• Population: 121 million (1917), 150 million (1944), 745 million (2014)
• Military Strength: 6 million (1917), 17.8 million (1944), 17.9 million (2014)
That's a dynamic of population growth comparable (relatively, not in total numbers) only with 3rd world countries.
And military strength... 17.9 million people under arms in 2014? It's more than the whole rest of the world combined. In the 1980s Soviet Armed Forces - then largest in the world, were around 5 million strong (including construction troops, railway troops, border guards of KGB, interior troops of MVD etc.). Chinese PLA was then 3 million strong. US Armed Forces around 2,2 million. No country every had 18 million people under arms in peacetime (well, no country every had 18 million people under arms at all).