Emmylou Harris (born April 2, 1947) is an American singer, songwriter, and musician. She has released dozens of albums and singles over the course of her career and won 14 Grammys, the Polar Music Prize, and numerous other honors, including induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame. In 2018 she was presented the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.[1]
Her work and recordings include work as a solo artist, a bandleader, an interpreter of other composers' works, a singer-songwriter, and a backing vocalist and duet partner. She has worked with numerous artists.
Biography
Early years
Harris is from a career military family. Her father, Walter Harris (1921-1993),[2] was a Marine Corps officer, and her mother, Eugenia (1921-2014),[3] was a wartime military wife. Her father was reported missing in action in Korea in 1952 and spent ten months as a prisoner of war. Born in Birmingham, Alabama, Harris spent her childhood in North Carolina and Woodbridge, Virginia, where she graduated from Gar-Field Senior High School as class valedictorian. She won a drama scholarship to the UNCG School of Music, Theatre and Dance at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where she began to study music, and learn the songs of Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan and Joan Baez on guitar. She dropped out of college to pursue her musical aspirations, and moved to New York City, working as a waitress to support herself while performing folk songs in Greenwich Village coffeehouses during the 1960s folk music boom.[4] She married fellow songwriter Tom Slocum in 1969 and recorded her first album, Gliding Bird. Harris and Slocum soon divorced, and Harris and her newborn daughter Hallie moved in with her parents in Clarksville, Maryland, a suburb near Washington, D.C.[4][5][6]
With Gram Parsons
Harris soon returned to performing as part of a trio with Gerry Mule and Tom Guidera. In 1971, members of the country rock group the Flying Burrito Brothers saw her perform; former Byrds member Chris Hillman had taken over the band and was impressed by Harris, and briefly considered asking her to join the Flying Burrito Brothers. Instead, Hillman recommended her to Gram Parsons, who was looking for a female vocalist to collaborate with on his first solo album, GP. Harris toured as a member of Parsons's band, the Fallen Angels, in 1973, and the pair shone during vocal harmonies and duets. Later that year, Parsons and Harris worked on a studio album, Grievous Angel. Parsons died in his motel room near what is now Joshua Tree National Park on September 19, 1973, from an accidental overdose of drugs and alcohol.[7] Parsons's Grievous Angel was released posthumously in 1974, and three more tracks from his sessions with Harris were included on another posthumous Parsons album, Sleepless Nights, in 1976. One more album of recorded material from that period was packaged as Live 1973, but was not released until 1982.
The Hot Band

