This came from the KPRF.ru site on Saturday. Instead of МО for Министерство обороны in the upper left, they’ve put it as МебельтОрг or furniture sales, making light of Serdyukov’s background in the furniture business.
The bottom says, “Serdyukov’s Plan is the Destruction of the Armed Forces! We’ll Save the Army, We’ll Save Russia!”
Yesterday’s Segodnya.ru published a speech (or an excerpt) given by former Armaments Chief, retired General-Colonel Sitnov. He now serves as deputy director of RUIE’s (РСПП) Commission on the OPK. Not heretofore a prominent critic, he offers a fairly withering critique of Defense Minister Serdyukov’s reforms.
He first offers up Milyutin as an example of someone who made an army reform match its purpose. According to Sitnov, Milyutin’s reform of the army enabled it to defend Russia from rapidly growing military powers in the West. He says Milyutin also devised the mobilization system since it was impossible for Russia to maintain a permanent army large enough to cover its expanses.
Then Sitnov fast forwards. His first major complaint is cutting the officer corps from 355,000 to 150,000. He believes this was done because the country’s authorities fear it. He criticizes the Defense Ministry’s remaking of the army on the ‘American principle.’ Sitnov says Russia is now trying to defend an enormous country with brigades that are no more than ‘patrol forces.’ He alleges Russia’s brigades can fight for only one day since they lack rear services, reconnaissance, maintenance, staffs, and command and control systems. He argues that Russia long ago settled on the division as its basic military unit to cover its open spaces.
Sitnov concludes the Russian Army is unready to fight 5th generation wars. He says America is already fighting 4th generation wars, employing automated systems that integrate units and highly intelligent weapons. But 5th generation war features automated command and control, robot systems, and the use and control of systems with automated means of guidance, targeting, and destruction.
And this, he continues, is just the technical part. He rhetorically asks whether an army can perform its missions when the country has no agriculture, industry, science, education, system of state administration or strategy for its development (ouch!). The army reflects society and, in Russia’s case, society’s imbalances are reflected in its army.
Sitnov spins off into a geopolitical monologue. He sounds like other ex-generals of the Soviet generation. If the U.S. continues to occupy positions on Russia’s periphery, Russia’s territorial integrity will become an issue in 10-15 years. Foreign pressure on Russia to share its empty spaces and resources, like Baykal’s fresh water, will intensify.
Lastly, Sitnov believes it would be naive to think Serdyukov took the decisions on army reform; rather he thinks Serdyukov was just the instrument picked for a policy of purging the army. Now he says, parallel with the army purge, there is a campaign against the MVD.
Sitnov’s criticism of brigades makes some sense, but defending the MVD? Also, most observers probably would agree that Serdyukov was simply sent to fix the army, once and for all, and the leadership didn’t worry too much about how.
Posted in Defense Industry, Ground Troops, Serdyukov's Reforms
Tagged Anatoliy Sitnov, РСПП, Milyutin, OPK
General Staff Chief Nikolay Makarov spoke at length to the press yesterday. In no particular order, here are some of the impressions and reports that followed in his wake.
RBCdaily quoted Makarov on the possible Mistral purchase: “Ships of the Mistral type have very great multifunctionality, and they surpass our ships in all parameters by three times.” He went on to say that Russian shipbuilders would only be able to produce helicopter carriers of this quality in 5-10 years. Aleksandr Khramchikhin commented that, in the first place, Russia doesn’t currently have comparable ships and, in the second, it will take 50 years.
Makarov said the final decision on buying the Mistral had not been made.
According to Rossiyskaya gazeta, Makarov said the Russian Army went to brigades vice divisions to avoid the previous need to flesh out units with reservists and take days to bring them to combat readiness. ‘Modular’ battalions by contrast are permanently ready for battle in an hour.
Makarov didn’t rule out establishment of some type of ‘rapid reaction forces,’ though these are closest in nature to today’s VDV. And this wouldn’t mean VDV would simply change its name. And other services need rapid reaction capabilities too for action in the air, on the sea, etc. Aren’t permanently ready brigades rapid reaction forces already?
