Current Russia Military Affairs: Assessing and Countering Russian Strategy, Operational Planning, and Modernization

This collection has pictures, maps, graphs, editor’s note, and footnotes. It is divided into four parts, Russian Strategic Objectives and Planning, Russian Operational Planning, Russian Force Modernization, and Keynote.

“This compendium of essays is based on presentations delivered at a one-day workshop sponsored jointly by the U.S. Army War College and the U.S. European Command (EUCOM), with additional funding generously provided by the U.S. Army War College Foundation. The invitation-only event was held on May 1, 2018 at the Atlantic Council in Washington, DC and included North American and European experts from the policymaking community, academia, think tanks, the intelligence community, and the military services. These individuals gathered together to address Russia’s geopolitical strategy, its operational capacity and capabilities, and its military modernization efforts, all in an effort to inform EUCOM and U.S. Department of Defense planning as well as strengthen allied deterrence in Europe.

“Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, its invasion of Ukraine, its large-scale no-notice military exercises, its violations of allied sovereignty, and its norm-shattering actions elsewhere across Europe in recent years have brought collective defense, deterrence, and near-peer competition back to the fore of transatlantic security. The West in general and the United States specifically are slowly waking to the new reality in relations with Russia. At best, Russian foreign policy is destabilizing what had been a relatively quiescent theater, compelling the West to reinforce its deterrent posture. At worst, Moscow is engaged in an unofficial hybrid war against the West, employing cyber-attacks, information manipulation, political interference, electronic warfare, and other methodologies designed to avoid provoking a full-throated alliance response and invocation of Article 5.

“Correctly identifying and understanding Moscow’s motivations, its modalities, and its vulnerabilities are critical to successfully constructing and maintaining a response that defends and secures the United States, its allies, and its vital interests. The essays of this compendium seek to do just that, providing decision-makers and policy-makers in both the executive and legislative branches with not simply analysis and insights, but also recommendations for strategy or policy. The Strategic Studies Institute at the U.S. Army War College is proud to have convened this expert group of thinkers in an effort to benefit U.S. national security.

Chapters include: Russian Strategic Objectives: It’s About the State, by Eugene Rumer; What Drives Russian Foreign Policy? by Angela Stent; How (and Why) Russia Does More With Less, by Julia Gurganus; From Plans to Strategy: Mobilization as Russian Grand Strategy, by Andrew Monaghan; The Russian Way of Warfare, by Jānis Bērziņš; The Role of Pre-Conflict Conflict and the Importance of the Syrian Crucible, by Michael Kofman; The Concept of Pace in Current Russian Military Thinking, by Rod Thornton; Russia and Strategic Competition with the United States, by Kristin Ven Bruusgaard; Force or Modernization? by Fredrik Westerlund; Factors Influencing Russian Force Modernization, by Charles Bartles; The Way Ahead in US-Russian Relations, by John Tefft.