Warner Brothers A&R representative Mary Martin introduced Harris to Canadian producer Brian Ahern, who produced her major label debut album, Pieces of the Sky, released in 1975 on Reprise Records. The album was surprisingly eclectic, especially by Nashville standards, including cover versions of the Beatles' "For No One", Merle Haggard's "Tonight the Bottle Let Me Down" and the Louvin Brothers' "If I Could Only Win Your Love".  It also featured "Bluebird Wine", a composition by a young Texas songwriter, Rodney Crowell, who was the first in a long line of songwriters whose talents Harris has championed. The record was one of the most expensive country records produced at the time, featuring the talents of James Burton, Glen Hardin, Ron Tutt, Ray Pohlman, and Bill Payne, as well as two tracks ("Before Believing" and "Queen of the Silver Dollar") that were cut with the Angel Band. Two singles were released: "Too Far Gone", which initially charted at No.73 (a 1979 reissue hit No.13), and Harris's first big hit, "If I Could Only Win Your Love", a duet with Herb Pedersen (later a founding member of the Desert Rose Band), which peaked at No.4.
Executives of Warner Bros. Records (Reprise Records's parent company) told Harris they would agree to record her if she would "get a hot band". Harris did so, enlisting guitarist James Burton and pianist Glen Hardin, both of whom had played with Elvis Presley as well as Parsons. Burton was a renowned guitarist, starting in Ricky Nelson's band in the 1950s, and Hardin had been a member of the Crickets. Other Hot Band members were drummer John Ware, pedal steel guitarist Hank DeVito, and bassist Emory Gordy, Jr., with whom Harris had worked while performing with Parsons. Singer-songwriter Crowell was enlisted as a rhythm guitarist and duet partner.[8] Harris's first tour schedule originally dovetailed around Presley's, owing to Burton and Hardin's continuing commitments to Presley's band. The Hot Band lived up to its name, with most of the members moving on with fresh talent replacing them as they went on to solo careers of their own.
Elite Hotel, released in December 1975, established that the buzz created by Pieces of the Sky was well-founded. Unusual for country albums at the time, which largely revolved around a hit single, Harris's albums borrowed their approach from the album-oriented rock market. In terms of quality and artistic merit, tracks like "Sin City", "Wheels", and "Till I Gain Control Again", which weren't singles, easily stood against tracks like "Together Again", "Sweet Dreams", and "One of These Days", which were. Elite Hotel was a No.1 country album and also did sufficiently well as a crossover success with the rock audience. Harris appealed to those who normally disapproved of the country market's pull toward crossover pop singles ("Together Again" and "Sweet Dreams" both topped the country charts). Elite Hotel won a Grammy in 1976 for Best Country Vocal Performance, Female.
Harris's reputation for guest work continued. She contributed to albums by Linda Ronstadt, Guy Clark and Neil Young, and she was tapped by Bob Dylan to perform on his Desire album. Harris also filmed one of the studio sequences, owing to her touring schedule, in the Band's The Last Waltz, singing "Evangeline".
Burton left the Hot Band in 1976, choosing to remain with Elvis Presley's band, and was replaced by English guitarist Albert Lee. Harris's commercial apex was Luxury Liner, released in 1977, which remains one of her definitive records. On Luxury Liner, Harris's mix of songs from Chuck Berry ("(You Never Can Tell) C'est la Vie"), Gram Parsons (the title track and "She"), the Carter Family ("Hello Stranger") and Kitty Wells ("Making Believe") illustrate a continuity and artistic merit to country music often overlooked at the time. Even so, many fans expected more original tunes, so she became known as a cover artist. Despite Top Ten singles with "C'est la Vie" and "Making Believe", the album's best-known track is the first recorded cover of Townes Van Zandt's classic "Pancho & Lefty", which would be a No.1 hit for Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard in 1983. At the end of 1977, Crowell left the Hot Band to pursue a solo career; his replacement was bluegrass multi-instrumentalist and singer Ricky Skaggs.
Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town signaled a slight change of direction from Harris's previous three albums.  Rather than mixing classic and contemporary, the album is made up largely of recently written songs, though from a wide variety of writers. "Two More Bottles of Wine", written by Delbert McClinton, became Harris's third No.1 single; "To Daddy", written by Dolly Parton, went to No.3; and a third single, "Easy from Now On", went Top Twenty. The album included two songs by Crowell ("I Ain't Living Long Like This" and "Leaving Louisiana in the Broad Daylight"), two by songwriter Jesse Winchester ("Defying Gravity" and "My Songbird"), and one by Utah Phillips ("Green Rolling Hills").
The Roots records
In January 1977, Harris married Brian Ahern.[4]
Their (Harris' second and also Ahern's second) daughter, Meghann, was born in 1979. During this period, Harris recorded and released three studio albums that reflected a shift toward traditional country (at a time when the public was beginning to embrace a more polished Urban Cowboy sound). The roots direction was prominent in her Grammy Award–winning 1979 album Blue Kentucky Girl. Apart from a cover of the Drifters' "Save the Last Dance for Me", the album was largely made up of classic-styled country material in the vein of Loretta Lynn and Kitty Wells. One of her best-loved albums, it includes songs from the Louvin Brothers' "Everytime You Leave", Willie Nelson's "Sister's Coming Home" and Gram Parsons's signature "Hickory Wind".  Wesley Rose took special interest in Harris's recording of "Beneath Still Waters", which became a No.1 hit.
The Christmas album Light of the Stable was released in 1979; its title track featured backing vocals by Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt and Neil Young, all of whom Harris had worked with sporadically since the mid-1970s, and with whom she continued to collaborate through the 2000s. In the 1980s, Harris explored country music's history further with the bluegrass-oriented recording of Roses in the Snow, featuring Ricky Skaggs, Tony Rice, Albert Lee, Emory Gordy Jr. and Jerry Douglas. Harris's versions of the traditional "Wayfaring Stranger" and Paul Simon's "The Boxer" were strong singles.
In 1980, Harris recorded "That Lovin' You Feelin' Again" with Roy Orbison. The duet's recording was a Top-10 hit on both the Country and Adult Contemporary charts. They were awarded a Grammy for Best Country Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group. She was featured on Paul Kennerley's concept album The Legend of Jesse James, which also featured Levon Helm of the Band and Johnny Cash.[9]
Pop-chart success, songwriting
In 1981, Harris's recordings reached the Top 40 on the Billboard pop chart with a cover of "Mister Sandman"—again Top 10 Country as well as Adult Contemporary—from her Evangeline album. (The album version of the song was a track from the  Trio sessions with Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt, but neither Parton's nor Ronstadt's record companies would allow their artists' vocals to be used on the single, so Harris re-recorded the song, singing all three parts for the single release of the song.). She also released her follow-up album Cimarron within the same year.
Harris moved to Nashville in 1982. White Shoes in 1983 included an eclectic pairing of the rockish reading of "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" with a remake of the Donna Summer hit "On the Radio", as well as tracks from a diverse group of songwriters including Hot Band member Crowell, Sandy Denny and T-Bone Burnett. It was her last album produced by Brian Ahern until All I Intended to Be in 2008.
Harris's major-label releases thus far included few of her own songs, but in 1985 her songwriting skills were prominent with the release of a concept album The Ballad of Sally Rose, for which she co-wrote all of the songs. The album was semi-autobiographical, based loosely on her relationship with Parsons. Harris described it as a "country opera", and a "huge commercial disaster".[10]
Her co-writer and producer on the album, English songwriter and musician Paul Kennerley, the writer of the hit singles "Born to Run" (on Harris's 1981 Cimarron album) and "In My Dreams" (on White Shoes). Kennerley also produced her next album, Thirteen. They married in 1985 and divorced in 1993.
Emmylou first appeared on A Prairie Home Companion in 1985 and has been a fan favourite ever since.[11]
In 1987, nearly a full decade after their first attempt, Harris teamed up with Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt for a long-promised and long-anticipated Trio disc.  The album was the biggest commercial success of Harris's career, spending five weeks at No.1 on Billboard's Country Albums chart (also quickly reaching the Top 10 on the Pop Albums chart). It sold several million copies and produced four Top 10 Country hits, including "To Know Him Is To Love Him", which hit No.1. The recording was nominated for the coveted Album of the Year Grammy award (given to U2 that year for The Joshua Tree) and the three women won the statuette for Best Country Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal; the album's Linda Thompson-penned track "Telling Me Lies" reached No.3 Country, No.25 Adult Contemporary, and was nominated for a Grammy as 1987's Best Country Song.
Harris also released a solo album in 1987, Angel Band, featuring traditional gospel songs, on which she worked with then rising country star Vince Gill, and others.  In 1989, she recorded two songs with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band on their album, Will the Circle Be Unbroken: Volume II. In a snippet of studio chatter included on one of the tracks, she talked during the recording session about her beginnings and how music had changed:
Years ago I had the experience of sitting around in a living room with a bunch of people and singing and playing, and it was like a spiritual experience, it was wonderful. And I decided then that was what I was going to do with my life was play music, do music. In the making of records, I think over the years we've all gotten a little too technical, a little too hung up on getting things perfect. We've lost the living room. The living room has gone out of the music, but today I feel like we got it back.

1989's Bluebird album, which featured contributions from Marty Stuart, Bonnie Raitt, and Kate & Anna McGarrigle, included the singles "Heartbreak Hill", which reached No.8 on the U.S. country singles chart, and "Heaven Only Knows", which reached No.16, the most recent top-twenty chart singles of Harris' career.  The following year's Brand New Dance album received favorable reviews, but marked the beginning of a chart and airplay decline for Harris.
Around 1991, she dissolved The Hot Band and formed a new band of acoustic musicians—Sam Bush on fiddle, mandolin and vocals, Roy Huskey, Jr. on bass and vocals, Larry Atamanuik on drums, Al Perkins on banjo, guitar, Dobro guitar and vocals, and Jon Randall on guitar, mandolin and vocals—which she named The Nash Ramblers. They recorded a Grammy Award-winning live album in 1992 at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee, which led to the $8 million restoration of the facility into a premium concert and event venue. It was her last album with Reprise Records.  She has been a member of the Grand Ole Opry since 1992.[12][13]
New directions