On the Navy headquarters move to St. Petersburg, Makarov claimed Moscow is overflowing with army and navy leadership [but haven’t they just cut 200,000 officers and lots of excess command structures to create a personnel pyramid?]. And with today’s networks the fleet can be commanded from thousands of kilometers away from the Genshtab and other main commands.
Makarov doesn’t foresee any change to the one-year conscription policy, but there may be changes in NCO acquisition. Instead of six months training in MD training centers, they may only get 3, so they can serve 9 months in troop units. Makarov thinks they’ll cut back on conscript sergeants once their professional ones start to appear.
Moskovskiy komsomolets quoted Makarov on the new strategic arms agreement with the U.S. to the effect that it’s 97 percent complete, and it only remains to agree on the relationship between offensive and defensive weapons, and there will not be anything in the treaty to Russia’s detriment in this regard.
On Mistral, Makarov said, after study, we’ve concluded we need this type of ship, which can be an amphibious assault ship, hospital, command ship, and helicopter carrier.
On the Navy and Piter, MK notes Makarov wanted to avoid Baluyevskiy’s fate and didn’t contradict his superiors. He expounded on his vision (perhaps dream) of Russian netcentric warfare:
“Earlier it was like this: the closer to subordinates, the more reliable the command and control. Now all leading countries, including us also, are going to netcentric command and control systems. This allows completely remote means of reconnaissance, command and control, electronic warfare, fire, command posts–all spread over an enormous distance, but located in a single information-communications space and capable of solving tasks in real time.”
On a related note, Makarov said the new Sozvezdiye tactical level command and control system will be part of the netcentric structure toward the end of the year.
Gazeta’s coverage focused on Makarov’s comments about establishing the personnel pyramid, i.e. going from armed forces with about 500,000 officers and warrants to one of 150,000 officers and 720,000 soldiers in the space of a year. It also noted Makarov’s remark that brigade commanders in their training assembly at the General Staff Academy are learning new warfare and command and control principles.
Izvestiya quoted Makarov at length on the Navy Main Staff’s move to Piter.
“Presently all command and control organs are concentrated in Moscow, but we want these command and control organs to be as close as possible to the troops they control [didn’t he also call this the old way of doing business?]. The dispersal of command and control and fire means at great distances doesn’t have any great significance, what’s important is maintaining uninterrupted and clear command and control of troops and weapons. Therefore, the transfer of the Navy Main Staff to St. Petersburg won’t place any kind of extra burden on the command and control system, with the exception perhaps, only in the initial period of its functioning in a new place.”
Viktor Baranets in Komsomolskaya pravda focused on Makarov’s words on the U.S. and Iran, noting his statements that the U.S. has a plan to strike Iran, and, if it occurs, it’ll be terrible for Iran, the region, and the U.S.
Krasnaya zvezda covered the Iran issue. It noted that Russia’s need for ready units forced the shift to brigades. It also covered Makarov’s comment that the Voronezh conference agreed on changes needed in the Sozvezdiye C2 system, and that it would be received this July and fielded in November. KZ also quoted Makarov at length on the capabilities of the 5th generation fighter aircraft.
KZ also indicated that Makarov noted the U.S. as an example where units and commands are often separated by great distances when he talked about the Navy Main Staff and Piter.
Generally, it seems those invited to this press availability only asked Makarov ‘soft ball’ questions.
General-Lieutenant Andrey Tretyak
In today’s Krasnaya zvezda, the new Main Operations Directorate (GOU) chief speaks on the anniversary of his organization. On 20 February, the GOU will trace its lineage back 308 years to Prince Shakovskoy. Shakovskoy was general-quartermaster in 1702 (early in Petr Velikiy’s Great Northern War) and he began the establishment of organs of operational command and control with the basic missions of preparing proposals for planning troop employment and providing command and control during combat.
Tretyak says the missions standing before the GOU today are imposing and large-scale. The GOU has to help transition the armed forces to a new level, and create a modern, combat-capable, and mobile army that won’t allow anyone the chance to threaten Russia or its allies.
He continues saying the deep transformation of the army was objectively necessary and the short period for the transition was dictated by the development of ‘leading armies’ and the threats facing Russia. In 2009, the shift to a three-layer command system and permanent readiness formations and units was completed. Tretyak says the tasks today are to complete their combat coordination (слаживание) and installations (обустройство).
