Contemporary conflict scenarios contemplated fighting non-state and failed state opponents where the combat power of the armored BCT would prove to be overwhelming; the most proficient enemy force the armored BCT trained to confront was what was a near peer opponent whose equipment and training was inferior to that of the Americans. The only military equipment that NATO owns is a fleet of AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control) surveillance aircraft. The new Russian soldier doesnt come cheap, although at a cost of $65,000 per year, he is nearly a third less expensive than his NATO and American counterpart. Its has 270 naval assets, including eight patrol craft and 18 mine-warfare vessels, in addition to landing craft, transport ships, and other vessels like tugs and cable layers. As of 12 of May 2022, Sweden and Finland are planning to join NATO soon, and a final section discusses the impact of their equipment and soldiers on NATO's strength. (U.S. Navy), In a Nov. 25 news release announcing that the destroyer USS Arleigh Burke was entering the Black Sea, 6th Fleet said the ships patrol would ensure security and stability in this vital international waterway.. Developed in the 1970s, the Slavas and the Sandboxes were designed to take on U.S. and NATO aircraft carriers by overwhelming them with a barrage of high-speed cruise missiles to sink ships. A relatively large amount of NATO standard service arms are from the M16 family of assault rifles, such as the M4 carbine, Colt Canada C7 and Heckler & Koch HK416. NATO involvement in Kosovo, against Serbia, Afghanistan and Libya has been a mixed bag of sub-standard performance and unmet objectives that have exposed the harsh reality that NATO cannot operate on any meaningful scale independent of American leadership, blood and steel. Global Firepower. Those US and. DON'T MISS:Already lost! Putin torn down as war comes to grinding stop[INSIGHT]Ukraine: Russia demands return of Alaska and Californian fort[NEWS]Nigel Farage slams Labour MP for dragging him into Russia debate[WATCH]. He and other analysts say that regardless of the outcome of the current situation in Ukraine, the U.S. must take the lead in developing a NATO Black Sea strategy. If you mean the US then yes. Whatever the genesis of this mindset may be, it is in the end a sound decision that both Americans and Europeans will grow to appreciate in the decades to come, unencumbered as they will be by the horrific consequences of a European war that does not need to be fought and, if Donald Trump has his way, will not be fought. In short, Saudi Arabia, in Donald Trumps view, put its money where its mouth was. The majority of European Navies only operate frigates and smaller craft to protect their own waters and lack a substantially armed "blue sea" navy. However, the British, French, Italian, and Spanish Navies hold a significant amount of naval power which is a strong addition to the US Navy to improve NATO's naval strength. NATO is also developing a capability for Global Hawk surveillance drones. This status changed in the aftermath of the Russian-Georgian war of August 2008. "Number of Military Ships in Nato in 2022, by Type. Only nine countries control the world's roughly 12,700 nuclear warheads, according to The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) As of 2022, FAS says Russia has the highest nuclear warhead . Most European members of NATO have total active personnel for their armies in the tens of thousands. (Jeremy Boan/U.S. To date, NATO ships that have entered the Black Sea are the U.S. guided-missile destroyers USS Laboon (DDG-58) and USS Ross (DDG-71), French diving support ship FS Aliz A645, British guided-missile destroyer HMSDefender (D63), patrol vessel HMS Trent (P224) and the Dutch frigate HNLMS Evertsen (F805). [8], Since August 2009, SNMG1 has been providing ships for NATO's Operation Ocean Shield anti-piracy mission in the Gulf of Aden. The CAESAR is, as of 2022, soon going to be used by multiple NATO members. Warfare under these conditions would be madness. The majority is used by Portugal and a smaller amount is used by Czechoslovakia. On Feb. 19, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned that communist . In 2021, about 12 Navy ships, including the U.S. 6th Fleet flagship Mount Whitney, spent some 182 collective days in the Black Sea. [6], In September 2007, SNMG1 was in the Red Sea bound for Suez to complete a circumnavigation of Africa when the Jabal al-Tair volcano erupted. North Korea, Iran and China forming nuclear 'axis' of horror, Russia humiliated as military helicopters destroyed in strike. Today, the alliance is made up of 30 members, including the UK, US, Canada, France and Germany. The president does, however, understand business, and NATO as it is currently configured and focused is the epitome of bad business pouring money into an investment whose only yield is death and destruction. The figures for NATO were calculated using the figures for the individual member states. The newest model T-72/T-80 main battle tank retrofitted with reactive armor and other upgrades is even less expensive. (February 25, 2022). The military alliance is made up of 30 members and can call upon one of the largest fighting forces in the world. Representation from a few other NATO countries has picked up in recent years but has been inconsistent. The result is an emboldened Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is orchestrating a stranglehold on Ukrainian ship traffic in the adjoining Sea of Azov and harassment of NATO ships in the Black Sea, said Foggo, now dean of the Arlington, Va.