I understand that modernizing the Russian military is important, especially in the naval sector. Your military has been, not ignored but offset, by the more important issue of the ailing economy after the fall of the Soviet Union. However, you said the main reason for the upgrades is to act as a deterrent from your "enemies". I would like to ask who those enemies are since Europe now spends half of their GDP on defense spending compared to 20 years ago along with the United States making serious cuts.

... is pure gold.

I wish to ask the esteemed Prime Minister of the Russian Federation: is Russia still committed to multilateral security arrangements, such as outlined in the UN Charter? Or does the Russian Federation feel the need to engage in unilateral actions to defend its sovereignty, which in my opinion does not seem to be directly threatened in the foreseeable future?

1. In the light of current relations; how will this modernization affect the nordic countries in general, and more specifically the situation in the Baltic sea?

2. What do you mean when you say that the servicemen of the army has an "enormous social responsibility"

3. Should you not be more worried about Russia´s socioeconomic situation? For example, the current demographical trend will make it hard for Russia to maintain its current position on the international arena.

I seriously doubt Mr. Putin will ever bother reading this (in fact I wonder if he actually wrote that article) but I still have to make a request. Don't pretend this is going to in any way increase democracy or the general capabilities of the Russian state. At most it will professionalize the Russian military, which is not the same thing at all.

Also I note the total lack of any admissions about the problems of corruption and horrible inefficiency which would hinder the professionalization of the military even if the Russian economy wasn't too dependent on oil wealth and suffering from the recession.

'peace enforcement operation in Georgia in 2008'?WTF?

We in the west have a different term for that. We call it INVASION. And if the NATO decided a "peace enforcement operation" was called for in Russia, you would too.

Thats ok. Here is the uprising world tour schedule:

Tunisia x
Egypt x
Libya x
Yemen x
Syria
Iran
Russia
China

Your on the list!

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message is loud and clear:

1- to the population at large....stop your nonsense protests, it's making us look weak and vulnerable.

2- to the army ...stay on my side and you will get nice salaries and pensions...

I think Putin's enemy is the US. From Russia's point of view, we are the one who broke the international rule by invading Iraq, ignore the Geneva Convention, support Uzbekistan's authoritarian regime which is no better than Syria but supports our war effort in Afghanistan, allowed Saudi army to put down Bahrain's uprising. Now Qatar, another American favorite, is arming Syrian opposition force. Only we are naive and innocent to believe that Russia not feels threatened.

Sounds more like Russia needs other countries to prepare for wars and wage wars in order to generate more sales of weapons.
but to put it bluntly it's the world we live in and has been for decades so no matter what we say or write you can bet your bottom dollar not much if at all anything is going to happen because in a governments eyes the small voice i.e the people who put them there' won't get heard.

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Feeling the heat at home, and then banging the drums as a way out. This is just too transparent. Like Russia is actually being "threatened" by anyone. I understand the need for a capable conventional military deterrent, but let's call a spade a spade. The reasons for modernization you outlined, Mr. Prime Minister, are fairly weak. Russia want's its power back. Plain and simple. I was wondering when this was going to happen. Ahhh the good ole' days of the Bear v.s. the Eagle.

The interests and concerns of a country are the aggregated interests and concerns of its citizens. From this perspective, how would the average Russian citizen benefit today from a significant increase in Russia's military budget, and would said average citizen really not benefit more from that money being spent elsewhere?

With its large pool of talented scientists and engineers, Russia should be able to redevelop a first rated military industry. Whether this being a burden or a strength in the long term depends very much on its ability to leverage advantages in the military industry to benefit the economy at large, which the old Soviet Union patently failed to do.

Russia has a massive thermonuclear arsenal, and for that reason Russia's strength is needed for humanity to survive. Whatever one may think about the joys of freedom, too much of it is often dangerous to the safety of everyone else. I prefer the competent, calculating sanity of Vladimir Putin to the idiotic and psychopathic actions of Bush, Cheney, and Obama.

Prime Minister Putin points out in his second sentence that Russia has "resources of global significance" by which he refers to oil and gas. Global warming heats the Siberian tundra, allowing more oil and gas fields to be discovered and exploited. An area roughly the size of the continental US is a huge basin that has collected animal and plant remains for millenia, so its reserves may be greater than those from Iran and Arabia to Algeria. Russia is a better source and protector of the world's oil and gas than the islamic world at this time.

Also, Siberia has timber, minerals, industry, water, livestock, and agriculture. The US, Mexico, Africa, the Middle East, India, and Australia are becoming polluted deserts, so Russian agriculture and livestock will be needed to feed increasing numbers of people. Siberia can yield timber to construct housing, cotton and wool for clothes, and hides for shoes. Minerals can feed industry.

