International security

Why the West Is Dismissing Russia, And Why It Really Shouldn’t

It has almost become a truism that the Russian military is crumbling, inept, and bumbling. Recent activity, however, paints a picture of an army fast modernising, adaptable, and capable. “Russia has surprised the West with its military capacity twice in succession,” writes Gustav Gressel in a recent policy brief for the European Council on Foreign Relations. “First, in Ukraine, the Russian armed forces overturned Western assumptions about their inefficiency with a swift and coordinated ‘hybrid war,’ combining subversion and infiltration with troop deployment to gain an early military advantage.” Then, in its first military foray into the international arena proper since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia “made the United States look hesitant and indecisive.” While “the long-term impact of Russia’s gambit remains uncertain,” what is now undisputable is that the old assumptions about the waning power of Russia’s military no longer stand under scrutiny.