Addressing the world geopolitical situation, Tretyak says, although a large-scale war is a low-probability event, many other threats have appeared. For instance, the widening of conflict zones into areas that affect Russia’s vital interests. He cites South Ossetia as an example.
So the General Staff constantly analyzes and evaluates the world’s military-political situation and develops practical measures to keep the armed forces ready to carry out their missions to guarantee Russia’s military security. The main part of this job falls on the General Staff, responsible as it is for strategic planning, military organizational development, armed forces development, and the military organization of the state overall, as well as for coordinating the activity of all troops and military formations in the area of defense.
The General Staff works with the country’s military-political leadership, federal executive organs, other state and military structures, and with the defense-industrial complex. According to Tretyak, the most important role in this connection goes to the GOU, the history of which is inseparable from that of the Russian Army and the General Staff.
All this sounds a bit doctrinal and it is, but it gives the new top man’s view on how and where his people fit in. It’s a bit like the new boss issuing a mission statement.
After a longish history lesson, Tretyak reminds that great military leaders have come from the post he now occupies.
Of course there’s nothing about his most recent predecessors Rukshin and Surovikin. They didn’t fare terribly well. And there’s the near-debacle in the five-day August 2008 war, i.e. many press reports saying that the GOU had been moved out of its spaces and just dismissed Rukshin had to be begged to run a lot of the war effort. Afterwards, many have claimed it was the planning previously done by Rukshin that kept the war from becoming a total fiasco for Moscow. And there’s nothing about cutting the GOU from 550 officers to 150 while its workload is unchanged, or perhaps even increased. See Segodnya.ru for reporting on this. Tretyak’s got his work cut out for him.
More details from his bio: born 11 March 1959, so he’ll soon be 51, in Magdeburg, East Germany. Graduated from the Kiev Higher Combined Arms Command School in 1980. Platoon and company commander in the GSFG, then battalion chief of staff, and battalion commander in the Belorussian MD. After graduating the mid-career Frunze Military Academy in 1991, he became deputy chief of the operations section for a division staff, chief of staff-deputy commander for a regiment, commander of a regiment, commander of a brigade, and division chief of staff in the Far East MD. He completed the General Staff Academy in 2001, and commanded a division in the Siberian MD. Here he was also chief of staff-first deputy commander of a corps and an army. Then he commanded an army (probably 22 CAA) in the Moscow MD. From April 2008, he was chief of staff-first deputy commander of the Leningrad MD before taking up his current duties in January 2010.
Posted in Command and Control, Serdyukov's Reforms
Tagged Andrey Tretyak, GOU, Main Operations Directorate, Rukshin, Surovikin
Ruslan Pukhov (photo: Radio Rossii)
In today’s Komsomolskaya pravda, Viktor Baranets interviews Ruslan Pukhov, Director of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, and Member of the Defense Ministry’s Public Council. Pukhov provides a fairly balanced assessment of Defense Minister Serdyukov’s reforms, one year on.
Pukhov believes Serdyukov managed to reorganize and shake up the Defense Ministry apparatus, and partially achieved more rational use of the military’s budget money. He says the main thing is the breakthrough on the ‘organizational measures’ of military reform. He calls the ‘new profile’ the deepest organizational change for Moscow since 1945, citing its large-scale relocation of troops and equipment, cutting of personnel and obsolete armaments, reorganization of military education, and civilianization of many military jobs. Pukhov concludes the administrative tasks of the reform are largely complete.
However, Pukhov also agrees with Baranets that the reforms have created a structural shell that has to be brought to life, made effective, and combat capable. This will be harder than what’s been done so far. Pukhov says there are few who doubt the army needed a radical, not just a cosmetic, reform, and the five-day August 2008 war proved it.
Pukhov thinks the reforms have created a new army, fundamentally different from the Soviet or previous Russian Army. In scale, they can only be compared with the military reform of Peter the Great. If it’s possible to reproach the Russian leadership for anything, it’s for dragging the process out with half measures which turned into a permanent degradation of the army, according to Pukhov.
