Vantage Point North

Latest news is that Russia will expand both of the remaining motorized rifle brigades of the 58 th Combined Arms Army into full strength divisions. This would mean that the army would have three full divisions of mechanized forces with heavy artillery and missile support. At the same time when the brigades are being upgraded, “Other units of the 58 th Army” will be moved from their traditional posts in the Northern Caucasus further into west. T-90S tanks (Photo: Some Russian propaganda outlet) There is no schedule for the transition, but as Chechnya is relatively calm under the iron grip of Kremlins pet attack dog Kadyrov, the already full strength 42 nd Motorized Rifle Division, that was expanded in 2016, could begin its relocation at a moments notice. Not that long ago the Russian armed forces transited largely to a brigade structure, very similar to that of the western armies. Next iteration of this concept were the Battalion Tactical Groups that are agile inde...

NATO E3 AWACS (Photo: NATO) Sweden is preparing for a parliamentary election next fall. Security, both internal and external, will be a major issue that all parties must confront. Situation in the Baltic-Sea region is getting tenser by the day and there are serious security issues within the troubled immigrant neighborhoods of the Swedish cities. As the nation’s political elite, diplomats and military leaders gathered to a ski resort in Sälen to their traditional foreign and defense policy seminar, the leading opposition party, the Moderates, stated that their goal is a Sweden that is a NATO member. The party leader Ulf Kristersson is confident that the now ruling social democrats will change their minds and that Sweden will be a NATO member within the next decade. Kristersson’s comments sparked a furious response from the Swedish defense minister Peter Hultqvist. According to Hultqvist the Social Democrats will maintain the traditional neutrality and co-operation and r...

The light weight tracked IFV:s of the BMD-series have been the mainstay of the Russian airborne forces, the VDV, for decades. Several new BMD-variants are currently under development. But the vehicle that is going to be  introduced  to service first is breaking the pattern.  K-4386 Typhoon-VDV (Photo: Vitaly V, Kuzmin) The K-4386 Typhoon-VDV is a wheeled 4x4 armored car, that can be armed with a variety of weapon systems. The base model is a formidable IFV that will have a remote-controlled turret with a 30 mm 2A42 automatic cannon and a coaxial 7.62mm PKT machine gun. But what really sets the VDV variant apart from most of the other MRAP:s is its ability to be parachuted from Russian transport aircraft. Drivers station of the  K-4386 Typhoon-VDV (photo: Nikita Grigoriev, Mil.Today)  The Typhoon “ family ” of Russian mine resistant vehicles has been adopted by the various military branches and security services in Russia. The vehicles are ma...

Kalynivka depot explosion. (Photo: REUTERS) As the night fell, a large Ukrainian armed forces ammunition storage was engulfed in flames at Kalynivka. The fires spread rapidly across the facility that contained 188,000 tons of munitions. Luckily most of the compartmentalization features, such as bunkers and steel walls have managed to limit the damage to about 30 % of the munitions stored there. This is the third ammunitions dump fire in Ukraine recently. All of these have been active facilities that are storing relevant and modern munitions and all have been feeding the Ukrainian Army units defending Ukraine against the Russian aggression. These are not some half-derelict old depots, looked after by the washouts the military wants to hide from sight. The Ukrainian security service has claimed that the previous fires/explosions were Russian sabotage operations. The Balakliya dump was claimed to have ignited by an explosive device dropped from a Russian drone. Similar cla...

The Russian military modernization program has two superstars that have been grabbing the headlines, the T-50 Pak-Fa 5 th generation fighter and the T-14 Armata main battle tank. The Armata has been dubbed as a wonder weapon that will make all other main battle tanks obsolete. The published plan was to phase out all other tracked platforms and gradually replace them with Armata variants. The T-14 Armata was supposed to be produced in great numbers. The delayed development of the Armata platform has been evident, not only by it’s failure in the Victory Day parade at the Red Square, but also by the fact that the advanced T-72B3 variant has been produced in large numbers and an additional upgrade package has been applied to it in 2016. In addition to the T-72B3M, two other Russian main battle tank upgrade programs are currently underway and the overall number of the modernized tanks will rise to thousands. It is remarkable that the Russian armed forces are committing to four ...

Local defense tested — Finland readies for the Zapad2017? Readiness unit prepares to storm a building. Finland has been busy building up the capacity to respond to the rapidly evolving hybrid threats of the modern world. The new military capabilities and the doctrines developed for the local troops, that I’ve written about earlier, are now being tested in a fresh round of  local defense exercises  that involve over 3500 personnel and last until 8th of September. Leopard 2A4:s are veing refuelled at a gas station. Note the simulators in the barrels The three exercises are organized by the major Army brigades. For the first time the new readiness units are used to support the local defense units manned with active reservists. The brigades have formed these readiness units from the conscripts serving for an extra six months and they are commanded by the professional officers and NCO:s. The reserve units were equipped and formed in the same manner that would ...

#Zapad2017: Russia threatens Finland and the Baltic states The eyes of the European military experts and leaders have been focused on the upcoming Russian Zapad2017 exercise for a while now. When compared to the hype the official Russian description of the exercise is rather underwhelming. Russia claims that the exercise will include slightly over 10000 Russian soldiers altogether with only 3000 entering Belarus to help the Belarussian army to quench an imaginary separatist uprising supported by the evil neighboring superpowers. It is most likely completely coincidental that these neighbors look awfully lot like Poland and Lithuania. So why is the west so worried? Most important reason is, that the scope of the preparations for the Zapad2017 seem to be quite conflicting to the official story. Russian army has activated a large contingent of reservists and specialists to create an infrastructure for the drill. These rear area troops include nearly 5000 men from t...

Maskirovka buildup by Russia 31st Air Assault Brigade has brand new BMD-4M IFVs. Exactly a year ago I wrote about the Russian  Maskirovka mobilizations  that are also known as “snap drills” or “readiness inspections”. Some of these drills have been massive and enough troops were set in motion, that the forces could’ve invaded a small nation. While the snap drills of various units of the Russian Armed Forces and the Russian National Guard have continued, the scale has been smaller. Most analysts are looking towards the well published Zapad 2017 exercise as the next possible window for a Russian aggression. However there is an ongoing, slow and creeping, buildup at the western border of Russia. Several combat units have been enlarged during the recent intakes of new recruits and conscripts. More importantly troops move around long distances in seemingly scheduled exercises, which are announced a day or few hours before they commence. These allow Russia to ...