“Serdyukov was forced to get the problem off the ground”
Exactly by the end of July, the Ministry of Defense still managed to bargain with the Moscow Institute of Thermal Engineering at the price of intercontinental ballistic missiles. Not far off - and other contracts. Thus, without exaggeration, the long-suffering state defense order will, apparently, be fulfilled.“We have already agreed on the price. All documents that the institute could submit for consideration are submitted. As far as I understand, we agreed on a price if there are no additional changes from the side of production, ”said Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov after the meeting on the state defense order, which took place in Novosibirsk on July 28. The Minister stressed that the department managed to resolve all fundamental differences with the manufacturer Bulava, including the most significant one, at a price. Serdyukov has no doubt that the rest of the contracts will be concluded, and he even voiced specific deadlines: the next one or two weeks. Thus, all 750,4 billion rubles allocated for the purchase of weapons from defense companies will be fully mastered. In addition, as Serdyukov did not fail to boast, 69% of this amount has already been paid to enterprises as an advance.
But it was not until the beginning of July that Yury Solomonov, a former employee of the Moscow Institute of Thermal Engineering, made a statement in an interview with Kommersant, which pretty much stirred up the already muddy water. “The state order of 2011 of the year has already been disrupted - it will not be fulfilled already ... To date, not a single contract has been concluded, if we talk about strategic nuclear forces. Now is July. And this was not the last years of 14. At the latest, we entered into contracts for the current year at the end of April - mid-May. And then it led to convulsive-convulsive actions of the industry, ”Solomonov told reporters.
The wave reached the top - the minister himself and the Supreme Commander. Serdyukov preferred to explain the fatalism of the ex-designer with personal motives associated with dismissals from MIT, Dmitry Medvedev, in turn, gave the department a general scolding for the order and speculated on what they do in wartime with the alarmists who, as he did not rule out , could well dig in the system of the Russian Defense Ministry. In the end, one large collective panic actually attributed the very system of the military-industrial complex, which fed a remarkable appetite and corrupted indecent prices for its products. So Prime Minister Vladimir Putin found the Defense Ministry’s claims to the defense industry enterprises justified: “With respect to military equipment, prices rose not by some 5-8%, but by several times. Is that where it suits you? ”- the head of the government was indignant at the meeting on the implementation of the state defense order.
Obviously, under such a serious double pressure, there was practically no room left for maneuver of defense industry enterprises. Unless they could, in response, lucidly convey to the first persons about the intricacies of pricing, but decided, apparently, to postpone the analyst until better times. In the meantime, the prime minister was given a rather tough task for defense industry enterprises: over the next two weeks, together with the Ministry of Defense, work out a transparent pricing mechanism for weapons and military products. As a result, the defense ministry will have to understand from which ceiling manufacturers take the price for their products, and the enterprises themselves will be able to more accurately organize the process, understanding the requirements of the Ministry of Defense. Enterprises will also be granted the exclusive right to choose subcontractors (previously it was the prerogative of the military).
Roman Trotsenko, president of the United Shipbuilding Corporation (OSK), who was present at the meeting with Putin, commented in the media’s comments, however, that he put forward the deadlines as “unrealistic.” Noting that, as of the end of July, the Ministry of Defense and USC did not conclude contracts for 40% of the total state defense order for the fleet, Trotsenko reminded that the prime minister’s order is impossible because of the enormous amount of documentation alone: “Only documents on the pricing of a serial project submarine - about 250 kg ...”
The words of Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov and the general situation with the state defense order in an interview with the KM.RU observer were commented by Vladislav Shurygin, a well-known military journalist, reserve captain, deputy editor-in-chief of Zavtra newspaper:
- I think that, of course, everything is not so simple. Despite the fact that some agreements have been reached and the money will go, we must understand that the state defense order-2011 is disrupted, and it has already been irreparably disrupted. Because the technological cycles of weapons production today are different from those that were, say, in the XNUMXth century. And in those days when it was urgently needed to get a large amount of artillery, to carry out this quickly was unrealistic. What can we say about modern weapons! The cycle of creating modern tank takes a total of more than three years. It is clear that the money that has now gone, at best, will begin to cover only those costs that the factories incurred in those months that have already passed in anticipation of orders from the Ministry of Defense. Factories were forced to take loans from banks, pay taxes, and bear other costs. So the criticism and reproaches that have recently attacked Serdyukov on all sides, and the political risks that arose for him in this regard, forced him to push this problem from a dead point.
The second problem is how exactly the money allocated for the state defense procurement will be spent. Already, several of the closest deputies of Serdyukov, whom he once brought with him from the tax service, are under investigation by the Chief Military Prosecutor’s Office, and precisely for that matter as regards cutting the military budget. This is the closest circle of the minister, I repeat. In light of this, it remains only to rhetorically ask: what will be the scale of the cut here? So this is an important question, where the money allocated will actually go, even after the conclusion of contracts.
But there is another problem, which is little talked about in the context of the state defense order: what should the troops themselves do? There exists a program whereby one or another part must be re-armed. In this regard, certain documents are adopted, combat regulations, in which so far it is necessary to lay down some theoretical positions that are not present in reality. So, appreciating the statement heard from Serdyukov’s lips, I would say that here you can rather not breathe in the hope of a full breast, but breathe out with relief to all those who, watching, are watching the development of events.
- How substantiated, in your opinion, are claims to defense industry enterprises in terms of pricing?
- If you carefully listen to the speeches of Mr. Serdyukov, then he somehow made a reservation that the plants are trying to hang on our orders in general all of its infrastructure - kindergartens, sanatoriums and more. Like, let's throw it all off, we are waiting for you only weapons. But in this case, I really want to ask Mr. Serdyukov: why then do we put food in the military budget? Let the army feed itself. In the end, the salaries are paid, money is given. If the military budget lays bread for the soldiers, then why can't the factories put social expenses into their expenses? You can not keep the plant in the nude. And even more so when it is a city-forming, when the entire city lives at the expense of the plant, with all the houses, schools, kindergartens, the whole communal apartment. And if the plant refuses all this burden, after six months it will simply close, because people will flee. This talk of unnecessary social programs is given such a bad smell, makes you wonder once again where the current military leadership, which in the beginning of 90’s bankrupt and divided other factories came from, threw all these “unprofitable” kindergartens and clinics overboard, squeezed out of privatized enterprises all and ravaged. In fact, there is a problem of price, it should be discussed and solved, and in each specific case it should be transparent. And the Ministry of Defense should understand where the price for a specific tank or ship comes from. Everything should be decided mutually, but not in July 2011 of the year, if we are talking about 2011 a year, but in September of 2010. Now these conversations would be appropriate for the 2012 order of the year.
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