Content deleted Content added
Ghirlandajo (talk | contribs) →Chechen Wars: such a POV version is unacceptable, see theTalk |
|||
Line 19:
As the Soviet Union officially dissolved on [[December 31]], 1991, the Soviet military was left in limbo. For the next year and a half various attempts to keep its unity and transform it into the military of the [[Commonwealth of Independent States]] (CIS) failed. Steadily, the units stationed in [[Ukraine]] and some other breakaway republics swore loyalty to their new national governments, while a series of treaties between the newly independent states divided up the military's assets. In mid-March [[1992]], Yeltsin appointed himself as the new Russian minister of defence, marking a crucial step in the creation of the new [[Military of Russia|Russian armed forces]], comprising the bulk of what was still left of the military. The last vestiges of the old Soviet command structure were finally dissolved in June [[1993]].
In the next few years, Russian forces withdrew from central and eastern Europe, as well as from some newly independent post-Soviet republics. While in most places the withdrawal took place without any problems, the Russian army remained in some disputed areas such as the [[Sevastopol]] naval base in the [[Crimea]] as well as in [[Abkhazia]] and [[
The loss of recruits and industrial capacity in breakaway republics, as well as the breakdown of the Russian economy, caused a devastating decline in the capacity of post-Soviet Russian armed forces in the decade following [[1992]].
| |||