THEATER OF COMBAT OPERATIONS: DMITRY MEDVEDEV WATCHED MILITARY EXERCISES NEAR ORENBURG
by Alexander Kolesnichenko

WPS Agency
DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
October 1, 2008 Wednesday
Russia

REPORT FROM STABILITY-2008 EXERCISES; Last Friday, President of
Russia Dmitry Medvedev visited the Donguzsky training range in the
Orenburg Region where he watched the final stage of military exercises
Stability-2008.

Last Friday, the President visited the Donguzsky training range in
the Orenburg Region where he watched the final stage of military
exercises Stability-2008.

The exercises in the Volga-Urals Military District began in the
middle of July and ended last Sunday. In the course of the exercises,
47,000 servicemen including 13,000 reservists transported 10,000
units of military hardware by 1,500 kilometers, dug 200 kilometers
of trenches, arranged 4,000 bunkers, built 80 bridges and crossed the
Ural Rivet. Mechanized infantry and tank units and pilots learned to
coordinate their actions with each other. Generals learned to fight
against a conventional enemy on maps.

This time the enemy was the Southern Alliance including Osmania (it
coincided with Turkey on the map), Transcaucasian Republic (Georgia,
Armenia and Azerbaijan united into one state) and Southern Emirstan
(Iran, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan). On the map of the exercises
Abkhazia and South Ossetia were within Georgia and Transcaucasian
Republic. Russia was renamed into the Northern Federation that
counteracted to the Southern Alliance together with its allies
Arystan (Kazakhstan) and Gornostan (Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and
Tajikistan). According to the scenario of the exercises, forces of the
Southern Alliance landed on the eastern coast of the Caspian Sea and
moved in four columns to the northwest towards Samara, to the north
towards Ufa, to the northeast towards Chelyabinsk and to the east
towards Astana. According to the map, the enemy managed to capture
Samara and Ufa, and the Orenburg Region (the President arrived to the
Donguzsky training range there last Friday) remained in the deep rear
of the attacking enemy. One of the officers said that at the end of
the exercises the Northern Federation defeated the Southern Alliance
and returned to the initial borders.

One of such battles took place in presence of Dmitry Medvedev. An
observation post was arranged for the President on Ryskina
Mountain. The battlefield was located below five kilometers
away. According to the scenario, a mechanized infantry regiment
attacked by exceeding enemy forces moved from the first defense line to
the second. The enemy thrust forward and went into a trap. At first,
it was bombed from the air, attacked by multiple rocket launchers
Grad and flamethrowers Buratino and blown up by mines. The defeat
was accomplished a tank attack.

In reality there were no enemies on the field but were white targets
and a combat infantry vehicle could not hit one of them for a few
minutes. When the firing began, the field was covered with black smoke
very quickly. It turned out that containers with solar oil were placed
near the targets to add realistic features to the exercises.

After that there was an air battle when two pairs of fighters circled
one above the other and the announcer explained which of them adopted
a beneficial position and which could be considered downed. Air
defense system Tunguska fired tracer projectiles at imitators of air
targets but the imitators did not react to the shots and landed on
the field. There were no other drawbacks, nothing broke and nobody
fired at the friendly forces. In any case, one of the officers said
that there were accidents during transportation of troops to the
training range and there were even victims.

Firing at the field lasted for about an hour.

The President stated that the exercises were successful and named
five tasks that the military had to fulfill.