Status of Russian Military Industrial Complex (MIC)

kvs wrote:We have seen in the course of the Ukraine operation that even an old integrated AA missile system network can shut down air force operations outside of standoff platforms.
So all the yammering about how many M-35s or Su-57s that Russia needs is not on target.   Russia needs to have an excess of anti-aircraft missiles and systems.   This includes
anti-drone units.

Unfortunately you are not following the war in Ukraine. The Russian air force is making a difference on the battlefield... Layered anti-aircraft defenses are fundamental, but they do not replace aircraft. Isreal has been attacking Syria with its air force for years and suffered 1 loss, causing damage mainly to the Iranian structure present there. Russia then lost several aircraft at the beginning due to wrong tactics and also due to friendly fire. After they realigned tactics and used glide bombs, the damage to the Ukrainian positions was huge.
I continue with my point of view on the matter.

There is certainly the issue of cost, although Russia is at war and cannot do without an air force with the minimum quantity necessary for defense/attack. It is certainly possible to reduce costs in other areas, as well as rationalize the existing one in order to make room for these acquisitions. Remembering that mass production reduces unit cost. When it comes to low-cost aircraft, I think they should go with the Su 75, not the Mig 35, which in my opinion is obsolete.

Think of it in terms of SAMS... what you are essentially saying is that the Russian army should stop wasting time and money on BUK/Viking and and S-350 and Pantsir/TOR systems and even MANPADS and SOSNA etc and just have lots of S-300V4 and S-400... because one S-400 battery can cover an enormous area.

An Su-35 and Su-57 can fly around a large area but it only can defend the distance its missiles can reach.

In comparison a MiG-35 can carry the same missiles with the same reach but having three or four for each of the larger types means it can be in several places at once thereby offering better coverage.

They can't go for the Su-75 because it hasn't even flown yet.

With AESA radar and IIR and IRST sensors and modern missiles, the only difference it has with the Su-75 would be level of stealth and if that is obsolete then why is the US putting F-15 and F-16 back into production because those aircraft are even older.

More importantly the F-15s they are talking about are going to be about 200 million each, you could probably get 5 or 6 MiG-35s for that price and operate them for a year.

We have seen in the course of the Ukraine operation that even an old integrated AA missile system network can shut down air force operations outside of standoff platforms.
So all the yammering about how many M-35s or Su-57s that Russia needs is not on target. Russia needs to have an excess of anti-aircraft missiles and systems

The situation in Ukraine is unique because the Ukraine can send things to the west for repair and new build material and their recon assets are safe from attack.

In a real conflict with HATO things will be different and having lots of platforms with radar and IR sensors that can detect targets in real time on the battlefield would actually allow the Russian military to send drones and guided munitions to attack target as they are detected leading to the massacre of enemy forces.

In a net centric environment you improve things by adding data collectors, and also adding weapon platforms that can engage said targets.

The light fighter or frontal aviation fighter is both... it offers ground forces unprecedented views of the battlefield in real time and the opportunity to attack enemy positions and forces in real time the way that drones struggle to do because of their low flight speed and lack of AESA radar and long range wide field IR sensors, and of course their inability to carry tons of weapons at a time.

With new glide bombs and missiles these MiGs wont operate directly over the battlefield but can sit back and look for threats and targets and launch standoff attacks at important targets they spot or coordinate artillery or drones to attack those targets.

The Russian air force is making a difference on the battlefield... Layered anti-aircraft defenses are fundamental, but they do not replace aircraft. Isreal has been attacking Syria with its air force for years and suffered 1 loss, causing damage mainly to the Iranian structure present there. Russia then lost several aircraft at the beginning due to wrong tactics and also due to friendly fire. After they realigned tactics and used glide bombs, the damage to the Ukrainian positions was huge.
I continue with my point of view on the matter.

I agree, and think what is missing is the numbers aircraft that provides the data on enemy positions and enemy platforms, but also carries weapons to deal with all these new targets they will be finding and tracking.

When the small Russian forces went into the Ukraine the Ukrainian forces could rely on their numbers to force Russian forces to retreat in some locations just by overwhelming them with targets. The Russian forces retreated while whittling down the attacking forces but that required the Russian forces to fire their weapons revealing their locations to the enemy... the enemy would send in a wave of concripts to attack and note where the Russian firing positions were and then attack those positions with artillery and their own fire when the next wave attacked... forcing the Russian forces to withdraw... not that the Russians didn't know what they were doing and had their own artillery zeroed on their own positions so once they were out they could hammer the enemy and then attack and retake the position a lot of the time... all the while inflicting massive losses on the enemy.

The point is that if the Russian forces had more guns... more shooters... more infantry... it would take more and more enemy numbers to overwhelm them, because there would be more eyes looking for enemy and more guns reducing their numbers.

