2008 Russian military reform

The Serdyukov reform (Russian: Реформа Сердюкова), named after its originator, Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov, was a major structural reorganisation of the Russian Armed Forces that began in 2009.

Significant reforms of the Russian military were announced in October 2008 under Serdyukov, and major structural reorganisation began in early 2009. The stated aims of the reform were to reorganise the structure and the chain of command in the Russian Army, and to reduce it in size.

Key elements of the reforms announced in October 2008 included:

• reducing the armed forces to a strength of one million by 2012;
• reducing the number of officers;
• centralising officer training from 65 military schools into 10 'systemic' military training centres;
• creating a professional NCO corps;
• reducing the size of the central command;
• introducing more civilian logistics and auxiliary staff;
• elimination of cadre-strength formations;
• reorganising the reserves; reorganising the army into a brigade system;
• reorganising air forces into an air base system instead of regiments.

There had previously been several reform attempts such as the 1997 plan under defence minister Igor Sergeyev and the 2003 programme of President Vladimir Putin (‘Urgent Tasks for the Development of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation’), the latter of which was very similar to the 2008 programme, as it emphasised already the need for reductions in personnel strength, a gradual decrease in the use of conscripts in favour of professional soldiers, the creation of a professional NCO corps, and drastic changes to officer training and education. The 2003 program moved at a very slow pace, mainly due to the unwillingness of the military to reform.^[1]