Tag Archives: S-400

Russia’s Second Best Protected City

Posted on December 15, 2019 | 4 comments

St. Petersburg is probably now Russia’s second best protected city in terms of air defense (as common sense would dictate).

Interfaks-AVN reported today that another regiment of the Western MD’s 2nd Air Defense Division in Leningrad oblast has completed training with the S-400 to include combat firings against Favorit targets (the 5V55 missile from the S-300P system).

S-400 deployments in the 2nd ADD

S-400 deployments in the 2nd ADD

The regiment, likely the 1489th SAM Regiment, has returned to its home base of Vaganovo ENE of StP. It’s supposed to begin combat duty in February 2020, according to Interfaks-AVN.

The 500th SAM Regiment at Gostilitsy WSW of StP got its S-400s in 2015. The 1488th at Zelenogorsk NW of StP in 2016, the 1490th at Ulyanovka SE of StP probably in 2017, and the 1544th at Vladimirskiy Lager (but launch battalions split between Luga and Strugi Krasnyye) S of StP in 2018.

So not only is the 2nd ADD now all S-400, it’s also a five-regiment SAM division.

Here’s a handy reference to S-400 deployments (which have been difficult to keep up on). No wonder Mr. Putin wants to unplug the Internet and get rid of ru.wikipedia.org.

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Posted in Aerospace Forces, Force Modernization, Order-of-Battle

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Taking Stock of Russian Acquisition

Posted on April 24, 2017 | 2 comments

Novyye izvestiya interviewed Ruslan Pukhov last week.  He has some perspectives on Russian military procurement we’ve heard before, and some we haven’t.

NI asked the CAST director if the U.S. Tomahawk strike on Shayrat would hurt Russia’s exports of air defense systems.  He said no, for all the obvious reasons.

More interestingly, Pukhov said air defense equipment typically represents 10-20 percent of Russia’s annual arms exports.  This could rise in coming years, he stated, due to future sales of the S-400 to “China and other countries.”

Ruslan Pukhov

Ruslan Pukhov

Asked how Russian weapons have performed in Syria, Pukhov responded:

“The Syrian campaign has made a good advertisement for Russian arms, particularly for new types of Russian combat aircraft (Su-30SM, Su-35 and especially Su-34) and helicopters (Mi-28N and Ka-52), but also for precision munitions — cruise missiles and aircraft ordnance.  Therefore it’s possible to expect growing interest from foreign buyers and growing sales in these segments.  The negative side one can draw from the actions of the Russian grouping in Syria is, first and foremost, the insufficient capability of its technical reconnaissance systems, including unmanned aerial vehicles and space systems.  The quantity of precision weapons is still insufficient.  The precision arms themselves in a number of cases require additional development.  There is still a lot of work ahead, but the main thing is that the Syrian campaign has allowed for revealing these deficiencies and partially eliminating them.  Meanwhile the cost of acquiring this priceless experience has been relatively low.”

Of course, the cost is only low if you’re not in the crossfire in Syria.

NI asked Pukhov if Russian weapons are better today or are they still based on old Soviet ones.  He answered:

“There is progress, but a large part of equipment, including what is being produced and bought now, still depends precisely on the Soviet legacy.  The weapons systems of a really new generation (the T-50 fighter, ‘Armata’ tank, new generation armor) remain in development and still haven’t gotten to the serial production stage.  But we have to understand that the creation of new generation armaments in any case involves many years – the cycle is 10-15-20 years from the start of R&D to the real achievement of combat capability in series models in troop units.  Considering that in Russia significant financing of defense and the OPK began only after 2005, and on a really large-scale only after 2010, then you really can’t expect any other result.  If there’s success in financing at the necessary level, then after 2020 the arrival of platforms and systems of a really new generation will begin.”

And how have economic problems and sanctions affected the OPK?

