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Russia favours airborne troops over army in armour modernisation

26th May 2020 - 16:30 GMT | by Alex Orlov in Riga

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Colonel General Alexander Postnikov, then the commander-in-chief of the Russian Ground Forces, announced in 2011 the transition of combined arms brigades to a new structure. Brigades were to be divided into heavy, medium and light categories and equipped with new military materiel, including a full spectrum of unified armoured platforms.

Beyond the long-awaited rearmament of the Russian army, this step was supposed to solve, at least partially, the long-standing problem of an over-abundance of wheeled and tracked vehicles in service.

However, the plans have still not been fully implemented nine years later. On the contrary, a breakdown of the RUB19

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Alex Orlov

Alex Orlov is a freelance journalist based in Helsinki.

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