The Russian military top brass are losing the battle of the bulge as the end of the Cold War takes its toll of their waistlines.

The Defence Ministry has ordered radical improvements to physical training after a study found that a third of senior officers were overweight and that a quarter had failed fitness tests.

The issue has reached critical proportions amid fears that officers will be too fat to fit into stylish new uniforms developed by Russia's top fashion designer. Valentin Yudashkin presented his designs to President Putin in January using chisel-jawed servicemen and leggy female models.

The reality on the parade ground is rather flabbier. The survey tested officers on their ability to run between 100 metres and a kilometre, to swim at least 100 metres and to pull themselves up on gym bars.

A quarter of generals and other senior officers failed to meet the requirements for their age group and rank, while 30 per cent were classed as overweight.

Alexander Kolmakov, the First Deputy Defence Minister, said that fitness requirements would be stiffened for the entire army under a seven-year programme from 2009 to improve combat readiness.

He said: “In the trenches our officers and professional servicemen must do much better than foreign servicemen. This is the goal of this work.”

Vyacheslav Sedov, an army spokesman, said that new gyms, swimming pools and sports halls would be built to get soldiers fighting fit and to revive a “culture of sport” in the military.

The fitness checks were supervised by Vladimir Shamanov, an officer alleged to have overseen widespread human rights abuses during Russia's war against separatist rebels in Chechnya. He told the newspaper Kommersant that officers needed more physical exercise, particularly aerobics.

Mr Sedov said that the campaign to improve fitness would complement the introduction of the stylish uniforms. He said: “The new military uniform should match what is inside it.”

Mr Yudashkin's designs are due to be worn in public for the first time next month when Russia revives the Soviet-era tradition of military parades on Red Square. More than 110 tanks, armoured personnel carriers and nuclear-missile launchers will be involved in the parade on May 9 to mark the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany.

Russia is modernising its military after the catastrophic decline of the Red Army after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Armed Forces have shrunk from 4 million to 1.2 million men since then and a growing proportion of troops are professional contract soldiers. New rules will reduce the length of service for conscripts from 18 months to one year in January. Only about 9 per cent of those eligible for the draft report for duty, however, because most exploit loopholes or pay bribes to avoid service.

Senior officers have complained for years about the quality of those that do turn up. A study by the Defence Ministry in 2002 found that more than half of conscripts had health problems that affected their ability to serve.

Thousands of recruits are killed or injured every year by older soldiers and officers in brutal bullying practices or initiation rites. There was uproar last year when a group representing soldiers' mothers claimed that conscripts were being forced to work as male prostitutes in St Petersburg by older servicemen who pocketed the earnings.

You're in the army now

USA

— Penalties for becoming overweight in the US Army are severe: soldiers are denied promotion, refused training courses and are not allowed to reenlist.

— If soldiers are above maximum weight — for a 25-year-old man this would constitute having more than 22 per cent body fat then they are required to join a weight control programme.

— If they then fail to lose 3-8lbs (1.4-3.6kg) a month, they are discharged

Britain

— The British Army requires all servicemen and women to pass two fitness tests: the combat test and the personal test.

— For the combat test soldiers must be able to march six miles with a 15kg pack. For the personal test they must do as many sit-ups and press-ups as they can in two minutes — the pass mark, dependant on age and sex, ranges from 30 to 40 of each.

— They must also be able to run a mile (2.4km) in about 12 minutes

— The British Army recently relaxed its entry requirements, even allowing applications from people technically classed as obese

Germany

— A recent study found that 40 per cent of German soldiers were overweight, a higher proportion than in the population as a whole. One in ten soldiers was clinically obese and almost a third said that they never engaged in exercise.

— 70 per cent were heavy smokers

Sources: US Army, Ministry of Defence, agencies

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