Moscow today is trying to deal with several crises at the same
time. Firstly, there is the severe economic crisis brought on by the
collapse in the price of crude oil and the continuing bite of
Western economic sanctions brought on by the Russian annexation of Crimea
and Russia’s support of the civil war in eastern Ukraine. With the Iran nuclear deal
moving forward, it is highly likely that large amounts of Iranian
crude oil will come on the market in the coming years. This in turn has
caused futures contracts for crude oil to plunge, damaging Russia's ability to meet
spending targets for its ambitious military goals. Moscow’s refusal to
diversify its economy in the heady days of US$100 per barrel of crude oil is now
coming back to haunt it. The war in eastern Ukraine shows no signs of
stabilising anytime soon, either. In fact, the NATO alliance is claiming
that upwards of 50,000 Russian troops are mobilised along the border with
Ukraine. The Kremlin will face tough decisions in the near-term as social
spending has already been cut dramatically and the threat of social unrest
due to high military spending ($18 billion in 2015, or 4.2% of Russia’s GDP) in
the face of further social security cutbacks is very real.
Secondly, Russia’s population is declining in quantitative terms,
which in turn is posing a severe strain on the availability of skilled human
resources. And this is happening at a time when the Kremlin may well be
required to launch low-intensity military operations against Estonia and Latvia
in order to secure the interests of the Russian-speaking disenfranchised
citizens of these two countries. Russia’s previous
National Security Doctrine, which was signed into law in 2009 by then-President Dmitry Medvedev, has
been superceded by the current military doctrine that President Vladimir Putin
signed into law in December 26, 2014, which cited “NATO’s military buildup” as
a key driver for the changes.
The new doctrine, beyond explicitly stating that NATO’s
expansion is the main external threat facing Moscow, calls for reinforcing
three geopolitical fronts that Russia sees as part of its existential security.
In the coming years Russia will focus considerable resources in developing and
maintaining a strong military presence in the Arctic, the recently annexed
Crimean peninsula, and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea. Each of these three regions is vital for Russia’s
goal of checking NATO expansion, while simultaneously maintaining access to
potential natural resources, as in the case of the Arctic, and warm water
shipping routes.
Russia’s military expansion in the Arctic has been a major goal for Putin for
much of the past decade. The new military doctrine officially puts special focus on the region and advocates a greater Russian role in the region to help
ensure access to potential energy resources on the Arctic seabed against
possible Danish, Norwegian, Canadian, and US claims. The US estimates that upwards of 15% of
the world’s remaining oil, 30% of its natural gas, and 20% of its liquefied
natural gas are stored in the Arctic sea bed. Moscow has undertaken a construction blitz across
the Arctic in a bid to ensure that it remains the unchallenged military power
in the region. It is presently building 10 Arctic search-and-rescue stations,
16 deepwater ports, 13 airfields, and ten airspace surveillance radar stations
across its Arctic coast. Simultaneously, Moscow has created a Joint
Strategic Command North (JSCN) from components of the Russian Navy’s Northern
Fleet in order to maintain a permanent military presence in the region. It is
likely that this command will ultimately become a fifth military district.
Bottomline: Russia’s strategic focus in the years ahead will continue to be
Euro-centric, and not not Eurasia-centric.
Thirdly, even though Russia is
already the world’s second-biggest arms exporter (accounting for 27% of the global
export market, with the US staying ahead with 31% market-share, and being followed
by China with 5%, Germany with 5%, France with 5% and the UK with 4%), it is
facing increasingly tough competition from the People’s Republic of China (PRC)
with each passing day—especially in South Asia, the Middle East and Central
America.
