Russia will not run up its defense spending like the United States and NATO, the head of the Federation Council’s Defense and Security Committee, former commander of the Russian Aerospace Forces Viktor Bondarev said.
The senator recalled that when the U.S. "beefed up their already-not-so-meager spending" on the military and the defense industry, many expected that Russia would mirror that step. However, this did not happen, he noted. "The funds allocated for ensuring national defense and security will be enough, and Russia’s authorities are not going to militarize the economy and industry," Bondarev said.
"And second, we are developing and enhancing our beloved nation’s defense and industry complex, the army and the fleet not due to the prevailing circumstances, but well ahead of time," he stressed. "The current level of financing the needs of the defense and security enables us to effectively counter any threat," TASS cited the legislator as saying.
The senator assured that the risk of toughening Western sanctions was taken into account when the nation’s military spending was planned. "We have become accustomed to sanctions. We have become immune to them and adapted our economy to this new regime," Bondarev said.