“The crisis still doesn’t directly affect the OPK.  Even with a sharp contraction in federal budget revenue and eight years of economic stagnation, state defense order financing has been preserved at a high level, and it will begin to drop only from 2017.  But not because of economic difficulties, but in connection with saturating the troops with new and modern equipment.  From another side, sometimes the conditions of GOZ price formation turn out so severe for enterprises that it sometimes leads to GOZ contracts being fulfilled at the limit of profitability.”

“The full action of sanctions began to be felt from 2015.  Because the non-supply of a number of components from Ukraine and Western countries already caused a shift in the completion of a number of programs, the most well-known instances are connected with the construction of project 11356 and 22350 frigates, but also project 20385 corvettes, on which Ukrainian gas turbines and German diesels, in turn, were replaced.  In addition, sanctions complicated the purchase of Western-produced equipment by Russian enterprises, and, most importantly, its licensed maintenance. And as practice has shown, analogues from China and other countries don’t always meet the quality standards we need.  By 2018, the import substitution program will allow for covering 80-90% of imported items, and finally, imports will be replaced by 2020.”

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Posted in Aerospace Forces, Air Forces, Arms Sales, Force Modernization, Military Operations

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S-500 in 2016?

Posted on April 18, 2016 | 2 comments

Predictions of the imminent appearance of the new anti-air, anti-missile S-500 system come with regularity.  Last week’s press reports aren’t novel in this respect.

Deputy Aerospace Forces (VKS) CINC and Chief of Air and Missile Defense General-Lieutenant Viktor Gumennyy [Goo-MYO-knee] says Almaz-Antey is completing development work on the S-500, and the VKS will receive it “soon.” Hard to argue. We know it’s in development, and he doesn’t say what “soon” means.

TASS and RIA Novosti covered Gumennyy’s comments on Rossiya 24 television.

The prevailing forecast is that the S-500 will complete development, and appear with operational units on an “experimental” basis in 2017.

As recently as early 2015, Deputy Defense Minister and procurement chief Yuriy Borisov predicted the S-500 wouldn’t complete development until 2017.

However, TASS reminds that VKS CINC General-Colonel Viktor Bondarev has said deliveries will start in 2016.  He’s an inveterate optimist; in 2012, he said 2013.

In any event, it’s a chance to review what’s claimed to date about the S-500.

The typical advertisement for the S-500 calls it a new generation, long-range surface-to-air missile with increased capability for high altitude (200 km) intercepts against ballistic missiles and RVs.  It can reportedly engage ten ballistic missiles simultaneously at a range of 600 km.  The S-500 is supposed to be superior to both the S-400 Triumf and U.S. Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3).

The system is supposed have 40N6M (possibly a longer-range mod of the S-400’s 400-km missile?) missiles as well as hypersonic 77N6-N and 77N6-N1 missile interceptors.  TASS reported that these anti-missile missiles were successfully tested in mid-2014.

According to Interfaks, GPV 2011-2020 calls for procurement of ten battalions (or five “regimental sets”) of the S-500.  Almaz-Antey’s original contract called for initial deliveries in 2015.

Noted by the regime or not, this is “GOZ breaking.” Some producers get in trouble for it; important ones sometimes don’t.

General-Lieutenant Gumennyy also reported that testing of the S-350 Vityaz SAM continues, and initial launches confirmed the system’s performance.  The S-350 will replace older Russian S-300PS SAMs.

Gumennyy said the share of “modern” SAMs and radars in Russia’s inventory is 45 percent.  Last December, the MOD indicated that 52 percent of all VKS weapons and equipment was “modern.”

P.S. President Vladimir Putin’s assistant for military-technical cooperation confirmed for Izvestiya today that Russia is negotiating sales of the S-400 system to China and India.

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Not OK in the OPK

Posted on April 3, 2016 | 14 comments
OAO Radiopribor

OAO Radiopribor

Recent news reports indicate all is not well in Russia’s defense-industrial complex (OPK).  This despite several years of budgetary largesse in the form of an ever-increasing state defense order (GOZ).