By the 1990s, Harris started receiving less airplay as mainstream country stations began shifting their focus to the youth-oriented "new country" format. As with Brand New Dance, 1993's Cowgirl's Prayer—Harris's first studio album after her switch to Elektra Records—was critically praised but received little airplay,[14] and its lead single, "High Powered Love" charted low, peaking at No.63, prompting her to shift her career in a new direction.
In 1995, Emmylou Harris was a regular contributor to the original series of the BBC's Transatlantic Sessions; contributing to each of its seven episodes of collaborative live performances by various leading folk and country musicians, who would play music, mostly from Scotland, Ireland, England and North America.[15]
In 1995, Harris released one of the most critically acclaimed albums of the decade, Wrecking Ball, produced by Daniel Lanois, best known for his work with U2, Peter Gabriel and Bob Dylan. An experimental album for Harris, the record included Harris's rendition of the Neil Young–penned title track (Young himself provided guest vocals on two of the album's songs), Steve Earle's "Goodbye", Julie Miller's "All My Tears", Jimi Hendrix's "May This Be Love", Anna McGarrigle's "Goin' Back to Harlan" and Gillian Welch's "Orphan Girl". U2's Larry Mullen, Jr., played drums for the project. The album received virtually no country airplay, but it brought Harris to the attention of alternative rock listeners, many of whom had never listened to her music before.
Harris then took her Wrecking Ball material on the road, releasing the live Spyboy in 1998, backed with a power trio consisting of Nashville producer, songwriter and guitarist Buddy Miller and two New Orleans musicians, drummer Brady Blade and bassist-vocalist-percussionist Daryl Johnson. In addition to performing songs from Wrecking Ball, the album updated many of Harris's career hits, including "Boulder to Birmingham".
Also in 1998, she appeared prominently on Willie Nelson's moody, instrumentally sparse Teatro album, produced by Wrecking Ball producer Lanois.[16]
During the summer of 1997 and 1998, Harris joined Sarah McLachlan's all-woman musical touring festival, the Lilith Fair, where new artists like Patty Griffin could share new experiences and ideas with seasoned musicians like Harris and Bonnie Raitt.
In January 1999, Harris released Trio 2 with Parton and Ronstadt. Much of the album had actually been recorded in 1994 but remained unreleased for nearly five years because of record label and personnel disputes, conflicting schedules, and career priorities of the three artists. Trio 2 was much more contemporary-sounding than its predecessor and was certified Gold. It included their version of Neil Young's classic "After the Gold Rush", which became a popular music video and won another Grammy—this one for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals. Harris and Ronstadt then released a duet album, Western Wall: The Tucson Sessions, later the same year. The two superstars toured together that fall in support of the disc. Both albums made the Top 10 of Billboard's Country Albums chart and also did well on the pop chart.
Also in 1999, Harris paid tribute to her former singing partner Gram Parsons by serving as co-executive producer of Return of the Grievous Angel: A Tribute to Gram Parsons, an album that brought together more than a dozen artists. Harris performed duets with Beck, Sheryl Crow and the Pretenders on this album's tracks.
In 2000, Harris released her solo follow-up to Wrecking Ball, Red Dirt Girl, produced by Lanois protégé Malcolm Burn. For the first time since The Ballad of Sally Rose, the album contained a number of Harris's own compositions. Like Wrecking Ball, the album's sound leaned more toward alternative rock than country. Nevertheless, it reached No.5 on Billboard's Country Albums chart as well as a healthy No.54 on the pop side. It also won Harris another of her 13 Grammy awards, in the category of Best Contemporary Folk Album.
Harris also accompanied alternative country singer Ryan Adams on his solo debut, Heartbreaker and sang on Tracy Chapman's fifth album, Telling Stories.
Also in 2000, Harris joined an all-star group of traditional country, folk and blues artists for the T-Bone Burnett–produced soundtrack to the Coen Brothers film, O Brother, Where Art Thou? The soundtrack won multiple CMA, ACM and Grammy awards. A documentary/concert film, Down from the Mountain, featured the artists performing music from the film and other songs at the Ryman Auditorium. Harris and many of the same artists took their show on the road for the Down from the Mountain Tour in 2002. In 2003, Harris supplied the finishing touches in harmonizing with the Dixie Chicks on a song they were recording in the studio, "Godspeed".
Later work
Harris released Stumble into Grace, her follow-up to Red Dirt Girl, in 2003. Like its predecessor, it contained mostly self-penned material. In 2004, Harris led the Sweet Harmony Traveling Revue with Gillian Welch, David Rawlings, Buddy Miller and Patty Griffin. They performed singly and together and swapped instruments.
On September 9, 2005, Harris participated in "Shelter from the Storm: A Concert for the Gulf Coast", a series of concerts simulcast by most American television stations to raise money for victims of Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita. She performed with Beth Neilsen Chapman and the Dixie Chicks, harmonizing on Patty Griffin's song "Mary". She also lent her voice to the soundtrack of the critically acclaimed 2005 film, Brokeback Mountain, on the song "A Love That Will Never Grow Old", which was controversially omitted from Oscar consideration because of the insubstantial amount of time the song played during the film.

In 2005, Harris worked with Conor Oberst on Bright Eyes' release, I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning, performing backup vocals on three tracks. In July, she joined Elvis Costello on several dates of his U.S. tour, performing alongside Costello and his band on several numbers each night. July also saw the release of The Very Best of Emmylou Harris: Heartaches & Highways, a single-disc retrospective of Harris's career, on the Rhino Entertainment label. This same year, Harris appeared as a guest vocalist on Neil Young's widely acclaimed Prairie Wind. She also appeared in the Jonathan Demme documentary concert film Neil Young: Heart of Gold, released in 2006.

All the Roadrunning, an album of collaborations with former Dire Straits frontman Mark Knopfler, was released in April 2006 and supported by a tour of Europe and the U.S. The album was a commercial success, reaching No.8 in the U.K. and No.17 in the U.S. Selections recorded during the All the Roadrunning tour performance at the Gibson Amphitheatre were released as a CD/DVD package titled Real Live Roadrunning in November 2006.  In addition to several of the compositions that Harris and Knopfler recorded together in the studio, Real Live Roadrunning features solo hits from both members of the duo, as well as a few classic tracks from Knopfler's days with Dire Straits.
Harris is featured on A Tribute to Joni Mitchell, released on April 24, 2007. Harris covered the song "The Magdalene Laundries" (originally on Mitchell's 1994 album, Turbulent Indigo). She sang "Another Pot o' Tea" with Anne Murray on Murray's album Anne Murray Duets: Friends and Legends, released on November 13, 2007, in Canada and on January 15, 2008, in the U.S.
Harris wrote a song entitled "In Rodanthe" for the 2008 film Nights in Rodanthe.

