Russia

Force Structure

The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation are organized into six services subordinate to the Ministry of Defense. In 1996 approximately 1.5 million personnel were serving, including about 160,000 women. The services are the ground forces, the naval forces, the air forces, the air defense forces, the strategic rocket forces, and the airborne troops (see fig. 13). There were plans to reduce the number of armed services to three by combining the air forces, air defense forces, and strategic rocket forces into a single space force, but this change had not been approved officially by mid-1996. Another proposed change, aimed at improving cost and operational efficiency, would establish a regional command structure that would encompass ground, air, and naval forces in a particular region. Altogether, the 1996 state budget authorized funding of 1,470,000 military personnel and 600,000 civilian support personnel.