The Russian Navy will bear the brunt of huge budget cuts as the Russian Armed Forces finds itself short of money to spend on its multi-billion dollar modernization programs on account of the massive deceleration in Russia's economy caused by financial sanctions imposed by the European Union and the United States.

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The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (VSRF) wants a $536 billion budget for the next seven years but Russian experts seriously doubt VSRF will receive all of this because of the economic crisis crippling Russia's economy.

This debilitating crisis, which was imposed by the EU and the U.S. to punish Russia for illegally annexing Crimea in March 2014, caused Russia's GDP to plummet by 50 percent from 2014 to 2016, according to western experts.

NATO said the sanctions "are generally assessed to have helped exacerbate the macroeconomic challenges it (Russia) was already facing, notably the rapid and pronounced fall in oil prices that started in the last months of 2014."

Russian military experts said the cash crisis will hit the navy particularly hard, which means the navy will get fewer new warships and submarines. As a result, the navy has to prioritize its procurement targets so no new warships will introduced in foreseeable future, said Dmitry Litovkin, a military analyst.

"Most likely, Russia will have to abandon the Project 23560 Lider-class destroyer program and postpone until the 2030s construction of the Shtorm (Project 23000E) aircraft carrier, which is expected to carry around 90 fighters, including the naval version of the fifth-generation fighter," said Litovkin.

The cash crunch will also seriously delay the mass production of Russia's only stealth fighter, the Sukhoi T-50.

"The government did not have the money to procure 50 of these (T-50) aircraft as envisaged before the current crisis, so the order will be for a smaller number," said Andrey Frolov, editor-in-chief of Eksport Vooruzheniy (Arms Export) magazine.

Russian military experts says the economic crisis will also affect the development and production of other big ticket weapons such as new intercontinental ballistic missiles and hypersonic missiles. 

TagsRussian Navy, financial sanctions, European Union, United States, Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, NATO, Lider-class destroyer, Shtorm