When you have 50 guys and 300 enemy attack you at best you can shoot at 50 at a time... sometimes your shooting will overlap so you might only be shooting at 30, while 300 are shooting at you. Depending on how much open ground they have to cover you could be in trouble... more so if that is only the first wave and there are four more waves on the way.

Right now the Ukrainian air defence is reduced to ambush attacks which means you can use standoff weapons to hit their positions and as we see a 500 kg bomb does way more damage than even a 120kg 240mm mortar bomb, and MiG-35s can carry plenty of those...

Most of the aircraft that Russia lost were doing ground attacks.

The introduction of glide kits for iron bombs and stand off missiles and rockets and of course their wide range of other stand off weapons... Kh-38s deliver a 250kg warhead to 40km range and are in serial production... the new Grom glide bombs are also cleared for use too... their problem is finding enough targets to use these weapons on and the introduction of MiG-35s adds weapons platforms to deliver these weapons from standoff distances but also the sensors and equipment to find the targets in the first place... AI drones looking for HATO equipment is a great improvement and drones in general are useful too, but manned aircraft have a part to play as well.

Drones are dumb and are easier to shoot down because they don't tend to react to being fired upon.

I also think they should integrate the LMUR and Vikhr into the MiG-35. And use the MiG-35 to supplement Su-25 losses.

The evolution of the Su-25 has been to become more and more sophisticated and capable while still delivering cheap dumb rockets and bombs.

As an evolution I think MiG-35s that operate at greater distance and instead of using eyes to spot targets using high resolution optics and AESA radar to scan the front line from a standoff distance is starting to make sense. No level of armour will keep future CAS aircraft safe, it seems hitting the ground targets when they don't even know you can see them is where CAS is going.

The stock of S-300 missiles and launchers in Ukraine was large enough to last them nearly two years. NATzO supplying Patriot systems
has been a kind of joke since they have not extended Ukraine's anti-aircraft complex by any significant length of time. Sure, Ukraine got
S-300 systems and missiles from former Warsaw Pact members but most of that was before February of 2022. The stuff they got after
was not enough to determine the capacity.

Anyway, people have been conditioned by NATzO imperial operations against nearly defenseless countries and think that air power
is the cat's meow. If Iraq had a system like Ukraine, then there would be no turkey shoot and the war would have lasted much longer.
Having large fleets of fighter jets makes more sense for imperial adventures than for homeland defense. The amount of Su-57s and
other models that Russia needs is determined by its air defense network and the number of NATzO jets it can take out in short order.
This is substantially less than the total number of jets fielded by NATzO. But any war with NATzO will escalate to nukes so this is all
academic.

Greece is going (or has already) transfer its S-300 systems to Ukraine. I am a bit surprised that the number of launchers in the former
Warsaw Pact was so limited. Did Poland have any?

There was a surge of equipment transfer since 2014. This is the prime reason that the capacity to transfer after 2022 was limited.
It also explains why Ukraine had any substantial numbers of operational tanks. They did not restore the rusting junk from the tank
bone yards. Mighty Ukria had essentially zero new tank production even though it had the Kharkov tank production complex.

Did Poland have any?

No. Poland never had any S-300s.

In addition, the West warns that the Russian military-industrial complex is producing seven times more ammunition than Moscow's adversaries, twice as much as at the end of January 2024. The Estonian Ministry of Defense believes that this year the Russian Federation will produce about 4.5 million ammunition. Also, a certain number of shells will arrive in Russia from Iran and North Korea.

The European Union will be able to produce about 1.4 million ammunition this year and about 2 million in 2025. If the political situation in the United States is favorable for Ukraine, the Americans will produce 1.2 million shells by the end of next year.

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2024 should be a record year in terms of supplies of weapons and equipment to the front. We can say that 2022 was a time of forced and emergency decisions, 2023 - mobilization and restructuring of production, 2024 - a systematic and large-scale increase in military production. Of course, I would like such production rates to be felt in the spring of 2022, but we have to work with what we have.

This year the Army will receive more than 36 thousand samples of military equipment and 16.6 million weapons. We'll talk about technology later, but for now let's focus on weapons. Obviously, we are talking about ammunition of various calibers and purposes. Such volumes of supplies suggest a consistent increase in attacks on military targets of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the depths of the defense - that is, there will be more Geraniums and other long-range equipment.

In January, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu visited the Raduga ICB from the Tactical Missile Weapons group, where, among other things, they announced an eight-fold increase in production volumes. There will also be more artillery ammunition. Interestingly, new modifications of 122-mm and 152-mm shells have already been noted at the front. A number of Telegram channels immediately inform about the appearance of shells filled with hexal instead of TNT. This provides a 1.5-fold increase in lethality on the target. The range should be increased by a more advanced aerodynamic shape of the projectiles. The appearance of “simplified” projectiles of the 152-mm 3OF98, 122-mm 3OF99 and 3OF56IM-1 series produced in 2023 has been noted, in which the original TNT is retained as an explosive.