Exhibit No. 1

Defense plant OAO Radiopribor in Vladivostok is officially bankrupt, but some remnant will be preserved in an 11th hour deal turning the company into a subsidiary of OAO Dubna Machinebuilding Plant (DMZ) in Moscow Oblast. How effectively DMZ can operate a money-losing business 6,500 km to the east is anyone’s guess.

Local press indicates that labor authorities in Primorskiy Kray are already working to place or retrain some Radiopribor employees (i.e. not all of them have a future at the old plant).

The industrial holding company AFK Sistema and its electronics subsidiary OAO RTI own DMZ.  DMZ makes components for military aircraft including external fuel tanks.

Radiopribor’s 1,500 workers hadn’t been paid in eight months, and the enterprise’s wage arrears amounted to 224 million rubles along with general debt of 3.5 billion rubles.

The figures on the salaries are interesting — the average employee may have been making a little more than 18,000 rubles per month. That was probably about two-thirds of average pay in Vladivostok last year.

Exhibit No. 2

Russia’s sole manufacturer of infantry fighting vehicles — BMPs, Kurganmashzavod (KMZ) in the Urals recently defeated a Moscow-based creditor’s attempt to have it declared bankrupt for failing to pay on 41 million rubles of arrears on its leasing contracts.

It defeated the effort because, as a subsidiary of Kontsern Tractor Plants, KMZ is a “strategically important enterprise” and can’t be bankrupt according to a longstanding presidential decree.

KMZ apparently also owes its gas supplier.

It has a state order for 200 BMPs in 2015-17 which should help it some.  It’s been a big supplier of civilian heavy equipment in the past, but that must not be going too well either.

Exhibit No. 3

Press from late March described OAO United Instrument-building Corporation’s effort to come up with an “anti-crisis” plan for its enterprises in Tambov Oblast southeast of Moscow.  OAO OPK is itself part of Rostekh.

OAO OPK’s Revtrud factory has 1 billion rubles worth of debt.  Revtrud’s wage and tax arrears come to about 150 million rubles.  It makes communications and electronic warfare systems.

OAO OPK says it plans to amalgamate affiliates Revtrud, Oktyabr, Tambovapparat, and Efir into a single production complex.  It will spend 4 billion rubles to recapitalize and reequip these enterprises.  Tambovapparat doesn’t seem to be doing too well either. Efir is doing the best; the MOD is buying its Borisoglebsk-2 jamming system.

Exhibit No. 4

On 22 March, TASS quoted Jan Novikov, general director of S-400 maker Almaz-Antey, who indicated he was considering a 30 percent cut in his workforce for economic reasons.  A week later, he walked this back saying savings might come through other means, according to a TASS report of an interview he gave Rossiyskaya gazeta.  Novikov stated that cost-cutting is needed to pay the bills for financing and starting up production at new plants in Nizhegorod and Kirov.  This from what is arguably Russia’s best-performing arms producer.

On top of these reports from various corners of the Russian OPK, we have interesting news from important characters in Moscow.  They seem to agree that the GOZ is turning downward, and taking the fortunes of these companies with it.

On 5 March, Deputy Defense Minister Tatyana Shevtsova, who oversees the military’s budget, said its financing would be trimmed by 5 percent this year, but claimed weapons procurement would be untouched.

A week later, Rostekh Chief Sergey Chemezov told The Wall Street Journal that the GOZ could be slashed by 10 percent in 2016.

On 26 March, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitriy Rogozin — tsar of the arms sector — told TASS that Russia needs “patriots of industry” ready to do everything necessary to renew not just the armed forces but industry too.  He continued:

“Then we won’t depend on the oil and gas needle, because we’ll rely on industry.”

President Putin’s administration chief Sergey Ivanov traveled to Tula on 29 March to preach about a time when the GOZ will decline and defense enterprises will have to diversify.

On 31 March, the chairman of the Federation Council’s Defense and Security Committee Viktor Ozerov admitted there could be problems financing military procurement in 2017, but insisted the Defense Ministry would not abandon its goal of 70 percent modern weapons and equipment by 2020.

