Iraqi Defeat Jolts Russian Military ; Defense and Policy Experts Said Last Week That Modernizing the Army Is a Top Priority

Weir, Fred, The Christian Science Monitor

In the US's easy defeat of Saddam Hussein's army, Russia sees a lesson for its own conventional forces.

The Iraqi Army - which was cloned from the Red Army in the final decades of the Soviet Union - mounted only a feeble defense before falling apart.

"The key conclusion we must draw from the latest Gulf war is that the obsolete structure of the Russian armed forces has to be urgently changed," says Vladimir Dvorkin, head of the Russian Defense Ministry's official think tank on strategic nuclear policy. "The gap between our capabilities and those of the Americans has been revealed, and it is vast. We are very lucky that Russia has no major enemies at the moment, …

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Publication information: Article title: Iraqi Defeat Jolts Russian Military ; Defense and Policy Experts Said Last Week That Modernizing the Army Is a Top Priority. Contributors: Weir, Fred - Author. Newspaper title: The Christian Science Monitor. Publication date: April 16, 2003. Page number: 6. © 2009 The Christian Science Publishing Society. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All Rights Reserved.

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