urcos is already available.
Next to the French army, we are chiefly concerned with the military
power of Russia. Since the peace and war establishments are not
published, it is hard to obtain accurate statistics; no information is
forthcoming as to the strength of the various branches of the service,
but the totals of the army may be calculated approximately. According to
the recruiting records of the last three years, the strength of the
Russian army on a peace footing amounts to 1,346,000 men, inclusive of
Cossacks and Frontier Guards. Infantry and sharp-shooters are formed
into 37 army corps (1 Guards, 1 Grenadiers, and 25 army corps in Europe;
3 Caucasian, 2 Turkistanian, and 5 Siberian corps). The cavalry is
divided into divisions, independent brigades, and separate independent
regiments.
In war, each army corps consists of 2 divisions, and is in round figures
42,000 strong; each infantry division contains 2 brigades, at a strength
of 20,000. Each sharp-shooter brigade is about 9,000 strong, the cavalry
divisions about 4,500 strong. On the basis of these numbers, we arrive
at a grand total of 1,800,000 for all the army corps, divisions,
sharp-shooter brigades, and cavalry divisions. To this must be added
unattached troops and troops on frontier or garrison duty, so that the
war strength of the standing army can be reckoned at some 2,000,000.
This grand total is not all available in a European theatre of war. The
Siberian and Turkistanian army corps must be deducted, as they would
certainly be left in the interior and on the eastern frontier. For the
maintenance of order in the interior, it would probably be necessary to
leave the troops in Finland, the Guards at St. Petersburg, at least one
division at Moscow, and the Caucasian army corps in the Caucasus. This
would mean a deduction of thirteen army corps, or 546,000 men; so that
we have to reckon with a field army, made up of the standing army,
1,454,000 men strong. To this must be added about 100 regiments of
Cossacks of the Second and Third Ban, which may be placed at 50,000 men,
and the reserve and Empire-defence formations to be set on foot in case
of war. For the formation of reserves, there are sufficient trained men
available to constitute a reserve division of the first and second rank
for each corps respectively. These troops, if each division is assumed
to contain 20,000 men, would be 1,480,000 men strong. Of course, a
certain reduction must be made
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