A solo album, All I Intended to Be, was released on June 10, 2008, to critical acclaim. It reached the Top Five of Billboard's Country Albums chart and the Top 20 of the Pop Albums chart. Contributors include Buddy Miller, the McGarrigle sisters, Vince Gill, Phil Madeira, and her Trio sister Dolly Parton. Harris toured with an ensemble she dubbed the Red Dirt Boys, featuring Phil Madeira on accordion, guitar, and keyboards, Colin Linden on guitar and banjo, Rickie Simpkins on mandolin and fiddle, Chris Donohue on bass, and Bryan Owings on drums.[17] It did not include Miller, who was touring with Robert Plant, Alison Krauss and T-Bone Burnett at the time. In 2009, Harris toured with Patty Griffin, Shawn Colvin, and Miller as "Three Girls and Their Buddy". Madeira, Simpkins, and Donohue performed with her in late 2008 and 2009, appearing on "A Prairie Home Companion" and at MerleFest and the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. In September 2009, Owings rejoined the Red Dirt Boys with Miller for the remainder of 2009.
In April 2009 Harris became a grandmother when her daughter gave birth to a daughter, Prudence.[18]
In 2010, Harris regrouped with the latest version of the Red Dirt Boys—Madeira, Owings, Donohue, and Simpkins—for Lilith Fair summer dates and a scheduled U.S. autumn tour.
According to an interview with Bonnie Tyler by Digital Spy, Harris will be teaming up with her on Tyler's upcoming album. Harris will do backing vocals on a song written and produced by Wayne Warner. A recent solo album, Hard Bargain, was released on the Nonesuch label on April 26, 2011.  It reached No.3 on Billboard's Country Albums chart—her highest-charting album since 1980—and the Top 20 of the Pop Albums chart.
PBS host Tavis Smiley interviewed Harris in a program that aired on April 20, 2011. In the interview Harris spoke of being a straight-A student in high school, which led her to being selected as valedictorian, and recounted learning to play guitar by memorizing three chords.[19]
In 2011 she released a version of the song 'To Ohio' in collaboration with the American indie folk band 'The Low Anthem'. Later in 2011, she collaborated with Australian musician and screenwriter Nick Cave on the soundtrack to John Hillcoat's film Lawless. Set in Depression-era Franklin County, Virginia, U.S., the film was released in August 2012 in the U.S. and September 2012 in the U.K.
Old Yellow Moon, an album of duets featuring Harris and former Hot Band member Rodney Crowell, was released on February 26, 2013.[20] It was another Billboard Top 10 Country album for Harris, and in 2014 she won her 13th Grammy Award for it.
The Traveling Kind, a collaboration with Rodney Crowell, was released May 12, 2015 by Nonesuch Records[21] which earned the pair a second Americana Music Award for Duo/Group of the year and also garnered two Grammy nominations.
In 2016, Harris was honored with a tribute concert entitled The Life & Songs of Emmylou Harris, which was later released as both a DVD and a live CD. The concert featured several of Harris's closest friends and collaborators including Rodney Crowell, Buddy Miller, Patty Griffin, Lucinda Williams, Alison Krauss, Lee Ann Womack, Martina McBride, Vince Gill and Sheryl Crow.[22] Harris  performed three songs at the concert: "Gone, Long Gone" (with John Starling), "Blackhawk" (with Daniel Lanois), and "Boulder to Birmingham" with the entire cast.
Activism
In 1997 and 1998, Harris performed in Sarah McLachlan's Lilith Fair, promoting feminism in music. Since 1999, Harris has been organizing an annual benefit tour called Concerts for a Landmine Free World. All proceeds from the tours support the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation's (VVAF) efforts to assist innocent victims of conflicts around the world. The tour also benefits the VVAF's work to raise America's awareness of the global landmine problem. Artists that have joined Harris on the road for these dates include Mary Chapin Carpenter, Bruce Cockburn, Sheryl Crow, Steve Earle, Joan Baez, Patty Griffin, Nanci Griffith, Willie Nelson, and Lucinda Williams. Harris is a supporter of animal rights and an active member of PETA.[23] She founded, and in her spare time assists at, Bonaparte's Retreat, an animal shelter in Nashville.[24]
She became a member of the newly formed Commission on the Humanities and Social Sciences of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2011.[25][26]
Awards and other honors
Grammy Awards
The Grammy Awards celebrate outstanding achievement in music. Harris has won 14 out of 48 nominations.

Country Music Association Awards
The CMA Awards recognize outstanding achievement in the country music industry. Harris has won 3 awards out of 24 nominations.

Academy of Country Music Awards
The ACM Awards recognize achievements in country music. Harris has won 2 awards from 12 nominations.

International Bluegrass Music Association Awards
The International Bluegrass Music Association recognise outstanding achievement in Bluegrass music. Harris has received five awards for her contributions to a Louvin Brothers tribute album, a Nitty Gritty Dirt Band album and a film (and the resulting documentary) soundtrack.

Americana Music Association Awards
The Americana Music Honors & Awards recognize outstanding achievement in Americana music. Of 5 nominations, Harris has won 4.

Other honors
Became a member of the Grand Ole Opry, 1992
VH1's 100 Most Influential Women in Rock and Roll, 1998 – Number 22 out of 100
Billboard's Century Award recipient, 1999[27] – inducted by Sarah McLachlan
CMT's 40 Greatest Women of Country Music, 2002 – No.5 ranking
Inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame, February 12, 2008[28]
Inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2009
Honorary doctorate of music from Berklee College of Music, 2009[29]
Swedish Polar Music Prize, 2015
Hollywood Walk of Fame, 2019 (with Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt)[30]
Discography

Collaborations and other appearances

Sources
In the Country of Country: A Journey to the Roots of American Music, Nicholas Dawidoff, Vintage Books, 1998. ISBN0-679-41567-X
Emmylou Harris: Angel in Disguise, Jim Brown, Fox Music Books, 2004.  ISBN1-894997-03-4
Fong-Torres, Ben. (1998). "Emmylou Harris". In The Encyclopedia of Country Music. Paul Kingsbury, Editor. New York: Oxford University Press. p.230.

 Media related to Emmylou Harris at Wikimedia Commons
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 at the Encyclopædia Britannica
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 (June 2008)

   on Charlie Rose
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Handkäse (pronounced[ˈhantkɛːzə]; literally: "hand cheese") is a German regional sour milk cheese (similar to Harzer) and is a culinary speciality of Frankfurt am Main, Offenbach am Main, Darmstadt, Langen, and other parts of southern Hesse. It gets its name from the traditional way of producing it: forming it with one's own hands.[2]
It is a small, translucent, yellow cheese with a pungent aroma that some people may find unpleasant. It is sometimes square, but more often round in shape.
Often served as an appetizer or as a snack with Apfelwein (Ebbelwoi or cider), it is traditionally topped with chopped onions,[3] locally known as "Handkäse mit Musik" (literally: hand cheese with music). It is usually eaten with caraway on it, but since many people in Germany do not like this spice, in many areas it is served on the side. Some Hessians say that it is a sign of the quality of the establishment when caraway is in a separate dispenser. As a sign of this, many restaurants have, in addition to the salt and pepper, a little pot for caraway seeds.
Strangers to this custom probably ask where the Musik is.  They most likely are told, Die Musik kommt später, i.e. the music "comes later".  This is a euphemism for the flatulence that the raw onions usually provide.  A more polite, but less likely explanation for the Musik is that the flasks of vinegar and oil customarily provided with the cheese would strike a musical note when they hit each other. Handkäse is popular among dieters and some health food devotees. It is also popular among bodybuilders, runners, and weightlifters for its high content of protein while being relatively low in fat.
Serving
While Apfelwein is traditionally served with Handkäse, white wine is also preferred in some areas, such as Rheinhessen.
See also
German cuisine
List of German cheeses
List of cheeses
Foodportal
Germanyportal


Armed Forces of the
Russian Federation
 Ministry of Defence
Services (vid)
 Russian Ground Forces
 Russian Aerospace Forces
 Russian Navy
Independent troops (rod)
 Strategic Missile Forces
 Russian Airborne Forces
Other troops
 Logistical Support
Ranks of the Russian Military
Air Force ranks and insignia
Army ranks and insignia
Navy ranks and insignia
Uniforms of the Russian Military
Uniforms of the Russian Armed Forces
History of the Russian military
Military history of Russia
History of Russian military ranks
Military ranks of the Soviet Unionvt

