Shoygu: The Russian military has planned more than 2,800 exercises for 2017
Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu said that the Russian military would conduct more than 2,800 exercises in 2017, TASS reported.
"Overall more than two thousand eight hundred tactical, special tactical and command staff exercises are planned for the current year. In September, we will hold the Russian-Belarusian strategic exercise West-2017,” Shoygu said during a conference call in the military department.
He drew the attention of the commanders to the need to take into account the experience gained in Syria during combat training.
Shoygu said that the units of the Ground Forces, Airborne and coastal Navy troops at the moment have begun "working out issues of teamwork as a part of the battalion and company tactical groups” and that military pilots are performing solitary exercises as well as paired, group and detachment flights.
Shoygu revealed that flight hours since the beginning of the winter training period amounted to 14% of their annual planned flight time. Navy ships and submarines continued training as well. Time spent by the crews of ships and submarines since the start of training exceeded 16%.