The impact of the ‘long peace’ on modern military capabilities
&quot;We have all noticed that the Russian military appears far less capable than we thought it was; frankly it seems incapable of even some of the very basic tasks of modern industrial armies engaged in conventional military operations.&quot;<p>I wondered about that. For the record, I have zero evidence of this as reliable records are hard to find in that arena. Chechnya was Russia&#x27;s bigger conflict and now, unlike Syria and few other spots, Russia&#x27;s approach resembled anti-terrorist stance ( pop in for a quick action and hold a small group keeping tabs on things ).<p>The societies that seem to have a handle on this are ones that currently do not have peace ( say Ukraine or Israel, where both deal with an enemy threat on a regular basis ).<p>&quot;Instead, the new incentive for most countries would be to build a military in a way that aims to minimize the political costs, rather than maximize combat power or even ‘security&#x27;.&quot;<p>I am willing to agree on this one. There is a clear weariness in US for giving military even more money. I am seeing something similar in the old country and that is despite Russian aggression aimed at Ukraine.<p>&quot;Meanwhile, maximizing the army for repression means developing paramilitary internal police forces at scale (Rosgvardiya is an obvious example), which direct resources away from core conventional military; such security-oriented forces aren’t designed for a conventional war and perform poorly at it.&quot;<p>The argument seems valid, but I am not entirely convinced. Secret police is not new to Russia and if any country has their apparatus working, it likely is Russia. If that is the case, it makes it difficult for me to believe that they do not have a working system that recognizes and gives some leeway, like any wars before that, to people doing the actual fighting ( like.. you don&#x27;t put a front soldier in Gulag just because he openly says Putin is a dick ). That said, the argument does provide an explanation for Russia&#x27;s failure. I am just not sure I agree though.<p>&quot;revanchist powers (Israel, Taiwan, Poland, Finland, Ukraine, etc.)&quot;<p>I found the listing of Poland and Finland interesting, but I am not sure what argument for keeping them on that list is.<p>&quot; Of course the big unanswered and at the moment unanswerable question is where countries like India or the People’s Republic of China fit.&quot;<p>I am not sure it is unanswerable. Some people have definitely taken a stab at it. Right now, the momentum seems to be generating a new axis with both India and China rising as new powers and flexing their individual muscles ( we hear a lot about China, but that seems like it is mostly, because it is US&#x27;s current main concern ).