WorldHundreds of thousands of Russian troops will take part in the country's largest ever military drills Tuesday, in a massive show of force featuring Chinese soldiers that has rattled the West. The Russian army has compared the show of force to the USSR's 1981 war games that saw between 100,000 and 150,000 Warsaw Pact soldiers take part in "Zapad-81" (West-81) -- the largest military exercises of the Soviet era. Russia's previous military exercise in the region, Vostok-2014, was almost half the size, with 155,000 soldiers participating. The country's war games in Eastern Europe last year, Zapad-2017, saw 12,700 troops take part according to Moscow. Ukraine and the Baltic states said the true number was far bigger.

Source: Sunday Times September 11, 2018 04:30 UTC