Almost every assessment of the condition of the Russian Armed Forces makes reference, usually unfavourably, to the earnings of Russian servicemen. This issue has become particularly prominent in discussions of failure to recruit and retain contract servicemen in 2005-2007, where salaries are presumed to play a key role.
Unfortunately the vast majority of references to military wages are excessively generalised, and therefore misleading; they do not take account of the complex nature of Russian service pay which means that first, every serviceman takes home far more than the published basic wage figure; and second, servicemen of similar rank doing similar jobs can be earning wildly different amounts. Unlike in the British Armed Forces, where the earnings of a serviceman not in possession of some exotic speciality can often be approximately deduced with reference to his or her rank, in the Russian Armed Forces no such generalisation is possible.
This note therefore leads with a broad summary of the overall structure of Russian servicemen’s pay, which should be sufficient to demonstrate the point above, followed by a more detailed explanation of some of its component elements for readers with a more specific interest. Although illustrative examples are given, this is in no way a comprehensive report on all Russian benefits and entitlements, and its main aim is to warn against issuing, or believing, sweeping generalisations about Russian soldier earnings....
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