Deputy Defense Minister Nikolay Pankov

Yesterday NVO recapped the Defense Ministry position on efforts to enlist 50,000 contract servicemen in 2013.  

The Armed Forces have to recruit (and retain) 50,000 each year through 2017 when they’re supposed to have 425,000 contractees.  President Putin decreed the goal upon his inauguration for a third term.  

Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu addressed contract service in a Monday videoconference.  He said the army has to enlist 60,000 contractees to reach 240,000 by the end of 2013.  Shoygu factored in more to cover the  anticipated departure of 10,000 current enlisted.

Deputy Defense Minister, State Secretary Nikolay Pankov reported the armed services had 186,000 contractees on January 1.  He said the selection of candidates is running a little ahead of schedule:

“This year the first quarter target indicator was fulfilled at 107%.  10,699 men were picked and accepted for military service.  In the second quarter we are planning to accept not less than 18,500 men for military service on contract, including 4,500 men in April.”

Defense Minister Shoygu addressed reestablishing warrant officer ranks eliminated by his predecessor.  He ordered up a directive listing the technical posts to which warrants will be assigned:

“Not depots or bases — only to those places where we really need specialists in maintaining complex equipment and complex weapons systems.”

Though not noted by NVO, according to the Defense Ministry account, Shoygu said 14,000 servicemen are no longer on ordnance disposal duty since explosive methods were halted.  He wants to hand shipbuilding companies the repair and dismantlement duties now carried out by 5,000 sailors. 

He didn’t specify whether these servicemen are conscripts or contractees.  But he apparently agrees with his predecessor’s emphasis on getting uniformed personnel out of non-core functions.

But back to signing up 50,000 contractees for service this year.  Is it possible?

Defense Ministry recruiting centers opened in August, and Mil.ru’s reported their numbers.  Some from the fall, others from the first quarter of 2013.

• The Western MD indicated it dispatched 2,500 new contractees by early January.  The Murmansk Oblast, by itself, has to recruit 3,000 this year.
• The Central MD recruited 1,100 in late fall, and has to enlist 5,500 in 2013.
• The Eastern MD reportedly recruited 1,000 by March, and its number for the year is 11,000.
• No word on overall Southern MD numbers.

So the country’s most sparsely inhabited regions need to provide about one-third of the contractees for 2013.  More populated western and southern areas have to provide two-thirds.  They should have supplied roughly 3,000-3,500 recruits each to reach the first quarter total of 10,699.   

Based on the early results, it doesn’t seem possible.  Recruiting centers had a “running start” during the fall.  And it’s likely the most interested men signed up right off.  Finding candidates may be harder later in the year.  And it may be easier now than in 2014, 2015, etc.

S-400

A reader recently asked:

What’s the cost of one division of the S-400 for Russia and for foreign customers?

Let’s call it a battalion (дивизион).  We’ll start with exports (for which there is actually data).  And we proceed from what was paid for the S-300.

Russia’s planned sale of the S-300PMU1 to Iran reportedly involved the transfer of five “battalion sets” for $800 million.  Some sources said as much as $1-1.2 billion.   

Let’s guess the “battalion set” has three firing batteries, with two launchers per, for a total of 30 TELs, 120+ missiles, and all associated radars, fire control systems, and vehicles.

If $800 million is accurate, the price for one battalion was $160 million.  The price for one S-400 system, four missiles on a TEL, was roughly $27 million.

This isn’t unlike what the Chinese paid for the S-300 in the 1990s and 2000s.  According to Sinodefence.com, they bought battalions for between $25 and $60 million at different times under different contracts.

That done, we make the leap from the S-300 price to the S-400 price.

A couple years ago, Vedomosti drew the scarcely precise conclusion that the price of the S-400 will double the S-300′s price (and the S-500 double the S-400′s). 

So perhaps a “battalion set” or a battalion of the S-400 will go for $320 million.  That would be one full-up launch vehicle for $40-50 million.

The only other shred of information is the widely-reported Financial Times story saying, if the Russians added the S-400 to a $2 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia, the price of the sale would climb to $7 billion.  But lots of Russian reports say Moscow won’t be selling the S-400 abroad soon.  The military obviously hopes that’s true, so it can get first.

