Russia tells NATO that military reforms no show of force
BRUSSELS. Oct 23 (Interfax-AVN) - Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said he had assured his counterparts from NATO countries that current military reforms in Russian armed forces are not "an attempt to show force" but a program to make the armed forces "ready to react to any challenges and threats."
"We told our counterparts about the reforming of the Russian armed forces. We stressed that it isn't about flexing our muscles, that it isn't an attempt to show force, but that it's meticulous work to build modern and battle-ready armed forces equipped with modern armaments and ready to react to any challenges and threats," Shoigu told reporters in Brussels after a defense minister-level meeting of the NATO-Russia Council on Wednesday.
Raising personnel skills is one of the main purposes of the reforms, he said.
Shoigu said Russia had taken "unprecedented measures to increase openness in the military sphere" this year.
"We voluntarily informed our counterparts about the objectives of our snap inspections and about the Zapad (West) 2013 Russian-Belarusian exercise and the personnel and armaments that were involved in it. Moreover, as regards Zapad 2013, this was done in advance, and not in summarizing the results of the exercise as had been the practice before," he said.