Abstract. This paper looks at the forms of using Airborne Forces formations in the Arctic and suggests action modes for them, both on their own and as part of troop/force groupings in the process of formation.

Since the start of the 21st century, the foremost states have been displaying an increasingly intense interest in the Arctic. The heightened attention is due both to the fact that the Arctic is tremendously rich in resources and has a vast transportation potential, and to the absence of recognized and normatively fixed demarcation of northern maritime areas; and the Arctic shelf. The Arctic is unique in terms of its geopolitical, socioeconomic and military-strategic significance, where the interests of the world’s biggest countries clash.1

Given these conditions, the Russian Federation, in order to implement its national interests and achieve its strategic priorities, approved a The Development Strategy of the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation and National Security Provision until 2020? The document, among other things, points out that to ensure military security, protection, and guarding of the RF national border, it provides for establishing a favorable operational regime in the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation, including maintenance of adequate combat readiness standards in general-purpose troop/force groupings of the Armed Forces, and other troops, military formations, and control agencies in accordance with the existing and prognosticated nature of military dangers and military threats to Russia in the Arctic. Under conditions of worsening contradictions, Russian military presence is essential for protecting Russia’s sovereign rights in the Arctic Zone, providing opportunities for unhindered performance of all kinds of activity, strategic deterrence, neutralization of military threats in peacetime, and in the event of an armed conflict, for repulsing aggression and arresting military activity on conditions that would correspond to the interests of the Russian Federation.

In order to carry out national policy in the area of military security and provision of uniform control over military forces and assets in the Arctic Zone, the Joint Strategic Command (JSC) was set up on the basis of the Northern Fleet on December 15, 2014; it comprised two Arctic brigades, AD formations, coast guards, marine aviation, and submarine and surface forces of the Navy. If need be, the ground-based JSC component can be reinforced with formations and military units of the Central and Eastern Military Districts.3

The troops and forces deployed on insular territories and at Cape Schmidt were united into a Joint Tactical Group, which, as of October 2014, undertook the job of ensuring Russia’s military security in the Arctic Zone. The Group is equipped with modern weapons items, military and specialized hardware adapted to the Arctic conditions, including Rubezh mobile coastal missile systems and Pantsir-Cl air and surface-to-air missile defense systems.4

To support the life and combat training of the troop/force groupings set up, there is a broad program of building infrastructure facilities that is currently being implemented, and this includes plans of reconstructing and restoring the airfields of Tiksi, Naryan-Mar, Alykel, Amderma, Anadyr, Rogachevo, and Nagurskaya, which work is already under way. These airfields are very important both for logistics and for keeping the troops mobile.5

At the moment, owing to unsettled disputes under international law over the ownership of the Arctic shelf and lack of properly agreed maritime borders in the region, the situation is fraught with conflict. It is highly likely that the business of ensuring Russia’s military security in the Arctic will be achieved by means of military strength display, and should an armed conflict break out, by using troop/force groupings, including in the form of combat actions, operations, and special acts.

It has to be said that both the forms of employment and activity methods of troop/force groupings in the Arctic will be directly affected by the composition of the adversary’s forces and assets, the likely manner of their actions, the remoteness of logistical support bases, and especially, the physical-geographic conditions of the region, namely, vast spaces, variable relief features, harsh climatic and weather conditions, the solid ice body, etc.

The troop/force groupings already set up and being created to protect Russia’s national interests in the Arctic will carry out assignments on its mainland, archipelagos, and islands, in seas and oceans (oil rigs, drifting research stations, and other facilities), and all along the Northern Sea Route.

Assessing the potential nature of the adversary’s actions in the event of aggression, we assume that it will seek not so much to destroy the economic infrastructure in the region, as to seize that for subsequent use in the interests of its own economy. Therefore, several major enterprises in the fuel-and-energy and defense-industrial complexes, mining, metallurgic, and nuclear industries, sea and river ports, airfields and well equipped takeoff-and-landing strips, as well as marine infrastructure facilities, are critically important within the system of defense by Russian troop/force groupings.