But not every customer is Iranian, not every one will have to pay a premium price, and not every customer is foreign.

Which brings the trickier question of what Russia’s Defense Ministry has to pay.  It’s simply impossible to guess.

Certainly a lot less than buyers abroad.  The military’s bought some S-400 systems so there is a going price.  OAO Concern PVO Almaz-Antey’s costs are a big question as is the level of profit the government is willing to tolerate.  

The government owns Almaz-Antey, so one part of government is selling to another.  It’s a prime example of angst over GOZ ”price formation” in recent years.  There was a similar big-ticket dustup over submarine prices with Sevmash.  It’s something of a Mexican standoff.  The buyer doesn’t have other supplier alternatives.  And the seller may not be allowed to sell elsewhere. 

The Defense Ministry, the government don’t want to pay a lot and have the power to refuse and yet still receive goods.  The question is how many.  That’s ECON 101, friends.

If those buyers set their price below equilibrium, Almaz-Antey will provide a lower than desired quantity more slowly than the buyers want.   And Almaz might have other buyers as an option, an advantage Sevmash lacks.  So “price formation” for the S-400 is all about agreement on Almaz’s costs and an acceptable level of profit.  That agreement is apparently not smoothly worked out yet.

Piskunov’s a government official.  Not a powerful voice, but an authoritative one in his specialty.

Auditor Aleksandr Piskunov

To say he’s well-equipped for his work is an understatement. 

Sixty-one or 62 years old, Piskunov graduated from the RVSN’s Dzherzhinskiy Military Academy with a radio engineering degree.  He served on active duty to the rank of general-major, spending many years at the Plesetsk cosmodrome.  He later trained in the RF Government’s Financial Academy and a business school in London.  He has a PhD in economics.

Piskunov served in both the RSFSR Supreme Soviet and State Duma in the early 1990s, and was deputy chairman of the Defense Committee for each body.  He also chaired the Defense Ministry’s Military-Technical Policy Committee.  In the mid-1990s, he moved to the staff (apparat) of the RF Government and was deputy chairman of its Committee on Military-Industrial Issues.

He returned to the Duma briefly in 1999, and became deputy chairman of its “Regions of Russia” faction.

He went to the Audit Chamber in 2001, and is currently in his third term of service.

Piskunov thinks Russia can’t produce new, better, or more weapons and military equipment without modernizing its badly neglected defense industrial base.  But he has pretty much nothing but scorn for the current management of the state defense order.  And he sees little but failure in the GPV over the last 20 years.  In particular, Piskunov calls for incorporating life cycle costs into the GPV.  Ultimately, however, he says auditors and accountants can’t fix the GOZ or GPV, but lawmakers could.

Enough preamble.  Here’s VPK’s excerpt of Piskunov’s remarks.

“STRICT CONTROL OF FULFILLING THE ARMAMENTS PROGRAM IS NEEDED”

“I represent a department that performs strategic audits in the Audit Chamber.  We’ve done a lot of work in evaluating the condition of practically all 1,350 enterprises of the defense-industrial complex, their financial stability and real contribution to equipping the Armed Forces.”

“We looked at how balanced the program of defense-industrial complex modernization and State Program of Armaments were.  A gap of 700 billion rubles was observed.  At the same time, 1 trillion 200 billion is built into the budget to guarantee compensation to enterprise directors who go to commercial banks for credits.”

“Similar credit practices are leading to the growth of OPK enterprises with an unstable financial situation.  More than 30 percent are like this.  Only 20 percent come close to world standards in technical equipping.  More than half are in a condition where their restoration is already senseless — it would be better to build from a clean slate.”

“In preparing the law on the state defense order we tried to correct this situation.”

“From my point of view, our system of administering the state defense order is uncompetitive.  The adopted law preserved the situation under which  management amounts to a lag in the state defense order.”

“The deputy prime minister, responsible for the defense-industrial complex, reported that the state defense order was fulfilled by 99 percent as in past years.  But almost one hundred percent fulfillment of state defense orders over the last 20 years has not prevented the failure of all arms programs or fulfilling them at 30, 40, 50 percent.”