Finally, there is political stability. After eleven years of insane policies from the West, the best outcome is that the US and NATO have defeated their own countries and destroyed their own economies. Global leadership is shifting to China and Russia for the next decade, and this is a relief. A decade of watching China and Russia lead the world might let the West learn valuable lessons in the wise applications of power.

Will this refocus on professionalism lead the Russian military-industrial complex to quit selling out to the highest bidder? The best guarantee for Russian security would be for Russia to quit giving its best technology to unstable regimes and other rising powers. They gave away their technical and numerical advantage when they sold all their hardware to India and China for pennies on the dollar. Now, not only are they playing catch up with the US, but they face a Chinese military that may soon surpass Russian capacity (if it has not in fact done so already).

Russia is deluded if they think they can indefinitely retain a strategic alliance with all of the dictatorships and procedural democracies they have been arming for the past 20 years. The only way they can maintain their security is if they invest in their own professionalism AND stop supplying any other country that is willing to pay.

OK, just to get it out of the way, at least half the comments on here are ridiculous.

As far as Putin's literature of the declarative genre, I might call this impenetrable apparatchik babble just because it brings back so many lovely memories, but the fact is that it's actually quite penetrable. It seems to me the product of a mind short on nuanced analysis and long on firm bluster. Maybe that's why Bush related to his soul so well. In any case, I grew up in communist Romania where I read many similar "compositions" by people to whom public communication and argument consisted of a series of disjointed declarations displaying paltry human perspective or an ability to make convincing arguments, but plenty of bravado and inelegantly veiled threats, plenty of resentment and paranoia, and then more bravado and more threats. This work by Comrade Putin is a masterpiece of the genre.

This entire article is consistent with Putin's attempts to blame all the recent demonstrations against himon foreign elements. In the beginning of this article Mr. Putin makesthe following statement: "We will not be able to strengthen our international position or develop our economy or our democratic institutions if we are unable to protect Russia." This statement shows that Putin either does not understand Russia's real problems, or more likely does not want to face the fact that he is the main source of Russia's problems. If Russia needs protection, it is from Putin returning to power for another 12 years; it is from the corruption that is the basis to his power. His reference to "democratic institution" islaughable since his entire rule has been marked by desroying any attempt to establish real democratic institutions in Russia. Putin's ability to "buy" power (as well as do anything about his plan to invest in the military) depends on one thing - the price of oil. If it stays high or go higher, the Russians will unfortunately have to suffer more years of his rule. If the price of oil goes down, he will not last!

. . . dividing them into matter, form and purpose.

What this appears to be is a campaign speech, aimed at his patrons within the military-industrial complex, and would rightly be regarded as hollow palaver to an international audience.

Are they aware of his stance already? Of course they are informed. But the declaration is to instill confidence, to publicly reinforce the intent and commitment, and perhaps pick-up a few straggling (underemployed) recruits along the way. You did note the phrase 'huge resources' in the fourth from last paragraph, didn't you?

I am assuming V. Putin has something in mind which is slightly more technologically advanced than that Kalashnikov Super-Soaker he's holding, there.

"STLCARDS32

10:36 PM ET

February 21, 2012

What enemies?

I understand that modernizing the Russian military is important, especially in the naval sector. Your military has been, not ignored but offset, by the more important issue of the ailing economy after the fall of the Soviet Union. However, you said the main reason for the upgrades is to act as a deterrent from your "enemies". I would like to ask who those enemies are since Europe now spends half of their GDP on defense spending compared to 20 years ago along with the United States making serious cuts."

The Gymnazium's Annual Mathematics Contest will be held 9 March 1924.

Anyone may enter except Teller and von Neumann Janos.

Join NATO, anyone may enter except Russia.

Last week, I heard countless people who comment on this, the Post, Times, NPR and other such Media Outlets, call Putin an Autocrat and Russia a Dictatorship.

Monte Haun mchaun@hotmail.com

make sure no one EVER again steals nuclear material from your reactors. Mr. Litvinenko's poisoning frightened not because anyone thought the KGB's former chief poisoner would be so inept, but because it indicated serious problems as respects Russian nuclear material security. Few care how you do this, given that Russia is still something of a dictatorship. For all anyone knows, Moscow could be obliterated by a nuclear cloud from Chechnyan terrorists tomorrow! What has been done to forestall this?

I agree with your ideas. It could be a truth that. We will not be able to strengthen our international position or develop our economy or our democratic institutions if we are unable to protect Russia.
We see ever new regional and local wars breaking out. We see new areas of instability and deliberately managed chaos. There also are attempts to provoke such conflicts even close to Russia's and its allies' borders. The basic principles of international law are being degraded and eroded, especially in terms of international security.