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Sanctions in motion or a failure of “Rosoboronexport” to remain competitive

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  • Sanctions in motion or a failure of “Rosoboronexport” to remain competitive

    Such a telling statement has been recently made by the representative of Russian weaponry monopolist “Rosoboronexport”. Particularly, he outlined that Russian arms trade juggernaut pales in comparison with its foreign counterparts and even named the exact areas of Russian-made military products suffering the biggest amount of export problems.
    Pursuant to the dictum hatched by “ITAR-TASS”, Mr. Aleksandr Brindikov, the chairman of the counselors’ board under the director-general of “Rosoboronexport”, in his speech delivered on March, 27 2015 to the members of the Counsel of Federation highlighted that Russian military hardware manufacturers are not able to stand a chance against the Western companies and were bound to leave more than 30 sectors in this field. To compliment, the statement of Mr. Brindikov is given below:
    “Actually, we have left half of the sectors linked to the defense industry. Furthermore, the problem does not lie with the lack of marketing skills, but simply comes down to deterioration of our competitive capability in arms business”.
    Basically, Mr. Brindikov explains the aforementioned state-of-affairs by internal problems, namely lack of expertise in electronics and software, which by and large happens to be a cornerstone of modern-day hi-tech military produce.
    Moreover, within the armor materiel niche of the world arms market Russia has been cut out by Ukraine, the USA, Germany and China, which spread far and wide with their tanks and APCs across the never-ending litany of new export sectors. All along, words of Mr. Brindikov speak for themselves:
    “We had no chance but to step aside as long as we fail to remain competitive. We faced problems with production and delivery of military hardware.”
    As well as that, the latest tank battle simulation encompassing the world’s most-renowned contemporary tanks showed that Russian armor materiel is a far way to go before being christened as an undisputed leader. Besides, the 1st place in the said battle was taken by the Ukrainian-manufactured T-84 “OPLOT”, which had outstripped both “Leopard 2A7” and American M1A2 SEP V2 “Abrams” running the 2nd and 3rd respectively, not to mention Russia’s tank T-90 MS “TAGIL”, which occupied the 6th place bowing to Japan’s Type-10 (the 4th place) and Israeli “Merkava Mk.4” (the 5th place).

    According to Mr. Brindikov, the arms dealers of Russia are not safe from problems on the market of artillery systems and munitions as well. In particular, he argues the following:
    “Our position in the artillery market leaves much to be desired, albeit previously in this realm it was no stress for us to go hand-in-hand with Sweden”.
    For example, as per the effective range Russian-made 152mm division-level self-propelled howitzer 2S19 “Msta-S” (manufactured since 1989) overwhelmingly loses to its foreign analogues produced in the USA, the UK, Germany and China. This is especially obvious in the case of firing by rocket projectiles as long as Russian system goes well to the limit of 29 km, while Chinese PLZ-05 hits the targets on the distance of 53 km together with American XM2001, British AS-90 “Braveheart” and German PzH 2000, which are able to remain effective within more than 40 km.
    In addition to that, Russian statesman was rather outspoken regarding a serious back-step in the aviation industry gravely affecting business both with internal and external clientele.
    Obviously, being in a state of continuous crises, Russian aircraft engine design industry has hardly managed to come up with any new offerings in recent years. With a bunch of years down the line, Russia saw no new aircraft manufacturing plant or design bureau or a project reaching the stage of lot production. Furthermore, the future of Russian aircraft industry will not last long without the Ukrainian assistance, which has already been fully perceived via the hands-on experience by its Indian as well as other foreign customers.
    In effect, another bold project between Russia and India that crumbled to dust is the development of medium transport aircraft for Indian Air Force able to deliver infantry, artillery guns and light armored vehicles including light tanks, which was set to replace An-32. Nevertheless, experts assert that even under the most favorable conditions the first prototype of the aforesaid aircraft may come to pass only in 2025.
    Interestingly, the aforementioned statement of a celebrated Russian official is the first open confession that the situation with Russian arms exports is far from being all smiles, although before Russian weaponry dealers seemed to exude optimism and confidence towards both uninitiated general public and well-versed potential customers.
    “That was fully understood by experts long before. This derives from logic.” – said Mr. Vadim Kozulin, the head of conventional arms program running by the Center for Political Studies.
    Admittedly, all these years Russia managed to keep its head above water only through the use of the experience gained during the Soviet times. Apart from the rest of the world vigorously canalizing money into brand-new projects, Russian defense industry saw not even a smattering of investment and continued to be propelled by the efforts of enthusiasts and rare financial pitch-ins.

    Seemingly, the question of at least any positive change is still hopelessly pending as long as all the software employed in the Russian military materiel is of the Western origin and arms imports are set to dwindle due to the sanctions imposed on Russia in the light of its annexation of Crimea and further aggression against Ukraine.
    All things considered, provided such a situation trails ahead, Russia will not be able to carry out its obligations or, to a larger extent, finalization of its contracts with foreign partners at all. Sanctions eat deeper into Russian military plants and corporations, therefore their next round will put a decisive end to the entire military industry of Russia in general and its arms exports in particular.
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