Military budget of the Russian Federation

Dmitry Rogozin: We cannot allow cuts in state program for rearmaments

In an interview with TASS Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said that Western countries should be thanked for Russia's energetic relations with China

Russian Deputy Prime Minister, the chairman of the Board for the Military-Industrial Complex, Dmitry Rogozin keeps construction of the Vostochny space center in the country’s Far East under personal control and he promises to have meetings with the co-chairman of the Russian-Chinese interstate commission not only at sessions of the latter. Rogozin spoke in an interview with TASS about complaints against the builders of the space center, new Russian-Chinese projects in aviation and space research, a new state armament program through to 2025 and talks with the US on building stations of the Russian global positioning system GLONASS in the US.

- A prosecutorial inquiry into the spending of budgetary funds for construction of the Vostochny space center and the causes for disruption of the schedule of works was ordered recently. What are the new terms for commissioning of the key facilities of the complex and has the problem with the schedule been eliminated?

- What you said contains two different questions. Number one, slipping behind schedule and how to eliminate it. This isn’t just a matter of the prosecutorial inspection. That’s a problem of a frugal treatment of spending, which concerns the customer of the project, the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos) to a much greater degree. Problem number two concerns elimination of leaning towards the possible encroachments on legitimacy that may occur and, on top of that, the ones that have occurred in the past.

When I came to Vostochny for the first time, we were about twelve months behind the schedule because the project documentation was haywire and in some cases it just didn’t exist at all. Along with it, everyone mentioned the uniqueness of some installations, saying it was simply impossible to draft project documentation for them. This is the biggest loophole for corruption schemes. We were about twelve months behind the schedule because the project documentation was haywire

One more problem that had brought about the slippage was the technologically incorrect computation of the time of completion of launch pad No. 1. The computation suggested that the construction teams were to round up their work in November 2015 and its commissioning for operations was to take place in December. But this is simply impossible because six months as a minimum is needed for testing all the equipment. And to be able to test it, you should bring it to the site, assemble it and get it ready for the first rocket launch. That’s why I demanded back in the summer of 2012 that completion of construction works be brought forward. I asked to finish them in June of July 2015 instead of November 2015. The fact also contributed to the slippage in some way but we were not falling behind time in this case, we were returning to the logic of the Presidential Decree on the launch of an unmanned ship from the Vostochny space center’s launch pad No. 1.

- And what are the main grudges against the builders?

- The main grudge is that, from our viewpoint, they are short of workforce to ensure the commissioning of all the phase-one facilities as scheduled. No doubt, we won’t agree with their smart tricks, with their proposals to establish the so-called ‘launch minimum’, which means to concentrate efforts on the facilities that are critical to the launch of the rocket, and to put the rest on a shelf. On our part, we believe everything included in the plan should be implemented in full.

- You visited Vostochny with a yet another inspection ten days ago? How big is the gap now?

- The most important task today is to begin supply of heating to all technological rooms on time so that we could unpack and assemble the equipment there. It’s important to keep up the pace of work in wintertime, too, to build up the volumes of output, and to bring the main works to the final phase by June.

As for the slippage, it remains practically unchanged – about one and a half months from one installation to another. I’m afraid I’ll have to go there quite often because big-shot visits always stimulate the progress of works. I plan to go there next time after November 20 and then closer to the New Year. That is, I’ll make trips to Vostochny practically every month and I’ll see to it that all construction works are normalized.

- What other measures are being taken to impart the necessary pace to construction works?

- To ensure that all of this is translated into life and works harmoniously, I took a decision to relocate there the main forces and knowledgeable people who have taken part in building large facilities of this kind in the past.

In the first place, we’re considering a full-scale inclusion of the Ministry of Construction Industry in the project. I’ve proposed to appoint Deputy Minister Leonid Stavitsky the principal official in charge of the Vostochny project on behalf of the ministry.

A working group is being formed now to take control of all the technical documentation, the work of the department for state appraisals (Glavgosexpertiza), and the computation of all the coefficients, including the ones applied at unique installations. In other words, struggle with paper tigers should be over within two or three months. It’s important to put the builders’ work on a routine, normal track. They will be controlled by the Ministry of Construction Industry at the instruction of the Russian government.

- The situation with the builders is clear but what are the claims against Roscosmos?