The sparsely populated Arctic where people are employed at major economic facilities, and the fact that a lot of the staff there are not local residents, but come from other areas of Russia to work for limited periods of time, make sure that there is shortage of human mobilization resources, which precludes rapid mobilization of units and formations.

In the circumstances, it becomes obvious that the formations and units used in the region, first and foremost, the Airborne Forces (ABF), have to be highly mobile to reinforce troop/force groupings, and carry out combat assignments, both within the former and independently. This approach has been conceptually substantiated comprehensively in laws and regulations and is conditioned by the following factors:

  • the prospects of the region’s economic development and its potential, its growing role in the economy of the state;
  • increasing contradictions and conflict of interests between countries and blocs in today’s world;
  • the fact that high-alert formations and units of the Ground Forces, Navy coast guards, and also formations of the Russian Guards deployed in the Arctic are not entirely up to securely guarding and defending critically important economic facilities;
  • lack of sufficient human mobilization resources.

Assessing the current makeup of the troop/force groupings set up in the Arctic, one has to observe that ABF formations and units have not been directly incorporated in the former, but considering their high mobility, they can be moved to the threatened sectors to reinforce the grouping’s ground component, and if necessary, to act on their own in some sectors so as to ensure prompt response to aggression against the Russian Federation, thus forestalling foreign states in army contingent buildup and employment.

In this context, we deem it most expedient to use ABF formations and units in the Arctic Zone as a highly mobile and maneuverable component in the following ways:

  • on the mainland, air assault units and subunits of air assault divisions (AAD), air assault brigades (AAB) with heavy combat hardware and weapons (tanks, airborne fighting vehicles (AFVs), infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs), self-propelled artillery guns, SPAG, etc.);
  • on archipelagos and insular territories, at fuel-and-energy infrastructure facilities located at sea and ocean areas, paratroop units of airborne divisions and AAB with light weapons;
  • along the Northern Sea Route, smaller units (company, platoon) with light arms, including with reinforcement assets, of paratroop, air assault regiments and brigades.

Units of the 98th Guard Airborne Division parachuting during an exercise in the Arctic

In all cases, ABF units and subunits can act both independently and in cooperation with groupings of the Ground Forces, Navy Coast Guards, Border Guards Troops of the Federal Security Service of Russia, and the National Guards Forces of Russia, as well as with People’s Militia formations set up at the region’s economic infrastructure facilities on grouping commanders’ decision.

Depending on the purpose of the would-be actions, combat mission and conditions of executing those, the composition of the landing party is decided upon, as is the form of using the latter, the methods of its actions and landing, by parachute, upon landing, combined, by naval transport.

In our view, in the event of ABF formations, units and subunits transferred into operational subordination to the troop/force grouping commander, the landing parties can be tasked with the following basic assignments: to seize major elements of operational equipment of a territory and hold those; to guard (step up the guarding of) critically important facilities; unblock facilities, should the latter be seized; prevent the landing of amphibious and airborne landing parties, and advancement of reserves; disrupt the logistics and deliveries of material means of the adversary.

Undoubtedly, the commanders who employ Airborne Forces as part of operations (combat actions) they engage in, should be guided by the basic principle of optimum forces and assets involved, that is set to them assignments that cannot be carried out by other elements of the operational formation (combat formation) or other military formations of the grouping in the kind of situation that is taking shape. Also, the actions of airborne units, from the moment of assignment setting to its fulfillment, is to be supported by the commander who employs them.

It will be different if an independent ABF grouping is set up on the decision of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief to act in individual sectors.

Given the immense spaces of the Arctic Zone, and the ability of highly mobile ABF formations and units to be quickly moved to remote areas, including to insular territories, that will be manageable for the ABF provided the matter gets comprehensive support. The entire responsibility for the preparation, organizing interaction, control and comprehensive support of actions by the subordinate troops in this case will rest with the ABF command.

