KSE Institute has released a new report, Disassembling the Russian War Machine: Logistics, Chokepoints, and Dependencies. The authors examine how the Russian military-industrial complex (MIC), despite its aggressive expansion since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, remains highly dependent on fragile logistics networks, critical imports from China and North Korea, and nominally civilian suppliers. Western policymakers can act now to disrupt this expansion. A narrow sanctions regime that spares civilian intermediaries, logistics firms, and Chinese suppliers effectively enables the Russian war machine. Strategic coordination and targeted pressure on these weak points can erode Russia’s military potential.

This publication builds on KSE Institute’s previous report, Disassembling the Russian War Machine: Key Players and Nodes, which analyzed the centralization and scaling of Russia’s MIC. The new report focuses on the logistics channels and supply bottlenecks that underpin Russia’s war economy and outlines actionable recommendations for undermining its sustainability.

Key insights from the report include:

• Depletion of Soviet stockpiles. Stockpiles of tanks, armored vehicles, artillery platforms, and other materiel are shrinking. Deliveries from storage bases fell by over 25% in 2024, with irreversible depletion of equipment. Much of what remains is now shipped directly to the front, bypassing larger repair plants.

• North Korea is filling the gap. Explosives from North Korea made up over half of all known shipments to Russian arsenals in 2024, while Iran likely supplies smaller volumes via the Caspian Sea.

• Critical chokepoints remain unsanctioned. Single firms dominate the MIC’s supplies of raw materials, reinforced concrete, and explosives—yet are still considered civilian, evading Western sanctions. Targeting the MIC’s suppliers and logistics firms would exploit chokepoints in Russia’s supply chains. Credibly threatening secondary sanctions and halting all scientific and commercial ties with Russia would further weaken the MIC.

• China is indispensable. Machinery and components from China now dominate the Russian MIC’s imports, with logistics routed through a few large military-affiliated firms and hubs concentrated around Moscow.

• Russia is investing heavily in naval capabilities aimed not at Ukraine but at NATO. Cargo flows reveal a strategic focus on submarine and Arctic-capable vessel production to assert dominance in the High North.

• Lifting sanctions on Russia would be a strategic mistake.  Lifting sanctions now would strengthen a MIC still constrained by inefficiencies, import reliance, and dwindling reserves, undermining deterrence and enabling future threats.

Policy recommendations: 

Sanctions relief to Russia should be out of the question. It would allow its military-industrial complex to reconstitute itself before an eventual confrontation with the West. In order to meaningfully constrain Russia’s capacity for prolonged warfare and future escalation, Western governments must widen the scope of economic pressure and close loopholes that sustain the MIC. This should entail sanctioning both the civilian entities supplying the MIC, as well as the logistics firms that serve as a bridge between Chinese manufacturers and the Russian MIC. The threat of secondary sanctions should be used to communicate clearly to Chinese firms and banks that facilitating machinery and component transfers to Russia’s MIC, directly or via intermediaries, is unacceptable. Finally, the West must monitor and pursue ways to disrupt the military and technological cooperation between Russia, North Korea, and Iran.