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MOSCOW, December 27 (RIA Novosti) – Russia will gradually increase the annual amount of the state defense order to 2.8 trillion rubles (about $92 billion) by 2015, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said on Thursday.

“The state defense order will reach about 1.9 trillion rubles next year, about 2.2 trillion in 2014 and 2.8 trillion in 2015," Rogozin said in an interview with Rossiya 24 television.

Russia allocated about 908 billion rubles (about $30.7 bln) on state defense order spending in 2012.

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Update: Russia to triple military spending -- Examiner

My Comment: When a country is tripling their defense spending .... that's usually a sign that they are preparing to go to war. Fortunately .... Russia is not preparing to go to war .... they are implementing a massive modernization program. But they also see the U.S. as a declining world power that is creating a political/military vacuum in areas where Russian interests coincide. In short .... Russia is positioning itself for the worse. (i.e. Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Central Asia, Chinese border disputes, unrest in Caucasus, etc.) just to name a few.

MOSCOW, December 26 (RIA Novosti) – A bill on voluntary military conscription for women could be introduced in the lower house of the Russian parliament by February 1, 2013, a Russian lawmaker said.

“We will be surveying the public opinion until January 15 and spend the rest of January discussing our initiative with colleagues,” Tatyana Moskalkova from the Just Russia faction in the State Duma and a co-author of the bill told reporters on Tuesday.

“If everything goes well, we will introduce this bill in the State Duma by February 1,” Moskalkova said.

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Update #1: Russia may soon draft new law on military service for women -- Voice of Russia
Update #2: Duma deputies propose military service for women -- Russia And India Report

My Comment: Here is an interesting article from Pravda on the Russian military .... it is arguing that the reason why many Russian women want to join the military is to find suitable husbands. (LOL). But aside from this "opinion", there is still a lot of good info in this Pravda article on other issues confronting the military.

Thousands of young men are dodging the draft over fears of hazing during military training.

The Russian Defence Ministry's autumn military recruitment drive to reinforce its rank of about a million soldiers is in full swing.

But every year it struggles to find the minimum number of recruits.

Thousands of young men are dodging the draft and many are willing to risk jail to avoid the army all together.

Al Jazeera's Charles Stratford reports from the capital, Moscow.

WNU Editor: Video report from Al Jazeera