by Associate Professor, Lt.Col. Juha Kukkola (D.Mil.Sc.)
The Russian military began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 with a force structure shaped by the so-called Serdyukov reforms, implemented from 2008 onward. After four years of war, a central question is what kind of force structure Russia will pursue in the future. The question is highly relevant, particularly given claims that such a force could eventually be used against NATO. “Know thy enemy” remains sound military advice, but “forecast thy enemy” is much easier said than done.
This short text does not offer a prediction of Russia’s probable future force structure. Its aim is more modest: to identify several factors likely to affect the development of Russian force structure in the short to medium term, with particular attention to the ground forces. In doing so, it offers a set of considerations that should inform any serious assessment of Russia’s future force structure.
Russia currently has three distinct force structures interacting with one another. Despite fighting a long war, the Russian force still resembles—at least on paper—the force with which it entered the conflict. This is the “legacy force structure.” Most command structures, formations, and units remain recognizable by prewar standards. In addition to organizational inertia and entrenched officer assumptions about force design, continuity has been reinforced by Russia’s extensive stocks of stored military equipment.
At the same time, the war has undeniably produced a “wartime force structure.” New and additional types of units have been developed, the balance among different types of units has shifted, and new equipment and methods of fighting have been introduced. Many of these changes, however, are adaptations to a particular kind of war that even Russia does not wish to fight indefinitely. Storm companies and assault battalions with heavy UAV and EW support, for example, are products of the current war. The poor quality and limited training of available personnel have required further modifications. Whether Russia will want to retain these formations after the war remains unclear.
Russia’s response to Finland’s and Sweden’s accession to NATO, together with the evident crisis in its conventional deterrence, has produced what might be called a “declarative force structure.” Moscow has announced the establishment of new units along the Baltic-Finnish-Norwegian frontier, but thus far these units exist largely on paper. This is a force structure as aspiration: a deterrent constructed through official statements, changes in unit designations, and a limited number of construction projects.
After the war, the legacy, wartime, and declarative force structures are likely to merge into an unsettled organizational mix, from which a new structure will eventually emerge. That structure will be shaped by five additional factors.
First, technological development will inevitably shape Russia’s future force structure. Unmanned Systems Troops (Voyska bespilotnykh sistem) and their associated regiments and brigades are already emerging. Robotic systems with AI-enabled capabilities are likely to be incorporated into future force design. Communications, electronic warfare, and air defense forces will also probably undergo significant changes as the weapon-counterweapon cycle continues to evolve. Space-based capabilities will need to be integrated more effectively into the force, as the difficulties surrounding Starlink have demonstrated.
However, the Russian military may not receive either the systems it wants or the most advanced systems available. It may receive only what the military-industrial complex is willing and able to produce.
Second, the Russian political leadership’s interpretation of the war’s outcome—whether as victory, defeat, or something in between—could impose significant constraints on future force design. Defeat could render plans for a 2.5-million-man peacetime armed forces unrealistic. Conversely, a surge of nationalist-patriotic sentiment could produce overinvestment in the military, generating waste, corruption, and a force structure that serves federal or regional elites more than operational requirements.
The Russian army has always been a social project as well as a military institution. The postwar model of state-society and civil-military relations that the Kremlin seeks to construct will therefore have a direct effect on the future shape of the armed forces
Third, resources are likely to be insufficient to satisfy all institutional demands. The same applies to manpower, given Russia’s unfavorable demographic outlook. Services such as the Navy, whose performance in this war has been limited or disappointing, may have to defend their institutional relevance, or at least redefine their future mission. Conversely, those services and branches perceived to have performed well may receive additional funding, units, personnel, and materiel.
The future force structure will certainly be shaped by the experience of the war. However, which experiences are treated as most relevant will not be determined through a purely rational lessons-learned process. After the war, every service and branch will seek to demonstrate its indispensable role in winning both the previous war and future wars.
Fourth, Russian expectations about the character of future war—if Russian military science is to be taken seriously—will shape the future force structure. The shadow of the future falls over every procurement and organizational decision. From a Western perspective, it is worth remembering that Russia is a continental power facing multiple potential adversaries and threats across geographically diverse strategic directions. Its future force structure will not be designed solely with the West in mind. Even Russia’s pseudo-ideology of a state-civilization implies defense against both internal and external enemies that challenge its core interests and “spiritual values.” Such defense may also include the use of ethnic or allied forces.
Fifth, good ideas alone are insufficient. Some may be suppressed for political reasons, while others may advance not because of their military merit but because they serve institutional, personal, or political interests. The military may or may not be granted the freedom to draw its own conclusions from the war, and this will have a significant effect on the future force structure. Russian history offers precedents for such dynamics.
It is possible, for example, that motorcycles and golf carts are not the instruments through which Russian leaders will wish to remember the war. Conversely, poor ideas may be institutionalized because a commander with access to political power is able to promote his preferred “hobby horse,” or because Russian military culture simply cannot imagine itself without blue-and-white striped T-shirts. Powerful individuals have remade certain Russian services and branches in the past.
Once peacetime politics reasserts itself, organizational culture, competition for resources, and struggles for power may matter even more than the lessons of war.
By compiling this list, I have sought to show how difficult it is, at this stage, to estimate the future trajectory of Russian force structure. We can be confident that the Russian military is already thinking about this problem and attempting to anticipate the character of future war. Yet we cannot know the interpretations and decisions that Russian leaders and military institutions have not yet made.
It would also be risky to extrapolate Russia’s future force structure solely from decisions already announced or currently visible to us. There is strong evidence that Russia will face significant financial and manpower constraints in implementing these plans successfully. Some decisions may also serve as instruments of strategic deception rather than reliable indicators of future force development.
What we can and must do is operate in the realm of probabilities: offer evidence-based alternatives, continuously test our assumptions, and critically evaluate our predictions as new information emerges. This is a multidisciplinary task that requires the participation of the broader Western academic community.
Russian Military and Security Research Group 