Since 2014, Russia has been forced to develop import substitution in various industries. The military-industrial complex was no exception. According to the Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation Sergei Shoigu, the domestic defense industry has managed to achieve significant success in the field of import substitution. As the minister noted, Russia will continue to develop military products that are technologically independent from other countries, regardless of whether the sanctions policy of Western states is maintained or weakened.
Import substitution problem
Until 2014, Russian policy in the field of arms and military equipment was subject to the general idea of economic globalization and division of labor markets. The share of dependence of the domestic defense-industrial complex on foreign suppliers was very high, partly due to the consequences of the collapse of the USSR, when many defense enterprises turned out to be outside Russia, but Moscow continued to maintain close ties with them. In many ways, the defense industry lived on the same principle as the rest of the Russian economy: why invest financially in the creation of weapons and related components and components, if you can buy such products in other countries, and even cheaper?
Until 2014, such a policy had the right to exist. Even the most famous deal canceled after the imposition of sanctions, involving the purchase of two Mistral-class amphibious assault ships from France, is not a failure. Russia did not lose money under this contract and gained access to technologies and design solutions, gaining experience in the construction of modern UDCs, the likes of which are simply not available in the Russian fleet. At the same time, the refusal of the authorities of the United States, Europe and Ukraine to supply defense and, in some cases, dual-use products to Russia, led to serious problems.
Apart from France, problems have arisen with other countries as well. The United States and Japan have imposed a ban on the supply of composite materials to Russia, as well as complex industrial equipment. The refusal to supply composites has already seriously hit the main Russian project in the field of civil aircraft construction - the MS-21 passenger aircraft, the serial production of which has shifted to 2021. At the same time, some experts believe that the real terms for the deployment of mass production and the achievement of the planned production volumes will be shifted to a later date. Painful for the Russian defense-industrial complex was the break with Germany and Ukraine, which supplied ship engines, and Ukraine and aircraft. In addition, European and a number of other traditional partners of Russia have stopped supplying their electronics.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukraine inherited a huge number of industrial enterprises of the military-industrial complex, as well as design bureaus. Like many other post-Soviet countries, the Ukrainian defense industry was focused on the production of individual components, assemblies and parts, the final assembly of products was carried out in Russia. This division of labor ensured cooperation between the two countries in the defense industry after the collapse of the USSR. Several key defense enterprises turned out to be in Ukraine, whose products were in demand in Russia. First of all, these are Motor Sich (engine building), Yuzhmash (rocket building), Antonov Design Bureau (aircraft building, transport aviation), Zorya - Mashproekt (gas turbine engines for the fleet).
After the annexation of Crimea and the outbreak of hostilities in the territory of Donbass, Ukraine curtailed all military cooperation with Russia, including in the field of the military-industrial complex. The execution of even prepaid contracts was stopped, as happened with gas turbine engines from Nikolaev. In fact, the authorities in Kiev have decided to take serious losses, endangering their own defense industry. Before the events of 2014, the ties between the two countries in the field of the defense industry were very close, and Ukraine received real real money from such cooperation. In modern realities, it is difficult for Ukrainian enterprises to find the same sales market for their products, which was Russia. True, it took Moscow many years to cope with the mass of problems that arose: from equipping helicopter technology with engines, to putting new frigates into operation.
Import substitution process in the Russian defense industry complex
It is rather difficult to accurately imagine the required volume of import substitution in the military-industrial complex due to the closed nature of such information. But using data from open sources, in particular, the speeches of high-ranking Russian officials, one can imagine the scale of the problem that the Russian defense industry faced in the second half of 2014. For example, according to Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, said during one of his speeches, components and assemblies from NATO and the EU (mainly radio electronics and optics) were used in 640 samples of Russian-made military equipment, of which 571 samples were to completely replace by 2018.
Even more impressive figures were announced on July 16, 2015 in a report to Vladimir Putin by the Deputy Minister of Defense of Russia Yuri Borisov, who specializes in military-technical support of the RF Armed Forces. According to Yuri Borisov, by 2025 the Russian industry must achieve import substitution for 826 models of weapons and military equipment. According to data from other sources, just to replace parts and components that came to Russia from NATO and the EU, it is necessary to process at least 800 different types of weapons and special equipment of Russian production.
At present, the Russian military-industrial complex has made serious progress towards import substitution. At the same time, deliveries of the main types of weapons and special equipment are carried out without delay. As part of a conference call held in early October 2019, Sergei Shoigu said that at the moment the country's armed forces received 2,300 units of modernized military equipment. According to the minister, the planned procurement and renewal targets for the main weapons were fulfilled in Russia by 47 percent, and in total, at the end of 2019, the share of new types of military equipment in the country's armed forces reached 68 percent.
Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin also spoke about the progress of import substitution in the military-industrial complex. During a meeting on September 19, 2019, which took place in Izhevsk as part of the celebration of the Day of the Gunsmith, the President noted that over the past five years the country had made significant progress in the field of import substitution "in a number of significant areas." According to Vladimir Putin, over the past five years, it has been possible to ensure technological independence in more than 350 models of weapons and military equipment. Among other things, the President highlighted the success in increasing the share of the Russian electronic component base, which is used in modern weapons. Separately, he highlighted the establishment of the production of engines for helicopters, as well as warships of the Russian Navy. According to Putin, Russian enterprises will soon start repairing the engines of the world's heaviest transport aircraft, the An-124 Ruslan.