- If you take Roscosmos, the claims against them are not fewer or even outweigh those against the builders. They concern the work of the directorate-general of the space center. I think an immediate reshuffle is necessary there along with the upgrading of its status and its competences so that the customer could control the works done by the general contractor.

I’ll make trips to Vostochny practically every months and I’ll see to it that all the construction works there are normalized. I’ll make trips to Vostochny practically every month and I’ll see to it that all construction works are normalized

On the whole, we realize the complexity of this work. The Vostochny space center is being built in a region that is short of construction equipment because it’s located in the taiga, quite far away from population centers, and workforce is also scanty there. We realize this but the fact does not annul in any way the task set forth by the President.

- Will extra funds be allocated to speed the works up?

- No, we won’t go beyond the allocations that have been earmarked. It’s all in the budget already and we haven’t had any contradictions with the Finance Ministry so far.

- What’s the situation with the launch pad for the Angara rockets?

- That’s one more crucial task. All the documentation for works at launch pad No. 2, that is for Angara, must be drawn up briskly.

Besides, we’ll have to build an airdrome at Vostochny and a city with permanent housing instead of the service one, to ramify the infrastructure, and to put the technological compound in place.

In fact, construction of the Vostochny space center will continue further on and there’ll be a third phase aimed at a super-heavy-duty rocket, which the designers are still pondering. That’s a story to take a long, long time. The main thing now is to keep up fair pace and to ensure the launch of a space ship with the Lomonosov satellite from the Far East in December 2015.

- Is sequestering of the State Program for Armaments through to 2020, for which 20 trillion rubles has been earmarked, possible now?

- Considering the situation in the world, we can’t allow any sort of cuts in the armaments program now. President Putin stated this unambiguously on many occasions, and quite naturally numerous consultations have been held on the issue. That means that if we reschedule separate things beyond 2020, this will be done only due to the inability of the manufacturing sector to accomplish one or another task.

Considering the situation in the world, we can’t allow any sort of cuts in the armaments program now. Considering the situation in the world, we can’t allow any sort of cuts in the armaments program now

- And can there be cuts in the new program for the years 2016 through to 2025?

- We plan to hold the next session of the commission for defense manufacturing either at the beginning of next year or at the end of this year, with President Putin attending it. The session will consider financial and economic background, against which the new program will be drafted. At present, the Finance Ministry and Economic Development Ministry are expected to produce a maximally realistic forecast for the country’s economic development.

Proceeding from it and from the benchmarks it stipulates, we’ll be able to figure out the minimum possible volume of financing of the future program of armaments. But it will be comparable with financing of the current program anyway.

- How is the import independence program for our defense industry sector developing? What’s the amount of work and what are the time limits?

- The first stage of the import substitution plan has been adopted by the president, approved, and funds have been allocated for it, including for the current year. These measures are already taken on some facilities. I can’t name them to avoid attracting unnecessary attention. But in general, everything is proceeding according to plan.

The Defense Ministry as the key customer and the key interested party supervises the plan implementation. They compile reports on the plan weekly. So once in three months, the government receives information to what extent the plan is being implemented.

As regards the second stage, it is connected with the response to the sanctions announced by the West.

Russian defense-industrial sector to substitute imported US, EU components in 3 years

- That is, substitution of US and European imports?

- Quite right. Everything has been calculated here too, all figures match one another. By the end of October, all this should be submitted to the government. The military industrial sector board staff will thoroughly analyze the data, reduce them to a common denominator, after which the matter will be reported to the president and approved.

- Has the cost of the program been calculated as well?

- Yes.

- Can you name the figure?

- No, I can’t.

- You head the Russian part of the bilateral intergovernmental commission with China on trade-economic and scientific-technical cooperation. How is it developing?

- We have rather energetic relations with the People’s Republic of China, and Western countries should be thanked a lot for that. I am not even joking, because in a certain sense it broke some psychological barriers, which probably existed in someone’s head regarding cooperation with China.

We are now actively working in the space sphere, considering possible joint projects in space exploration.

In November, a delegation of (Russian space agency) Roscosmos and leading rocket and space industry enterprises is heading to the International Aviation & Aerospace Exhibition in Zhuhai, where they will discuss specific projects with representatives of the Chinese industry. Then they will report to the governments of their countries. We have rather energetic relations with China, and Western countries should be thanked for that

Through (Russian state nuclear energy corporation) Rosatom, we are actively discussing the issue of expanding Russian participation on the market of China’s electric power industry, up to entering jointly the markets of third countries on some separate projects.

