This is all just so much chest-thumping. The immense sums required to support these lavish promises will not materialize. You can't get there from here, as the old aphorism goes. The price of oil (which Russia depends on for a great deal of its state revenues) has dropped to less than half its value from this past summer, the Russian stock market is in free fall, and foreign investment has fled Russia.
The article also reports that Russia lost twelve aircraft in the war with Georgia and, amazingly, that Russian pilots refused to fly missions. The latter is simply shocking. The days of advancing Russian troops with KGB troops following behind firing away to discourage army retreat are long gone, I guess, but apparently still needed.
I don't completely dismiss the Russian performance in the Russian-Georgian War since, despite heavier Russian ground and air losses than we would have suffered in a comparable fight, the Russians did achieve their objective. I remain puzzled that their objective did not include going all the way to Tbilisi and installing a friendly regime, but the Russians achieved their apparent battlefield goals. Moscow may not get style points but if they don't mind the casualties, a win is a win.
And the Russian army victory was not because of Russian numbers, as the article states. Russia had a division's worth of troops to throw at the Georgians, plus local militias. While the Russians surely had the numerical advantage at the point of attack, overall the Russians did not outnumber the total Georgian troop strength. But Russian troops who trained for that war beat Georgian troops who practiced for peacekeeping.
The Russian military is not about to hold Western Europe hostage again any time soon with the ability to drive to the Rhine. But they can achieve limited objectives if they are willing to endure the casualties.
