NATO Military Committee chairman assesses size and quality of Russian army
Photo: Admiral Rob Bauer, Chairman of the NATO Military Committee (Getty Images)
Russian ground forces are now larger than they were during the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. However, since then, their quality has declined, according to Admiral Rob Bauer, chairman of NATO's Military Committee.
“The quality of those forces has gone down,” Bauer says.
He points to the state of equipment of the forces and the level of training of soldiers.
“At the moment, the Russians are not the same threat as in February 2022, so we have a bit of time to prepare ourselves,” he says, adding that this means increasing investment in the defense industry.
Russian army
Vladimir Putin has issued a decree to increase the size of the Russian army by 180,000 to 1.5 million people starting December 1, 2024.
According to a source in the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the Russian grouping in Ukraine currently has about 574-575,000 personnel. Moscow wanted to increase its number to 690,000 by the end of this year, but primarily due to heavy losses, they failed.
Currently, an 11,000-strong group of North Korean soldiers is stationed in the Kursk region. In total, the Russian group in the Kursk region now numbers 59,000.
Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia has lost more than 700,000 troops killed and wounded. According to UK intelligence, in October, the average daily losses of Russian troops in the war in Ukraine reached a new high.