Regarding satellite navigation – Russia’s GLONASS and China’s Beidou – we have also agreed. I suggested to our Chinese colleagues the idea to unite the efforts of two systems. They liked the idea. The Russian system is more northern, we mainly cover the Northern Hemisphere. The Chinese in this sense are southerners. Combination is possible here: technical cooperation both in the orbit and on Earth in creation of chipsets that could be receivers of both Beidou and GLONASS signals. This will give additional characteristics in terms of a clear and precise signal, so we will no longer depend on our connection with GPS.

- How does joint work with China proceed to build a wide-body long-range aircraft and a heavy helicopter? Will the helicopter be the development of our Mi-26 project?

- Yes, in the field of aviation we have considerably moved forward on the road to create a heavy 38-ton helicopter. But it will not even be a deep upgrade of Mi-26, but in essence the Russian Federation’s technological contribution to the creation of a new helicopter with large-scale Chinese financing for the project. We are also interested in the machine.

Regarding the wide-body long-range aircraft, the situation is also moving. Its design project has been completed. We are now calculating what China’s demand for these planes is, what our domestic demand is.

The key question is for how long will we certify it and where? It will either be Russian certification, that is by the Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC), or China will certify it at its place. We suggested China join the IAC and thus remove the problem connected with certification of both this plane and other aircraft specimens. This issue is being studied.

So, we have progress in many spheres with China. We are working with the Chinese side very closely and have agreed that we will hold co-chair-level meetings more often than commission meetings. In the beginning of the year, I am going to visit China to specify work on these strategically important projects.

- Back in May, the Russian side declared some sort of an “ultimatum” to the United States on deployment of GPS earth stations on the territory of the Russian Federation. By August 31, the American partners were to make a decision on similar deployment of GLONASS earth stations on their territory. How are the talks proceeding?

- There are no talks there. We made a relevant statement in spring. I proposed initiating talks with the United States on deployment of GLONASS infrastructure on its territory, and suspend GPS stations’ infrastructure on Russian territory while talks are ongoing.

In conditions of sanctions, the Americans did not agree on any talks. So the issue is senseless from the viewpoint of prospects, that’s why we took measures. They suit us well. We deprived GPS stations in Russia by technical means of the opportunity to be used for military purposes.

- How exactly technically did Russian specialists deprive the Americans of the opportunity to use GPS stations on our territory for military purposes?

- For obvious reasons, I won’t tell you how we did it, but we did that. In conditions of sanctions, the Americans did not agree on any talks

We don’t want to frostbite our ears to annoy our granny but we don’t want to deprive our users of the opportunity to work with GLONASS and GPS either. Why should we create fewer opportunities for our own population? But we completely destroyed any prospects, even indirect ones, for the use of the American navigation system for homing of precision weapons.

First launch of Russia's new Angara rocket due December 25

- How is preparation for the launch of the heavy Angara rocket from the Plesetsk space center going?

- According to reports by our military, Plesetsk has complete construction preparedness for the launch of Angara at the end of December. In line with the industry report, they also have complete preparedness of the rocket for the launch. There are no issues demanding interference of the Russian government. The matter is under the supervision of the Defense Ministry as the launching organization and the Khrunichev Center (Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center) as the manufacturer of the rocket.

- Will Angara be launched as planned – on December 25?

- Preliminarily, yes. But there is a weeklong window there. These are tests, so the launch will be made by technical readiness.

The interview was taken by Anastasiya Savinykh and Dmitry Reshetnikov

Last year the World Bank said Russia's defense budget was already 4.2 percent of its GDP.[/quote]




usa is around 4 percent . china is not over 2 percent , two low . I expect 3 percent in 2020 around 400 billion

http://itar-tass.com/en/russia/768022

"Collapsing military programs will result in increased costs for the state"
http://vpk.name/news/123793_svertyivanie_voennyih_programm_obernetsya_dlya_gosudarstva_povyishennyimi_zatratami.html

Deputy Defense Minister Tatyana Shevtsova on the financing of the Ministry of Defense

Budget of the Ministry of Defence in 2015 remains one of the largest - the item "National Defense" department will receive 3.3 trillion rubles. What threatens its reduction and why military expenditure benefit not only the military, Deputy Defense Minister of Finance Tatyana Shevtsova told the "Kommersant" Ivan Safronov.

- How real is the sequestration of the defense budget?

