Russia seeks U.S. technology as it boosts military spending

Over the next ten years Russia plans to spend 613 billion dollars to upgrade its military and buy new up to date weapons. Even though this seems a huge amount it is lower than the U.S. military expenditures of 663.8 estimated for this year alone! However the 613 billion represents a 45 per cent increase over the previous estimate!

Defense minister Serdyukov said:

"This is the minimum we need to equip our armed forces with modern weaponry, We could ask for a bigger number, but we need to understand that the budget cannot afford such spending, so 19 trillion is a serious amount of money that will provide considerable orders for our defense industry."

Serdyukov is looking abroad for some equipment breaking a long tradition of of trying to ensure that Russia does not become dependent upon other countries for its mililtary equipment. Much of the interest however is in foreign technology.

Serdyukov has reduced military personnel by about 130,000 since taking office. He said he's seeking to build "a compact and mobile army" and plans to use all the tools at his disposal, including foreign weapons.

The Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies forecast in June that Russia, the largest arms exporter after the U.S., would spend as much as $12 billion to buy defense technologies from European and Israeli companies over the next five years.

For more see bloomberg.