“Dmitriy Rogozin himself noted that fulfillment happened because of the appearance of realization.  During the execution of the arms program 7,200 changes were introduced into it, that is the real result is being slanted to agree with this fact.”

“Meanwhile Rogozin recognized that the arms program has gotten old.  The task of preparing a new State Program of Armaments stands before him.  So the problem of forming a legislative basis and management of the State Program of Armaments is more acute than ever.”

“Our opponents in government, having considered it inexpedient to include the management of the acquisition program life cycle in the GOZ law, said it was necessary to include this management in the law on the State Program of Armaments.”

“To me it seems necessary in this instance to hold them to their word — to propose that the government prepare a draft law on the State Program of Armaments.  It’s possible this will allow us to compensate for not realizing it in the GOZ law, and meet the president’s demand to create essential management of the life cycle of weapons systems.  But today the state of affairs is seriously complicated by the fact that the life cycle is really torn into several parts in the Defense Ministry itself.”

“Those who’ve served understand:  you can’t modernize armaments without the experience of using them.  Who really tracks all this life cycle?  It would be logical if Rosoboronpostavka were occupied with this, but it is located at the junction of the functional orderer – a service of the Armed Forces and a contracting firm.  It would be more appropriate to subordinate this department to the government.  It’s perfectly clear that the main risks are connected not to corruption, but to the low qualifications of the orderer.  Someone needs to “hang” over the orderer from the point of view of its responsibility for how both the program and the contract as a unitary whole are being executed.  Juridical responsibility is not rebuilt only through the contract.”

“The level of project management in our ‘defense sector,’ unfortunately, is also very low, especially the quality management system.  We are all witness to what is happening now in space.”

“It’s frightening that it’s impossible to create new equipment without metrics.  We lost the project management culture and stopped training specialists in military academies and schools.  The very best on this plane is OOO ’KB Sukhoy’ and it used the American experience-plan for metrics on developmental aircraft.  The Americans seized and simply closed the issue — this project is no longer being supported.  To rewrite project documentation now in some kind of domestic variant is complex, therefore the development of these systems is essential.”

“The participation of commercial banks in providing credit for the state defense order is an important question.  Now in the government they are discussing how these 23 trillion will go — through commercial banks, for free or for money?  It’s understood that banks simply don’t work that way.  There is a precedent – the government resolution on the Mariinka, the Bolshoy [theaters], the M-4 [highway].  If you calculate it, then 20 percent received from 23 trillion over these years, it’s necessary to take an additional amount from the taxpayers or cut the defense order by this sum.”

“Not less sensitive is the issue of intermediaries.  If the Defense Ministry and government don’t put transactions under the strictest control, then there are all the calculations on the defense order, life cycle and cooperation levels, we will mess up this program of armaments also.  This, undoubtedly, is one of the most dangerous questions for the Defense Ministry — too large lobbyist forces participating, too large sums going.”

“Questions of managing the life cycle and control of finances are the most fundamental.  The treasury is incapable of resolving this task.”

Last Monday, Newsru.com recapped a Kommersant story saying that Serdyukov’s signature was on documents transferring the Bolshoy Utrish property to his brother-in-law Valeriy Puzikov.  But investigators haven’t talked to the ex-minister about that case yet, which they say amounts to large-scale fraud by a group of conspirators.

Recall the Defense Ministry obtained this Black Sea coastal property near Anapa in 2010 to build a radar station, but, with the help of Yekaterina Smetanova, it was excessed for two-thirds of the military’s purchase price to Puzikov. 

According to Newsru.com from Tuesday, Serdyukov was called to the GVSU SKR to meet with investigators about the Zhitnoye dacha.  ITAR-TASS said he provided 11 pages of evidence, and claimed the Defense Ministry participated in this civilian project out of military “necessity.”

On Wednesday, Politkom.ru commentator Tatyana Stanovaya reported that the ex-Defense Minister talked to investigators for five hours.