- Budget Host in difficult conditions, part of the cost of government programs really was sequestered, but the article "National Defense" is not affected, although many experts insisted on this. I think that calls for a reduction in military spending is now fundamentally wrong.

- What are the main financial parameters you have planned for 2015?

- On defense spending plans to spend 3.3 trillion rubles., That is 4.2% of the gross domestic product of the country. Can not be regarded defense spending just as the cost of maintaining the army. The bulk of these costs - more than 65% - will be directed to re-Army and Navy, as well as for the modernization of defense enterprises.

It is thanks to the defense budget over the next decade, the industry will be able to upgrade the industrial base, to create skilled jobs. Today, the industry employs more than 4 thousand. Companies, one way or another involved in the production of military goods, of which 1,339 companies included in the single register of DIC, form the basis of the domestic industry, and about 1 tys.- work with them in collaboration, the rest also supply materials and components. The share of revenue in the first group of GDP rose from 5.5% in 2009 to 9% in 2013. The total contribution to GDP as the entire industry in the past year can be estimated at 14-15%. Do not forget that on the defense industry employs more than 2 million people, along with their families this would be about 5 million - the presence of enterprises of our order guarantees workers a stable high-paying job, and hence wealth in families.

- Still talking about the need to draw in their military expenditures do not cease.

- In our view, touch the military expenditure is not worth it. We must understand that we are not just modernizing the army and navy, and in fact derive from their serious condition in which they were at the time when the armed forces are constantly underfunded and delivery of new weapons were made in very limited quantities. This objective long-term process, which has already spent significant financial resources, requires a logical conclusion. Any reduction of budget expenditures in funding state armaments program will lead to a significant loss of the federal budget.

- There are political reasons for increased conservation funding of defense programs?

- Today is clearly seen increasing military threats to Russia. This is reflected in the increased military activity of NATO, increasing the fighting strength of the alliance's troops along the border with Russia, gradually building the capacity of a missile defense system, secretive development of hypersonic shock and other weapons. All this points to the need to strengthen the country's defense, the Defense Ministry can not not respond to this. One of the tasks of the West is to undermine the modernization of the armed forces, or to make us really roll it, or to adjust the maximum scheduled performance towards their reduction. And if this is done, it will be possible to state that they have achieved their goals. I firmly believe that the task of creating modern armed forces can not be postponed. We will lose the pace, and the next time again return to the modernization of the army and navy, costs a lot more resources. Savings from clotting military programs actually will result in higher costs for the state.

- The growth of military spending does not harm the economy as a whole?

- In addition to aspects of the country's defense, there is also the economic effect. Investing in the defense industry stimulates various sectors of our economy. When broken down by industry costs the Ministry of Defense of the economy, we see that the state defense order affects nearly every industry - the aerospace, aviation, shipbuilding, automotive industry, as well as education, construction and healthcare. In practice, the increase in production of defense enterprises generates the demand for metals, energy, transport services and so on, which in turn leads to an increase in production, which after a certain period of time show a greater demand for the products of other industries already in accordance with its own cost structure .

In addition to the direct effect of increasing the gross production of the Russian defense industry due to the increase in purchases of weapons, military and special equipment, as well as military R & D funding for high-tech industries generates indirect multiplier effect procurement and investment activities under the state armaments program until 2025. It is currently being developed and should be approved by the end of 2015.

Historical experience shows that the basis of economic power, technological and defense security of our country during the Soviet era was the scientific-industrial complex, formed as a result of huge efforts to industrialise the country's economic structure. A special role here has always belonged to the defense complex, which develops priority compared with the civil sector of the economy, allowing to equip defense plants, research institutes and design new high-performance scientific and industrial equipment, implement and master the latest technology for military and civil purposes, to create a unique scientific school. Scientific and technical achievements DIC were the main source of technological innovation in the civilian sector. All this has allowed to form a powerful scientific and technological infrastructure, which gave the opportunity to create advanced weapons systems, still in demand and competitive on the international arms markets.

- But the civilian sector now wants to develop not only due to military programs.

- I think that today in opposition to address the socio-economic development and military security is incorrect, because now they are integrated into a single unit: the same United Aircraft Corporation successfully develops and manufactures military aircraft series "Su" and produces civilian aircraft Sukhoi Superjet. Already proved that participation in the state defense order has a positive impact on the regions with a high proportion of the defense industry in the gross regional product. Maintaining military spending at 4% of GDP, which is characteristic for most countries, and the establishment of chain transfer of military technology to the civilian sector is key to economic growth.