The Russian Armed Forces (Russian:Вооружённые Си́лы Росси́йской Федера́ции, tr.Vooruzhonnije Síly Rossíyskoj Federátsii) are the military forces of the Russian Federation, established after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. On 7 May 1992, Boris Yeltsin signed a presidential decree establishing the Russian Ministry of Defence and placing all Soviet Armed Forces troops on the territory of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic under Russian control.[14] The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces is the President of Russia. The Russian Armed Forces were formed in 1992. The Russian Armed Forces is one of the world's largest military forces. It is also the world's second most powerful military and the world's second largest arms exporter.[15]
Under Russian federal law, the RuAF along with the Federal Security Service (FSB)'s Border Troops, the National Guard, the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), the Federal Protective Service (FSO), the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), and EMERCOM's civil defence form Russia's military services and are under direct control of the Security Council of Russia.
Service Branches
Armed forces under the Ministry of Defence are divided into:
the three "branches of Armed Forces" (вида вооружённых сил): the Ground Forces, Aerospace Forces, and the Navy
the two "separate troop branches" (Отдельные рода войск): the Strategic Missile Troops and the Airborne Troops
the Logistical Support, which has a separate status of its own
There are additionally two further "separate troop branches", the National Guard and the Border Service. These retain the legal status of "Armed Forces", while falling outside of the jurisdiction of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The National Guard is formed on the basis of the former Internal Troops of Russia. The new structure has been detached from the Ministry of Internal Affairs into a separate agency, directly subordinated to the President of Russia. The Border Service is a paramilitary organization of the Federal Security Service - the country's main internal intelligence agency. Both organizations have significant wartime tasks in addition to their main peacetime activities and operate their own land, air and maritime units.
The number of personnel is specified by decree of the President of Russia. On 1 January 2008, a number of 2,019,629 units, including military of 1,134,800 units, was set.[16] In 2010 the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) estimated that the Russian Armed Forces numbered about 1,027,000 active troops and in the region of 2,035,000 reserves (largely ex-conscripts).[17] As opposed to personnel specified by decree, actual personnel numbers on the payroll was reported by the Audit Chamber of Russia as 766,000 in October 2013.[18][19] As of December 2016, the armed forces are at 93 percent of the required manpower, up from 82 percent reported in December 2013.[20]
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, between 2005-2009 and 2010-2014, Russian exports of major weapons increased by 37 percent;[21] Russia spent $66.4 billion on arms in 2015,[22] then $69.2 billion in 2016, having taken 3rd place (after the U.S. and China).[23]  According to the Russian Defence Ministry, share of modern weapons in the Armed Forces reached from 26 to 48 percent among different kinds of troops in December 2014.[24] This was raised to 30.5–70.7% as of July 2015.[25] The average was 61.5 per cent over the end of 2018.[26][27]
History
The Soviet Union officially dissolved on 25 December 1991, leaving the Soviet military in limbo. For the next year and a half various attempts to keep its unity and to transform it into the military of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) failed. Over time, some units stationed in the newly independent republics swore loyalty to their new national governments, while a series of treaties between the newly independent states divided up the military's assets.[28]
Apart from assuming control of the bulk of the former Soviet Internal Troops and the KGB Border Troops, seemingly the only independent defence move the new Russian government made before March 1992 involved announcing the establishment of a National Guard.[29] Until 1995, it was planned to form at least 11 brigades numbering 3,000 to 5,000 each, with a total of no more than 100,000. National Guard military units were to be deployed in 10 regions, including in Moscow (three brigades), Leningrad (two brigades), and a number of other important cities and regions. By the end of September 1991 in Moscow the National Guard was about 15,000 strong, mostly consisting of former Soviet Armed Forces servicemen. In the end, President Yeltsin tabled a decree "On the temporary position of the Russian Guard", but it was not put into practice.[30]
After signing the Belavezha Accords on 21 December 1991, the countries of the newly formed CIS signed a protocol on the temporary appointment of Marshal of Aviation Yevgeny Shaposhnikov as Minister of Defence and commander of the armed forces in their territory, including strategic nuclear forces. On 14 February 1992 Shaposhnikov formally became Supreme Commander of the CIS Armed Forces. On 16 March 1992 a decree by Boris Yeltsin created The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation the operational control of Allied High Command and the Ministry of Defence, which was headed by President. Finally, on 7 May 1992, Yeltsin signed a decree establishing the armed forces and Yeltsin assumed the duties of the Supreme Commander.[31]
In May 1992, General Colonel Pavel Grachev became the Minister of Defence, and was made Russia's first Army General on assuming the post. By August or December 1993 CIS military structures had become CIS military cooperation structures with all real influence lost.[32]
In the next few years, Russian forces withdrew from central and eastern Europe, as well as from some newly-independent post-Soviet republics.  While in most places the withdrawal took place without any problems, the Russian Armed Forces remained in some disputed areas such as the Sevastopol naval base in the Crimea as well as in Abkhazia and in Transnistria. The Armed Forces have several bases in foreign countries, especially on territory of the former Soviet Republics.
A new military doctrine, promulgated in November 1993, implicitly acknowledged the contraction of the old Soviet military into a regional military power without global ambitions. In keeping with its emphasis on the threat of regional conflicts, the doctrine called for a smaller, lighter, and more mobile Russian military, with a higher degree of professionalism and with greater rapid-deployment capability. Such change proved extremely difficult to achieve. Under Pavel Grachev (Defence Minister from 1992 to 1996) little military reform took place, though there was a plan to create more deployable mobile forces. Later Defence Minister Rodionov (in office 1996-1997) had good qualifications but did not manage to institute lasting change. Only under Defence Minister Igor Sergeyev (in office 1997-2001) did a certain amount of limited reform begin, though attention focused upon the Strategic Rocket Forces.[33]
2008 military reform

Significant reforms were announced in late 2008 under Defence Minister Anatoliy Serdyukov (in office 2007-2012), and major structural reorganisation began in 2009. Key elements of the reforms announced in October 2008 included reducing the armed forces to a strength of one million by 2012 (planned end-date was 2016);[34] reducing the number of officers; centralising officer training from 65 military schools into 10 "systemic" military training centres; reducing the size of the central command; introducing more civilian logistics and auxiliary staff; elimination of cadre-strength formations; reorganising the reserves; reorganising the army into a brigade system; and reorganising air forces into an air-base system instead of regiments.[35] On 17 October 2012 the head of the State Duma's Defence Committee told RIA Novosti that Russia planned to boost annual defense spending by 59 percent to almost 3 trillion rubles ($83.3 billion) in 2015 up from $61 billion in 2012. "Targeted national defence spending as a percentage of GDP will amount to 3.2 percent in 2013, 3.4 percent in 2014 and 3.7 percent in 2015", Defence Committee chairman Vladimir Komoedov is quoted as saying in the committee's conclusion on the draft budget for 2013-2015.[36]
The number of military units is to be reduced in accordance with the table:[37]

Arms and branches20082012ReductionGround Forces1,890172-90 %Air Force340180-48 %Navy240123-49 %Strategic Rocket Forces128-33 %Space Forces76-15 %Airborne Troops65-17 %
An essential part of the military reform involves down-sizing. At the beginning of the reform the Russian Army had about 1,200,000 active personnel. Largely, the reductions fall among the officers. Personnel are to be reduced according to the table:[37]