-based Center for Maritime Strategy. Frigate ITS Virginio Fasan (F 591) passed through the Bosphorus headed for the Black Sea with a Turkish frigate and will join with a Romanian warship, according to ship spotters in Turkey. It can include naval warfare, support, and many other elements. The Swedish Gotland Class submarines are of note as HSwMS Gotland (Gtd) the first ship of the class could have been able to sink USS Ronald Reagan while protected by its carrier strike group while it was acting as a hostile submarine in an exercise that was designed to test whether a US carrier strike group could defend its carrier against a diesel electric submarine. Show publisher information The total for all these IFV's is roughly around 5000, meaning the US has roughly half of NATO's IFV's. The deployment of the Iron Brigade represents the latest manifestation of this commitment, which involves a continued rotation of an armored BCT into Europe every nine months, creating a permanent American armored presence in Europe. They know they cannot win this conflict: we would be fighting for our own territory; we didnt travel thousands of miles to get to their borders, they did, he said. The second least used is the MOWAG Piranha with roughly 500 in service in NATO. In terms of other armoured fighting vehicles, a lot of NATO members operate wheeled APC's and IFV's to carry infantry, the difference being an IFV would be employed with an infantry squad that was meant to work with tanks and a wheeled APC would be employed with independent infantry that were not supposed to cooperate with any tanks. However Germany makes its own machine guns: the 5.56mm MG4 and the 7.62mm MG5. Sailors aboard the USS Ross fire a 25mm machine gun during a multinational exercise hosted by U.S. 6th Fleet and the Ukrainian navy in the Black Sea, July 7, 2021. If sinking a couple Russian cruisers wasn't enough to end the blockade, it would at least raise the costs for the Russian Navy. After evaluating Russian capabilities in the aftermath of the Cold War, American intelligence determined that the notion of American qualitative superiority was a myth; had there been a war in Europe, the tanks of the then-Soviet Army would have been nearly impervious to the weapons then available to NATO and American forces. 9mm Parabellum is still in use for sidearms. For example, a Leopard 2 can fire American M829 tank ammo and vice versa. The Soviet soldier of the 1980s was a three-year conscript, whose training limitations mandated simple but functional equipment, and tactics that stressed mass over finesse. More NATO Ships Enter Black Sea While Tensions With Russia Simmer, Member Services call 800-233-8764 or 410-268-6110, according to a translation of the exchange by the, AFRICOM: U.S. NATO planners are concerned about any Russian attack here, as it would effectively cut off the Baltics from Poland and the rest of Europe and as things currently stand, there is nothing the 3Armored BCT, or any other combination of U.S., Polish and NATO forces, could do to stop the Russians. Today, the Russian soldier is a contracted professional, a volunteer who is paid a salary for service over a period of enlistment, usually around five to six years in length. According to Statista, NATO countries own a combined total of 2,049 military ships - correct as of March 2022. West of Fulda the hills turn into fertile plains that form a natural corridor the so-called Fulda Gap leading straight to Frankfurt, some 60 miles (95 kilometers) to the southwest, and the Rhine River beyond. This list of country-specific lists details the military equipment used by NATO. from around the world. It could also uphold freedom of navigation if requested by allies. M142 HIMARS is only used by US and Romania and RM-70 multiple rocket launcher by Greece, Poland and Slovakia. The Czech 152 mm SpGH DANA self propelled artillery is also unarmoured and used by multiple NATO members. However, the Iraqis made use of inferior export versions of the T-72; the Russian army uses a different model, with modern reactive armor and associated defensive systems that are designed to defeat the latest American and NATO anti-armor weapons. The United States has cancelled the deployment of two warships to the Black Sea, Turkish foreign ministry officials said, amid concerns over a Russian military build-up on Ukraine's . Both American and NATO reinforcements would need to travel on rail lines similarly susceptible to interdiction. For a national defense neophyte like Donald Trump, military prowess is measured in dollars.. Within this total are: Patrol boats - 298 Minesweepers - 153 Submarines - 144. Accessed March 05, 2023. