Russian army among world’s most efficient, Putin says

Putin

MOSCOW, December 17. /TASS/: The Russian Army is among the world’s most efficient today, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin said at his annual press conference on Thursday.

"With the state of the army in 1993, was it possible [to speak about the inviolability of Russian territory]? It is possible to say anything on this score. Could we have provided it with? You won’t use an atomic bomb for every occasion, that’s right. Our conventional forces actually disintegrated. We could not collect 50,000 effective troops across the country to fight international terrorism in the Caucasus while the Army’s strength was over 1 million people," the Russian president said, speaking about the Constitutional amendments adopted in 2020 compared to the 1993 document.

"Now the situation is different and even our opponents already say: ‘Yes, its size has decreased but it has become much more effective.’ Today, this is one of the world’s most efficient armies in Russia today," Putin said.