The main direction of military development for the next year in Kiev is called the revival of the air defense forces, which are now represented by outdated Soviet models. The problem is that Ukraine has no money to buy modern systems, and there is no corresponding production in the country. The problem of other countries in connection with Kiev's plans is the safety of civil aviation.
The secretary of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council, Oleksandr Turchinov, was concerned about the state of the air defense of the armed forces of this post-Soviet state. According to him, the council considers the revival of the air defense potential as a priority next year.
"In the best case for Ukraine, it could be some kind of portable anti-aircraft missile systems of American production"
“The biggest problem when we started to revive the potential of the armed forces is the problem of reviving the potential of air defense. That is why the National Security and Defense Council has identified the revival of the air defense potential as a priority of 2016, Turchinov said to RIA Novosti.
According to him, the main difficulties in this matter are that the anti-aircraft missile systems and radar stations that are in Ukraine were produced at the enterprises of the Russian Federation, therefore it is necessary to create production capacities from scratch. Turchynov noted that spare parts of either Ukrainian production or NATO countries will be used to modernize the stations and complexes.
The press secretary of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine Oksana Gavrilyuk said that the department purchased weapons and equipment for $ 208 million in 2015, TASS reports.
According to her, the specified types of weapons, technology and equipment include 67 artillery pieces of armored weapons; 625 thermal imaging, optical sights and night vision devices; 50 ground-based radars; 640 small arms and 1000 silencers. In addition, 31 units of armored weapons and equipment, 30 anti-tank missile systems, 610 units of automotive equipment, 20 modernized aircraft and helicopters, 28 units of radio-electronic equipment were purchased. That is, all purchases concerned weapons for killing people and destroying buildings on the ground, and not air defense.
In Ukraine's 2016 budget, spending on national security and defense was increased by UAH 16 billion - to UAH 113 billion ($ 4.7 billion). At the same time, one division of Russian S-400s supplied to China with ammunition and training equipment costs about $ 500 million, about the same costs a division comparable to the S-300 of the American Patriot. The cost of the S-300 division is $ 200-250 million.
Disposed of the inheritance
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Ukrainian state inherited the most powerful military grouping in Europe, which included a separate air defense army, nine separate air defense brigades, as well as three air armies and seven army aviation regiments. 14 motorized rifle and four tank divisions of the Soviet army, each with an anti-aircraft missile regiment, also passed under the jurisdiction of Ukraine. These divisions had a total of 72 motorized rifle and tank regiments, each with an anti-aircraft missile division.
As of 2014, Ukraine possessed 60 Buk, 125 Osa-AKM, 100 Krug, 70 Tunguska, 150 Strela-10M complexes, as well as several hundred 57-mm anti-aircraft guns and MANPADS. Needle . In addition, the Kiev military has at its disposal a certain number of not the newest by Russian standards, but rather sophisticated S-300 complexes, the number of which was not mentioned in open sources. According to the Ukrainian specialized press, as of April 2013, 60 divisions of the S-200V, S-300V1, S-300PT / PS and Buk-M1 air defense systems were on combat duty, while it was reported that the S-200V, S-300PT air defense missile systems and S-300V1 should be removed from service and transferred to storage bases. The warranty periods of the S-300 and Bukovs have long since expired, and the operational systems are assembled from components removed from other systems.
All the air defense systems that Ukraine has are of Soviet production, it does not have its own production of modern systems.
The only thing that the air defense of the independent Ukrainian state has become famous for in its history is the Russian Tu-154 shot down by mistake during exercises in 2001. With the outbreak of the war in Donbass last year, anti-aircraft missile systems appeared in the photo from the ATO zone (which gave rise to suspicions of the Ukrainian side that it was they who shot down a Boeing that was flying MH-17), but they were directly involved in combat they did not take action. At the same time, we recall that the small and relatively combat-ready Ukrainian aviation was practically destroyed by the militia's MANPADS already in the first months of the war.
Threat to passengers
According to Viktor Murakhovsky, editor of the Arsenal of the Fatherland magazine, Ukraine has no chances to revive its air defense forces. “All developers of air defense systems are located in Russia. If we talk about the purchase of Western products, this is absolutely not the kind of money that Ukraine's western partners are able to allocate. In the best case for Ukraine, it could be some kind of portable anti-aircraft missile systems of American production,”he told the VZGLYAD newspaper.
He noted that from a military point of view, the Ukrainian air defense does not pose any threat to Russia and its army, however, airlines flying through the territory of this state should be wary of Turchinov's plans.
“These systems are dangerous in the sense that it can turn out, as with the" Boeing "unfortunate. But if you look at Flightradar today, it looks like a black hole over Ukraine, everyone is trying to fly around it by any crooked paths,”the expert concluded.