She believes Putin doesn’t want Serdyukov to sit in jail, and anonymous media sources say he told SKR chief Aleksandr Bastrykin as much early on.  She sees it like this:

“It’s important for Putin to sort out the corruption cases, to intimidate the elite, but generally not to get worn out with real purges.  He recognizes corruption as an evil, but an unbeatable evil which is part of Russia’s historical tradition.  In other words, for Putin thievery is an insufficient basis for ‘sitting’ given the political loyalty of the ‘figure.’”

Bastrykin notwithstanding, the siloviki think they long since had enough evidence for Serdyukov’s prosecution. 

Stanovaya cites Kommersant’s report that the former minister decided to cooperate, to talk, because investigators recently conducted searches and seized documents on the case from his relatives.  The commentator believes his more constructive position improves his chances of escaping the affair without criminal charges.

If the existing affair of the three dachas weren’t enough, Nezavisimaya gazeta unearthed another issue last week.

In the deal to import light armored vehicles from the Italian firm IVECO, Serdyukov’s Defense Ministry allegedly conspired to avoid paying customs duties amounting to $10 million.  All for vehicles of questionable suitability for Russian conditions.  NG concludes charges will be brought against the Oboronservis officials involved in the purchase.   

The paper wonders out loud if Serdyukov will play a part in the regime’s anti-corruption campaign (such as it is): 

“A critical mass of dissatisfaction is accumulating.  The country’s leadership is turning into a hostage of its own effort to reprove part of the confused elite in this way.  Citizens have learned too much about the life of high officialdom so it’s possible the ‘valve could turn’ at any moment.  It’s possible for this besides the usual cosmetic means of a party-political character a serious sacrificial victim is required – if the process of disclosures goes far enough.  It’s possible that now some backstage casting for the role of such a victim is going on.”

Izvestiya provided details on Serdyukov’s personal involvement in building Puzikov’s resort on Zhitnoye, where he claimed officers could stay (but not for free) after air defense exercises at Ashuluk.  The former Defense Minister traveled to the site 17 times between 2010 and 2012, while the road construction and landscaping was in progress, on Air Forces helicopters leased to Chkalov Avia.  That company’s majority owner is Anna Tretyakova, and her mother Yelena is general director of Zhitnoye.

“First they built themselves a dacha at government expense, and then they wanted to rent out the very same — also at government expense.”

We usually get various prosecutors’ reports about this time.  This year’s no different.

Newsru.com picked up some of Main Military Prosecutor Sergey Fridinskiy’s comments on military corruption from the GVP’s web site.

The biggest issue, of course, is Oboronservis, 25 related criminal cases, and more than five billion rubles in damages to the state.  But those future facts and figures don’t play into Fridinskiy’s 2012 report.

In 2012, Fridinskiy said crimes by officers, as a share of the armed forces total, reached their highest level in 10 years — 30 percent.  The share of crimes by contract servicemen increased by 14 percent.

The overwhelming motive, said Fridinskiy, was greed, and losses to the state tripled to 11 billion rubles.

According to GVP data, every fifth crime involved corruption.  Losses from corruption exceeded seven billion rubles.  Bribery cases rose by a third.  Embezzlement and misappropriation by two times.  And fraud by almost 20 percent.

Three higher [general] officers and 210 senior officers, including 64 military unit commanders and chiefs of various facilities, were convicted of corruption-related offenses.

Putin promoted forty officers.  Most of their duty posts are identified on the spreadsheet.

You can see the original promotion list at Pravo.gov.ru or Krasnaya zvezda.

“The ‘Oboronservis’ Affair:  Figures and Episodes”

“Despite, more precisely, thanks to his unconstructive, in the SKR’s opinion, silence, Serdyukov continues to keep his witness status in the ‘Oboronservis’ affair.  At present the number of accused has reached eight.  And the charge of particularly large-scale fraud has been leveled at the former head of OAO ‘Oboronservis’ Vasilyeva (the restraint measure is house arrest), Smetanova (personal recognizance) and Zakutaylo (arrest).  Smetanova is also implicated in commercial bribery as a result of investigation of activity which the ‘Oboronservis’ affair initiated.”