At the outset of the armaments program in 2011, more than one or two wise observers said Russia’s industrial obsolescence and its reliance on hydrocarbon rents needed fixing before making heavy investments in defense industry.  Why?  Defense industrial investment has a smaller multiplier effect in the overall economy.  The time and money to make these changes has been wasted, and now is an inauspicious time for them.

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What’s It Cost? (Part III)

Posted on March 31, 2016 | 1 comment
48N6E2

48N6E2

We might never be done with this topic, and that’s OK.

On 17 March, TASS reported that Russia will sell China two “regimental sets” of S-400 Triumf surface-to-air missiles in a deal reportedly worth $3 billion.

The first will be delivered in December 2017-January 2018 and the second in May-June 2019, according to the news agency’s “military-diplomatic source.”

Moscow and Beijing signed the S-400 contract in September 2014.

Each “set” has two battalions of four S-400 launchers.  Or a total of 16 launch vehicles.  Or 64 missiles and an unreported number of reloads.

Recall that previous reports claimed China was after no less than six S-400 battalions for that same $3 billion price.

The September 2014 deal includes training for Chinese personnel beginning in the last quarter of 2017, according to TASS.

Its source also stated that the first “regiment” will have the same missiles as the S-300PMU-2 SAM systems China already has.  The 48N6E2 with its 200-km range.

The second will have missiles “with improved characteristics.”  Presumably, the newer 400-km 40N6E.

But it’s not clear that the 40N6 (or export-version 40N6E) missile is fully out of testing, if some press reporting is accurate.

China is, of course, the first foreign customer, but India will apparently be the second.  According to RIA Novosti, India is negotiating for five S-400 battalions for a reported $5.8 billion.

However, it seems unlikely New Delhi would pay that kind of premium for a fifth battalion, even with all 40N6E missiles.

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More S-400s

Posted on September 7, 2015 | 7 comments

On 2 September, TASS reported Almaz-Antey delivered its ninth “regimental set” of S-400 / Triumf SAMs “ahead of schedule.”  The agency cited General Director Jan Novikov who claimed his company will send two more “sets” to the military before next year.  They will be numbers ten and eleven.

But those late year deliveries have a way of sliding to the right.

S-400s on Display (photo: ITAR-TASS / Sergey Bobylev)

S-400s on Display (photo: ITAR-TASS / Sergey Bobylev)

Novikov said the most recent “set” wasn’t due until November under the delivery plan.  He indicated the S-400s and associated equipment were sent to the “test range” — Kapustin Yar — where all “delivery-handover tests” were conducted successfully.

Writing for RG, Yuriy Gavrilov reports that, to meet the demand for the S-400 and S-500, Almaz-Antey has a robotic microelectronics production line for SAMs in Omsk.  This week the firm is also supposed to open a robotic lathe and milling line at the same facility.  Novikov reportedly said it will increase productivity in priority areas by a factor of 12.

Gavrilov writes that the new “set” is bound for Moscow.  It will make a fifth red pin in a blob of four currently around the capital.  Twelve “sets” are supposed to defend the skies of the “central administrative and industrial region” by 2020.

Russia's S-400 Deployments

Russia’s S-400 Deployments

That count of nine S-400 “regimental sets” is intriguing.  

By last year’s information, this should be ten, with the delivery to Kamchatka being the ninth.  But apparently not.  So which of the nine red pins is wrong (if any)?  It might be Novocherkassk, but some recent sources place this “regimental set” at Novorossiysk. Which begs its own question:  will the Defense Ministry shift them to Sevastopol eventually?

Also, there’s no indication yet of where “sets” ten and eleven (or eleven and twelve?) could go.

How do the overall numbers look?  If the fifth “set” for Moscow is actually the ninth overall, we’d expect a total of 19 regimental sets (based on General-Major Demin’s September 2014 statement that 12 more would be deployed).  If it’s actually the tenth, then a total of 20.

Both possibilities get close to the 56 S-400 battalions projected under the GPV. If all “sets” after Kamchatka have three battalions, they might get between 50 and 52 battalions.