Fourthly, the PRC’s weapons
manufacturers have succeeded to a large extent in back-engineering several
weapons, sensors and fire-control systems that were on the drawing boards
during the last years of the Soviet era, and whose production-engineering data
were easily available from various countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Since 1991, the PRC had
struck several military-industrial partnerships with several CIS-based original
equipment manufacturers (OEM), especially in Ukraine, Belarus and Kyrgyzstan,
for the purpose of obtaining critical research and development (R & D)
inputs that are required for developing and producing new-generation weapon
systems for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Consequently, Ukraine’s total arms exports grew steadily, from $20
million in 1994 to $600 million in 1997 and $1.5 billion in 2001. In 2002 the Industrial
Policy Ministry of Ukraine and the PRC’s Commission for Science, Technology and
Industry for National Defense (COSTIND) signed a protocol on cooperation in the military-industrial arena. In that same year, Ukraine became the
world’s fourth-largest weapons exporter and sold weapons and military
technologies to Beijing worth $700 million, which accounted for 31% of
Ukrainian exports that year. In 2011, 43% of Ukraine-built weapons were
sold to the PRC, while in 2013 Ukraine became the PRC’s second-largest
trade partner in the CIS, while the PLA became Ukraine’s biggest military
customer in Asia.
Since 2002, the following Ukraine-based firms/enterprises/R & D institutes have had military-industrial partnerships with the PRC: Aerotechnica-MLT Ltd, ARSENAL Central Design Bureau State Enterprise, ARSENAL State Enterprise
Plant, AVIAKONTROL Joint Stock Company (JSC), AVIONIKA Ltd, BURAN State Enterprise Research
Institute, CHERNOMOSUDOPROEKT, Chernomorsky
Shipbuilding (formerly the Nikolayev South Shipyard Soviet Shipyard No. 444), Engine Design Bureau of
Kharkiv (EDBK), FEODOSYA State-Owned Optic Plant, ISKRA Ltd, Ivchenko-Progress OKB, Kharkiv Morozov Machine Building
Design Bureau, KVANT Research Institute, Kyiv Plant Radar
JSC, LUCH KYIV State Design Bureau, LVIV State Plant, Motor Sich JSC, MORYE Feodosya Shipbuilding Company, ORDZHONIKIDZE
Sevastopol Marine Plant, PROGRESS
Zaporozhye Machine-Building Design Bureau, RADIONIX
Ltd, Radioizmeritel Plant, Scientific Research Institute
for Aeroelastic Systems, Scientific and Technical Enterprise
Electronprylad JSC, State Enterprise Malyshev Plant, Ukroboronprom JSC, Ukrspetsexport JSC, Ukrspetstechnika JSC, YUZHMASH Southern
Machine Building Plant Association, VIZAR ZHULIANY Machine-Building Plant, and Zorya–Mashproekt State Enterprise.
Ukrainian officials in August 2001 had conspired in the illegal sale of
12 Ukraine-owned Kh-55 strategic cruise missiles—six each to China and Iran
(known locally as the Soumar GLCM),
plus four Kolchuga passive surveillance systems
to the PRC. Also smuggled out of Kiev by August 2001 were detailed
production engineering data packages of a long-range land-attack cruise missile
(LACM) called Korshun, which had by then been developed by Ukraine’s
Dnipropetrovsk-based Yuzhnoye State Design Bureau, with production tooling
being built by the Yuzhnoye Machine-Building Production Association, or
Yuzhmash. The Korshun’s powerplant was a redesigned RD95-300 turbofan that bore
a strong resemblance to the 36MT engine developed by Russia’s NPO Saturn. This
turbofan was subsequently re-engineered in the PRC by its 624 Engine Design
Institute, or the China Gas Turbine Establishment (GTE), and its related
Chengdu Engine Group. Dimensions of the Korshun, which was identical to the
Raduga-developed Kh-65SE LACM (first displayed in August 1992), included a wingspan
of 3.1 metres, length of 6.3 metres, diameter of 0.514 metres, and a mass of
1,090kg.