“Another branch of the anticorruption investigation concerns OAO ‘Slavyanka’ and ZAO ‘Security and Communications.’  The three affairs, united into one case, arose over falsely signed statements of completed construction and cleaning work on Kolymazhnyy Lane, the Military Academy of the General Staff and a number of other facilities.  As of today in this affair the charge of particularly large-scale fraud has been leveled at five:  former general director of ‘Slavyanka’ and ‘Security’ founder Aleksandr Yelkin; Andrey Luganskiy, who has been general director of ‘Security’ since April 2011; ‘Security’ head bookkeeper Yuliya Rotanova.  And also Nikolay Ryabykh and Konstantin Lapshin – former acting chief of the Defense Ministry’s administrative directorate and chief of ‘Slavyanka’s’ repair department.  All of them are under arrest.”

“The largest part of criminal cases in ‘Oboronservis’ concerns the disposition of several pieces of property.  They are the complex of buildings ‘31st State Planning Institute of Special Construction’ and the ‘Main Directorate of Troop Installations,’ the hotel ‘Soyuz’ and the premises of OAO ‘Mosvoyentorg’ on the Arbat, buildings in the working-class village Bolshiye Vyazemy in Moscow Oblast, land plots in St. Petersburg.  Part of the matters arose over the facts of theft of money upon the conclusion of contracts with ‘Expert’ Smetanova, for example, in the sale of shares in Moscow-based ‘Central Experimental Production Combine’ and stakes in ООО ‘436th Non-Metallic Minerals Combine’ in Leningrad Oblast.”

“‘Thanks to timely intervention we succeeded in preventing the illegal, in our view, disposition of the building of the directorate of trade of the Moscow Military District on Bolshaya Serpukhovskaya Street in Moscow, and also the oil transshipping complex in the village of Roslyakovo-1 in Murmansk Oblast,’ - GVSU Chief Sorochkin boasted to ‘Rossiyskaya gazeta.’  He also recalled that today the general amount of losses, suffered by the state in the ‘Oboronservis’ affair, exceeded four billion rubles.”

“Serdyukov’s Brother-in-Law Could be Called for Questioning”

“So, investigators tactfully sidestep the question of whether the appearance of new figures and still more accused in the ‘Oboronservis’ affair is expected.  There are already a number of candidates to populate the list.  For example, there’s Marina Lopatina, ex-chief of OAO ‘Voyentorg’ and the ‘Red Star’ subholding.  But also head of ‘Oboronstroy’ Larisa Yegorina.  Both ladies are thought to be former classmates of Vasilyeva and at present are alleged to be on the run.”

“There are suspicions that Serdyukov’s brother-in-law is also on the run, still, it’s true, investigators are not confirming this information.  ‘I don’t have unambiguous information about this.  I confirm that we have questions for him, therefore he could be interrogated,’ – Sorochkin said.”

“Petersburg’s ‘Fontanka’ relays interesting facts from Puzikov’s life.  ‘No stranger to the family furniture business, Puzikov managed to achieve notable commercial successes also in the automobile business and in construction, and the amount of property he’s acquired is striking,’ – the article’s author notes.”

“According to the publication’s information, the Kuban native Puzikov built an expensive development where his neighbor found a space for Serdyukov’s OAO ‘Furniture-Market’ (the former ‘Lenmebeltorg’).  At the same address nine companies, fully or partly controlled by Puzikov, appeared, for example, OOO ‘Avtotsentr Soyuz 021.’  The auto business generally attracted Puzikov’s attention, ‘Fontanka’ notes.  So, he owns 15% of OOO ‘Aksel Group’ - a large dealer of BMW, Volkswagen and Toyota automobiles, one of the showrooms of which is located in the very same expensive development.  Incidentally, also located there is OOO ‘Avtoservis-MM,’ where Viktor Zubkov, father of Serdyukov’s wife Yuliya Zubkova bought a Toyota Land Cruiser, ‘Fontanka’ writes.”