Testing new parachute systems for humans in difficult climatic conditions during exercise

In our view, employment of ABF formations and units in the Arctic as part of an independent grouping is expedient in the form of air assault or airmobile actions. To fulfill the tasks, the ABF grouping commander should provide a resource of the military-transport, operational-tactical, and army aviation (AA), Navy forces and assets, those of other paramilitary structures (departments), or else hand them over for operational command and control while the grouping is being formed and functioning.

When taking into consideration the physical-geographic conditions of the region, it would appear that on the mainland the forms of using an ABF grouping may be engagement, air assault, and reconnaissance-combat actions,6 while carrying out the assignments set to the landing party in the examined conditions will involve a combination of offensive, defensive, and ambush action types.

On islands the forms of employment may be search and reconnaissance, search and assault actions in the designated strips, in specified sectors, and to a certain depth.

Moving about the battlefield on skis in Arctic conditions

Among these forms of employment, we believe, the priority ones to be the following reconnaissance and assault action methods: helicopter drop of troops in the sectors where the adversary is seen to advance; organization of ambush actions there distributed about the front and into the depth; immobilization of the main forces by fighting; transferring of target designation to aircraft and missile troops and artillery (MT&A) in order to deliver strikes with precision-guided ammunition, both by the stand-by assets and by the main grouping. Subsequently, when injuring the adversary in the course of PGW strikes, the landing party withdraws from battle, concentrates in the assembly area, and boards helicopters in order to be moved to other sectors in the designated strip (zone).

In these actions, the main ones will be operational assessment of the adversary, timely discovery of its intentions and actions nature, neutralization of its main forces, forcing a static position on its combat formation, extra reconnaissance and prompt release of target designation to the fire destruction assets based, among others, on surface ships and submarines. The role of MT&A forward aircraft gun-layers and fire adjusters will increase.

The adversary’s rout can be completed in the course of air assault actions, by helicopter gunships attacks and landing units’ fire from air assault helicopters followed with maneuvering to other sectors.

At oil-and-gas infrastructure facilities and along the Northern Sea Route, it is expedient to resort to a combination of search-and-raiding and air assault actions from the air and from the sea. Actions from the sea can be either diversionary or principal, depending on the assignment set, distribution of the landing party’s forces, its composition and transportation means at its disposal. The main thing is to create the kind of conditions for the adversary that would convince the latter of the futility of its attempts to hold the seized facility and that the only way out is to cease resistance and surrender. To this end, among other things, it is necessary to perform demonstration acts, sometimes in several sectors at once.

When acting in landing-accessible maritime sectors, to prevent the amphibious landing of the adversary forces, assault actions should combine work at sea and on the ground at the shoreline. In this case, once the intentions of the adversary to land marines have been discovered, and the latter’s composition and landing time have been ascertained, a portion of the landing force occupies a section of the coast, while the sectors suited for landing are being mined by hand, from helicopters, and the water area, with multiple-rocket launchers (MRLS) and aviation. The system of defensive positions (areas, lines) is best constructed by means of the focal method favoring ambushes, inducing the adversary to act in disconnected sectors of no advantage to it, in fragmented groups. The destruction of the adversary force that has landed is to be finalized by strikes with variously-based PGW, and attacks by transport and helicopter-gunships with landing parties on board.

When acting to unblock seized facilities at sea (oil-and-gas rigs, vessels, etc.), it is necessary first of all to have helicopter gunships strike in the direction of the facility, then block the captured vessel by ships and force it to slow down. In this case, the assault groups boarding the vessel are covered with sniper fire from suspended helicopters, and also with asphyxiating and noise grenades fired by landing subunits. Helicopter crews in the course of these actions, in order to prevent being hit, fire off thermal traps and use electronic protection means, as well as other means of active and passive protection.

Since the Arctic Zone is a long distance from areas where ABF formations and units are deployed, it is necessary to ensure that they are ready to be transferred to crisis areas at short notice. To this end, the formations and units are to be equipped with weapons and military and specialized hardware (WaMSH) that enable them to efficiently carry out assignments in Arctic areas, and their personnel is to be fitted out accordingly and trained to act in harsh climatic conditions.

