And Dmitry Rogozin - with the statements of the Chief of the General Staff

Yesterday, the Chief of the General Staff - First Deputy Minister of Defense, Army General Nikolai Makarov, again criticized the products of the domestic defense-industrial complex (DIC). According to him, the Ministry of Defense has refused to purchase Russian armored vehicles for the next five years. However, almost immediately, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin refuted General Makarov’s statement in his microblog on Twitter, advising the Chief of the General Staff not to “argue with military science and industry with the help of the media.”

Yesterday, General Makarov said: “We have stopped purchasing armored vehicles. We have given designers five years to develop new types of military equipment.” According to the Chief of the General Staff, current developments do not fully satisfy the military. He cited the T-90S tank as an example, emphasizing that only the characteristics of the tank’s turret were fully met, but in general the combat unit was not yet satisfactory. General Makarov explained: world practice shows that the entire tank crew must be protected and located not in the turret, but in the vehicle’s body. Previously, the military had complaints about the unsatisfactory condition of the gun, weak engine and lack of automatic transmission. General Director of Uralvagonzavod Oleg Sienko admitted in an interview with Kommersant that the development of the T-90S tank was carried out without the allocation of funds from the Ministry of Defense.

General Makarov claims that the situation is the same with armored personnel carriers: due to poor protection against mines, soldiers are forced to sit not inside, but on top. “The BMD-4 is a version of the BMP-3, and it costs more than a tank. We haven’t looked at this vehicle and still don’t,” he said.

In turn, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin considered Nikolai Makarov’s assessments about the combat characteristics of Russian weapons to be incorrect, as he reported on his microblog on Twitter. “If the Chief of the General Staff (Chief of the General Staff) has complaints about tanks or other equipment, he can express them in a professional environment to our designers and industrialists. Our military leaders should not argue with military science and industry with the help of the media,” wrote Mr. Rogozin. “The NGSH is not the only one who makes decisions on the purchase of weapons and military equipment. The Army and Navy will be rearmed as planned.”

Chief of the General Staff - First Deputy Minister of Defense, Army General Nikolai Makarov
Photo: Alexander Miridonov, Kommersant

However, according to a Kommersant source in the Ministry of Defense, the main role in matters of state defense procurement is assigned to the General Staff. “In 2011, the state defense procurement planning system was streamlined: from now on, the General Staff, together with the branches and branches of the military, forms procurement needs and long-term requirements for the weapons system,” says Kommersant’s interlocutor. “All ordering bodies from the branches, branches, main and central departments were excluded." That is why, according to him, the last word in the formation of the order belongs to the General Staff.

“Nikolai Makarov spoke about the real state of affairs, explained what caused this reaction, explained what needs to be done next,” says Andrei Frolov, editor-in-chief of the Arms Export magazine. “Perhaps Dmitry Rogozin, who has recently been actively trying to defend the defense industry, I just lashed out when I saw a few quotes from General Makarov."

Let us note that this is not the first time General Makarov has criticized the products of the Russian defense industry. At a meeting of the public council in September 2011, the head of the General Staff criticized the Smerch multiple launch rocket system. Then the reason for the criticism was the characteristics, which, according to him, were inferior to the American missile and artillery system HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System).

Ivan Safronov Jr.

The General Staff is puzzled by the armored issue