the preceding decade of reforms had barely closed.

• 5. The New Look

  ›

  Russia won the August 2008 war with Georgia, but its military's performance troubled planners. Russian forces temporarily occupied the Georgian cities of Zugdidi, Senaki, Poti, and Gori. On the 26th of August 2008, Russia recognised the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia from Georgia. Russia completed its withdrawal from undisputed Georgian territory on the 8th of October. The war is regarded as the first European war of the 21st century. Despite the victory, the conflict had exposed poor coordination, malfunctioning equipment, and instances of friendly fire. Vladimir Shamanov noted that cadre regiments and divisions, designed to receive reinforcements at the outbreak of war, had become a costly relic. Defence Minister Anatoliy Serdyukov announced a major reform programme on the 14th of October 2008, under the name 'New Look.' Major structural reorganization began in 2009.

  Active personnel were to be reduced to one million by 2012, four years earlier than the original 2016 target. The officer corps was to fall from 365,000 to 220,000. The ranks of colonel and major were to shrink by roughly 64 percent and 75 percent respectively. Warrant officer grades, the Praporshchik and Midshipman categories, were to be eliminated entirely: from a combined 140,000 down to zero. Officer training was to be consolidated from 65 military schools into 10 systemic training centres. Civilian staff would take over logistics and auxiliary roles from uniformed personnel. The Ground Forces alone were to see their number of military units cut from 1,890 to 172, a reduction of over 90 percent.

  The previous four-level command chain, comprising Military District, Army, Division, and Regiment, was replaced by a three-level structure: Military District, Operational Command, and Brigade. The reform also eliminated cadre units maintained at peacetime strength, known as paper divisions. Every formation was to be at full combat readiness at all times. On the 31st of October 2010, Serdyukov declared that the organisational changes were complete.

  The defence committee chairman, Vladimir Komoedov, told RIA Novosti in October 2012 that annual defence spending was planned to grow by 59 percent by 2015. The planned total was almost 3 trillion rubles, roughly 83.3 billion dollars. The projected share of GDP allocated to defence was 3.2 percent in 2013, rising to 3.4 percent in 2014 and 3.7 percent in 2015.

  The schedule initially envisaged cutting the officer corps from 335,000 to 150,000. In early February 2011, Serdyukov revised that target upward by 70,000, setting the new floor at 220,000. Sergey Shoygu eventually succeeded Serdyukov and reversed several of the reforms, partly to rebuild trust with senior officers who had intensely resented the changes. The 2nd Guards Motor Rifle Division and the 4th Guards Tank Division were reformed from 2013.

  Military analyst Alexander Golts concluded that the reforms gave Russia absolute military dominance in the post-Soviet space. He also identified a new rapid-deployment capability, which was demonstrated in February 2014.

• 6. From Crimea to Full-Scale War

  ›

  Following the removal of Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych on the 22nd of February 2014, Russian soldiers without insignias appeared across the Crimean Peninsula. They seized strategic positions and infrastructure across the territory. On the 1st of March 2014, the Federation Council unanimously adopted a resolution petitioning President Putin to use military force in Ukraine. Russia then annexed Crimea after a referendum organized under occupation conditions and widely condemned internationally. In April 2014, demonstrations by pro-Russian groups in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine escalated into open conflict. Ukrainian government forces faced Russian-backed separatist formations. In August, Russian military vehicles crossed the Russia-Ukraine border in several locations in Donetsk Oblast. That incursion was seen as responsible for a decisive defeat of Ukrainian government forces in early September.

  On the 7th of October 2014, in the city of Zuhres in the Donetsk region, a 53-year-old Ukrainian named Ihor Kozhoma was seized by Russian and separatist forces. He was tied to a column and tortured for several hours. He had been attempting to evacuate his wife from occupied territory. A Donetsk resident named Iryna Dovhan was publicly tortured for her pro-Ukrainian views.

  On the 24th of February 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. At approximately 06:00 Moscow time, President Putin announced a military operation in eastern Ukraine. Minutes later, missile strikes began across the country, including in the capital Kyiv. Nearly all of the 190,000 troops previously amassed on Ukraine's borders were moved in within days. Despite initial territorial gains, the offensive stalled under Ukrainian armed resistance, large-scale international arms deliveries, and failures of Russian logistics and morale. In March 2022, the Russian military retreated from the northern Kyiv region and refocused on eastern Ukraine.

  On the 21st of September 2022, Putin announced the first mobilization of citizens in the history of the Russian Federation and signed decree No. 647. The decision followed a successful Ukrainian counteroffensive in the Kharkiv Oblast that had recovered territory to the west of the Oskil River. In June 2023, the Wagner Group, a mercenary force that had previously operated close to Putin, launched an armed rebellion against the Russian military command. Earlier that month, Putin had backed legislation that would require Wagner and other private military companies to sign government contracts, placing them under military authority.

  By the 30th of June 2024, Russian independent outlet Meduza estimated 120,000 Russian soldiers had been killed since the start of the invasion. The Economist used a wounded-to-killed ratio from leaked United States Department of Defense documents. Its calculation yielded between 462,000 and 728,000 soldiers killed or wounded. NATO and Western officials reported around 1,200 Russian soldiers killed or wounded in Ukraine on average every day during May and June 2024. Human wave attacks were cited as the primary cause.

• 7. Syria and Expansion

  ›

  Russia's military intervention in the Syrian civil war began in September 2015, after the Syrian government formally requested military assistance. Russian aircraft deployed to the Khmeimim base and began airstrikes primarily in north-western Syria. Their targets included the Syrian National Coalition, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, al-Nusra Front, and the Army of Conquest. Russian special operations forces and military advisers were deployed alongside the air campaign. At the end of December 2017, the Russian government announced that its troops would remain in Syria permanently. In December 2024, the Russian-backed government of Bashar al-Assad fell. Assad was given refuge in Moscow.

  On the 21st of December 2022, as the invasion of Ukraine entered its tenth month, Defence Minister Sergey Shoigu presented a detailed expansion plan to President Putin at a collegium of the Ministry of Defence. Shoigu proposed establishing an army corps in Karelia. He called for splitting the Western Military District into two, recreating separate Moscow and Leningrad military districts. Ten new divisions were proposed: five artillery, two air assault, and three motor rifle. Two of the motor rifle divisions were to be established in the occupied Ukrainian territories of Zaporozhye and Kherson. Seven more motor rifle divisions were to be formed from existing brigades across the Northern Fleet and the Western, Central, and Eastern Military Districts. Five brigades of the Russian Naval Infantry were proposed for upgrade to full divisions. The armed forces as a whole were to expand to 1.5 million personnel. The conscription age range was to be raised gradually from 18-27 to 21-30.

  New motor rifle divisions established after the start of the invasion included the 6th, 27th Guards, 32nd, 67th, 69th, 70th, and 72nd. The 104th Guards Air Assault Division was also formed, along with the 44th division, sponsored by the Airborne Forces. The 68th, 69th, and 72nd Motor Rifle Divisions were planned for the Leningrad Military District. New brigades included the 11th Separate Tank Brigade, the 49th Separate Airborne Assault Brigade, and the 17th Guards Artillery Brigade of High Power.

  The Russian Aerospace Forces were also to receive three new aviation division headquarters, eight bomber aviation regiments, and one fighter aviation regiment. Six army aviation brigades were proposed as well. The 1.5 million personnel target and eight new bomber aviation regiments point toward a military intended to project force far beyond Russia's existing borders.