We believe it expedient to define in advance the structure and composition of the ABF-based independent troop/force grouping, plan and test promising forms of employment and action forms, substantiate those scientifically, provide for training command and control (C2) bodies and troops to act in concert under various scenarios in the event of a crisis developing in the Arctic.

The formation of the independent ABF grouping and its actions in a separate important sector, in our view, can include several stages.

  • Stage one is regrouping and deployment (concentration) in the combatintended area (base area), taking under control (protection) airfields, ports in the littoral sea zone, by the airborne (air assault) division (brigade) as the forward echelon, support of the landing (transfer) of the ABF grouping’s main forces.
  • Stage two is conducting air assault and airmobile actions by the main forces, i.e. fire and electronic damage to the adversary, landing at and seizing critically important facilities (unblocking those held by the adversary), airfields, ports, road junctures, communications, polar stations, economic facilities, etc.; taking those under protection (defense) or, if need be, holding them until the arrival of own troops advancing from the front.
  • Stage three is actions (air assault, airmobile, combat, specialized) aimed at preventing adversary’s amphibious or airborne forces from landing at protected facilities in the responsibility area.
  • Stage four is completion of combat actions.

A look at the stage of setting up the grouping suggests that transporting the air assault component of the ABF forces and assets to the conflict area (or setting them out upon landing) requires a considerable aircraft resource to be planned. Thus, the 2014 exercise involving the 98th Guards Airborne Division was to be supported with up to 60 Ilyushin 76MD military transport aircraft allocated simultaneously. With the adoption of Ilyushin 76MD-90A, the number of planes while forming the air echelon of the landing can be reduced considerably.

Another problem issue at the stage of setting up the ABF grouping is lack of suitable infrastructure in Arctic areas that would allow all the grouping systems to be deployed and function properly. This is primarily due to the fact that in the recent past the development of the region was largely neglected, and also to the current views on the use of the created infrastructure facilities relying on the military-political and economic centers already existing in the Arctic Zone, which will most likely be regarded by the adversary as foremost targets to be destroyed or seized. The solution appears to lie in increasing the grouping’s potential in terms of logistical support, maximum autonomy (building up reserves of missiles, ammunition, fuel and lubricants, food, and other material means, opportunity for promptly transporting those to the actions area, etc.), which will directly affect the length of time when it can operate on its own.

All elements of the operational formation or combat formation, whatever names they go by, should be based on the module principle, intended for a specific combat task, and have their own set of forces and assets to carry out the latter.

Besides, it is necessary to pay due attention to the mobilization readiness of the Arctic Zone, for which purpose it is expedient already now to set mobilization assignments to relevant organizations for providing material resources for the troop/force groupings while there is an immediate threat, and also in wartime.

Considering the ability of an independent ABF grouping to carry out assignments in the Arctic, and the fact that its core may be the airborne (air assault) division (brigade), one should note the peculiarities of using tactical airborne landing parties (TacABP) as a constituent of air assault (airmobile) actions. The chief one is that own troops (forward units of the grouping) cannot always be moved to the TacABP activity area, among other things, because of the physical-geographic features of the area. Therefore, after fulfilling the combat assignment, the landing units will either have to be moved to a different sector, or continue for a long time to act on their own (autonomously) in the adversary rear away from the main forces.

In these conditions, the principle of a timely linkup of the landing party with the troops advancing from the front, which is scrupulously observed while employing TacABP in a classical operation (combat action), recedes into the background, while the principle coming to the fore is that of all-round support of combat actions. The reason is decentralized use of forces and assets of the ABF independent grouping, which will carry out assignments over a vast area, in sectors within the assigned responsibility zone, the landing of the TacABP, and also raiding (air assault, circumventing) detachments, groups set up largely on the basis of a reinforced battalion (company), and occasionally also a platoon, i.e. at the tactical level.