Asked about Serdyukov’s greatest achievement and greatest failure, Pukhov says the former is having the political and administrative will to complete the first phase of reform. But the greatest failure is Serdyukov’s inability to win the support of the entire officer corps, and this has put part of the officer corps against him. Bureaucratic and poorly explained changes have often demoralized personnel, and poorly thought out personnel cuts have created discontent in the ranks, from contractee to general. Military discontent with the methods of conducting the reform could discredit the reform itself, and make it too difficult for the political leadership to continue supporting Serdyukov, although for now Kremlin is satisfied with Serdyukov and his role as the army’s ‘surgeon.’
Pukhov says many of the measures have been extremely painful, affecting the fate of hundreds of thousands of servicemen, and often been implemented in a typical Russian fashion he describes as ‘up the ass.’ The Defense Ministry’s ‘secret-bureaucratic’ approach itself has had an effect here as well.
After practically calling Serdyukov’s the army’s proctologist-in-chief, Pukhov cuts him some slack, saying he didn’t personally plan and implement the largest part of the ‘orgshtat measures.’ They were done by military specialists in the Defense Ministry, General Staff, and service and district staffs, by men who’ve served out there themselves and are now engaged in transferring their colleagues, cutting some, putting some outside the TO&E, ‘optimizing,’ and so forth. But Pukhov notes, all this could be done humanely, with respect toward the men and their professional experience.
Pukhov agrees with Baranets that a ‘soulless’ style of dealing with people, a lack of concern about human capital, and disregard for the human factor is traditional in the army. And, unfortunately, it permeates the entire military system, according to Pukhov. And a significant portion of the officer corps has become victim to such an approach during these rapid reforms.
Pukhov ends with some criticism for the top military leadership which often says it has come all the way from the bottom ranks, like those being ‘optimized’ today. But what’s happening, including the aforementioned ‘excesses’ of reform, in Pukhov’s view, should make one think that there are some unhealthy morale-psychological tendencies in the army, which started long before Serdyukov, and can’t be considered normal. Perhaps, for the success of reforms, the leadership should focus on the human aspect and recognize that the army, first and foremost, is people, and not pieces of iron.
So it sounds a little like Pukhov is saying the civilian Serdyukov didn’t realize how military men would implement his changes in their own organization, and what the human costs would be. Again, it sounds like he wants to cut Serdyukov some slack, and share the blame for the pain caused with others around him wearing uniforms with big stars. This tends to overlook the reality that many of those with the stars who objected were sent packing by someone.
Posted in Officer Corps, Serdyukov's Reforms
Tagged CAST, ЦАСТ, New Profile, Ruslan Pukhov, Viktor Baranets
Admiralty
Unnamed Navy sources told the media this week that the Navy Main Staff’s postponed transfer to Admiralty in St. Petersburg is back on, and will begin in July. But the Navy has not commented officially.
The Leningrad Naval Base left Admiralty for Kronshtadt, leaving space for the Navy Main Staff in the former. The Naval Engineering Institute may or may not have left Admiralty for Pushkin.
The first elements to move could be administrative elements not bearing on the fleet’s combat readiness, while the Navy’s ‘operational services’ remain on Bolshoy Kozlovskiy Lane providing uninterrupted command and control of the fleet, and naval strategic forces in particular. Some press pieces have said the transfer process could stretch out into 2012.
A radical ‘optimization’ [i.e. personnel cut] in the Navy’s command and control structures, beginning 1 March, will reportedly precede the move to Admiralty. Some press sources say the cut will focus on the Navy’s Central Command Post (ЦКП).
Cutting Navy headquarters personnel may not be all that hard. Izvestiya notes that, according to some sources, 300 Navy staff officers came out against the transfer to Petersburg when the story first broke in 2007. Nezavisimaya gazeta has repeated the rumor that only 10-15 percent of current staff officers will move to Piter and Grani.ru claims most are already looking for other work in Moscow.
Recall that Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov first ‘suggested’ the move to Defense Minister Serdyukov in fall 2007, saying that the Navy should return to Russia’s ‘naval capital’ already replete with naval educational institutions and shipbuilding enterprises, and lighten Moscow’s heavy load of governmental organs.
