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Aviation Week & Space Technology
March 5, 2001
Russian Air Force Faces Deepening Crisis
By Craig Covault, Moscow
The situation in the dilapidated and demoralized Russian air force continues to worsen with hundreds upon hundreds of aircraft rusting into the ground, few changes
in Soviet-era doctrine or tactics and thousands of pilots receiving little or no flight time.
The Russian air force is in a downward spiral from which there is little hope of recovery without more massive cuts than contemplated in both aircraft and personnel,
according to about a dozen experts and close observers of that air force who met recently with Aviation Week & Space Technology.
These sources, from seven countries, spoke on background. All confirmed that the overall situation in the Russian air force is generally worse than acknowledged by
their military. Modernization remains a dream, but the changes need to be far more drastic than upgraded hardware.
THERE IS SCANT FUEL to maintain basic proficiency, let alone military capability, and the crisis is trending toward an even worse situation when most of the
experienced pilots will have retired or moved into staff jobs.
This will leave the air force with a minimal flight experience base and largely unserviceable aircraft.
Under these circumstances, there is serious question about whether the air force has become as much a liability as an asset to the former Soviet Union.
These assessments on the weakening of the Russian air force will have an impact on U.S. and West European military budgets and weapons system planning,
especially as part of the overall Pentagon review ordered by President George W. Bush.
Russian plans to cut 36,000 air force personnel in the next several years will still leave the air force too large and inefficient for the resources needed, according to
sources.
In aircraft, for example, the Russians have a force of about 2,000 at the present time, but only 46% or less are serviceable. "I would try and sell them off or dig a big
hole and just push them in, scrap them, because they are no good," one source said. "Many are little more than hulks."
In order for the force to remain viable under current conditions, it would need to be reduced to about 500 aircraft. But the experts interviewed had doubts about
President Vladimir Putin and the Ministry of Defense opting for such cuts because that would relegate the country to the status of a "regional power," like India, as
opposed to a global power--a position in which it still views itself.
However, Russia's strategic bomber force maintains a viable nuclear deterrent with a force of Tu-160 Blackjack, Tu-22 Backfire and Tu-95MS Bear-H cruise
missile bombers. About 100 strategic bombers are in service.
As recently as late February, all three aircraft types in the bomber force participated in a major exercise, supported by Il-78 Midas tankers, in connection with the
test launch of ballistic missiles fired from Russian submarines.
The situation is much worse in fighter and tactical regiments. There is a small cadre of proficient ground-attack fighter-bomber pilots, many with Chechnyan
experience (AW&ST Feb. 14, 2000, p. 76). But pure fighter pilot regiments have become largely impotent, according to sources.
Russian military aircraft export issues and a return to Soviet-style restrictiveness all are also factors in the air force situation. Those interviewed agreed that beyond
the aircraft, fuel and training problems there is increased subterfuge and a lack of truthfulness in statements from the Russian military.
THE PROBLEM IS ALSO GROWING in marketing claims made by the Russian military aircraft and weapons industry, sources agreed. There is an increased level
of "outright lying, especially by Russian officials at the MAKS Moscow air show," about aerospace system capabilities and Russian export sales and support, one
senior official said. "You have to expect some of this because it is Russia, but it is getting worse."
"This is going to increasingly affect their ability to sell aircraft. If they are not being honest with their customers, they will start to go away," another official said.
There are signs that bogus spare parts, fronted by financially desperate Russian component manufacturers, are also beginning to enter the parts support flow for
Russian aerospace exports.
"The Chinese were recently given some Russian spare parts that were not up to par, so there is corruption going on in the Russian spare parts business. Parts are
being sold with 'false passports' and the factories involved could lose their reputations," a source said.
Export sales of Su-27 variants, like those to India and China, are maintaining Sukhoi as a company and form a basis for modernization of the Russian air force
(AW&ST Feb. 5, p. 51). But the sources cautioned not to read too much into the broader impact on the air force from these sales.
Having weapons exports as a fundamental underpinning for operating an air force to carry out Russian national objectives raises serious policy questions.
"Now their only large clients are traditional clients like China and India, that do not have much [political leeway] to buy Western aircraft.
"And they do have a bit of an advertising problem," one source said. "They say 'buy our aircraft--even our own government won't touch them, but you've got to have
them.'"
Sukhoi may be relatively healthy, but virtually none of the other Russian aircraft manufacturers are, and exports are no help to them. Some export prices have
become so ridiculously cheap that no industry could be sustained on the prices charged. The sources said some Mil Mi-17 armed helicopters capable of carrying
about 25 troops have been sold for as little as $3.5 million, while base prices for MiG-29s have been quoted as low as $11.5 million.
And there is little stability in the way sales are conducted. When people who were involved in a deal at the outset change, contracts are not necessarily honored by
the new people. "This is one of their biggest problems. If a deal is signed by one guy, the next guy may not honor it."