Ivan Safronov

Despite a looming recession, Russia will increase military spending by 30 percent next year to a record post-Soviet high of 3.3 trillion rubles ($62 billion)

Whoa! Great news. They need to cut social spending thought. It's fricking enormous and wasteful.

Regular wrote:Whoa! Great news. They need to cut social spending thought. It's fricking enormous and wasteful.

Only wasteful in the manner that they do not re-open or invest it in regions that do need them. There were several dozens of mining entrances to minerals closed, opening them back again would bring some of the more remote locations leave more money and investing in siberia is anyway a good.

solutions to recesion? encourage new bussines open, lower taxes maibe cause everyone pays when is low, destroy evasion, cheap transporting from city to city and village, i dont' know

George1 wrote:Despite a looming recession, Russia will increase military spending by 30 percent next year to a record post-Soviet high of 3.3 trillion rubles ($62 billion)

Increasing spending will help reduce the amplitude of the recession. The Russian government needs to buy a clue and accept that
running deficits is perfectly acceptable and smart. There is something called opportunity cost. Do you not buy a house because you
don't have the full price in cash or do you buy it by taking out a mortgage? If you wait to accumulate the cash then it can take years
and the house prices increase and the availability of houses in the neighbourhood you like becomes smaller. Deficits are the same
thing as loans and mortgages. Why is it considered normal to deny loan based government operations when these are routine in
business?

Reducing social spending just reduces spending for lower income families... which is not good for any economy.

Hi all, I know that corruption in the Russian armed forces has been pretty bad in the past and I believe 4yrs ago around $13 billion was being stolen from the budget which is pretty horrendous. Does anyone know if its still as bad and if so has there been any improvement? any figures of money lost would be good.

d_taddei2 wrote:Hi all, I know that corruption in the Russian armed forces has been pretty bad in the past and I believe 4yrs ago around $13 billion was being stolen from the budget which is pretty horrendous. Does anyone know if its still as bad and if so has there been any improvement? any figures of money lost would be good.

Bad? Not compared to oh... I don't know...

d_taddei2 wrote:Hi all, I know that corruption in the Russian armed forces has been pretty bad in the past and I believe 4yrs ago around $13 billion was being stolen from the budget which is pretty horrendous. Does anyone know if its still as bad and if so has there been any improvement? any figures of money lost would be good.

Serdyukov was indeed a corrupt maggot and was not reigned in by Medvedev.

Putin pardoned Serdykov.

Think about that one for a while.

And yes, it is very bad. Brace yourself for posts denying how bad it is and how compared to the Pentagon the Russian military is a paragon of honesty and transparency.

Also lets be clear... this is a western inflicted reduction in growth that is not even a recession yet.

Once Russia reorients itself away from partners that want to cripple her economically thinks will not only be better, but will be much more stable for the future.

And yes, it is very bad.

Well duh... how can it be good?

The facts are when it comes to money and power there is dishonesty with human beings... whether it is the Russian military, the US military, or the Catholic church.

An FSB team nabbed one senior officer from my unit shortly before I started my service there; over corruption. He was basically blackmailing I believe, officers under his command.

I got the impression that over the years from 2009 onwards, Military Prosecution started working more and more actively and nabbing all these small-time losers.

Although in terms of corruption right at the top - I have no idea. It's probably still there. There was of course the Serdyukov case, but the only reason it was started was because he was disgraced anyway as a Defence Minister - or needed to be disgraced. Wouldn't be surprised if the top brass is still as corrupt as before, but then I don't know either way.

America's military elite is of course, also corrupt. One look at the deals corrupt American generals have been enjoying in Kosovo lately, and probably soon in the Ukraine - is enough to confirm this.

The main problem is that in the west corruption is acceptable... the last lot of economy figures the UK published included prostitution and drug sales as part of the economy to boost their figures.

The west often pulls crap like that and it is accepted... which is why the world economy is failing... a house of cards built upon the US dollar.

So Russian military budget is going to grow by 30% but by nominal terms (ofc) it's actually lower. Why are they using the nominal values with countries like Russia and China... sigh. Yeah sure, I guess it's to only way to directly convert them to dollars/euros but it just looks... so dumb and misleading. Atleast Pentagon and IISS (IIRC) add up to those figures, so for instance last year Russia's budget was officially $70b, but according to IISS it was already 90 billion, same with China.

