RUSSIAN DEFENSE SHAKEUP COULD END MISTRAL SALES THREAT

Whatever their political affiliation, Georgians can join with Russia’s other neighbors in contemplating how the leadership changes in the Russian Ministry of Defense (MOD) might affect their security. During his years as Russia’s first civilian defense minister, Anatoly Serdyukov and the Russian government made the unprecedented decision to purchase expensive Western defense equipment. The decision was designed partly to fill gaps in Russian military capabilities, and partly to use the threat of foreign competition to induce its military-industrial complex to modernize its means of production and contain its costs. Now the recent shakeup in the leadership of suggests that Russian policy makers are reconsidering their decision to import advanced foreign military equipment and experts.  

BACKGROUND: The most well-known Russian purchase of Western military equipment was the signing in June 2011 of a US$ 1.7 billion contract to buy two French-built Mistral class amphibious assault ships for the Russian Navy, with the option to negotiate the purchase of two additional Mistral class ships that would be manufactured in Russian shipyards under French license. In addition to the Mistral sale, Russia’s Ministry of Defense (MOD) has been buying light armored vehicles from Italy, combat training technologies from Germany, and unmanned aerial vehicles from Israel. French products seem particularly in vogue in the MOD, which is also purchasing personal combat systems, thermal tank imagers, as well as light armored infantry kits and vehicles from France.

The August 2008 Georgia War exposed deep problems with Russian military equipment. Former President Dmitry Medvedev, who repeatedly stated his desire to modernize Russia’s economy through greater integration with the outside world, firmly supported the buy abroad policy in the defense sector. Several large West European governments encouraged these sales as a means to support their ailing defense industries and justified the sales as a way to improve Russia-NATO relations frayed by the Georgia War.  

In response to the alarm of neighboring states, Russian officials indicated that they would keep the Mistral-class ships away from their European neighbors or would send it on distant peace operations. Russian military leaders said that the main aim of the Mistral purchase is to protect Russian control over the Kuril Islands in the Pacific, which has been contested by Japan since the end of the Second World War. Of course, nothing can stop the Russian military from assigning Mistral-class ships to its Baltic or Black Sea Fleets. In addition, Russia’s naval strategy envisages moving valuable combat assets from one theater of war to another, with such re-deployment maneuvers forming a major part of recent naval exercises. Even if Russia’s Mistrals were assigned to the Pacific or Northern Fleets, they could still be utilized quickly and easily in the Baltic or Black Seas. Then Prime Minister Putin acknowledged to reporters in November 2009 in Paris that “if we purchase this armament, we will use it wherever deemed necessary.” 

The ships’ most threatening purpose would be to intimidate and, if necessary, fight, Moscow’s recalcitrant littoral neighbors among the former Soviet republics. Western opponents of the sale have frequently cited the unguarded remarks of Adm. Vladimir Vysotsky, the commander of the Russian Navy, to the effect that, if a ship like the Mistral had been available during Russia’s August 2008 war with Georgia, then the Russian Black Sea fleet could have carried out its amphibious operations in 40 minutes rather than the 26 hours they required. The Russian Navy saw buying the Mistral as helping fill an important gap that Russia’s own defense industry likely could not fill. Russia lacks a large amphibious assault ship like the Mistral that can anchor in coastal waters and send troops ashore using helicopters and landing craft.

IMPLICATIONS: After meeting with French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates explained that the proposed sale was “more a problem of the message being sent than a military issue.” State Department cables subsequently released by WikiLeaks revealed grave misgivings from U.S. officials on the proposed sale, with U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy especially opposed. Gates claimed that the sale would be “sending a mixed signal to both Russia and our Central and East European Allies,” while Flournoy said that while the U.S. was all for closer cooperation between European countries and Russia, Washington “would prefer that France find a different confidence-building measure than a Mistral sale.” Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs William Burns worried that the deal “would feed Georgia’s fears and could lead to an arms race, increasing the chance of miscalculation by one or both sides.” Of course, many of these objections were not publicly stated, but they confirm the U.S. defense establishment’s skepticism of this sort of “engagement.”

Although acknowledging the concerns of some European governments about the sale, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen declined to object to the transfer. But pressure on Washington and NATO to address the sales issue in a more comprehensive manner have grown with the subsequent indications that the transfer of the Mistrals to Russia, while marking the first time that a NATO country would sell such a major weapons system to Russia, would be followed by other voluntary transfers of Western weapons systems and defense technologies to the Russian military. 

Even before Serdukov’s dismissal, the MOD had come under increased pressure to buy more indigenous defense systems and help sustain Russia’s defense industry through domestic contracts as well as foreign sales. Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin and former Defense Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov seem especially eager to exploit the situation to redirect the flow of defense funding inward. Rogozin has repeatedly affirmed that the government will buy foreign arms only as an exception. The close links between state officials and certain defense companies ensure that the VPK has a strong lobby inside the Russian government as well as the corporate sector. Western analysts believed that the purge resulted from a power struggle over who would control the distribution of the 23 trillion rubles that Putin pledged in February to spend on new weapons purchases through the end of this decade. In this interpretation, the VPK and its political allies wanted to ensure that the funds flowed to their constituents rather than foreign firms.  

CONCLUSIONS: Whatever happens in Moscow, NATO leaders would do well to establish some general guidelines to govern these sales. Many countries of the former Soviet sphere including Georgia, Poland, and the Baltic States are uncomfortable with the idea of arming Moscow. The former Soviet bloc countries are not so much concerned by the prospect of a near-term war with Russia as much as they resent that they were never consulted before these transactions occurred. They fear this process of disparate NATO arms sales to Russia could suggest, or contribute to, a weakening of the alliance, which from their point of view has already become dangerously distracted by events in the Middle East and other developments outside Europe. The sight of NATO governments competing to sell sophisticated weapons to – if not a potential adversary against NATO members, then a potential military threat against NATO-friendly countries like Georgia – with little consultation with other allies makes the alliance look incoherent and tempts Moscow to try to exploit and exacerbate such fears.

AUTHOR’S BIO: Dr. Richard Weitz is a Senior Fellow and Associate Director of the Center for Future Security Strategies at the Hudson Institute.