As it became known, representatives of two defense plants - FSUE "Plant" Plastmass "and FSUE" Signal "- addressed an open letter to the President of the Russian Federation, deputies of the State Duma and the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. In their letter, they indicate that at the moment there is an open collapse of the Russian military-industrial complex, and, in their opinion, urgent measures must be taken to stop these destructive processes. The most difficult situation has developed in the production of ammunition in connection with the adoption of the decision by the Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation Anatoly Serdyukov to stop funding. These South Ural factories are engaged in the production of ammunition.
The open letter, in particular, states: “If a similar situation persists, thousands of workers will be thrown out of factories tomorrow. The state will lose not only unique technologies for the production of special products, but also specialists, which, in general, will cause irreparable damage to the defense capability of Russia."
“This year the cost of the state defense order for the Signal plant amounted to 125 million rubles, which is exactly half of last year's. But besides this, the Ministry of Defense has accumulated debts to the plant in the amount of more than 27 million rubles, - says Alexander Dolganov, head of the regional trade union committee of defense industry workers. - In order to somehow live and keep a close-knit team, at the beginning of 2011, the administration of the plant took a forced measure - the working week was reduced to 4 days. The staff is expected to be laid off. According to preliminary data, 170 out of 1,100 people will become unemployed. Considering that earlier reductions had already been made and all existing non-core positions were removed from the staff of the enterprise, at the moment we are talking about the reduction of specialists in the main professions. This further aggravates the situation, since it will be extremely difficult to find qualified and trained specialists in the future”.
The situation at the Plastmass Plant is even sadder. The state defense order for this enterprise was 95% of the total production volume three years ago, today it is only 3.8%. To stay afloat, the plant has to look for export orders on its own.
Today, wages in ammunition factories are the lowest in the military-industrial complex. The average earnings of a skilled worker is 14, 3 thousand rubles. And this is taking into account the often harmful and dangerous working conditions. But these enterprises are located mostly in small monotowns. There is no other place to make money. And dismissal from production as a result of layoffs is a real disaster for many families.
But why did this situation develop? Because this is the situation throughout the Russian military-industrial complex. The Ministry of Defense, under the pretext of the chronic technological backwardness of the military-industrial complex, leaves more and more domestic enterprises without government orders. The preference in providing the army with weapons and ammunition is given to the massive purchases of obsolete foreign models of military equipment and weapons. For example, Mr. Serdyukov and his comrades decided that our army no longer needs Russian tanks. Obviously, the German Leopard with crosses will look better against the background of the new army. As a result, only at one Nizhniy Tagil "Uralvagonzavod", which is the monopoly manufacturer of T-90, 5 thousand unique specialists are simultaneously being prepared for dismissal. This is only at the plant, and there are also tank-builders' allied enterprises - 50 thousand people can lose their jobs.
They decided to buy the Mistral helicopter carrier from the French. Perhaps the idea is not a bad one, but, as it turned out, the dimensions of modern Russian helicopters are somewhat large for him. The hangar, in which the deck helicopters are located, is somewhat low built. You can, for example, raise the deck of the ship, and thereby solve the problem, but this means a serious and long revision of the Mistral project. The French representatives are persuading our military to make a different decision. According to Mikhail Shmakov, chairman of the Federation of Independent Trade Unions, Russia will obviously have to buy deck-based helicopters from them. But on this issue Shmakov is categorical: “Naturally, Russian weapons do not fit these helicopters, only French ones. Russian ammunition, respectively, does not fit French machine guns and cannons, which means that it is necessary to purchase ammunition from France, for example. Meanwhile, our ammunition enterprises have zero in the state defense order. Therefore, I propose to immediately warn the Ministry of Defense that in order to restore order in the labor market after such "wise" decisions, compensation for the funds spent on stabilizing the labor market must be carried out from the funds of the Ministry of Defense."
However, the department of Mr. Serdyukov, it seems, is not afraid of anyone or anything. And even more so, threats from trade union leaders. The range of weapons and military equipment planned for the planned purchase in the West is growing by leaps and bounds. In February 2011, the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Navy, Admiral Vladimir Vysotsky, during a visit to Severnaya Verf in St. Petersburg, said that he did not rule out the possibility of installing foreign-made artillery systems on modern Russian frigates under construction there. Obviously, we are talking about replacing the Russian 130-mm artillery installation of the A-192M type, which is currently considered as the main artillery weapon on the ships of Project 22350, with foreign systems. As the main candidates for replacing Russian weapons, Commander-in-Chief Vysotsky offers a 100-mm French Creusot-Loire Compact installation, as well as a 127-mm Italian OTO-Melara 127 / 64LW system.
But it is completely unclear - why? According to experts, the newest Russian lightweight shipborne 130-mm artillery mount of the A-192M "Armat" type is now at the stage of the last development of a prototype. The activities related to the finalization of the design and tests are carried out according to the schedules and plans previously agreed with the same Admiral Vysotsky and should be completed in 2012. For all the main combat and technical indicators, the installation is not inferior to world analogues, and even surpasses many.
One gets the impression that the deal on the purchase of Mistrals opened a Pandora's box, which is truly destructive for the Russian military-industrial complex, and now it is difficult and perhaps impossible to stop the rapidly developing process.
