Even after partial collapse of the USSR, Russia remains to be threat to humanity. This is evidenced by the report on Russian elite and expansionist plans of Russia, which was released by "Politonline" publication.

 The report mentions in particular:

• The Army should be formed for certain reasons - both defensive and offensive.

Russia's military must be able to perform a wide spectrum of tasks. To accomplish this, the priority and emphasis should be given to universality, rather than specialization.

Parts that are suitable for defense and deterrence should not carry the offensive functions and vice versa. We are turning into the Army 2.0 - Army based on two components.

Offensive army should include intelligence and sabotage units, breakthrough units, the main attacking units, "anchor" units to secure the bridgeheads, etc. 

Deterrence army should consist of defensive units, mobile units to eliminate breakthroughs, intelligence and sabotage groups, etc.

Superstructure over the Army of 2.0 consists of innovative units that serve for the ideological war in the informational battlefield as well as for sabotage in the information\network space in the area of high tech.

• We have to define the zone of our interest.

The zone of Russia's interest - is not only territories of post USSR, but also Eastern Europe, Turkey, Iran and Northern China. The best marker on the map is the army.

It is not necessary to draw troops into the zone of interest. It is enough to make sure their presence close this zone. Thus, we will be able to monitor not only possible military or terrorist threats, but also economic security issues.

At the time when oil and gas remain one of the key energy resources, the protection of energy infrastructure is a second priority given to Russia army.

There can't be double approach in dealing with energy infrastructure - Russia's oil and gas should be protected by Russian soldiers until they delivered to customers. Oil and gas pipelines should become modern analogues of CER (Chinese Eastern Railroads) that was secured by Russia along the entire length of the road on the territory of China. Status of Petroleum and Gas army can be formally private, but in reality its management should belong to the state.

• Upcoming Global threats till 2020.

The main global threat up to now still remains uncontrolled growth in number of nuclear powers and the danger of loss of control over nuclear weapons.

Note that this threat to Russia is a real one - for the moment we have common borders with four countries that possess nuclear weapons or have the capacity to produce it: the US, China, North Korea and Iran. None of these countries can be called friendly to Russia.

Moreover, the admittance of a number of countries in Eastern Europe and former USSR republics in NATO allows deploying nuclear weapons in the immediate vicinity of the borders of Russia. In addition, according to experts of the IAEA, in the next 10 years, additional 30 countries will have access to the technology of nuclear weapons. This can be a potential threat to Russian security.

The second serious problem is a fight for traditional non-renewable sources of energy. Wars in Kuwait and Iraq for oil and gas reserves in last decades are a striking example of such conflicts.

Russia's reserves in Siberia are highly vulnerable due to a low populated area and absence of efficient transportation and communication systems to ensure the security of resources when necessary.

Even the Chinese now with only one Parachute Regiment unit can capture any of Russia's oil and gas fields to destroy or disrupt the mining complex. This kind of action could lead to a serious damage to Russian economy despite of existing "safety cushion" in the form of a serious difference between the cost of energy and its prices from producers.

The third problem relates to the global effort of the countries to move away from the use of traditional energy sources and to switch to biological fuels that will enable them to save their own economy from oil and gas dependency. Transition of a large percentage of agricultural acreage to area under oleifera crops (lat. Brassica napus) at the moment led to a sharp drop in agricultural production and, consequently, to an increase in food prices.

Another cause of the food crisis is also an increase in diet of people of India and China.

As a result, most Asian farmers shifted to the provision of food for domestic markets. Meanwhile, there is a gradual increase in the consumption of meat and dairy products in developed countries, which together with reducing the production of meat and milk automatically leads to higher food prices.

Thus, in the next 10-15 years we can expect a serious conflict for free lands suitable for agriculture or cattle breeding. One of the least used and the most promising regions in this regard is East China, which can be a battlefield for taking control over it as by India, China and other world powers. In the context of proliferation of nuclear weapons, this problem can become the most dangerous.

• Upcoming Regional threats till 2020.

There are four regional threats in the long run:

In the western sector there is a threat of losing Kaliningrad region, in the form of separation and declaration of independence as well as the formation of public opinion of the region as "European Russian republic". Thus, we risk losing strategically important port on the Baltic Sea.

Moreover, at the west there is a danger of annexation of Belarus as "a fight against Lukashenko's regime" and its division into zones of influence between Poland and Lithuania. In theory, Ukraine can participate into this division, but the only part it would receive is territory of "Chernobyl".

In case of this scenario, the border between Russia and NATO countries would be passing close to areas of the central region and thus would put under potential danger transportation cross points of Smolensk and Moscow.

The threat in the Caucasus region is referred to upcoming Olympic Games in Sochi. The situation in the Black Sea coast could remain volatile for a long time, putting at risk the economy of the Russian South, the main agricultural region. The most obvious solution in this case is gradual establishment of control over Abkhazia and modernization of the Sukhumi port.

Entire length of border with Kazakhstan is a threat and will continue to be a threat due to drug trafficking through it. Border troops should not be used to solve this problem because they are originally designed to serve other issues. It makes sense to transfer these responsibilities to the Federal Service which will control and fight drug trafficking and provide it with appropriate power and resources in the form of special troops.

The fourth and most serious problem is upcoming annexation of East Siberia and the Far East regions close to China. Penetration of Chinese population in the territory of Russia, their assimilation with local population and merging of Chinese and Russian small and medium business can pose a threat of losing control over these regions in the future.

If problems of infrastructure would not be resolved in the next few years, there would be a high risk of separation of East Siberia and the Far East and, consequently, the loss of access to natural resources.

In addition to solving the problem through the development of infrastructure, it is necessary to build million-populated military city on the border with China. This will solve the problem of lack of large urban agglomerations between Irkutsk and Vladivostok, and the problem of content grouping deterrence on the Russian-Chinese border.

Kavkaz Center