Range of the LACM was then claimed to be 600km when carrying a 500kg
warhead. By late 2003, the General Armaments Dept of COSTIND, the China
Aerospace Science and Technology Corp’s (CASC) 3rd Aerospace Academy (also
known as China Haiying Electro-Mechanical Technology Academy or CHETA, or the
066 Base in Hubei) and 8359 Research Institute had, along with the Beijing
University for Aeronautics & Astronautics, Shanghai Jiaotong University,
China State Electronics Systems Engineering Corp, Sichuan Aerospace Industry
Corp and the Tianjin Institute for Power Sources had completed fabrication of
the first six prototypes of the 800km-range Chang Jian CJ-10 LACM (a direct copy
of the Korshun), and on August 10, 2004 the first test-firings were conducted
at an instrumented offshore range in the Bohai Sea. Its configuration features
a cylindrical body with two retractable wings, four non-retractable tailfins as
well as a retractable engine inlet. The CJ-10 made its first public appearance
during the October 1 military parade in 2009. In early 2005, flight-tests of
another variant of the CJ-10, having a range of 1,200km, were carried out. The
CJ-10 has since been deployed by China with both conventional HE/FAE and
tactical low-yield nuclear warheads, with the latter developed by a consortium
of China’s 7th Research and Design Institute, owned by the China National
Nuclear Corp, China Metallurgical Equipment Corp (CMEC) and China Southwest
Institute for Nuclear & Fluid Physics.
CASC’s 3rd Academy’s Beijing Xinghang Electromechanical Equipment
Factory (159 Factory) is the final assembly facility for the CJ-10, while
Beijing Hangxing Machine Building Factory (239 Factory) and the Xinxin Factory
in Shanghai produce the various on-board components of the CJ-10. The LACM and
its ALCM variant carries a range of different 770lb or 1,100lb warheads. The
GLCM variant of the CJ-10 has a length of 7.0 metres, launch mass of 1,350kg,
warhead mass of 300kg, cruise speed of 0.9 Mach. Thus far, the PLAAF has
operationalised 20 H-6K bombers capable of launching the CJ-10’s ALCM variant.
There are presently three operational, road-mobile, CJ-10 Brigades: the 821
Brigade, 96215 Unit in Liuzhou, Guangxi Province; the 824 Brigade, 96317 Unit
in Dongkou, Hunan Province; and a third Brigade in Jianshui, Yunnan Province
Another highly successful military-industrial partnership between the
PRC and Ukraine concerns the PLA Navy’s Type 052C Luyang-class guided-missile
destroyers (DDG). Each of these DDGs come equipped with six forward vertical
launch stations (VLS) each containing six revolving long-range surface-to-air
missile (LR-SAM) launchers (for 36 Hong Qi-16 LR-SAMs) located below the bridge
and behind the main gun; and a rear VLS station equipped with 12 Hong Qi-16
LR-SAMs forward of the helicopter hangar. Thus, a total of 48 Hong Qi-16
LR-SAMs are carried on board. The two-stage HQ-16 LR-SAM is ‘cold-launched’
vertically from a tubular launcher. The missile’s first stage has a diameter of
700mm while the second stage has a diameter of 560mm. The total launch mass is
2 tonnes, while the missile’s length is 9 metres. It is armed with a 180kg HE
fragmentation warhead and has a maximum speed of Mach 4.2. The HQ-16 has a
slant range of 125km and a service ceiling of 30km. The missile’s proximity
fuze has an effective range of 35 metres, which goes active when the missile is
35 metres away from its target. The HQ-16’s guidance mechanism comprises
initial inertial navigation, radio command mid-course correction, and active
terminal guidance. When in range for an effective lock-on with the on-board
X-band monopulse radar, the terminal guidance phase, lasting 20km, gets
underway. The HQ-16 has been developed to specifically counter incoming
intermediate-range/tactical ballistic missiles and supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles,
and is therefore not cost-effective if deployed to counter only manned combat
aircraft. For naval target tracking and engagement, the Jiangsu Province-based
Nanjing Research Institute of Electronic Technology (NRIET, but also more
commonly known as the 14th Institute) has co-developed with Ukraine’s the KVANT
Research Institute, the shipborne Type 346 S-band multi-function active phased-array radar with four antenna arrays, each of
which has a maximum range of 150km, a maximum
resolution of 0.5 metres, and can scan a 0-120-degree arc in azimuth and 0-90
degrees in elevation, with a peak power output of 1mWe. The HQ-16 LR-SAM itself
is a re-engineered version of the Soviet-era 5V55R LR-SAM and Ukrainian
companies that were consultants to the PRC for developing the HQ-16 and its
land-based HQ-9 LR-SAM variant (the FD-2000 being its export variant and
already sold to Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan) were YUZHMASH and the VIZAR ZHULIANY Machine-Building Plant.