These conditions cannot fail to cause changes both in the methods of acting by the designated military formations, and in the organization of control and comprehensive support. All elements of the operational formation or combat formation, whatever name they may go by (TacABP, raiding detachment, air assault party or group, etc.), should be based on the module principle, intended for a specific combat task, and have their own set of forces and assets to carry out the latter.

The one thing that will remain unchanged within the framework of airborne landing party activity is that these groups will be taken to the combat area by air, on board flying vehicles whose capacity is limited in terms of transport-landing load and tactical actions range. So the idea that detachments (groups) will fight employing what they have taken with them cannot be faulted, and the gear in question will most likely be light arms and a minimum of equipment intended (prepared) for action in the Arctic Zone. The base to rely on in this case is base areas (operational bases) with reserves of material means.

A similar option of decentralized employment of an air assault party is no news; it was used by the US army in the course of its Iraq operation, in 2003. In the operational depth of the adversary’s defenses an operational base was set up for a combined-arms formation, landing units, and army aviation (the so-called “bounce base”) and, falling back on that, the airmobile units carried out their assignments.

Based on the analysis of the available experience in using similar formations, including in the Arctic, and taking into consideration the complex terrain relief, particularly on the islands, the polar night conditions, too few reference points, low temperatures, a difficult electromagnetic situation, and deep snow, as well as the extreme ice situation at sea and ocean areas along the Northern Sea Route, it is possible to suggest the following action methods for them.

  • Method one. Airlifting the detachment (group) from the source (base) area by helicopters (heliplanes, air-cum-hydroplanes known as screen planes) to the drop site, landing, seizing (destroying) adversary’s facilities, reaching the designated landing grounds, boarding helicopters and flying over to the source basing area (base area). Aviation support of the fighting by the landing party is achieved by helicopters acting from landing (basing, bouncing) grounds when summoned or from the duty position in the air of one or two helicopter flights. There, it is necessary to regularly change the basing grounds of the army aviation. The proposed method, in our view, will be acceptable for action on Arctic archipelagos and islands, and also at economic facilities located at sea. To implement this method one should provide for a chance of both a sea drop and subsequent evacuation from there. To this end, the landing personnel should be adequately equipped (with diving suits and aqualungs) and trained to handle various watercraft (inflatable boats, rafts, water cycles, and other basic and improvised items suited for landing by a variety of methods).
  • Method two. Having accomplished the mission of seizing and destroying a facility in one area, the detachment (group) is airlifted by helicopters (heliplanes, screen planes) to another previously designated area (areas), to seize and destroy new facilities, and then returns to the source basing area on board the helicopters.
    This method is the most relevant in the course of operations to control the area in designated responsibility zones in conditions when adversary units have been dispersed, and their combat potential is insignificant.
  • Method three. The flyover of helicopters (heliplanes, screen planes) with the landing party (group) on board proceeds in a single combat formation in the designated band of flight. Upon crossing the combat divergence line, the helicopters (heliplanes, screen planes) perform a maneuver and simultaneously (at different times) drop the landing groups in several areas. The landing parties attack from various directions to seize and destroy adversary facilities, then proceed to hold (defend) the captured major segment of the terrain without being evacuated to the base area. This method can be used when it is necessary to hold important bits of terrain (sea coast), landing-accessible sectors, mountain passages, passes, canyons, barrier lines in order to prevent the adversary from sending in reserves and to support actions by own main forces of the grouping.
  • Method four. After dropping the landing party, the helicopters (heliplanes, screen planes) concentrate in the assembly areas. The landing units, having destroyed (captured) the adversary’s facilities, move on to the assembly points on their own and return by helicopter to the source basing area (base area). This method is expedient when the facility to be captured is of especial importance, and the landing party has to achieve a surprise effect.
  • Method five. The helicopters (heliplanes, screen planes) drop the landing party at a considerable distance from the seizure object, then return to the basing area. The landing party seizes and destroys the facilities, then moves to the assembly area whence helicopters pick the men at a set time to take them to the source area of basing (base area).
    This method of action is relevant if the commander resorting to landing has enough forces and assets (aviation, missile troops, and artillery) to provide fire support for the landing party at a fair distance, and also Navy ships rendering fire support. One of the success conditions for this method is preparedness of the personnel to use skis, snowshoes, snow mobiles, motorized sledges, and other transportation means for a thick snow mantle. It is not ruled out that they can use means of locomotion captured from the adversary, and also reindeer and dog teams.