On average, the Russian Army spends every month at least one million units of weapons of various classes and purposes. Increasing ammunition production was not easy. First of all, new areas and capacities had to be put into operation. It required the involvement of a large number of specialists, some of whom had to be retrained, and sometimes retrained. The shortage of workers, by the way, is the main problem of the country's growing defense sector. Mobilization, which removed 300 thousand healthy and strong men of working age from the labor market, and the general growth of industrial production throughout the country also had an impact.

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Even if they could reach those promised figures... not very much is getting to the front line intact and when it does reach the front it often gets hit in ammo and fuel dump attacks that destroys it and renders it useless.

They will likely run out of men before anything else actually runs out.

The pace the Russian defense industry has picked up in 2023 has made it possible to significantly increase the production of weapons and ammunition. Bekhan Ozdoev, industrial director of the conventional weapons, ammunition and special chemicals cluster of the State Corporation, spoke about work on a new heavy flamethrower system, the development of ammunition capable of destroying American Abrams, and innovations in the fight against attack drones in an exclusive interview with TASS.


– Bekhan Ibrahimovic, a special operation has been going on in Ukraine for two years now. The military equipment that Russia will use during the Northern Military District is 90% produced by Rostec enterprises. These include planes, tanks, drones, small arms, and, of course, artillery. In modern warfare, artillery has again confirmed its leading role. How much has the rate of production of artillery systems increased over the past two years? What are the most important achievements in this area?

– If we compare the domestic defense industry at the beginning of 2022 and now, the difference is huge. We have achieved production rates and volumes that only recently seemed unrealistic. Compared to 2022, the production volume of self-propelled artillery has increased 10 times, towed artillery - 14 times. Mortars - 20 times, MLRS - 2 times. In addition, the production of components has been established. In particular, the production and repair of tank guns and artillery barrels has doubled. As a result, in 2023, Rostec fulfilled the state defense order for the supply of artillery in full.

Of course, there is a big contribution from our specialists - engineers, workers, plant directors. People understand that they are working to win, and they spare no effort. At the same time, there was serious preparatory work. Over the years, our enterprises have purchased equipment and modernized. We mastered new technologies and carried out promising developments. Artillery, which Stalin called the “god of war,” was a special focus of attention.

Last year we completed the development of several new systems. Among them are the 152-mm Malva wheeled howitzer, the 82-mm Drok self-propelled mortar, and the 57-mm Derivatsiya-PVO anti-aircraft artillery complex. This technique has advanced combat qualities and provides good protection for the crew. It is very much needed in the Northern Military District zone, we understand this and have done everything to complete the task as quickly as possible.

I would like to note that we respond flexibly to the needs of the army. Our designers and engineers continue to refine weapons and military equipment and improve them based on the results of their use in the Northern Military District zone. Today we not only produce well-proven models, but also develop new ones. Engineering thought does not stand still.

– Can you tell me more?

– For example, everyone knows the TOS-1 “Solntsepek” and TOS-2 “Tosochka” heavy flamethrower systems. This is a powerful weapon that has proven itself well in the NWO zone. We are currently working on creating a new heavy flamethrower system TOS-3. The promising tracked vehicle will be equipped with a new launcher. This will increase the firing range and use new ammunition. The first prototype has already been created.

– Tell us about the production of ammunition. Is there an increase in their production volumes? Have new ammunition been developed in 2023?

– In 2023, Rostec enterprises supplied 25 times more ammunition than a year earlier. The production of the entire line of weapons has increased. For certain items, supplies have been increased up to 50 times. For some items, advance delivery of part of the volume of tasks of the state defense order for 2024 was carried out in excess of the approved schedule for 2023.

For example, last year we increased the production of shots for automatic and under-barrel grenade launchers fivefold. This is compared to the period before the start of the SVO. And we plan to further increase the production of such ammunition due to the great demand. Our army is advancing, and these shots increase the offensive potential of units in the near tactical zone.

In addition, in 2023, the State Corporation also multiplied the production of guided artillery shells, including Krasnopol-M2. This year we will also increase the production of these products.

Today, Rostec's ammunition factories are at 100% capacity and work 24/7. This year we plan to further increase the production of weapons and expand production capacity.

I would like to add that our specialists are constantly improving the production process. Last year, Rostec enterprises began the industrial production of gunpowder from alternative raw materials - wood and flax cellulose. The results are positive: a set of tests and practical shooting showed that such gunpowder is in no way inferior to traditional ones. There is no shortage of wood raw materials in Russia. In the future, the share of new raw materials in the production of gunpowder will reach 60–70%.

