Russian president orders bill on cutting conscription time

RIA Novosti ^ | 09:45 | 01/ 12/ 2005

[mym]

MOSCOW, December 1 (RIA Novosti) - Russian President Vladimir Putin has instructed the government to revise and submit to parliament a bill on cutting the length of army conscription from 24 to 12 months from January 1, 2008, the Kremlin press service said Thursday.

The bill also seeks to change and revoke a number of grounds for deferrals, as well as to release students who have undergone military training at university from this duty.

[Alex-DV]

I think 12 month is not enough to teach a conscript necessary military skills and knowledges. It's just a half measure that can only weaken the armed forces. IMHO the only way is to create small (500000-800000 soldiers) but eminently qualified, professional army. It's expensive, but the old system is outdated, ineffective and should be replaced by the new one.

[mym]

I agree with you.

At the same time I think that ministry of defense's plan is to increase the quantity of professionals and to teach draftees bases of military.

[Centurion2000]

I think 12 month is not enough to teach a conscript necessary military skills and knowledges. It's just a half measure that can only weaken the armed forces.

12 months is plenty of time to teach a basic infantryman's skillset to a large number of people. Looks like he is dropping the enlistment time so that he can save more $$ and pour it into the professional soldiers while still retaining the ability to call up large numbers of grunts in case of invasion.

It's certainly a step in the right direction. Better comm systems would be the biggest force multiplier that the Russian Army / Air Force combined arms can use immediately.