DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
Friday
AN OLD CONTRACT FOR THE NEW PREMIER
Ivan Safronov, Alexandra Djordjevic
Source: Kommersant, June 19, 2018, p. 6
Shortly before the change of power in Armenia, its Ministry of Defense postponed the issue of purchasing Russian multifunctional Su-30SM fighters until 2024. The contract, implying the delivery of at least one squadron to the Armenian Air Force, was signed in 2012, but never came into force due to the financial difficulties of the customer. Russia expects to implement the agreement with the new leadership of Armenia.
Discussions on Armenia's intention to acquire Su-30SM were resumed after Nikol Pashinyan posted a photo in his Facebook, where he is in the cockpit of the plane located at Erebuni military airport (where is 3624th Russian airbase is located).
As several top managers of the aviation industry said, the Armenian military began to show interest in the Su-30SMM in 2010. In addition to planes (in Moscow, they tried to solve the financial problem of Yerevan by allowing it to purchase the planes for domestic, rather than export prices), Armenia needed to purchase other weapons, too. Thus, for example, Yerevan became the first export recipient of the Iskander tactical missile system division, and it also acquired $300 million worth weapons at the expense of Russian loans.
Moscow expects to proceed with the implementation of the contract as soon as possible: it is necessary to provide the Irkutsk Aircraft Building Plant with orders until 2022 (otherwise, the production of the Su-30SM is planned to be curtailed and to bet on Su-35, which is serially produced at the plant in Komsomolsk-on-Amur).
Expert of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies Konstantin Makienko believes that "the supplies of modern combat aircraft systems can provoke Azerbaijan to purchase Western fighters." Similar precedents have already happened: in response to the Iskanderdeliveries of to Yerevan, Baku purchased Belarusian Polonez rocket launcher systems. Therefore, these deliveries should be balanced by the offer of Su-35 fighters to Azerbaijan, the expert notes.
[Translated from Russian]