Testing snowshoes during Arctic exercise

When an ABF grouping fulfills assignments in Arctic conditions, the role and importance of issues of comprehensive combat support increase manyfold. In particular, to ensure trouble-free operation of the communication system in conditions of frequent and powerful magnetic storms, it is necessary to make a grouping of Arctic-oriented space vehicles. It is getting abundantly clear that it is necessary to create a grouping of electronic warfare forces and assets and radio-engineering troops to conduct reconnaissance, protect control bodies and points of the ABF grouping carrying out its assignments, issue target designation for fire support forces and assets in real time, and suppress and disrupt adversary control systems, including those managing precision-guided weapons and reconnaissance assets, spacecraft included.

Logistical support of the grouping has its own specific features owing to the remoteness of northern territories from supply bases and the difficulty of supplying the troops with material means, which can only be carried by air and sea transport. It has to be said that the time slot when ships can be piloted along the main navigation routes of the Northern Sea Route, even in relatively easy ice conditions, lasts up to 18 days in July, and up to 13 days in August.7 Cargo transportation by military transport aircraft is hampered by difficult weather conditions typical of the Arctic during most of the year.

In this connection, when organizing logistical support, the commander and the staff of the troop/force grouping have to keep units and subunits as autonomous as possible for a considerable length of time. To do that they will have to lay in extra stores of weapons, military and specialized hardware, missiles, ammunition, petroleum, oil, and lubricants (POL), food, and other material means, with a view to using them in likely combat sectors in conditions of prolonged isolation.8

As preliminary calculation shows, in Arctic military formations the reserves of basic material means (WaMSH, missiles, ammunition, rocket propellant, POL, food, fuel, etc.) should be made to last a minimum of two months.9

Obviously, successful employment of landing parties will also largely depend on what the weapons, military hardware, and outfit can do, for they have to be suited to carrying out assignments in Arctic conditions. Their development is currently given close attention in the armies of trans-Arctic states, including those incorporated in the Barents Euro-Arctic Council (BEAC) set up in 1992. Foreign armies clearly tend to opt for lightening heavy weapon types. Thus, in the US Army, the caliber of the weapons for formations that are to act in Arctic conditions is limited to 105 mm, for guns (105 mm howitzer on the uniform Stryker platform) and to 120 mm, for automatically charged mortars on the same platform. In the Arctic formations of other states fire destruction means are chiefly represented by mortars (of 81 mm and 60 mm).

Unit assembly after landing exercise in the Arctic

Successful employment of landing parties will also largely depend on what the weapons, military hardware, and outfit can do, for they have to be suited to carrying out assignments in Arctic conditions.

Analysis of the domestic and foreign practice in using and operating hardware and locomotion (transportation) means of various purposes in Arctic conditions suggests that virtually all items of hardware are either specifically designed to match these conditions or are subjected to drastic modification.

Thus close attention is being paid to designing and modernizing air transport for operation in conditions of extremely low temperatures. In particular, the Russian Helicopters concern has developed and launched a new helicopter, Mi-8AMTSh-VA. Its main distinctive feature is a unique heating system for the lubricating and transmission set, thanks to which it is possible to quickly start the engine at temperatures of up to -60° after the machine has been kept in the open. Besides, the helicopter is fitted out with extra mounted fuel tanks, which allows it to cover distances of up to 1,400 km. The Mi-8AMTSh-VA can monitor responsibility areas, provide transportation and landing support, deliver and drop landing parties, and render aviation support to the latter.10