“The publication also reports that Puzikov together with Aleksandr and Petr Usov and Artur Pozov was involved in construction, and also bought up property in Leningrad Oblast.  According to YEGRYUL [Unified State Register of Juridical Persons] data, today limited liability companies ‘Alyans’ (until 2012 – ‘Furniture-Market’), ‘Petersburg Agricultural Corporation,’ ‘Contemporary Food Technologies,’ ‘Investproyekt,’ ‘KRIOS’ fully belong to Puzikov, he has shares in OOO ‘Novyy Megapolis,’ ‘TrestStroyKomplekt’ and ‘InterVal.’  An OOO with the classic name ‘Vektor-SPb,’ in which Puzikov was the only participant, no longer belongs to him, but the firm remained in the larger family [?!] of the ex-defense minister — now its owner is Yevgeniya Vasilyeva, ‘Fontanka’ concludes.”

Inspection Report Delivered in Central Command Post

More reaction to the results of the inspection . . .

Nezavisimoye voyennoye obozreniye editor Viktor Litovkin expressed surprise at ”the military’s absolute openness” in allowing journalists to attend General Staff Chief Valeriy Gerasimov’s report on the results of the exercise.

Litovkin noted the 98th Air-Assault Division’s 227th Parachute-Assault Regiment participated in the exercise.  Su-25 and Su-24 aircraft flew from 4th Air and Air Defense Command bases at Primorsko-Akhtarsk, Morozovsk, and Marinovka.

201st Military Base Commander, Colonel Sergey Ryumshin attributed his problems in communicating to the Russian military in Tajikistan using old local phone lines, which are often out of order.  Gerasimov ordered the chief of the Main (?!) Directorate of Communications to sort out the problems.

Litovkin added that part and system malfunctions kept five Mi-8 and Mi-24 helicopters from the 2nd Air and Air Defense Command’s 565th Aviation Base from joining the exercise.  Su-25 ground attack aircraft from the 4th Command’s 6972nd Aviation Base returned home without dropping ordnance. 

Two Msta-S artillery systems were out of order in the Central MD’s 28th Motorized Rifle Brigade.  Oleg Sidenko [sic] was there to answer for this.  He said there are defects in 900 Msta-S systems.  Siyenko, you’ll recall, is General Director of Uralvagonzavod, owner of Uraltransmash.  The latter has a contract to maintain the Msta-S, but needs to buy new components from sub-contractors.  Siyenko indicated he wants his enterprise to take over Oboronservis affiliate Spetsremont, currently responsible for Defense Ministry armored vehicles.  He said UVZ can’t constantly make repairs “on the fly.”

Litovkin reported 100 R-168-5un radios in the 58th Army are inoperable.  Specialists call these systems from the Yaroslavl Radio Factory unreliable.

However, an earlier NVO article, by Oleg Vladykin, points to the positive; 20 VTA transports were able to operate successfully. 

Vedomosti’s Aleksey Nikolskiy summed the inspection up this way:

“In Soviet times such evaluations were conducted so often that every officer fell into them at least once every two years, says retired Colonel Viktor Murakhovskiy.  Unsatisfactory results after so many years without normal combat training don’t surprise the expert, in his words, such an inspection is very useful and will give the Genshtab a picture of the true condition of combat readiness.  The reason such a large quantity of equipment is out of order is also fully clear — organizational chaos has ruled in the realm of equipment repair in the troops in recent years, the expert says.  Therefore Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu’s decision to return repair sub-units which were liquidated in the course of the transition to outsourcing should be implemented as quickly as possible.”

Yes, it’s not surprising, and the honesty is the first step toward improvement.  But we should remember the civilian side of the Serdyukov-led Defense Ministry really didn’t, and wasn’t supposed to, worry too much about what the troops could do in strictly military terms.  That was properly the responsibility of the General Staff.  Shouldn’t it be criticizing itself too?  Shouldn’t it have come forward about problems earlier?

And one has to wonder, in the relatively short period of time since Serdyukov announced the outsourcing of most army maintenance, how much outsourcing was actually done?  Certainly some, but certainly not all of it.  Nevertheless, Serdyukov’s scheme is certainly bearing the brunt of the blame.  A proper question might be how capable were those repair sub-units before Serdyukov supposedly swept them all away?  Probably not very.

Army General Gerasimov promised surprise inspections and exercises will occur regularly now.  It’ll be interesting to see just how routine they become.

