Russia to hold sweeping joint war games with China and others

Russia has said it will launch sweeping war games drills in the country’s east that will involve forces from China (Savitskiy Vadim/Russian Defence Ministry Press Service/AP)

Russia said on Monday that it will launch sweeping war games drills in the country’s east which will involve forces from China – a show of increasingly close military ties between Moscow and Beijing amid tensions with the West over the Kremlin’s action in Ukraine.

The Russian Defence Ministry said the Vostok 2022 (East 2022) exercise will be held from September 1-7 in various locations in Russia’s Far East and the Sea of Japan and involve more than 50,000 troops and some 5,000 weapons units, including 140 aircraft and 60 warships.