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1293765/nato-naval-strength-type/, Global Firepower. Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group 1, Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group 2, "Admiral Richard G. Colbert: Pioneer in Building Global Maritime Partnerships", "New NATO Transformation Command Established in Norfolk", "Enterprise Hosts Commander, Standing NATO Maritime Group 1", "Allied Maritime Command - SNMG1 ship accident at sea", "Allied Maritime Command - Standing NATO Maritime Group One (SNMG1)", "Danish Frigate HDMS Peter Willemoes and F-16 Fighting Falcons to Reinforce NATO Forces", "SNMG1 participates in the Norwegian exercise TG 21-1", "NATO exercise Dynamic Guard underway in Norway", "NATO ships train in exercise Joint Warrior 21-1 with UK Queen Elizabeth Carrier Strike Group", "Exercise Steadfast Defender 2021 to test NATO readiness and military mobility", "NATO Exercise Dynamic Mongoose 21 Underway in High North", "NATO Exercise Dynamic Mariner and Joint Warrior Begins in the Atlantic", "Royal Norwegian Navy Kicked Off FLOTEX 21 Exercise", "NATO exercises with new maritime unmanned systems", Allied Maritime Command Headquarters Homepage, Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Standing_NATO_Maritime_Group_1&oldid=1139176114, Military units and formations established in 1968, Articles with dead external links from September 2017, Articles with permanently dead external links, Short description is different from Wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 13 February 2023, at 19:58. Aside from logistics, man power, etc. The only anti-tank weapons that are not in widespread use in NATO is the French Eryx, only used by France and Turkey, the Missile Moyenne Porte, also only in use with France, and the British and Swedish NLAW, only used by the United Kingdom. The Russians routinely train in large-scale combined arms i.e., incorporating supporting artillery and air power with maneuver operations, something the United States stopped doing after 9/11. Both countries are NATO members. Preventing that war is paramount. Where they collectively had about 100 frigates in 1995, that number hovers at 51 today. For infantry anti-aircraft weapons, NATO countries possess various Man-portable air-defense systems, such as the FIM-92 Stinger, Starstreak, and Piorun (missile). Navy patrols, military drills and port calls are critical in sending a deterrent signal to Russia, military and security experts say. A number of NATOs navy ships are patrolling the Mediterranean Sea as part of its naval mission, Operation Sea Guardian. This means that Finland and Sweden together could contribute an extra 550 infantry fighting vehicles to NATO which is a lot. USNI News reported the automatic identification system (AIS) tracks ofDefenderand Evertsen were falsified on June 18 to show the warships off of the Russian naval basein Sevastopol in Crimea, while a track for USS Ross (DDG-71) was falsified on June 29 operating about 5 miles from the Crimean coast. A NATO-led naval intervention would be a deliberate military provocation, designed to create a pretext for a direct clash with Russian forces, carried out under the cover of a "humanitarian. But according to the CRS, China is on pace to have 425 battle force ships by 2030. The 12.7mm NATO cartridge, also known as the .50 BMG, is standard for heavy machine guns. Stars and Stripes compared the U.S. ship data with Navy press releases and news reports, finding rare variances of a day or two. The Italian Army has just under 100,000 and the British Army is relatively large at 82,040. The Leopard 2A4 is the most widely used variant but this is the least modern variant in current use. [1], In late November 1966, U.S. Rear Admiral Richard G. Colbert prepared a concept paper proposing a permanent Allied Command Atlantic naval contingency force based on Operation Matchmaker, an annual six-month exercise involving ships from NATO navies. Since 1949, NATO has increased its collective military power. Published by D. Clark , Mar 2, 2022. [84] Finland also has more than 120 other aircraft, such as 37 BAE Systems Hawk trainers that can reportedly be converted into fighter aircraft.