The plan called forth the late 2007 protest letter signed by many retired admirals, asserting that moving the Navy Main Staff would “not only lack common sense, but actually undermine the country’s defense capability.”
Former General Staff Chief Yuriy Baluyevskiy was publicly ambivalent about the wisdom of the transfer. In early 2009, Navy CINC Vysotskiy told the press he had no orders on the move. However, new General Staff Chief Nikolay Makarov was quick to remind Vysotskiy:
“Now command and control organs of the armed forces can be located anywhere. The main thing is a reliable command and control system should be created which allows for carrying out missions in peace and wartime.”
But can it really be located anywhere?
Retired General-Major Vladimir Belous of IMEMO’s International Security Center has been quoted everywhere saying that, in St. Petersburg, the Navy headquarters could come under a devastating enemy air attack in as little as 15-20 minutes.
Some have guessed the price tag for relocating to Piter at between 26 and 50 billion rubles, Grani.ru guesses 80 billion, and still others say completely rebuilding the Navy’s Moscow infrastructure in the country’s second capital would cost up to 1 trillion rubles. In any event, a gigantic sum forcing the Defense Ministry to forego lots of other good uses for its money.
Many experts believe the Navy’s command posts, comms, and underground bunkers will remain in Moscow and Moscow suburbs, since relocating them to Piter will be physically or financially impossible. Former First Deputy Navy CINC Igor Kasatonov has been widely quoted saying that Piter will be no more than an alternate headquarters for the Navy CINC, from which it will be possible only to exert tactical control over the fleet.
IA Regnum concludes that, although military experts unanimously believe a Moscow-to-Petersburg move will undermine the Navy’s combat readiness, it’s not clear it matters given the other things [i.e. political considerations, business interests] that are in play.
Vladimir Temnyy writing for Grani.ru makes the point that old admirals’ alarmist rumblings about disrupting the Navy’s command and control are unimportant to those who want to build a business center and expensive apartments in place of the Navy Main Staff building near the Krasnyye Vorota metro station.
In Stoletie.ru, Sergey Ptichkin calls the possible move ‘administrative caprice,’ adding that there’s profit motive in this caprice since the Navy headquarter’s building is valuable central Moscow property. He says not a single expert or Navy leader can justify the move, and brands Gryzlov’s talk of returning the Navy to Russia’s ‘naval capital’ the height of naivete. He makes the point that the Navy was only in Piter because Piter was the capital of the Russian Empire. Otherwise, the Navy’s headquarters should be with the rest of the nation’s leadership. Ptichkin concludes the modern Russian Navy can only be commanded from Moscow’s infrastructure and to replicate it in Piter is, if not impossible, then insanely expensive, especially at a time when there are questions about what kind of Navy will remains to be commanded.
An editorial in Friday’s Nezavisimoye voyennoye obozreniye concluded that the “ambitions of the powers-that-be trump common sense” and “the fact that arguments ‘against’ are clearly superior doesn’t bother them.”
Northern Machinebuilding Enterprise (Sevmash)
Here is 9 February RIA Novosti verbatim:
“Sevmash” Will Not Meet Schedules for Nuclear Submarine Construction Due to Insufficient Personnel
SEVERODVINSK, 9 Feb – RIA Novosti. The “Sevmash” enterprise in Severodvinsk, Arkhangelsk Oblast will fall behind schedule in constructing nuclear submarines, it was announced to RIA Novosti on Tuesday in the enterprise’s press service.
Information about the lag in the schedule was heard in the session of the interdepartmental coordinating council which took place under the leadership of RF Government Military-Industrial Commission member Vladimir Pospelov and Deputy Navy Commander-in-Chief for Armaments Nikolay Borisov.
Members of the coordinating council discussed the state of affairs in producing nuclear submarines at “Sevmash” – “Yuriy Dolgorukiy,” “Aleksandr Nevskiy,” “Vladimir Monomakh” (project 955 “Borey”), and also “Severodvinsk” and “Kazan.”
“Today, as noted in the session, there is some lag from the construction schedule acknowledged by Sevmash and its partner-enterprises,” stated the press service’s announcement.
