Russian military to hold 'intensive' summer drills to be ready to 'protect national interests'

MOSCOW, June 1 (UPI) -- The Russian military is preparing for an intensive round of drills and cooperative exercises with other countries this summer.

Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu announced Wednesday that the training schedule, which begins in June and goes until October, will include 2,000 exercises, nine cooperative drills and a strategic command exercise, and will also include surprise drills and checks to maintain the armed forces' ability to protect Russia's national interests and respond to geopolitical events.

"The training period will be intensive," he said. "The focus will be on the training of tactical forces within combined groups and on personnel's individual performance parameters, such as flight and airdrop records," Shoigu said in a teleconference.

He added that there will also be cooperative exercises with other nations' military forces. He identified three of them: Peace Mission, an anti-terrorist exercise; the Russian-Belarusian Unbreakable Brotherhood, involving Russia and Belarus, and Russian-Mongolian Selenga-2016, named for a river in Mongolia.

A strategic command and staff exercise called Kavkaz-2016, referring to Russia's Caucasus region, will be conducted in September.