Rank1 September 20081 December 2009Planned for 2012ReductionGeneral/Admiral1,107780877−20.8 %Colonel/Captain 1st Rank25,6659,114−64.5 %Lieutenant Colonel/Captain 2nd Rank19,3007,500−61 %Major/Captain 3rd Rank99,55025,000−75 %Captain/Captain Lieutenant90,00040,000−56 %First Lieutenant/Senior Lieutenant30,00035,000+17%Lieutenant/Lieutenant20,00026,000+30%Officers in total365,000220,000−40 %Praporshchik/Warrant Officer90,00000−100 %Warrant officer50,00000−100 %
The schedule envisaged reducing the total numbers in the officer corps from 335 thousand to 150 thousand, but in early February 2011 Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov announced the decision to increase officers by 70,000 - to 220 thousand[38] to counteract this.
Structure

The Defence Ministry of the Russian Federation serves as the administrative body of the Armed Forces. Since Soviet times, the General Staff has acted as the main commanding and supervising body of the Russian armed forces: U.S. expert William Odom said in 1998, that 'the Soviet General Staff without the MoD is conceivable, but the MoD without the General Staff is not.'[39] However, currently the General Staff's role is being reduced to that of the Ministry's department of strategic planning, the Minister himself, currently Sergey Shoygu may now be gaining further executive authority over the troops. Other departments include the personnel directorate as well as the Logistical Support, Railway Troops, Signal Troops and Construction Troops. The Chief of the General Staff is currently General of the Army Valery Gerasimov.
The Russian military is divided into three services: the Russian Ground Forces, the Russian Navy, and the Russian Aerospace Forces. In addition there are two independent arms of service: the Strategic Missile Troops and the Russian Airborne Troops.  The Armed Forces as a whole are traditionally referred to as the Army (armiya), except in some cases, the Navy is specifically singled out.
Military districts

Since late 2010 the Ground Forces as well as the Air Forces and Navy are distributed among four military districts: Western Military District, Southern Military District, Central Military District, and the Eastern Military District which also constitute four Joint Strategic Commands— West, South, Central, and East. Previously from 1992 to 2010, the Ground Forces were divided into six military districts: Moscow, Leningrad, North Caucausian, Privolzhsk-Ural, Siberian and Far Eastern and Russia's four fleets and one flotilla were organizations on par with the Ground Forces' Military Districts. These six MDs were merged into the four new MDs, which now also incorporate the air forces and naval forces. There is one remaining Russian military base, the 102nd Military Base, in Armenia left of the former Transcaucasus Group of Forces. It likely reports to the Southern Military District.
In mid-2010 a reorganisation was announced which consolidated military districts and the navy's fleets into four Joint Strategic Commands (OSC).[40]
In 2014 the Northern Fleet was reorganized in separate Joint Strategic Command.
Geographically divided, the five commands are:
Joint Strategic Command West - Western Military District (HQ in St. Petersburg), includes the Baltic Fleet;
Joint Strategic Command Northern Fleet - (HQ in Severomorsk);
Joint Strategic Command South - Southern Military District (HQ in Rostov-on-Don) includes the Black Sea Fleet and Caspian Flotilla;
Joint Strategic Command Center - Central Military District (HQ in Yekaterinburg);
Joint Strategic Command East - Eastern Military District (HQ in Khabarovsk), includes the Pacific Fleet.
The plan was put in place on 1 December 2010 and mirrors a proposed reorganisation by former Chief of the General Staff Army General Yuri Baluyevsky for a Regional Command East which was not implemented.[41] The four commands were set up by a decree of President Medvedev on 14 July 2010.[42][43] In July 2011, an Operational-Strategic Command of Missile-Space Defence has also been established on the basis of the former Special Purpose Command of the Russian Air Force. A Presidential decree of January 2011 named commanders for several of the new organisational structures.[44]
Russian military command posts, according to globalsecurity.org, include Chekhov/Sharapovo about 80 kilometres (50mi) south of Moscow, for the General Staff and President, Chaadayevka near Penza, Voronovo in Moscow, and a facility at Lipetsk all for the national leadership, Yamantau in the Urals, and command posts for the Strategic Rocket Forces at Kuntsevo in Moscow (primary) and Kosvinsky Mountain in the Urals (alternate).[45] It is speculated that many of the Moscow bunkers are linked by the special underground Moscow Metro 2 line.
Russian security bodies not under the control of the Ministry of Defence include the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (now the National Guard of Russia's National Guard Forces Command), the Border Guard Service of Russia (part of the Federal Security Service), the Kremlin Regiment and the rest of the Federal Protective Service (Russia), and the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the country's civil defence service since 1995 and successor to earlier civil defence units.
Naval fleets

The Navy consists of four fleets and one flotilla:
Northern Fleet (HQ at Severomorsk) forms own Joint Strategic Command.
Baltic Fleet (HQ at Kaliningrad in the exclave of Kaliningrad Oblast) subordinated to Joint Strategic Command West.
Black Sea Fleet (HQ at Sevastopol, disputed region of Crimea) subordinated to Joint Strategic Command South.
Caspian Flotilla (HQ at Astrakhan) subordinated to Joint Strategic Command South.
Pacific Fleet (HQ at Vladivostok) subordinated to Joint Strategic Command East.
The Kaliningrad Special Region, under the command of the Commander Baltic Fleet, comprises Ground & Coastal Forces, formerly the 11th Guards Army, with a motor rifle division and a motor rifle brigade, and a fighter aviation regiment of Sukhoi Su-27 'Flanker', as well as other forces.
Similarly, the Northeast Group of Troops and Forces, headquartered at Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy, comprises all Russian Armed Forces components in the Kamchatka Krai and the Chukotka Autonomous Okrug [district] and is subordinate to the Commander Pacific Fleet headquartered in Vladivostok.
Personnel