[85]. (Dan Rosenbaum/U.K. These aircraft are operated by the US Navy, Air Force, and Army. Effective European-based deterrence would require an additional three to four American BCTs, at a cost of more than $15 billion in annual operation and maintenance costs, and hundreds of millions in basing and support expenses. They also recommended exploring ways to circumvent various restrictions on warships in the sea. This makes Poland the only NATO country other than the US to operate the Abrams. NATO Warships List. According to ArmedForces.EU, Russia's navy is estimated to be 314 strong and include 16 destroyers. The main air defence system in NATO is the MIM-104 Patriot. [1] Contents 1 History 2 Current ships 3 Previous task groups 4 Organization 5 See also 6 References Operation Sea Guardian provides maritime situational awareness to allies, as well as supporting counter-terrorism operations at sea. The inconsistency is driven by competing security priorities among allies, a lack of available ships and resources, and the failure of NATO to devise and implement a strategy in the Black Sea, Foggo said. Whether Donald Trump has actually factored in the price of blood and steel when making his pronouncements about NATOs need to meet its financial obligations requiring military spending is unknown at this time; certainly none of his statements have indicated that the president is even aware of the linkage between Article 3 and Article 5. English ships spent some 61 days, and Italian ships spent about 52 days on patrol in the sea. Of even greater concern is the modern-day equivalent of the Cold Wars Fulda Gap, known as the Suwalki Gap. The Suwalki Gap is named for a Polish town that sits astride the narrow corridor of land that connects Lithuania with Poland. Increasing presence would require creative thinking, Luke Coffey and Brent Sadler wrote in a May report from the Washington D.C.-based conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation, which relied in part on the same data. At present the majority of NATOs warships remain stationed in their respective member states. Sweden operates 120 Stridsvagn 122 tanks a Swedish variant of the Leopard 2 while Finland operates roughly 200 Leopard 2 tank with roughly half being old Leopard 2A4 and the other half modern Leopard 2A6. NATO jets streaking over Ukrainian skies will silence at least some of the protests, and give. A significant amount of NATO carriers are not US and, while not being as advanced, most operate modern aircraft, except Spain, so they are a significant NATO asset that increases NATO naval power considerably. There is no debating the point that the European nations of NATO have collectively failed to live up to their obligations under Article 3; as such, it is only logical that the United States, under President Trump, may opt not to respond with armed force against any Russian move on the Baltics, especially when such a move may be prompted by provocations by either the Baltic states or Poland operating under the false bravado that a broad-based reading of Article 5 might promote. In terms of MBT's there are 5 types in NATO that are modern enough for a peer conflict with Russia that are talked about below. While Donald Trump has oscillated on the issue of NATOs obsolescence, his gut reaction to NATOs unwillingness to underwrite the cost of either confronting Islamic extremism or containing Russia is spot on either pay up, or shut up. Germany would need to double this amount at a minimum to possess a realistic deterrent capability, an option mooted by the fact that the German Army has trouble keeping 30 percent of the armored forces it currently possesses operational. Number of military ships in NATO in 2022, by type [Graph]. February 22, 2022 8:15 PM EST. The standard NATO ammunition for service small arms is 5.56mm NATO, although 7.62mm NATO is still in use with machine guns and sniper rifles. Tank ammo has similarly also been standardised across NATO with 120570mm NATO ammunition being in use in all NATO tanks except the British Challenger 2. We use your sign-up to provide content in ways you've consented to and to improve our understanding of you. Sweden has corvettes and submarines and Finland is in the process of getting Corvettes and currently has Missile boats. China officially possesses the world's largest navy, with some 360 ships in active service. The previous list does not include anything that could be described as an IFV but is not classified as such, like a Stryker, Boxer or Piranha. The U.S. Army has prepositioned an additional Armored BCTs worth of equipment in warehouses in Poland; there are plans afoot to increase this capability to a full armored division. [4], The force was under the operational control of SACLANT until SACLANT was decommissioned in 2003 and it was folded into NATO's Allied Command Operations (ACO) at that time. Then you can access your favorite statistics via the star in the header. Currently, you are using a shared account. Russias demands that U.S. and NATO troops leave the countries that once formed the Cold War-era Warsaw Pact have several nations on the Black Sea concerned about Moscows intentions, particularly in light of Russias massive military buildup along Ukraines borders. (With) the Black Sea specifically, so much of deterrence and dealing with other nations geopolitically has do with presence, said Jim Townsend, a fellow at the Center for a New American Security in Washington and a former Defense Department undersecretary for European and NATO policy. NATO is a traditional enemyand one many Russians have blamed for their troubles in the past. The old