Factory General Director Nikolay Kalistratov explained the delay was caused by a lack of qualified personnel.
“It’s essential to apply maximum effort to realize the outlined plans and complete orders on time. In the near future, we have to attract an additional 500 qualified production workers in the specialties pipefitter, machinist-fitter, ship finisher. It should also be noted that over two years we’ve increased the number of basic production workers by 2,000 people, but this force is still insufficient,” said the director of the enterprise’s press service.
The directors of TsKB MT [Central Design Bureau of Naval Technology] “Rubin,” SPMBM [St. Petersburg Naval Machinebuilding Bureau] “Malakhit,” “Rosatom” state corporation, RF Ministry of Industry and Trade and other departments also attended the session.
Now at the “Sevmash” factory in various degrees of completion are three strategic nuclear submarines of project 955 “Borey” – “Yuriy Dolgorukiy,” “Aleksandr Nevskiy” and “Vladimir Monomakh.” Work on construction of the fourth strategic nuclear submarine of this project, with the provisional name “Saint Nikolay” began in December 2009. In all by 2015 it is planned to build eight nuclear submarines of this class.
This statement seems to imply there’s no problem with money, but, at a certain point, more workers equal money because higher wages should attract them, the northern climate notwithstanding. So to some degree, this is a Sevmash call for more resources to do the work already on its order books. Although these Sevmash officials said work’s begun on the fourth 955, RIA Novosti from 8 February made it clear there’s no firm idea of when its keel-laying ceremony would occur. And Navy CINC Vysotskiy said the problem was “technological,” not related to the fate of the Bulava SLBM or to funding. So maybe he meant a labor shortage, but, as noted, a lack of labor is an inability or unwillingness to pay what it costs to do the work.
Yuriy Dolgorukiy SSBN has more sea trials before handover to the Navy. Sevmash says Aleksandr Nevskiy will be launched in 2010 (it was laid down in early 2004). Vladimir Monomakh is about two years behind it. The big question for these boats is when and if they’ll have a missile. Late last year, a number of Russian media outlets claimed SSBN production was frozen due to Bulava’s problems. But Sevmash’s call for more workers doesn’t track with that. In October, the Russian government also announced Sevmash would receive 4 billion rubles to add to its working capital for modernization, along with a 6 billion ruble credit from VEB.
Posted in Defense Industry, Naval Modernization, Navy
Tagged Aleksandr Nevskiy, Borey, Bulava, Kalistratov, Malakhit, Military-Industrial Commission, Proyekt 955, Rubin, Saint Nikolay, Sevmash, SLBM, SSBN, SSN, Vladimir Monomakh, VPK, Vysotskiy, Yuriy Dolgorukiy
First S-400 Battalion on Duty in 2007 (photo: Leonid Yakutin)
On 9 February, RIA Novosti quoted Air Forces CINC Aleksandr Zelin:
“All that has been planned and must be supplied in the coming years, has been agreed with Almaz-Antey, will be fulfilled on time. The S-400 antiaircraft missile system is fully entering the Air Forces’ weapons inventory. The shift in the schedule for its supply has some organizational but mainly a technical character.”
Reminding the press that he’s member of the Almaz-Antey board of directors, Zelin said, “At the last session, we talked over all issues connected with planned supplies of the S-400 to the Air Forces.”
It sounds like Zelin is admitting the S-400 has been delayed, and the reasons are technical in nature. Maybe there’s been some problem in the S-400’s operations or capabilities.
So where does the S-400 stand? Two battalions were fielded at Elektrostal near Moscow in 2007 and 2008, and Air Forces spokesmen have said repeatedly that 5 additional battalions will be delivered this year. The State Armaments Program, 2007-2015, called for 18 battalions by 2015. But, as Mikhail Rastopshin has said, 18 battalions don’t cover Russia’s main administrative and industrial centers or support its strategic nuclear forces.
In the midst of his late November criticism of Russian defense industry’s inability to provide the VVS with the UAVs it needs, Zelin also said Russian needs a second factory to produce the S-400 Triumf and other future air defense systems. According to him, Almaz-Antey cannot fully satisfy the country’s demand for S-400 systems. Not sounding too sure, he added that, “In 2010, we need to receive another five battalions, but everything depends on the industry and financing.”