Conscription is still used in Russia; the term of service being 12 months; and eligible age is between 18 and 27 years old. Deferments are provided to undergraduate and graduate students, men solely supporting disabled relatives, parents of at least two children and— upon Presidential proclamation— to some employees of military-oriented enterprises. Men holding a Ph.D., as well as sons and brothers of servicemen killed or disabled during their military service, are released from conscription.
There were widespread problems with hazing in the Army, known as dedovshchina, where first-year draftees are bullied by second-year draftees, a practice that appeared in its current form after the change to a two-year service term in 1967.[46] According to Anna Politkovskaya, in 2002, "a complete battalion, more than five hundred men, had been killed not by enemy fire but by beatings".[47] To combat this problem, a new decree was signed in March 2007, which cut the conscription service term from 24 to 18 months. The term was cut further to one year on 1 January 2008.[48][49]
Thirty percent of Russian Armed Forces' personnel were contract servicemen at the end of 2005.[50] For the foreseeable future, the Armed Forces will be a mixed contract/conscript force.[50] The Russian Armed Forces need to maintain a mobilization reserve to have manning resources capable of reinforcing the permanent readiness forces if the permanent readiness forces cannot deter or suppress an armed conflict on their own.[51] Professional soldiers now outnumber their conscript counterparts in the Russian Army for the first time in Russian history, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu told Russian media 28 April 2015.[52]
The ranks of the Russian military are also open to non-Russian citizens of the Commonwealth of Independent States, of which Russia is the largest member.[53] By December 2003, the Russian parliament had approved a law in principle to permit the Armed Forces to employ foreign nationals on contract by offering them Russian citizenship after several years service[54] yet, up to 2010, foreigners could only serve in Russia's armed forces after getting a Russian passport. Under a 2010 Defence Ministry plan, foreigners without dual citizenship would be able to sign up for five-year contracts and will be eligible for Russian citizenship after serving three years.[55][56] The change could open the way for CIS citizens to get fast-track Russian citizenship, and counter the effects of Russia's demographic crisis on its army recruitment. Each soldier in duty receives an Identity Card of the Russian Armed Forces.
Awards and decorations of the Armed Forces are covered at Awards and Emblems of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation.
On 17 November 2011, General Nikolai Makarov said that Russia had reached a crisis in the conscript service where there simply were not sufficient able bodied men to draft and was forced to halve its conscription.[57]
In March 2013, Defence Minister Shoigu promised that all army quarters would have showers by the end of the year.[58] RIA also said that the shower plans were the latest in a series of creature-comfort improvements the Defence Ministry had recently announced. In mid-January, Shoigu said he would rid the army of its antiquated "footwraps," or portyanki, and a few days later the designer of Russia's new army uniform said that the ear-flap hats traditionally worn in winter would be replaced with more modern headgear. The Russian military’s ushanka hats were improved between 2013 and 2015, when the Russian armed forces were being equipped with new uniforms. The new version of the traditional - and somewhat stereotypical - hat features better heat insulation and longer ear flaps.[59]
Russian military officers with top secret security clearance are now being issued domestically-developed, ultra-secure, cryptographically protected Atlas M-663S cellphones, Russia's Izvestia newspaper has reported in early 2018.[60] A new uniform for hot climates was introduced in mid-2018.[61]
Budget

Between 1991 and 1997 newly independent Russia's defence spending fell by a factor of eight in real prices.[62] In 1998, when Russia experienced a severe financial crisis, its military expenditure in real terms reached its lowest point— barely one-quarter of the USSR's in 1991, and two-fifths of the level of 1992, the first year of Russia's independent existence.
In the early 2000s, defence spending increased by at least a minimum of one-third year-on-year, leading to overall defence expenditure almost quadrupling over the past six years, and according to Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, this rate is to be sustained through 2010.[63] Official government military spending for 2005 was US $32.4 billion, though various sources, have estimated Russia's military expenditures to be considerably higher than the reported amount.[64] Estimating Russian military expenditure is beset with difficulty; the annual IISS Military Balance has underscored the problem numerous times within its section on Russia.[64] The IISS Military Balance comments - 'By simple observation..[the military budget] would appear to be lower than is suggested by the size of the armed forces or the structure of the military-industrial complex, and thus neither of the figures is particularly useful for comparative analysis'.[65] By some estimates, overall Russian defence expenditure is now at the second highest in the world after the USA.[66]
According to Alexander Kanshin, Chairman of the Public Chamber of Russia on affairs of veterans, military personnel, and their families, the Russian military is losing up to US$13 billion to corruption every year.[67]
On 16 September 2008 Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced that in 2009, Russian defence budget will be increased to a record amount of $50 billion.[68][69]
On 16 February 2009 Russia's deputy defence minister said state defence contracts would not be subject to cuts this year despite the ongoing financial crisis, and that there would be no decrease in 2009.[70] The budget would still be 1,376 billion roubles and in the current exchange rates this would amount to $41.5 billion.
However, later that month, due to the world financial crisis, the Russian Parliament's Defence Committee stated that the Russian defence budget would instead be slashed by 15 percent, from $40 billion to $34 billion, with further cuts to come.[71] On 5 May 2009, First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said that the defence budget for 2009 will be 1.3 trillion rubles (US$39.4 billion). 322 billion rubles are allocated to purchase weapons, and the rest of the fund will be spent on construction, fuel storage and food supply.
According to the head of the Defence Committee of the State Duma Vladimir Komoyedov, Russia plans to spend 101.15 billion rubles on nuclear weapons in 2013-2015. "The budget provisions under 'The Nuclear Weapons Complex' section in 2013-2015 will amount to 29.28 billion rubles, 33.3 billion rubles and 38.57 billion rubles respectively," Komoyedov said, Vechernaya Moskva reports.
Komoyedov added that in 2012 the spending on nuclear weapons made up 27.4 billion rubles. The draft law "On the Federal Budget for 2013 and for the planning period of 2014 and 2015" will be discussed in the first reading on 19 October 2012, The Voice of Russia reports.[72] In a meeting in Sochi in November 2013, President Putin said the country's defence budget will reach 2.3 trillion roubles, stressing the huge amount in comparison to the 2003 budget, which stood on 600 billion rubles.[73]
The Russian government's published 2014 military budget is about 2.49 trillion rubles (approximately US$69.3 billion), the third largest in the world behind the US and China. The official budget is set to rise to 3.03 trillion rubles (approximately US$83.7 billion) in 2015, and 3.36 trillion rubles (approximately US$93.9 billion) in 2016.[74] As of 2014, Russia's military budget is higher than any other European nation, and approximately 1/7th (14 percent) of the US military budget. In 2015, SIPRI found that Russia was the world's second biggest exporter of major weapons for the period 2010-14, increasing exports by 37 per cent. India, China and Algeria accounted for almost 60 percent of total Russian exports. Asia and Oceania received 66 percent of Russian arms exports in 2010–14, Africa 12 percent and the Middle East 10 percent.[21]
In 2017, Russia was reported to have slashed its defense spending by 20%, due to calls by Vladimir Putin to spend Russian money on other initiatives such as healthcare and education. The cut decreased Russia's military spending to $66.3 billion, in which Russia slumped to being the fourth-highest spender on its military.[75]
Procurement

