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| Defense for the 'offensive.' Kyiv dreams with the help of the West to revive the dead military-industrial complex |
| 2023-06-22 |
| Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. by Sergey Adamov [REGNUM] Military-industrial firms from Britain, France, Germany and Eastern European countries are planning to create several defense enterprises in Ukraine. This was stated in an interview with Reuters by Sergey Boev , Deputy Minister of Industry of Ukraine for Strategic Industries. “We are in … very detailed negotiations. We are sure that in the next few months we will sign contract agreements,” the official said. The message about the plans of the Western military-industrial complex to deploy production in the conflict zone was heard against the backdrop of reports of ongoing fighting in the Donetsk and Zaporozhye directions. The offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, long promised to Western partners, is not only “ slower than expected” (as the Kiev leadership admitted), but is also accompanied by tangible damage, including in equipment. Since June 4 alone, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have lost 245 tanks and 678 armored vehicles of various types, which was announced on June 21 by Russian President Vladimir Putin. Only in the area of the village of Novodonetskoye, fifty units of Ukrainian equipment, both Soviet and NATO, were knocked out. It has been repeatedly noted earlier: the more the Armed Forces of Ukraine lose Soviet-type combat vehicles (both inherited from the all-Union military-industrial complex, and transferred by NATO from among the countries of the former Warsaw Pact), the more Ukraine depends on the supply of, in fact, Western equipment, both NATO, as well as "neutral." At the same time, all the costs of production, delivery, maintenance of equipment are forced to take on the countries of the West. In such a situation, the “partners” from the alliance are looking for ways to get rid of some of the costs and shift the issues of repair, and possibly the production of armored vehicles, onto the shoulders of Ukrainian partners. Therefore, Boev's statement about the deployment of enterprises for the repair (and, possibly, assembly) of equipment looks plausible. The West cannot restore in Ukraine an equally powerful military-industrial complex similar to the one that existed in the Ukrainian SSR, military expert Oleg Zheltonozhko emphasized in a commentary to IA Regnum. WHAT WAS AND WHAT CAME “Ukraine has traditionally had a developed military industry since Soviet times as part of a single Soviet military-industrial complex. In the event of a possible military conflict with NATO, it was considered the front-line rear of the first echelon,” the expert recalled. According to experts, at the time of the collapse of the Union, about 2 thousand enterprises, design bureaus and other organizations related to the defense industry were concentrated in the Ukrainian SSR. Up to 2.7 million people worked at 1,840 enterprises (for example, in the Nikolaev region, up to 25% of the able-bodied population was employed at defense enterprises). According to various estimates, the Ukrainian state had at its disposal from 17% to a quarter of the all-Union military-industrial complex, which in 1991 could give up to a third of the GDP of an independent state, according to data provided on the IMEMO RAS portal. Ukraine could earn not only on the production and sale, but also on the repair of Soviet equipment, Zheltonozhko notes. “Here, among other things, enterprises for the repair and maintenance of military equipment were concentrated. In particular, the Kharkov armored plant, repair enterprises in Nikolaev, for the repair of armored vehicles, a tank repair plant in Lvov, ”the military expert listed. But, the interlocutor noted, all the production facilities in Ukraine to one degree or another depended first on the all-union defense complex, and later on cooperation with Russia. As the Military Review portal recalls , the tanks produced at KhTZM (Kharkov Transport Engineering Plant) had up to 50% of Russian components. Therefore, since 2014, with an active severance of economic ties with Russia, the industry for the production and maintenance of military equipment “began to gradually bend,” Zheltonozhko notes. As IA Regnum noted earlier , in a relatively peaceful 2019, the Ukrainian military-industrial complex was in a dying state. If until 2014 the revenue of the Zaporozhye enterprise Motor Sich alone could reach $1 billion a year, by 2019 the volume of products actually produced by the Ukrainian defense industry barely reached $500 million. Of the 350 military-industrial complex enterprises, more than 100 were inactive and fifty were in bankruptcy proceedings. And in the best years of independence, the production of new types of weapons by Ukrainian enterprises faced serious difficulties, Zheltonozhko noted. The main brainchild of the Ukrainian military-industrial complex - the Oplot tank manufactured by the Kharkov plant - due to financial difficulties, had to be made from "recycled materials," melting down the armor of Soviet tanks. 