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From Av Week:
World News & Analysis
Russia's Defense-Aerospace Sector Stands To Benefit From Spending Rise
Aviation Week & Space Technology
07/05/2004, page 34
Alexey Komarov
Moscow
Douglas Barrie
London
Russia's aerospace/defense sector stands to benefit from planned rise in spending
Budget Inflation
The Russian defense ministry hopes to bolster procurement and research and development funding as part of its overall 2005 budget, with the air force focus on adequately supporting its fifth-generation fighter effort.
Senior government officials discussed a draft of the 2005 budget last month. While details of the funding proposal are classified, the overall level of spending appears likely to rise from 2.8% to 2.9% of the country's gross domestic product to 520 billion rubles ($17.93 billion).
While this is a comparatively small increase, procurement spending, including research, development, acquisitions and upgrades to existing systems, will get a disproportionate boost of about 45 billion rubles. And Russia's economy, buoyed by skyrocketing oil prices, is growing rapidly.
Total procurement funding would be around 180 billion rubles. This figure would be supplemented by proceeds from weapons exports. Last year export sales topped $5 billion, the bulk generated by the sale of combat aircraft and air defense systems (AW&ST Feb. 23, p. 52).
If all this funding materializes, it would mark a distinct improvement for Russia's aerospace-defense sector, which has in many areas been nearly crippled by a lack of cash.
The government has been trying to boost procurement funding since 2002, but results so far have been patchy. The air force has yet to receive a single new-build aircraft, although it has started to take deliveries of the upgraded Sukhoi Su-27SM. This is a comparatively limited upgrade, but does give the basic Flanker an air-to-surface capability.
Five aircraft have so far been modified, with a further 20 to be upgraded this year by the Komsomolsk-on-Amur production plant.
Another likely beneficiary of the funding increase is the Sukhoi Su-34, a strike variant of the Flanker, previously known as the Su-27IB. This long delayed program is intended to provide a successor to the Su-24 Fencer, as well as take on some roles from the Tupolev Tu-22M Backfire.
One beneficiary of the proposed funding increase could be the Sukhoi Su-34, a strike variant of the Su-27 Flanker.
However, the primary recipient of additional cash will almost certainly be the air force's fifth-generation fighter development. Sukhoi is working on the design, understood to carry the internal designation of the T-50. A prototype is slated to be flown--perhaps optimistically--in 2006.
The bulk of funds over the past few years has gone into attempting to sustain Russia's strategic inventory, including its intercontinental ballistic missiles and bomber fleet. The Tu-95 Bear and the Tu-160 Blackjack are both the subject of upgrade programs.
The air force also appears to be close to fielding a new conventional long-range cruise missile, the Raduga Kh-555, believed to be nearing the end of trials. The Kh-555 is a derivative of the Kh-55 (AS-15 Kent), with the nuclear payload replaced by a conventional warhead.
Raduga is also working on the Kh-101/Kh-102 family of long-range cruise missiles. These systems will eventually replace the Kh-55/Kh-555.
The Duma, the lower chamber of the Russian parliament, will discuss the draft budget at the end of July.
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