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Large-scale military exercises to be held in Russia every five years - defense minister

Sergei Shoigu stressed the need of intermediate results of the state armaments program implementation
Russian defense minister Sergei Shoigu Vyacheslav Prokofiev / TASS
Russian defense minister Sergei Shoigu
© Vyacheslav Prokofiev / TASS

MOSCOW, September 16. /TASS/. Russia will organize large-scale military drills every five years, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in an interview with the Rossiya-1 television channel on Sunday.

According to the minister, it was planned to organize the large-scale Vostok-2018 military exercise back in 2017. "When we submit a plan for a next year for approval of the supreme commander-in-chief, we outline everything that is to be done throughout the year. The only thing that is not included in the plan are surprise checks. Naturally, these drills were carefully planned and we want to conduct such drills every five years," he said.

In his words, since the state armaments program covers a period of ten years some intermediate results are needed. "As we spend such big funds on re-arming the army and the navy, we need to see where we are moving and be sure that everything is all right," Shoigu stressed.

The large-scale Vostok-2018 exercises are running on September 11-17 under the command of Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on the soil and in the waters of Russia’s Far East and in the neighboring waters of the Pacific Ocean. A total of 300,000 Russian servicemen are taking part in the maneuvers, as well as more than 1,000 planes, helicopters and drones, along with as many as 36,000 tanks, armored fighting vehicles and other vehicles, and up to 80 ships and support vessels.