Army General Valeriy Gerasimov

Complete coverage of General Staff Chief Valeriy Gerasimov’s remarks on the surprise inspection and readiness exercise can be found on Radio Voice of Russia or Mil.ru.

According to the newly-minted army general (four stars), the General Staff planned the inspection on the Defense Minister’s order.  It evaluated command and control organs, formations, and units of the Central and Southern MDs, VDV, VTA, and the 12th GUMO.  It was the largest of its kind in 20 years. 

The inspection began at 0400 on 18 February when operational and unit duty officers received packets with General Staff orders to go to higher states of combat readiness and carry out combat training missions.  This, Gerasimov said, required moving and transporting forces to exercise areas and “unfamiliar terrain” far from their permanent deployment locations.  The inspection included 7,000 soldiers, several hundred pieces of equipment, and 48 aircraft.

The General Staff Chief emphasized that the inspection was a complete surprise to command and control organs and troops to allow for objectively the combat readiness of formations and uncovering problems.

He praised the readiness and performance of sub-units of the VDV’s 98th Air-Assault Division (Ivanovo) and the 4th Air Forces and Air Defense Command (Southern MD / Rostov).  What was likely a battalion tactical group of the 98th loaded in twenty Il-76 transports and flew to Shagol outside Chelyabinsk, marched 100 km under difficult conditions (-20° C / -4° F, broken terrain, deep snow cover) to Chebarkul, and conducted its combat training.  For its part, the 4th VVS and PVO Command’s aircraft conducted bombing exercises with good or excellent results.

There were, however, “a number of systematic deficiencies in the state of combat readiness and lever of personnel training.” 

In practically all evaluated elements, duty officers showed weak skill in transmitting orders via automated combat command and control systems.  They weren’t certain how to receive the order to go to higher readiness.  In the VDV and the 201st Military Base, it took too long to send signals to subordinate troops.

In the Central MD’s 28th Motorized Rifle Brigade, training center graduates, drivers, and mechanic-drivers showed a low level of training.  Tank and BMP crews usually got only satisfactory in firing exercises.  Young officers just graduated from military schools exhibited poor knowledge of weapons and equipment.

Equipment generally performed reliably, given the weather conditions and its age.  Some of it required repair in the field, and, according to Gerasimov, this demonstrated the expedience of the Defense Minister’s decision to reestablish maintenance units.  But they need more training, spare parts, and improved organization.  Factory repair is more problematic:

“Sufficiently efficient work by repair factories and industrial enterprises is a serious problem for the troops.  Equipment coming from capital or medium repair, even under a service guarantee, often breaks down in the first months of its use in line units.  An analysis of deficiencies discovered is currently being conducted.”

Interesting, where does the fault lie?  The factory or troops and young officers who don’t know how to use or repair it?

Gerasimov admitted and lamented that nearly two-thirds of aircraft (in units being drilled?) is out of repair.  He called effective resolution of this problem the most important joint task of command and control organs and industry.

Gerasimov called the BMD-2 both obsolete and worn-out at 20 to 25 years old, or even more.  At 14.2 metric tons, he said the BMD-4M’s weight is at the limit for air transport, and an Il-76 can only carry three.  The General Staff Chief cited repair problems with Mi-8 and Mi-24 helicopters, Su-25, self-propelled Msta artillery, and R-168-5un radio.  He indicated the still experimental Volk armored vehicle doesn’t meet 12 of its TTZs and won’t undergo repeat state testing.

Gerasimov said the Defense Minister has decided inspections like this will now take place on a regular basis.

It’s Not a Search (photo: Polit.ru)

Nervous times for some in the Defense Ministry.

The mail delivery woman knocks on the Defense Ministry’s door and says, “Open up, don’t be afraid!  It’s not a search.  It’s a postcard for 23 February.”

It’s a Defender’s Day greeting with a tank and red star, reading “I congratulate you on 23 February . . . .”

Cartoonist Sergey Yelkin (Yolkin, Elkin, Ёлкин, Елкин) is a Russian national treasure however you spell his name.

To this English speaker’s fingers, reaching for and finding the Ё key is akin to a holy fool wandering from Moscow to Anadyr.

Yes, if one had a category for Cheap Posts, this would be filed there.