There are other items as well of weapons and military hardware that are worth looking at. DIC enterprises, on their own initiative, conduct research into the manufacturing of heliplanes (multiple-mission tiltrotors), screen planes, backpack helicopters, collapsible aircraft, parachute systems whose introduction, according to their designers, will help, among other things, greatly expand the scope of using ABF units in Arctic conditions. Likewise, the potential of fulfilling reconnaissance and attack-and-fire assignments can be increased with the help of a new deicing system developed for unmanned aerial vehicles. The need has long been overdue to engage in this work military experts who could assess its results and issue technical specifications and orders for equipment and weapon items that will prove to be of interest to the Ministry of Defense.

There has been marked progress in the work on specialized individual outfits for the personnel. The Ratnik set adopted for fighting in the Arctic conditions, apart from special warm clothing, includes an added heating system that switches on after staying for a long time in the open. It also has a special set of masks to protect the face from northern winds.

It is known that the Kalashnikov Concern is working on a combat outfit for Arctic units, including Task Forces and ABF subunits, as part of the initiated Northern Landing research project.

To be sure, all of those are also to be examined in the context of the commando having to carry weapons and ammunition of considerable weight, from 30 kg to 50 kg, which will strongly affect his mobility on the battlefield. The problem can be solved by giving the landing forces various external skeletons.

One of the promising lines in enhancing the combat potential of Arctic formations is also their equipment with various multifunctional military robotechnical systems.

Thus, one of the major tasks of the first stage in implementing the Strategy is “provision of fundamental, problem-oriented and applied research in the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation, including the development of assets to tackle defense problems.”11

This task implies initiating and conducting military research in the interests of progress and improvement in weapons and military hardware, organization and staff structure of the troops, their employment forms and actions methods in Arctic conditions, comprehensive support and organization of cooperation with other power entities and bodies of state and local authority.

NOTES:

1. Larchenko, L.V., “Sovremennaya Arktika: problemy osvoyeniya i sotsialno-ekonomicheskogo razvitiya [The Arctic at Present: Issues of Development and Socioeconomic Progress],” Regionalnaya ekonomika: teoriya, praktika [Regional Economics, Theory and Practice], #11, 2011, p. 194.

2. Strategiya razvitiya Arkticheskoy zony Rossiyskoy Federatsiyi i obespecheniya natsionalnoy bezopasnosti na period do 2020 goda [The Development Strategy for the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation and National Security Provision until the Year 2020], URL: http://www.concultant.ru/document/cons_doc_LAW_142561/ (Retrieved in October 2018.)

3. Wikipedia.

4. Ibid.

5. Vestnik Akademiyi voyennykh nauk, Special Issue, # 4 (53), 2015, p. 64.

6. Tanenya, O.S. and Litvinenko, V.I., “Sovershenstvovaniye sposobov vedeniya razvedyvatelno-boyevykh deystviy desantno-shturmovymi podrazdeleniyami VDV v vooruzhonnom kon-flikte [Improving the Methods of Reconnaissance and Combat Actions by ABF Air Assault Landing Units in an Armed Conflict],” Armeyskiy sbornik, # 11, 2016, pp. 40-47.

7. Khryapov, A.D. and Falaleyev, Ye.L., “Osobennosti materialno-tekhnicheskogo obespecheniya gruppirovki voysk (sil) v Arkticheskoy Zone [Certain Features of Logistical Support of the Troop/Force Grouping in the Arctic Zone],” Voyennaya mysl, # 5, 2017, pp. 34-40.

8. Voyennaya entsiklopediya [Military Encyclopedia], Vol. 1, Voyenizdat Publishers, Moscow, 1997, pp. 214-215.

9. Khryapov, A.D. and Falaleyev, Ye.L., Op. cit.

10. Obozreniye foruma “Armiya 2016” [Review of the Army 2016 Forum], ABE-Media publishers, 2016.

11. Strategiya razvitiya….

Translated by Margarita Kvartskhava