And the Russian budget has always been somewhat a mystery to me. Their budget was something like 30-50 billion around 2005-2012 but they didn't procure almost any new arms at all. Now, from 2012 with 60 billion and last year, 70 billion budget they "suddenly" get 100 new planes, 100 new helicopters (more than the US with their 500 billion, or so I read), S400s, hundreds of vehicles, Iskanders, submarines and frigates and conduct massive exercises... And I've read that corruption eats 20% of the budget, or something like that.

I mean their budget is supposed to be only slightly bigger than the UK's or France's and those forces are pretty small... What is going on? And It's not like they are using all their money to buy new weapons either, because as I mentioned their readiness has also improved considerably. For a long time I thought that the rearmament plan of 600 billion or so, was "outside" the budget, meaning that every year until 2020 they would get additional 60 billion every year for new equipment, but apparently that's not the case. That much "advertised" 600 billion is actually their whole budget, or maybe I'm mistaken. In any case, they seem to do extremely well with money they get.

I did some VERY unscientific calculations... Russia's nominal GDP per capita used to be 14k before the fall of the ruble. It is 23k by PPP, IIRC. In other words, the nominal GDP is only 60% of the PPP value. So Russia's "real" military budget is also 40% higher. Military budget will rise 30% this year. That is $90 billion, old ruble rate. And let's increase that by 40% and we get roughly around $130 billion. US military budget is 510 billion. So Russia's military budget, without 10 supercarriers, hundreds of foreign military bases, etc., is pretty much exactly 1/4th of the US budget. IMO that is atleast much closer to the truth.

China's situation is pretty much the same. This year, their budget should be around $150 billion. We get $210 billion.

Their combined budget would be around $350 billion vs. the US $510 billion. Not bad. And at this rate the Chinese budget will keep increasing considerably every single year. (And no, I'm not saying there's a military alliance between them, just for the lulz.)

Kimppis wrote:I did some VERY unscientific calculations...

It would be interested to see those calculations and perhaps even make some corections with the help of other members.

sepheronx wrote:Take into account that majority of this is into procuring equipment (Sap2020) and that after procurment, Russias modernization of military will stand at 70%, so there will be another SAP to deal with the next 30%, which I imagine will be a smaller number (much smaller) and after that, military budget will plung to maintaining gear, R&D, and procurement of additional equipment here and there. Only purpose for this massive budget is because of procurment (creates a lot of jobs) and restructuring. I imagine 10 years from now, western monkeys will be swinging from the chandaleres, screeching how well they did in "hurting" Rus economy that they "had to drop" defense spending, when reality is that it is because the SAP's are done and no need for mass modernization anymore.

Hopefully by then, most defense companies would be involved in import substitution. Would love to buy cutlery and a TV with the Mikoyan/sokol brand name or a vehicle/truck with the Kalashnikov brand.

But my point kind of was that it's not even that big, the official figure. It's "only" around 4% of the GDP, 20% of the budget, comparable to the US. If it gets considerably lower, it would less than UK's military spending. If by "much smaller" you mean something like 3% of the GDP, then I can understand but the official numbers are not that large to begin with.

And as I said, with only a budget of 30-50 billion they didn't modernize basically at all. Now, with 70 billion, they procure massive amounts of equipment and conduct massive exercises, improve housing, etc., etc.. It's not only weapons. And that's why I really don't understand the numbers. The difference is massive but the budget really isn't that much different.

They should keep roughly this amount of spending and I don't see why they couldn't. But sure, the percentage to the GDP is probably going to get slightly smaller and less will used to buy new equipment, when there is no need.

Viktor wrote:

Kimppis wrote:I did some VERY unscientific calculations...

It would be interested to see those calculations and perhaps even make some corections with the help of other members.

I showed pretty much all of them in that post. As I said, VERY unscientific.

Russian military spending was supposed to be $90 billion before the fall of the ruble. That still stands, because of Russia's domestic military industry. By purchasing power, Russia GDP is (was, before ruble lost its value) around 40% higher than in dollar terms. So I simply increased that 90 billion by 40%. I did the same thing with China.

They certainly get more bang for their buck than the western militaries, in dollar terms, as we can see with the current Russian modernization. So around $130 billion could be a more accurate figure when we compare Russian military spending to some other countries, especially in the west.