Closing problematic issues in the defense industry
The most acute, one might even say critical, for the Russian defense industry was the severance of relations with Ukraine. The dependence of the Russian military-industrial complex on Ukrainian subcontractors in the aviation, shipbuilding and rocket and space industries was enormous. Until 2014, almost all engines that were installed on Russian military and civilian helicopters were manufactured in Ukraine at the Motor Sich enterprise. Back in 2011, within the framework of the Dubai Airshow, the Russian holding Russian Helicopters and the Ukrainian company Motor Sich signed a contract for the supply of 1,300 helicopter engines to Russia for a total of $ 1.2 billion. Every year the Ukrainian manufacturer had to transfer 250-270 engines to Russia.
Today Russia has almost completely overcome this dependence in the military sphere. Back in 2017, the head of the Russian Helicopters holding reported to the country's president that by 2019 Russia would overcome the problem with the supply of helicopter engines from Ukraine. In Russia, the VK-2500 engine, completely localized in our country, came to replace the Ukrainian TVZ-117VMA engines, for the creation and production of which OJSC Klimov is responsible. These engines are installed on most of the Mi and Ka helicopters. According to the Rostec state corporation, in 2018 Ufa PJSC UEC-UMPO supplied 180 engine kits for VK-2500 engines. At the same time, Motor Sich continues to cooperate with Russian companies in the supply of engines for civilian helicopters and even takes part in a joint project to create a Russian-Chinese heavy helicopter AHL, on which a new version of the Zaporozhye D-136 engine is to be installed, on which all heavy helicopters Mi-26 in the world. In addition, Russia has completely localized the production of the AI-222-25 engine, which is installed on the Yak-130 combat training aircraft. The Salyut Gas Turbine Engineering Research and Production Center announced the complete localization of the AI-222-25 engine production and the termination of cooperation with Motor Sich back in April 2015.
Another important problem that the Russian defense industry had to solve was the replacement of Ukrainian ship engines produced in Nikolaev. Due to the rupture of military-technical cooperation between the two countries, Russian shipyards froze in anticipation of the adoption of the frigates of the far sea zone of projects 11356 and 22350. frigates 11356, intended for the Indian Navy. So the second frigate of project 22350 "Admiral of the Fleet Kasatonov" was laid down back in 2009, but entered the factory sea trials only in 2019, a similar situation with the frigate "Admiral Golovko", the laying of which took place back in 2012. The fact that the domestic industry has overcome dependence on Ukrainian gas turbine engines became clear only in February 2019. Deputy Minister of Defense of Russia Alexei Krivoruchko told reporters about this during his visit to the Severnaya Verf. According to him, UEC-Saturn has produced completely domestic gas turbine units for frigates under construction of project 22350. It is already known that the frigates under construction provide for the use of 10D49 sustainer diesel engines manufactured by the Kolomna plant and the M90FR gas turbine unit manufactured by UEC-Saturn.
Russia has also achieved notable successes in aircraft construction. Moreover, we are talking about both manned aircraft and drones. One of the implicit examples of import substitution is the work on the Il-112V military transport aircraft, which first flew on March 30, 2019. The new aircraft not only changes the morally and physically obsolete An-26 aircraft, but is also a kind of response and direct competitor to the An-140T aircraft developed at the Antonov Design Bureau. Back in 2011, the Russian military was going to purchase a Ukrainian car for transport needs.
In addition, Russian defense industry enterprises have made great strides in the field of unmanned aircraft development. At the beginning of 2020, the Forpost-R drone will enter service with the Aerospace Forces. The first flight of the UAV, built using completely Russian-made components, with the Russian APD-85 engine and domestic software, took place at the end of August 2019. Previously, this drone was assembled in Russia under an Israeli license from foreign components. An obvious success can be called the creation in Russia of the heavy shock-reconnaissance drone S-70 "Okhotnik", the first flight of which took place on August 3, 2019. This unique UAV will be able to interact with the most advanced Russian fifth-generation fighter Su-57. On September 27, the Ministry of Defense told about the first joint flight of a combination of the Su-57 fighter and the Okhotnik drone, the flight duration was 30 minutes.
Already, we can say that the sanctions have given impetus to the development of the domestic defense industry, having a health-improving effect on the entire sector. Over the past five years since 2014, the domestic defense industry has gotten rid of foreign dependence in many areas. At the same time, the process of re-equipping the army with new types of weapons and military equipment was not stopped. The most notable disruption occurred in shipbuilding, but by 2019 the problem had been overcome. At the same time, the course towards import substitution still does not mean complete isolation of the Russian industry. In the field of the electronic component base, Russia is actively developing cooperation with China. In an interview with RT, military expert Yuri Knutov expressed the opinion that in the field of the electronic component base, Russia currently relies heavily on China, which, after the introduction of Western sanctions, has become one of the key Russian partners in military-technical cooperation.