Commenting on the S-400 tests at Ashuluk, Zelin said he was satisfied with the results, but the tactical-technical characteristics in the system are “still less than we wanted.” He may be referring to lingering, well-known problems with the S-400’s long-range missiles.
VVS CINC General-Colonel Aleksandr Zelin
Zelin went on to criticize the pace of development of the next generation S-500:
“Development of this system doesn’t satisfy me. We would like for the existing potential in the Almaz-Antey concern to be doubled or even tripled.”
He said he planned to raise the S-500 development issue at the December board meeting.
More recently, on 28 January, Rosoboroneksport General Director Isaykin indicated that, although he has foreign orders for the S-400, Russia’s requirements would be met first.
On 17 September, Almaz General Director Ashurbeyli told ITAR-TASS that the S-500 would need 4-5 years to complete. On possible S-400 export orders, he said he could only say two countries had signed large agreements for more than 10 battalions, but contracts remained to be finalized. But Zelin made another statement this day that the system would go first to Russia’s armed forces.
So to recap. The S-400 supply schedule has shifted for technical reasons. The VVS hasn’t gotten a battalion since 2008. Zelin admits he’s not fully happy with the S-400’s capabilities. He says everything depends on the manufacturer, with whom he’s unhappy. Meanwhile, foreign customers are already lined up for the S-400 that Russia can’t get and Almaz-Antey is marching off on the new S-500.
Konstantin Makiyenko (photo: Dmitriy Lebedev/Kommersant)
Commenting in today’s Vedomosti, Konstantin Makiyenko of Moscow’s Center for the Analysis of Strategies and Technologies (ЦАСТ), also a member of the Duma Defense Committee’s Scientific-Expert Council, addresses the recent tendency of Russian military leaders, especially Air Forces and Navy, to criticize and even reject the OPK’s homegrown products.
He notes VVS CINC Zelin’s publicly expressed dissatisfaction with the pace of work on the S-500, and the Navy’s ‘slap in the face’ to Russian shipbuilding over consideration of the Mistral and German conventional subs. He claims the oboronki themselves sensed Defense Minister Serdyukov’s bias against them and rushed to confess their problems.
And Makiyenko concludes the criticism is well-founded, as many OPK enterprises and companies are in pitiful shape, and the management of a number them leaves a lot to be desired. However, he asserts, the OPK’s post-Soviet decline is not as great as that of the armed forces. And restoring Russia’s ‘normal’ military potential is a higher priority task than preserving or adding to the OPK’s scientific-industrial potential.
Makiyenko believes Russia’s place as the number 2 or 3 arms exporter in the world indicates the OPK’s real potential. Even more so since the economic conditions in which the OPK operates are worse than those of its competitors. So, for all its problems, the OPK is still number 2 or 3 in the world, according to Makiyenko, while the army, nuclear weapons aside, is capable only of defeating the lilliputian armies of the former Soviet republics.
Makiyenko believes the degradation of the Soviet Armed Forces was occurring as early as the 1970s, while the Soviet OPK was reaching the peak of its capabilities at the end of the Soviet epoch. It had practically overcome any lag with the U.S. and was building competitive products. So, Makiyenko concludes, the OPK, rather than the Soviet Army, was the advanced guard in the last stage of the Cold War. And Russia’s arms market successes would have been impossible without the Soviet OPK legacy.
Makiyenko suggests that the OPK should have priority over the army because, not only can it play a role in national development, but, with some effort, it can be restored in 5-10 years, while if it is [completely?] lost, it could take one or two generations to rebuild. And even if Serdyukov builds the best army in the world, it won’t be able to provide for the country’s security without the basis of national defense–Russian industry.
So, without orders from its own army, without financing for basic research or RDT&E for the last 15 years, the OPK isn’t always able to meet demands for low priced, high technology goods on tight schedules to help Serdyukov rearm the armed forces quickly and effectively. But this is no reason to call oboronki thieves and junk dealers. Makiyenko calls for a long-term perspective and systematic evaluation of the situation instead of nearsightedness.