Putin recently made another in a series of continuing shifts in this regard. The heads of Russia's two arms export agencies, Promexport and Rosvooruzheniye, were
removed and the organizations merged into a single agency called Rosoboronexport.
THE SHIFT MAY BE GOOD for Russia if it can bring order to the export process. But if history is any guide, the new agency will still go for big sales with
countries like India and China where they can make fast money, sources said. By doing this, they are neglecting broader arms export options and
arrangements--even with U.S. companies--that might create more stability.
And the new managers will likely bring their own set of rules--which will all change again if they are shifted out, as has been the trend in the past.
The influence of the traditional Soviet-style power ministries also appears to be growing under the Putin Administration. "We continually get reports of the Federal
Security Service (FSB), the domestic arm of the old KGB, tightening the screws," several of the sources agreed.
"I've detected an increase in the influences of the security services and a general regression to Soviet ways. Their reflexes are still Soviet," said another source.
The reorganization of the air force is another major challenge. In the past five years air defense forces, formerly a separate entity, have been brought into the service
while there continues to be a major internal debate about merging the strategic rocket forces with the air force.
THAT MAJOR SHIFT IS LIKELY to happen eventually, but once it occurs there are questions about whether the strategic missile arm will still consume large
amounts of the reorganized air force budget.
Putin's relatively new bureaucracy remains in somewhat of a power struggle with the Ministry of Defense over reorganization.
And although there are signs Putin is trying to convert the Russian Security Council into his own de facto, Soviet-style "Politburo," the Putin side has either been
unsuccessful--or failed to try--to bypass the military General Staff for military organizational decisions. "The Security Council is where the political lines are being
drawn, but the General Staff is still very much playing a role in any reorganization decisions," a source said.
Russia's military space program is in as bad a shape as its air elements, leaving Russia largely "blind and deaf" from a space-support standpoint, they said.
Putin, in late January, took the military space forces out of the strategic rocket forces to form a separate space force to address this problem and give Russian
military space planners more autonomy and flexibility. The shift is significant but it could be years before the change will show results.
The commander-in-chief of the air force, Gen. Anatoly Kornukov, has gone on record in the past as saying that the air force is achieving all of its aims, yet, in other
forums, the same commander has said the air force cannot achieve its objectives and will die altogether within a few years without major funding. "They can't keep
giving both sides of that coin," a source said.
Kornukov earlier this year said that 2000 "was a year of stabilization" and he claimed that training levels were up as the number of exercises rose to 400 in 2000
from about 300 in 1999 (AW&ST Feb. 5, p. 52).
But he also said that, overall, Russian air force pilots accumulated, on average, just 25-30 flight hours for the entire year, slightly higher than in 1999. Transport pilots
averaged only 50 hr. per year, while strike and bomber pilots were getting a mere 25-35 hr. per year, slightly higher than previously. But fighter pilots continue to
receive a paltry 10 hr. annually.
Kornukov said that 2.5 million metric tons of aviation fuel are required to maintain proper training levels, but last year only half a million metric tons were made
available.
Although the flight-time averages indicate much of the force is barely getting minimal hours for fair-weather flying in the landing pattern, "there are whole air force
regiments that have not been flying at all for two years," sources said.
MiG-31 and Su-27 crews are doing next-to-no flying while Su-24 and Su-25 pilots in Chechnya have been logging more hours than the force average.
"The Russian system is to give a limited number of first-class pilots the larger amount of hours while the rest are just flying simulators."
Russian simulators are of poor quality, according to sources who have flown several of them. They are comparable to U.S. and European simulator technology of
the mid-1960s, and are not capable of keeping pilots in flight-ready condition.
This means that in a few years, they will face an even bigger problem as first-class pilots age. When even senior-level fighter pilots get as few as 10 flight hours a
year, it's nowhere near enough to maintain safe flight on high-speed aircraft.
"If these guys had to go to war, it would take them a long time to work up their people--and then a lot of them would fly into the ground," according to a source.
If the service were to get a large infusion of money it would take 5-10 years to produce several regiments capable of modern flight operations. And the conditions
are so bad now it would take two years to work up even 2-3 effective squadrons, he elaborated.
With this situation, even factoring in the Chechnya experience, tactics have continued to stagnate.
"Their manner of conducting air warfare has not changed significantly--there have been some minor tweaks--but it has not changed in a major way," a source said.
"To the extent that they have precision weapons, they do not seem to be using them in the same way we did in Desert Storm or Kosovo. We would come in from
specific directions so if we missed, there would be less collateral damage. They still go in with everything until they have killed it, 'and to hell with the broader
effects.'"
If the Russian air force continues the way it is going--thousands of aircraft being underutilized and tens of thousands of people receiving no flying and no meaningful
training--then it is "going to go down the drain," was the consensus of everyone interviewed.