MG 3 machine gun is still in service with the Bundeswehr and in the armies of other NATO members although it is being phased out by the Bundeswehr and should be replaced by the MG4 and MG 5 soon as of 2022. The intended target of the deterrence mission of the Iron Brigade is, by design, Russia. The simple fact of the matter is that of the two major ground combat forces in Europe today the Russian military and NATO only the Russians are prepared to fight and win a general war in Europe. France and Spain both have 1 aircraft carrier. Contrary to popular belief, Article 5 of the NATO Charter is not a suicide pact. These were not vast distances. Other IFV's in NATO have hundreds of each type depending on which exact one present in NATO. Please create an employee account to be able to mark statistics as favorites. The majority of modern wheeled Armored fighting vehicles in NATO are Strykers at roughly 4,500. Directly accessible data for 170 industries from 50 countries and over 1 million facts: Get quick analyses with our professional research service. Donald Trumps alienation of NATO may actually turn out to be the best action the United States could take in regard to the continued viability of NATO, exposing the hypocritical reality that Europe is, on its own, incapable of defending either Poland or the Baltics from a Russian attack, and unwilling and/or unable to pay the price such a defense would require. For its part the United States Navy boasts a surface fleet of 11 aircraft carriers, 92 cruisers and destroyers, and 59 small surface combatants and combat logistics ships. The destroyer USS Laboon, center, the U.K. Royal Navy's HMS Defender, left, and the Dutch HMNLS Evertsen sail together as a Russian warship watches from afar in the Black Sea in June 2021. Facebook: quarterly number of MAU (monthly active users) worldwide 2008-2022, Quarterly smartphone market share worldwide by vendor 2009-2022, Number of apps available in leading app stores Q3 2022, Profit from additional features with an Employee Account. Despite not being blue water navies the German, Dutch, Danish, Norwegian and Turkish navies have ships that could make a significant difference when part of a NATO carrier strike group or task force at sea. By any standard, blood and steel, circa 2017, is prohibitively expensive. The US army is followed by the Turkish Army with 260,200 personnel. Older vehicles still in use as APC's but with tracks are the M113 armored personnel carrier and ELVO Leonidas-2. NATO has a very wide variety of infantry anti-tank weapons which are the FGM-148 Javelin, M72 LAW, NLAW, Panzerfaust 3, MATADOR, Carl Gustaf, AT4, Spike, C90-CR (M3), Eryx, MILAN, Missile Moyenne Porte, RPG-75, RPG-7 and the 9K111 Fagot. Sam LaGrone is the editor of USNI News. (Claire DuBois/U.S. Deterrence the action of discouraging an action or event through instilling doubt or fear of the consequences is a military mission, and constitutes one of the stated objectives of the deployment of the Iron Brigade to Europe. Greece and France each made three Black Sea visits last year, and Germany appears to have sent none of its ships to the sea in 2021. If either the 3 Armored BCT or any of the NATO battlegroups were to engage the 1 Guards Tank Army, it is very likely most of their units would be rendered combat ineffective by massed artillery fires before they even had a chance to engage the hundreds of Russian tanks bearing down on them. We will always respond to any deterioration of our. Of even greater concern is the mismatch in artillery; the 18 self-propelled artillery pieces in the 3rd Armored BCT would be facing off against more than 700 distinct artillery and artillery rocket weapons. A similar mismatch in military capacity and capability exists with the four 1,500-man battlegroups deployed by NATO in Poland and the Baltics. The number of days its warships spend annually in the strategic waterway mostly has fallen since 2014, when Kremlin forces seized Crimea from Ukraine. While the tanks previously listed are the main NATO tank forces, other NATO members operate obsolete Cold War era tanks from both the West and the Soviet Union. Therefore, roughly half of NATO's tank strength is composed of American M1 Abrams tanks and the other half of European Leopard 2s with smaller amounts of Challenger 2's, Leclerc's and Ariete's. During the event of an armed attack against any one member state, other NATO allies will come to their aid. NATO forces own 17 aircraft carriers overall such as HMS Queen Elizabeth from the UK, Mass exodus of journalists from Russian media in major Putin blow, NATO countries are estimated to own a combined total of 2,049 military ships, Russian forces have laid siege to the Ukrainian city of Mariupol since the start of the war, RAF emergency: Typhoon jet forced into U-turn after emitting squawk, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), 'Cataclysmic' history repeats itself as Russia set to default on debt, Already lost! Putin torn down as war comes to grinding stop, Ukraine: Russia demands return of Alaska and Californian fort, Nigel Farage slams Labour MP for dragging him into Russia debate, UK to avoid Putin's EU energy wrath as huge new gas field found, Verhofstadt admits EU's desperation over UK exit 'Brexit was a loss! A live webcam in Odessa shows her berthed there as expected.