2014 AND 2022 BECAME POINTS OF NO RETURN, INCLUDING FOR THE MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX Of course, the loss of control over the Donbass caused great damage to the Ukrainian military industry. Suffice it to mention that until 2014, the following worked for the Ukrainian military-industrial complex: the Lugansk Aircraft Repair Plant, the Luhansk Cartridge Plant, the Topaz Donetsk Plant (development and production of radio-technical complexes, including the Kolchuga reconnaissance stations), the Gorlovsky chemical plant (production of explosives), the Zarya chemical plant in Rubizhne on the territory of the LPR (TNT production) and other facilities lost to Ukraine. The objects of the Ukrainian defense industry, which continued to operate in the territories controlled by Kiev, with the start of the special operation, came under attack from the Russian Aerospace Forces and high-precision missile weapons. “It was repeatedly announced that strikes were being carried out against the Kiev design bureau Luch, Pavlodar, where the production of rocket technology is located,” Zheltonozhko cited examples. A significant part of these enterprises has already been put out of action. “They are being decentralized. That is, production facilities are moved to several objects remote from each other,” the interlocutor pointed out. — Take, for example, the Zaporizhzhya MotorSich plant, which produced aircraft engines. He was hit several times. There is information that the equipment is taken out and distributed by some nests at existing industrial sites. A certain share of military production remains, however, maintenance of equipment is not carried out on the same scale as before, the interlocutor concluded. Accordingly, there was a need for assistance from the new NATO countries - Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and others. ZAPOROZHYE "BAYRAKTAR" AND "DID NOT TAKE OFF" The further Ukraine moved away from Russia, the more often, before the start of the NMD, there was talk about the need for closer cooperation with NATO in the field of arms production. In October 2022, Haluk Bayraktar, the head of the Turkish concern Baykar, was one of the first to announce the possibility of creating an enterprise in Ukraine according to NATO standards. According to him, the construction of a plant in the Kiev region will take about two years, then RIA Novosti reported. However, since then, no information about the construction of the enterprise has appeared in the media. “As for the Baykar enterprise for the production of drones in Ukraine, for the first time this was announced even before the start of the SVO,” Zheltonozhko noted, “ It was assumed that some components would be supplied from Turkey, and Ukraine would produce engines. However, after the Motor Sich plant shut down part of the production for objective reasons, the project stalled. Therefore, it is not worth waiting for the production of modern drones to be launched in Ukraine in the near future. But in any case, Kiev is faced with the task of servicing NATO-made military equipment. In the context of full-fledged hostilities and heavy losses at the front, sending Western armored vehicles to Europe for repairs seriously complicates logistics. RHEINMETAL REPAIR WORKSHOPS Therefore, as mentioned above, there was a need to create some enterprises for the maintenance of Western military equipment, primarily armored vehicles, closer to the theater of operations. “Now the Armed Forces of Ukraine are armed with a lot of military equipment made in Germany and France,” Zheltonozhko said. "We are talking, again, about armored vehicles and artillery. From here, there are initiatives from Western partners, for example from the Rheinmetall concern, to create enterprises to service them." So far, the task is clearly not to create a full-cycle enterprise. “It is difficult to say how realistic it is to create a full-fledged enterprise. Now it's probably unrealistic. Some local productions may appear, but there will be no large ones comparable to Soviet ones,” Oleg Zheltonozhko notes. Andrey Koshkin, an expert from the association of military political scientists, has a slightly different opinion. He agrees: the creation of large enterprises for the production of military equipment in Ukraine is not possible, but there are several nuances. CALCULATION FOR THE "KOREAN SCENARIO" “Ukraine does not have the potential to create a full-scale military production. This means that it is necessary to work in cooperation with Western states, including Germany. The head of the Rheinmetall concern generally announced plans to create factories that will produce Leopard tanks,” Koshkin reminded IA Regnum. So far, all this is in the plans, in some kind of strategy for a possible rise in the military-industrial complex. “How they will be carried out, frankly speaking, is unknown. Especially in the context of ongoing hostilities, ”Koshkin believes. But Kyiv's statements may be aimed at the future. Perhaps the West is already considering the possibility of producing modern weapons in Ukraine after the current conflict is suspended in one format or another, the interlocutor suggested. “Now everyone is waiting for how the Ukrainian counteroffensive will end. If we assume that a certain state of the status quo will be achieved ( a truce, maybe some kind of “Korean version” promoted by the United States) , then, according to the plans of the West, it will be possible to immediately deploy such enterprises, ”the expert emphasized. The calculation is made that in the foreseeable future they will be able to organize the release of everything necessary in order to again pump up the Armed Forces of Ukraine with weapons to continue military pressure on Russia, Koshkin believes. “Accordingly, the text of any possible peace agreement must necessarily include a ban on the creation by Ukraine on its own or with the participation of the West of new enterprises for the production of military equipment,” the source believes. |
| Posted by:badanov |
| #2 And don't forget Jamie Dimon either visited Ukraine or spoke with the Ukrainians somewhere not too long ago. But BlackRock....ugh. Fooey. |
| Posted by: DooDahMan 2023-06-22 13:16 |
| #1 I thought that was part of the plan which will see trillions of dollars given to Blackrock to rebuild Ukraine. |
| Posted by: mossomo 2023-06-22 13:14 |