This is all well and good. Makiyenko’s a smart guy and makes valid points, and he’s done an admirable job of defending the OPK. But let’s remember that he tends to shill for arms sales. Russian weapons sold abroad have had more than their share of problems in recent years. And the Soviet technology in them grows older and older. Also, there appears to be no cogent program for fixing the OPK anywhere in sight. Nor is there even any clear analysis of how buying arms abroad will affect the OPK.
Posted in Air Forces, Defense Industry, Force Modernization, Navy
Too much doctrine makes Jack a dull (ok, duller) boy.
Writing in Moskovskiy komsomolets, Olga Bozhyeva again puts reality and faces on Russia’s military housing problems.
Colonel Valeriy Ananyev (photo: Gennadiy Cherkasov)
Bozhyeva contrasts the announcement of a major aerial portion of the upcoming 9 May Victory Parade, featuring Long-Range Aviation among other Air Forces aircraft, with the living conditions of LRA officers:
“Homeless [apartmentless, if you will] bums from dormitories declared unfit 9 years ago will demonstrate the power of our strategic aviation on this holiday.”
Thirty-nine families of command personnel from LRA live in 14 communal apartments in the building on 41 Myasnitskaya Street. Thirty-two of the officers are Honored Pilots or Navigators of the RF. Their apartment block was built in 1891.
Colonel Ananyev says they’ve talked about relocating these officers since 2002, so they didn’t do any capital repairs. An inspection showed that living in the building was dangerous. Bozhyeva thinks maybe Defense Ministry officials thought this was ok since LRA officers are accustomed to danger.
Ananyev himself wears three military orders–the Red Star for Afghanistan, For Military Services for Chechnya, and For Honor for planning and participating in the LRA part of the 2008 parade over Red Square.
So, Bozhyeva asks, why didn’t Ananyev and his LRA neighbors in this dangerous building get some of the 45,000 military apartments reportedly acquired last year? Because 44 apartments in Kozhukhovo intended for them are caught up in an investment contract dispute.
The State Property Committee (Goskomimushchestvo) was originally involved in preparing the paperwork so an investor could build an office building on the site of the ruined dormitory and the new Kozhukhovo apartments could be occupied by the LRA men. However, Defense Minister Serdyukov squeezed Goskomimushchestvo out of the Defense Ministry’s property business in 2008 and the whole deal had to restart. But it was forgotten until May 2009 when the Defense Ministry and the investor each blamed the other for not fulfilling the contract.
Apparently, under the contract, the Defense Ministry was supposed to move the LRA officers and their families out of the old building, so the investor could start work, and the LRA men would move into temporary quarters, then on to the new apartments when the investor finished them. The company even offered to settle them directly in the new apartments, albeit on a provisional basis. But the Defense Ministry didn’t accept, and the investor has empty apartments for which it pays communal fees and provides security.
So what led Ananyev to become a poster boy for the military housing problem? He wrote twice to Serdyukov without receiving an answer. Then he wrote to President Medvedev, and he got an answer, only from the Defense Ministry–no one would be allowed to occupy the Kozhukhovo apartments directly before the Defense Ministry took ownership of them.
No one can say when this will happen, but it’s only a matter of signing documents, according to Ananyev.
But it’s not so simple according to a Defense Ministry source familiar with the housing issue who spoke with Bozhyeva.
The source indicated there is a financial motive in this situation, but not corruption or bribery. The Defense Ministry is operating according to an unwritten order–don’t give any more housing to officers in Moscow. Kozhukhovo is the same as Moscow. But in the outlying suburbs and Moscow Oblast housing is cheaper and the Defense Ministry can buy more apartments faster.
Apparently, some officers have gone to court to get apartments in Moscow, but the courts, while backing their claims to apartments, are not enforcing their legal right to choose Moscow as the location.
Bozhyeva thinks this is a plausible explanation in the case of the LRA officers on Myasnitskaya Street.
She wrote a similar piece on the plight of PVO officers this summer, find it here. They live at 37 Myasnitskaya.
Posted in Air Forces, Military Housing
Russian Defense Policy 