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What’s It Cost? (Addendum)

Posted on November 29, 2014 | 1 comment

There’s reason this week to return to the issue of what the S-400 system costs. Specifically, what it might cost China.

Vedomosti reported Wednesday that Russia has signed a deal with China to sell it the S-400 / Triumf.

The business daily’s defense industry source claims the agreement inked by Rosoboroneksport and the Chinese military will send off not less than six battalions of the advanced SAM system for more than $3 billion.

That would be at least $500 million per battalion (against the previously ventured guess of about $320 million).  Or in excess of $80 million per TEL.

The Russian Defense Ministry has consistently maintained that the S-400 won’t go abroad before 2016.

Vedomosti notes China’s last big purchase was 15 battalions of S-300PMU-2 completed in 2010.

RIA Novosti pretty quickly reported that an official of Russia’s Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation (FSVTS) said an S-400 contract hadn’t been signed with China as yet.

Rosoboroneksport and Almaz-Antey just declined comment.

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S-400 Deployments

Posted on November 23, 2014 | Leave a comment
S-400 Firing (photo: Interfaks-AVN / Andrey Stanavov)

S-400 Firing (photo: Interfaks-AVN / Andrey Stanavov)

Last week Interfaks-AVN wrote that the Russian military just received two “regimental sets” of S-400 / Triumf SAMs.  They make numbers seven and eight.

One became the fourth “regimental set” of the 4th Aerospace Defense Brigade around Moscow and the other is bound for the 1st Aerospace Defense Brigade on the Kola near Northern Fleet headquarters at Severomorsk.

The Kola brigade is the first in the Western MD to have the S-400.  It falls under the Western MD’s 1st Air Forces and Air Defense Command.

The other three of the eight are the 3rd (Kaliningrad), 7th (Novocherkassk), and 12th (Nakhodka) Aerospace Defense Brigades.

Almaz-Antey General Director Yan Novikov told the Interfaks-AVN that, for the first time, the Defense Ministry will get three S-400 “regiments” in a single year in 2014.

TASS reported even earlier last week that Almaz-Antey will deliver the ninth “regiment” will before the end of December.  It will be the first three-battalion regiment, and is destined for Kamchatka, or the 14th Aerospace Defense Brigade (Yelizovo).

In September, the commander of PVO and PRO for VVKO, General-Major Andrey Demin told TASS that 12 “regimental sets” of S-400 and 72 Pantsir-S would be procured by 2020.

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The Next China Deal

Posted on October 17, 2014 | Leave a comment

IA Regnum military observer Leonid Nersisyan recently took a stab at preparing Russian public opinion for the eventual sale of S-400 SAMs and Su-35S fighters to China.  A major arms deal with China should be expected, especially given Moscow’s turn further east in the wake of Western sanctions.

Nersisyan aims to refute usual complaints about exporting Russia’s most advanced weaponry to China, i.e. that Beijing will quickly copy and sell it more cheaply.  He dials back to the early 1990s.

The sale of S-300 SAMs began in 1993, amounting to something between 24 and 40 battalions of three variants.  Along the way, China developed a copy, the HQ-9, similar but less capable than the original in many performance parameters.  If it had been a really good knock off, Nersisyan argues, the HQ-9 would be found in many of the world’s armies, but it isn’t.

China's S-300, Whitewalls on a TEL?

China’s S-300, Whitewalls on a TEL?

The S-300 has grown old, and the money earned from China went into S-400 development and saved Almaz-Antey from bankruptcy at a time of little, if any, Russian military procurement.  Nersisyan concludes that:

“. . . the deal was successful — the system was copied (with deficiencies) only two decades after the first deliveries, when it had already grown old, and Russia had more modern analogues.”