About 70 percent of the former Soviet Union's defence industries are located in the Russian Federation.[76] Many defence firms have been privatised; some have developed significant partnerships with firms in other countries.
The recent steps towards modernization of the Armed Forces have been made possible by Russia's economic resurgence based on oil and gas revenues as well a strengthening of its own domestic market. Currently, the military is in the middle of a major equipment upgrade, with the government in the process of spending about $200 billion (what equals to about $400 billion in PPP dollars) on development and production of military equipment between 2006-2015 under the State Armament Programme for 2007-2015 (GPV— госпрограмма вооружения).[77] Mainly as a result of lessons learned during the August War, the State Armament Programme for 2011-2020 was launched in December 2010. Prime Minister Putin announced that 20-21.5 trillion rubles (over $650 billion) will be allocated to purchase new hardware in the next 10 years. The aim is to have a growth of 30% of modern equipment in the army, navy and air force by 2015, and of 70% by 2020.[78][79][80][81]
In some categories, the proportion of new weapon systems will reach 80% or even 100%.[82] At this point, the Russian MoD plans to purchase, among others, up to 250 ICBMs, 800 aircraft, 1,200 helicopters, 44 submarines, 36 frigates, 28 corvettes, 18 cruisers, 24 destroyers, 6 aircraft carriers, and 62 air defence battalions. Several existing types will be upgraded.[82][83] The share of modern and advanced weapons in some branches of the Russian Armed Forces currently amounts over 60 percent, the Defence Ministry reported 31 July 2015.[84]
In total since 2012 and as of 2017, the Armed Forces received more than 30,000 units of new and modernized weapons and equipment, including more than 50 warships, 1,300 aircraft, over 1,800 drones, 4,700 tanks and armored combat vehicles compared to two warships, 151 aircraft and 217 tanks received in 2007-2011. The Russian army also receives 150-250 aircraft per year and over 300 short-range UAVs.[85][86][87]
The Russian Federation is also producing drones (including combat ones) and EW systems to counter them, unmanned vehicles, exoskeletons and military robots.[88][89][90][91][92][93][94][95][96][97]
As of 2011, Russia's chief military prosecutor said that 20 percent of the defence budget was being stolen or defrauded yearly.[98]
In 2018, RF Armed Forces adopted 35 types of weapons and military equipment and completed state tests of 21 more.[99] The Russian Ministry of Defence (MoD) was procured the YeSU TZ (Yedinaya Sistema Upravleniya Takticheskogo Zvena) battlefield management system that same year. The YeSU TZ battlefield management system incorporates 11 subsystems that control artillery, electronic warfare systems, ground vehicles, air defence assets, engineering equipment, and logistics support, among other things.[100]
Nuclear weapons

As of January 2017, the Federation of American Scientists estimated that Russia has approximately 1,765 deployed strategic warheads, and another 2,700 non-deployed strategic and deployed and non-deployed tactical warheads, plus an additional 2,510 warheads awaiting dismantlement.[101] Russia's Strategic Rocket Forces controls its land-based nuclear warheads, while the Navy controls the submarine based missiles and the Air Force the air-launched warheads. Russia's nuclear warheads are deployed in four areas:
Land-based immobile (silos), like R-36 and its replacement RS-28 Sarmat.
Land-based mobile, like RT-2PM2 Topol-M and new RS-24 Yars.
Submarine based, like R-29RMU2 Layner and RSM-56 Bulava.
Air-launched warheads of the Russian Air Forces' Long Range Aviation Command
The Military doctrine of Russia sees NATO expansion as one of the threats for the Russian Federation and reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in response to a conventional aggression that can endanger the existence of the state. In keeping with this, the country's nuclear forces received adequate funding throughout the late 1990s.  The number of intercontinental ballistic missiles and warheads on active duty has declined over the years, in part in keeping with arms limitation agreements with the U.S. and in part due to insufficient spending on maintenance, but this is balanced by the deployment of new missiles as proof against missile defences. Russia has developed the new RT-2PM2 Topol-M (SS-27) missiles that are stated to be able to penetrate any missile defence, including the planned U.S. National Missile Defence. The missile can change course in both air and space to avoid countermeasures. It is designed to be launched from land-based, mobile TEL units.[102] Russian nuclear forces are confident that they can carry out a successful retaliation strike if attacked.
Because of international awareness of the danger that Russian nuclear technology might fall into the hands of terrorists or rogue officers who it was feared might want to use nuclear weapons to threaten or attack other countries, the Federal government of the United States and many other countries provided considerable financial assistance to the Russian nuclear forces in the early 1990s. Many friendly countries gave huge amounts of money in lieu for Russian Arms purchase deals which kept Russian Agencies functioning. This money went in part to finance decommissioning of warheads under international agreements, such the Cooperative Threat Reduction programme, but also to improve security and personnel training in Russian nuclear facilities.
In the late evening of 11 September 2007 the fuel-air explosive AVBPM or "Father of all bombs" was successfully field-tested.[103] According to the Russian military, the new weapon will replace several smaller types of nuclear bombs in its arsenal.
See also
Awards and emblems of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation
Uniforms of the Russian Armed Forces

Notes

"How are the mighty fallen". The Economist. 2–8 July 2005. pp.45–46.
 RNS, November 2016

Keir Giles, Military Service in Russia: No New Model Army, Conflict Studies Research Centre, May 2007
International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance, various editions

Further reading
*
Galeotti, Mark, 'Organised crime and Russian security forces: mafiya, militia and military', Journal of Conflict, Security and Development, issue 1:2, 2001.
Ivanov, Henry, 'Country Briefing: Russia—Austere deterrence', Jane's Defence Weekly, 28 April 2006

Pynnöniemi, K., , FIIA Briefing Paper 126, 26 March 2013, .
Turbiville, G., 'Organized crime and the Russian armed forces', Transnational Organized Crime, vol. 1, issue 4, 1995, pp.55–73;
Waters, T., 'Crime in the Russian military', CSRC Paper C90, (Camberley: Conflict Studies Research Centre, 1996).

 (in English)
 A very comprehensive online database of modern Russian arms and military technologies. Website also has discussion forums, videos and more.
 Includes satellite photos of bases.
 (PDF) 2013 study by the Swedish Defence Research Agency
 by The Economist, 24 May 2014
 by The National Interest 15 July 2016 by Nikolas Gvosdev
Cite uses deprecated parameter |dead-url= (help)
 study from 2011 by the Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies
 report by the Center on Global Interests
 an article about Russian drones by Mark Galeotti, 10 January 2014


Hāngi (Māori pronunciation:[ˈhaːŋi]) is a traditional New Zealand Māori method of cooking food using heated rocks buried in a pit oven, also called an umu.[1] It is still used for large groups on special occasions.[2]
Basic process
To "lay a hāngi" or "put down a hāngi" involves digging a pit in the ground, heating stones in the pit with a large fire, placing baskets of food on top of the stones, and covering everything with earth for several hours before uncovering (or lifting) the hāngi.[3]
Prior to colonisation and the introduction of metals and wire, food was laid between bark, large leaves and other vegetation. Wire baskets became widely used in the early 19th century, with sacking and cloth replacing leaves and bark as the covering of choice,[4] and scrap iron or steel may now be used in addition to or instead of stones.[3] There are many variations and details that can be altered. Hāngi "experts" have developed and improved methods that have often, like the stones themselves, been handed down for generations.
In the early 21st century, gas heated stainless steel "hāngi machines" are sometimes used to replicate the style of cooking without the need for a wood fire, rocks and a pit.[5]
Early umu-ti
Evidence from early Polynesian settler sites in New Zealand such as Wairau Bar and in coastal Otago Peninsula from about 1280 shows a significant number of large cooking pits or umu which were designed to cook ti-pore or various other species of Cordyline.[4] The distinguishing feature of an umu-ti was its large size compared to a normal cooking earth oven. This was a common east Polynesian practice in the Cook Islands and Society Islands,[6] and the remains of large umu have also been found in the Kermadec Islands.
The long, carrot shaped tap root was cooked in a large stone lined pit for between 1 and 2 days. The result was a fibrous mass of sweet pulp with a bitter after taste. Investigation in Otago shows that most pits were used only once or twice.
See also
Clam bake
Curanto
Kalua
Lovo
Pachamanca
Rosvopaisti