100 New Russian Military Bases To Be Built

General Valery Gerasimov - Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia

28/06/2013 by Paul Fiddian - Armed Forces International's Lead Reporter

Russia intends to construct around 100 new military bases, according to comments made by a military official on 27 June 2013. Encompassing airfields, maintenance facilities for the Russian Army and Navy and more, it's a comprehensive military infrastructure development plan, as described by the chief of the General Staff of Russia's Armed Forces, General Valery Gerasimov.

Within just three years, there will be some 300 new garrison towns built, with almost 200 more by 2020, he explained. Together, these will accommodate over 3,000 elements, namely barracks, eating facilities, car parks and more.

The aim is to get all this new Russian military infrastructure up and running, then take delivery of new military technologies and, ultimately, create within the Russian armed forces new standards of training quality and operational efficiency.

New Russian Military Bases

Last month, Dmitry Medvedev - the Russian Prime Minister - called for new equipment to make up the majority of Russian arms by 2020. Already $730 billion in defence funding has been allocated to rearm the Russian Air Force, Army and Navy over the coming decade or so and the new Russian military bases plan is but a part of this process.

In related news, the first Russian airbase sited in Belarus will go into operation before December 2013, according to Lieutenant General Vladimir Bondarev - the commander of the Russian Air Force. While Armenia, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan all presently host Russian Air Force bases, the Belarusian facility will be the first of its kind to be constructed since the breakup of the USSR.

"The establishment of is the result of an inter-governmental agreement to increase the military strength of the Union", Bondarev explained, adding that the Belarusian Air Force might share the base in due course but, initially, it'll be home to Russian Air Force Sukhoi Su-27 Flanker air superiority fighters.

In further related news, the groundbreaking joint Russian/US Megatons-to-Megawatts nuclear non-proliferation programme will reach its conclusion in coming months, the two nations have just announced. In a statement, they confirmed that the US will soon receive its last consignment of low-enriched uranium from Russia, bringing to an end a 20-year history of highly-enriched uranium conversion and shipment.