Nersisyan points also to the Su-27 sale.  First Russia sold Beijing 24, then 200 kits for assembly in China.  But the Chinese stopped the transfer at 100, and began producing a copy, the J-11B.  However, its engine proved unreliable in comparison with Russia’s AL-31F, which the Chinese opted to buy for their domestic fighters.  Similarly, China bought nearly 100 Su-30 variants beginning in 2000 before producing a copy, the J-16, which also lacks a reliable engine. China’s difficulty, according to various reports, is manufacturing turbine blades and plates.

Neither the J-11B nor the J-16 is being produced in volume, and Russian aircraft remain the foundation of Chinese fighter aviation.

So, concludes Nersisyan, it will take China 20 years to copy the more complex S-400, while Russia is deploying the S-500.  Copying the generation 4++ Su-35S will be complicated by its more advanced thrust-vectored AL-41F1S engine, and Russia will be fielding the PAK FA / T-50 in the meantime.

Nersisyan writes that becoming a real competitor in the global arms market requires original RDT&E, not copying.  He sums up in three maxims:

  • Modern technologies don’t lend themselves to quick copying.
  • Copiers always lag behind.
  • The copy is often worse than the original.

What do others say about the threat of Chinese copying?

CAST’s Vasiliy Kashin agrees that fears are exaggerated because people don’t understand the obstacles to successful copying or that China’s military modernization is directed against the U.S. (something that, he adds, benefits Moscow).  He also blames much of the copying of Russian fighters on Ukrainian technical cooperation with China.

Vasiliy Sychev has written that S-400 and Su-35S sales to China will be straight sales without any technical or production licenses.  Moscow typically wants to sell more, and Beijing buy less, but the sides have worked toward the middle.  A new deal (or deals) will be for 2-4 SAM battalions and 24 fighters ($1.5 billion, or $60 million per).

Nor does Viktor Murakhovskiy see anything critical because Russian capabilities will be ahead of what China gets.

More Sinophobic, Aleksandr Khramchikhin says there’s an active and effective pro-China lobby in Moscow’s power ministries and OPK, and he believes Russia needs to understand it faces a grave threat from China.

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The Next S-400 “Regimental Set”

Posted on February 20, 2014 | Leave a comment

On 14 February, Krasnaya zvezda covered the arrival of a new Pantsir-S battalion in VVKO’s 4th Air Defense Brigade north and west of Moscow.

In a bit of sidebar, the brigade’s commander indicated the next S-400 “regimental set” (sixth overall) will be deployed in his formation. Recall at the end of 2013, Russian media reported two “sets” (six and seven) were delivered to the military.

Pantsir-S (photo: Krasnaya zvezda)

Pantsir-S (photo: Krasnaya zvezda)

The new two-battery unit of six Pantsir-S vehicles came from Ashuluk, following its first live fire exercises.  Before this, the battalion was in Gatchina, near St. Petersburg, for initial training.

Colonel Valeriy Varentsov (photo: Krasnaya zvezda)

Colonel Valeriy Varentsov (photo: Krasnaya zvezda)

According to its commander, Colonel Valeriy Varentsov, the 4th Brigade has four SAM regiments deployed in Yaroslavl, Tver, Kaluga, and Moscow regions.  It received its first Pantsir-S battalion a year ago, and it is part of the S-400-equipped SAM regiment at Dmitrov.

Colonel Varentsov notes the Pantsirs remain under factory warranty, so Tula-based developer KBP maintains them.  His troops will take that responsibility at some future time.

Varentsov expects another two-battalion “regimental set” of S-400 SAMs, which just performed live firings at Kapustin Yar, to arrive in his brigade soon.

One might guess the new S-400s will deploy with existing regiments northwest of Moscow near Klin or Solnechnogorsk, or southwest near Naro-Fominsk.

Varentsov said, for the first time, his brigade is getting S-400s on the MZRT-7930 8-wheel chassis from the Minsk Wheeled Tractor Factory, instead of the previous tractor / trailer configuration.  Its prime mover was apparently built by the Bryansk Automobile Factory.

The brigade expects S-500 deliveries in 2015, and a fully new inventory of armaments by 2020.  Varentsov hinted he’d like Baykal-1M command post vehicles.

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