– The SVO showed the importance of unmanned aircraft. Is Rostec currently developing special ammunition for drones? Has their serial production already been established?

– Today no one doubts the effectiveness of drones on the battlefield. We see many examples where our drones help fighters conduct reconnaissance, direct strikes and destroy Western equipment, including the vaunted Abrams.

Last year, Rostec specialists developed a line of airdropable weapons for drones. We quickly launched large-scale production of them and organized uninterrupted supplies. In 2024, their production will be increased. The manufactured range is planned to be expanded in accordance with the operational needs of the troops.

Currently, the priority is the serial production of inserted warheads with a specialized fuse. Such ammunition ensures safe and reliable operation of kamikaze drones of various payload classes.

– Please tell us about new products in the field of ammunition for the most modern tanks used in the Northern Military District.

– We are working ahead and creating a new line of promising ammunition with improved characteristics. This takes into account the parameters and features of the protection of captured armored vehicles, data on the protection of promising enemy models, and information received from tankers taking part in a special military operation. If the enemy creates a new tank with improved protection, our task is to release ammunition that will multiply their efforts by zero.

– It was previously reported that one of Rostec’s enterprises has developed an automated gun control system that programs ammunition to explode at the optimal point for hitting the enemy. Are the holding companies developing ammunition with programmable detonation? How effective are such munitions in the fight against drones? Are there any combat tests?

– This is a very promising direction, and, of course, such work is underway. For example, a 30-mm shot with a high-explosive fragmentation projectile with a remotely controlled fuse was created. A complex for remote control of detonation time has been developed for combat vehicles, providing commanded detonation of a projectile at the desired point in the flight path. Last year, it successfully passed state tests as part of a BMPT (tank support combat vehicle - TASS note), they confirmed the correctness of engineering calculations. In the future, such a complex is planned to be placed not only in BMPTs, but also in the combat modules of BTR-82A, BMP-3M, etc. This will significantly increase the effectiveness of small-caliber cannon weapons.

In addition, our designers are creating means to combat small-sized drones and enemy loitering munitions, including attack FPV drones. On our own initiative, we quickly developed a small-caliber shot with a multi-element projectile and a remote-controlled fuse. The design of this product contains striking elements, which, after the command detonation of a projectile, create a field of striking elements directed towards the UAV.

Our engineers are now actively working on several options for expanding air defense capabilities in the fight against drones. All options are fully developed from a constructive and technical point of view, that is, they are practically ready and do not require time for modification. In particular, the use of 57-mm or 30-mm artillery shrapnel rounds with controlled remote detonation based on the Derivation-Air Defense and Typhoon-VDV complexes is being considered.

– We have repeatedly reported on the effectiveness of using aerial bombs with a universal planning and correction module in the NWO zone. Is work currently underway to modernize them?

– UMPC is a vivid example of the fact that everything ingenious is simple. Today, our specialists, together with KTRV JSC, continue work on adapting standard aviation ammunition to the planning and correction module. Due to the demand for long-range weapons, the production of aerial bombs of all calibers and types of action is being increased for use with the specified modules.

– Many have seen footage from the front, where equipment is moving under the cover of smoke bombs, or footage of the Crimean Bridge in a smoke screen. Has the production of these products increased? Are there any new developments in this area now?

– Despite their apparent simplicity, such means are very effective for protecting armored vehicles, ships, coastline objects, etc. They set up camouflage screens and create decoys that “divert” the enemy’s attacking ammunition. We produce a wide range of aerosol masking and jamming products - from hand-held smoke grenades and mines to smoke protection systems. We continue to improve their characteristics and create new models that meet the latest challenges dictated by the realities of modern combat.

– Are there any improvements in jamming and anti-radar cartridges for aviation based on the results of their use in air defense systems? Is the production of these products increasing?

– To protect airplanes, helicopters and ground equipment from high-precision weapons, Rostec enterprises supply the troops with more than 20 types of jamming cartridges of various calibers. Our products can set different types of decoys, be they thermal (infrared), anti-laser, anti-radar or combined. They protect military equipment from guided missile systems with optical, infrared, radar homing heads, as well as from missiles with laser proximity fuses. Combined decoys can protect aircraft and helicopters in the visible, infrared and radar ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum. It must be said that the developments of our specialists can significantly increase the combat capabilities of aviation in the conditions of the Northern Military District.

The reliability and effectiveness of protecting aircraft and helicopters from enemy missiles, including modern man-portable anti-aircraft missile systems, has been repeatedly confirmed in real combat conditions. Now the volume of orders is growing, we are fulfilling them in full. Of course, our specialists are working to modernize products, including analyzing information about the latest weapons systems used by the enemy. I can say with confidence that the existing scientific and technical potential allows us to quickly and efficiently solve these problems.

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Thank god, Derivatsiya-PVO is still alive...