Other naval products that have been co-developed by the PRC with
Ukraine’s assistance include the Type 382 radar (originally the Fregat-M2EM), Type 344 radar (originally the Mineral-ME), Type 345 radar (originally
MR-90)—all of which were re-engineered by the Nanjing Marine Radar Research Institute/No 724 Institute; the SUR-17/Type
517B air surveillance radar with Yagi antenna
that was re-engineered by the Yangzhou
Marine Electronic Instruments Research Institute/ No. 723 Institute; and the
Type 344 multifunctional
fire-control radar that was
re-engineered by the Xi’an Research Institute of Navigation Technology
(XRINT) No 20 Research Institute. The Type 344 (Mineral-ME) and Type
382 (Fregat-M2EM) radars are installed on board the PLA Navy’s Type
054A Jiankai-class guided-missile frigates, while the Type 346s are on the
PLAN's Type 052C/D Luyang-class DDGs and on the aircraft carrier Liao Ning. In
addition, a seabed-based SOSUS network,
developed jointly by Ukraine and China, has been under installation along
China's territorial waters since 2012.
The PLAN’s sole aircraft carrier Liao Ning too has been refitted and
upgraded with Ukraine’s military-industrial help. In another development, the
PRC’s Nanchang-based Hongdu Industrial Aviation Group (HAIG) inked a contract
in 2009 with Ukrainian engine manufacturer Motor Sich for the supply AI-222-25F
turbofans—each valued at $2 million—for its production-standard L-15 ‘Hunting
Eagle’ lead-in fighter trainer (LIFT). The first tranche of 12 engines was
delivered in 2011. The tandem-seat, twin-engined L-15, co-developed by HAIG and
Russia’s Yakovlev OKB, made its maiden flight on March 13, 2006. The first L-15
prototype, powered by twin non-afterburning ZMKB-Progress (Lotarev) DV-2 engines, was rolled out on September
29, 2005. The third prototype, powered by twin DV-2F afterburning turbofans,
first flew on May 10, 2008, and was powered by twin non-afterburning AI-222-25 turbofans.
The fourth prototype first flew on June 8, 2009, and was powered by two afterburner-equipped
AI-222K-25F turbofans. The sixth L-15 prototype, which was rolled out on August
15, 2010, features a stretched nose that
can house a multi-mode fire-control radar, HOTAS controls, and improved glass
cockpit avionics with three AMLCD-based multifunction displays. Powered by two
AI-222K-25F turbofans delivering enough thrust for sustained supersonic flight,
its maiden flight took place on October 26, 2010. It features a three-axis
quadruplex fly-by-wire flight control system. The L-15 has a maximum takeoff
weight of 9,500kg, maximum speed of Mach 1.4, maximum climb rate of 150
metres/second, load sustenance of +8g/-3g, service ceiling of 16,000 metres,
loitering time of two hours, and a structural airframe life of 10,000 flight
hours. Unit price quoted for the L-15 is US$16 million. The L-15 is likely to
be procured in future by the air forces of China, Myanmar and Pakistan.
Ukraine has also
sold the PRC four Project 1232.2 Zubr
hovercraft at a cost of US$315 million. While the first two were built
(and delivered on April 12, 2013) by the Crimea-based MORYE Feodosya
Shipbuilding Company in Feodosiya (now in Russia-annexed Crimea), the latter
two are now being licence-assembled at the China State Shipbuilding Corp-owned
Huangpu Shipyard in Guangzhou under the supervision of Ukrainian technicians.