#OSINT pic.twitter.com/3E82eikFTs, H I Sutton (@CovertShores) June 29, 2021. There is no justification whatsoever for this kind of aggressive act, which also unnecessarily increases the chance of accidents., #FakeOSINT alert It is hard to imagine any scenario that has 90 tanks (the number deployed by the 3rd Armored BCT) deterring a force of 800 tanks (the number deployed by the 1st Guards Tank Army.) Instead, Americas NATO allies where chastised for their collective failure to comply with a target level of defense spending equivalent to two percent of each members gross national product. Brookings scholars from around the institution weigh in on how what does (or does not) happen at the conference will impact their area of expertise. It ended with Trump dedicating a memorial celebrating the transatlantic bonds between Europe and the United States at the new headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Brussels. Worse for U.S. planners, the PLAN is on track to add another 70 warships by. What you are seeing are President Putin's ships at that port. [Online]. The US has tens of thousands of soldiers stationed across Europe, including in Germany, the UK, Italy and Spain. The U.S. Navy has shouldered most of the burden for patrolling the Black Sea. NATO Photo. The biggest army in NATO, by a significant margin, is the United States Army with 485,000 regular personnel, as of 2021. Other assault rifles in NATO service are the Steyr AUG, Heckler & Koch G36, FN SCAR, SA 80, Beretta AR70/90, Beretta ARX160, CZ 805 BREN and HS Produkt VHS. These costs are prohibitively high, which is why only five of the U.S. Armys 15 armored brigade combat teams are maintained at full readiness levels. In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, the Russian military underwent a significant reduction in force and capability that transformed it into a shell of its former Soviet-era glory. More info. This cohesion falls apart when NATO seeks to become a regional police force enforcing standards of conduct that, while embraced by NATO members, are not widely adhered to or even agreed upon outside the NATO umbrella. "NATO Allies are putting forces on standby and sending additional ships and fighter jets to NATO deployments in eastern Europe, reinforcing Allied deterrence and defence as Russia continues. First ships of this class were built at the end of the First World War. The US Navy forms the bulk of NATO's naval strength through large numbers as well as having the most advanced aircraft carriers in the world. Since 2015, the United States has conducted a series of military deployments and maneuvers designed to demonstrate Americas ability to back this commitment with meaningful military power. Some of those Soviet tanks are domestic variants of an original Soviet design. Part of HuffPost Politics. Neither NATO nor the United States currently have the ability to reinforce and sustain these forces in combat in a timely fashion, virtually assuring their piecemeal destruction at the hands of Russian formations purpose-built to destroy them. The US M1 Abrams tank is mainly used by the US, although Poland uses them alongside their Leopard 2's. NAPLES, Italy NATO activity in the Black Sea region has become less frequent since Moscows takeover of the Crimean Peninsula nearly eight years ago, sparking concerns that the West is falling short in checking further Russian ambitions in the strategically critical waterway. According to NATO Allied Air "within the concept of 'Plug & Fight' a small contingent of personnel and aircraft from one Ally conducts operations with another Ally by docking on existing. Profit from the additional features of your individual account. Slovenia has also made a request for 14 Pandur II as they already operate Pandur I. In 1980, the annual cost of maintaining an American soldier hovered around $30,000; today that cost is $170,000 and growing. [82][83] Finland has 55 McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornets fighter aircraft, and 64 F-35A fighter aircraft on order. Earlier this week, when asked about the incidents on a television show, Russian president Vladimir Putin said the intent of the alliance ships in the Black Sea was to help establish U.S. bases in the region, according to a translation of the exchange by the BBC. Like other. RUSSIAN Warships List. One of 15 Armored BCTs in the army today, the Iron Brigades five maneuver battalions (two armor, one cavalry, one mechanized infantry and one artillery), comprising some 4,700 soldiers, 90 main battle tanks, 150 armored fighting vehicles, and 18 self-propelled artillery pieces, represent the greatest concentration of lethal firepower in an organized combat unit in the American military.