The International Maritime Defense Show IMDS-2015, which took place in St. Petersburg from 1 to 5 July, has ended. The show was attended by 62 official delegations from 46 countries, more than 424 participating companies, an air show was held for ordinary visitors with the participation of the Russian Knights aerobatic team. In addition to the opportunity for visitors to look at the latest and promising developments of domestic (this time, for obvious reasons, there were almost no foreign companies) manufacturers of military and civilian products, one way or another related to shipbuilding, several rather important statements were made at IMDS-2015. mainly by the commander-in-chief of the Russian Navy, Viktor Chirkov. Let's try to sum up the results of the last maritime show and find out in which direction the Russian Navy is developing, the main problems and challenges.
Import substitution
At the exhibition, there was a noticeable desire of many manufacturers to present products, the lion's share of which had previously been purchased by the Russian military-industrial complex abroad (mainly in the EU and Ukraine). This was especially true of marine diesel power plants. For example, Zvezda OJSC held a presentation of the new M150 Pulsar diesel engine. However, there is no information about what engines will be installed on the unfinished ships of projects 11356 and 22350. The reason for this, apparently, is that the declared characteristics of the new Russian power plants do not correspond to the real ones - those required by the fleet. This is confirmed by the dissatisfaction with the domestic marine engine building, expressed by the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy Viktor Chirkov and Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin. Against this background, the stand of the German company MTU stood alone, which stopped supplying engines to the Russian fleet due to the sanctions, but nevertheless arrived at the salon.
In addition to the motors, a noticeable number of various electronic components were exhibited - boards, monitors, input devices, etc. - Most of them had a somewhat "clumsy" appearance, but this is not so important for the military sector, where reliability is most important, but it will be problematic to sell such products in the civilian sector, given the fierce competition.
Against the background of the foregoing and with a reduction in funding due to problems in the Russian economy, the task of quickly creating Russian analogues that were previously purchased in the West (there will be fewer problems with Ukrainian products, since the basic technologies are Soviet) components becomes a difficult task. Nevertheless, there is no other way - the payment for the inaction of the past years will have to be done with a likely shift in the implementation of some projects and additional costs.
There are more words and statements than deeds
The situation is, in general, familiar. But nevertheless, this does not become less unpleasant. This time most of the loud statements were made by the Commander-in-Chief of the Navy. Not all of them are consistent, some do not "fit" with what was said before. For example, the anaerobic (air-independent) submarines promised by Viktor Chirkov last year were supposed to appear in 2017, but in a new statement, which was made after the ceremony of transferring the new submarine of project 636.3 Stary Oskol to the Black Sea Fleet, the start of their construction was shifted to “after 2018 ". The statement of the same Viktor Chirkov about the construction in the coming years of 18 new small missile ships (MRK) of project 22800, armed with universal launchers for anti-ship and cruise missiles, and having a displacement of only 500 tons, was skeptically commented on in a personal conversation with an anonymous source from the shipbuilding industry … According to him, this ship is still in a fairly "raw" state, and the mass with the weapons used has already exceeded 700 tons, and there are no real expectations, backed up by something other than words, regarding the purchase of such a large series of such RTOs.
Large-scale talks about the construction of an aircraft carrier so far also have little factual information - nevertheless, competition for a possible giant project, no doubt, with huge funding, is already in full swing, despite the fact that real construction work will not begin before 2025 … The Krylov State Scientific Center (KGNTs) demonstrated its mock-up concept, and the head of the Department of State Defense Order of the United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC) Anatoly Shlemov, in an interview with Lente.ru, said that according to the designs of an aircraft carrier and a large ship of the ocean zone (a destroyer under the Leader program) studies are underway in the Northern PKB and Nevsky PKB, and that "everyone should do their own thing." So between the USC and the KGNTs, which is independent of it, a serious struggle is outlined, which, in general, is very useful.
Export
Despite the large number of foreign delegations visiting the salon, no export contracts were signed. However, it is worth noting that Rosoboronexport did not initially count on this. Nevertheless, several countries have shown interest in Russian weapons, which may allow maintaining a package of orders for our naval equipment at a high level (now the amount of signed contracts exceeds $ 5 billion). Interesting news was the talks between the Iranian delegation led by the commander-in-chief of the Iranian Navy Habibollah Sayyari and Viktor Chirkov: there is some evidence that the Iranian side is interested in the supply of Russian naval military equipment. More vague information is available about the interest of Saudi Arabia, which is still busy with acquaintance with Russian naval equipment and weapons. In the meantime, the Saudis are more interested in buying the Iskander-E operational-tactical complex, and Igor Sevastyanov, deputy general director of Rosoboronexport, said at IMDS-2015 that, under certain conditions, such a deal is possible.
And finally, a little "Ukrainian" theme - Russia intends to fulfill the contract for the supply of 4 Project 12322 Zubr landing craft to China (2 ships have already been supplied by Ukraine), since the More plant is located in Crimea, which entered to the RF.
Perspectives
Despite the presence of a considerable number of problems, Russia nevertheless began the production of a noticeable number of warships, including quite large surface ships - corvettes and frigates. And if the prospects for the construction of a full-fledged aircraft carrier are rather vague, then the construction of a new generation destroyer, comparable in armament to a missile cruiser, does not seem an impossible task, although a few years ago it would have been an unobvious statement. Problems are a normal phenomenon, given that in fact many of the industries associated with the construction of surface warships were simply destroyed to the ground and are now being recreated from scratch. In the context of reduced funding, an important role will be played by prioritization and selection of optimal development paths, of which, judging by the number of layouts and sketches presented at IMDS-2015, there are a lot. In such conditions, one of the key factors is the conditions of fair competition, which, unfortunately, are not always observed. As for the submarine fleet, the situation here is very good. A large number of both nuclear and diesel-electric submarines are being built, work is already underway to determine the appearance of a new multipurpose nuclear submarine, even taking into account the fact that quite modern submarines of this class are being built - Project 855 Yasen-M.