Ukraine has also helped the PRC upgrade its fleet of Su-27SK heavy multi-role
combat (H-MRCA) aircraft by supplying kits for upgraded N-001 mlti-mode
airborne radars (from RADIONIX Ltd), OMUT internalu jammers for Shenyang J-11B
H-MRCAs, as well as upgraded ZSh-7APN
Sura-K helmet-mounted display systems (HMDS) and upgrade kits for the OEPS-27
infra-red search-and-track (IRST) sensors.
In addition, Ukraine has also
helped the Sichuan Changhong Electric Appliance Corp and its Luoyang Optical-Electronic Technology Development Centre (LOEC) to develop both an indigenous HMDS as well as the Hongguang-1 IRST sensor for the Shenyang J-11B, Chengdu J-10B and Shenyang J-15 MRCAs.
Lastly,
Ukraine in 2001 supplied the PRC’s 601 Research Institute at Shenyang with one
Su-33 carrier-based H-MRCA prototype (the T-10K-3) along with related
production-engineering data as well as the source-codes (crypto-keys) for the
aircraft’s fly-by-wire flight-control systems and its digital databus. The
T-10K-3 aircraft had made its maiden flight on February 17, 1990
in the former USSR. Also sold by Ukraine were the production-licences for the
LIMAN ground-radio jammers, mobile GPS jamming systems, and road-mobile
troposcatter-based communications relay systems like the TS-504 and multi-point TS-510/GS-510 systems,
which are re-engineered versions of Ukraine’s R-423-1
Brig-1 troposcatter system.
When it comes to military-industrial cooperation with Belarus, in
1998, in the Chinese city of Hubei in Siogan Province a joint assembly plant
called ‘Sanjiang Volat Co Ltd’ for the production of multi-wheeled tractors and
chassis for various purposes with capacity from 20 to 75 tonnes was
established. The founders of the joint venture with a capital of 52.2 million
Yuan were Minsk Wheel Tractor Plant (MWTP), with an authorised capital share of
30% and Sanjiang Aerospace Corp with the 70 % share. MWTP contributed technologies
and accessories for building multi-wheeled heavy-duty vehicles. In accordance with the agreed-upon business statutes, in the first
five years of operation 70 % of all components for the plant should have been
delivered by MWTP. Subsequently, the share of Belarusian components was
intended to be reduced to 30%. But the PRC, known for its outstanding talent
for re-engineering, exceeded the plan, and now MWTP provides only the
wheel-hubs. The production facilities of Sanjiang Volat Co Ltd are designed to
produce 300 multi-axle vehicles per year to meet the needs of the defence, oil,
construction, mining and forestry industries. The industrial partners have
since September 2009 also created a joint production facility for
hydro-mechanical transmission (HMT) of heavy-duty vehicles and wheeled
tractors. This facility is known as the Wuhan Sanjiang Import &
Export Company Ltd (WSIEC), a subsidiary of China Sanjiang Space Group (CSSG).
With Kyrgyzstan, the PRC has joined forces to develop
an indigenous version of the VA-111 Shkval
supercavitating rocket-propelled torpedo, which achieves
a high velocity of 230mph (386kph). The Shkval
is fired from the standard 533mm torpedo tube at a depth of up to 328 feet (100
metres). The torpedo exits the tube at 50 Knots (93kph) and then ignites the
rocket motor, propelling the weapon to speeds four to five times faster than
other conventional torpedoes. The weapon has an 80% kill probability at a range
of 7,655 yards (7,000 metres). The torpedo is guided by an autopilot rather
than by a homing head as on most torpedoes. Manufacturing
know-how for the torpedo’s cruise-control sub-systems has been procured from
Ukraine, while Kyrgyzstan’s Dastan Engineering JSC has supplied the
autopilot’s manufacturing know-how to the PRC.
To Be Concluded
