Russian Ministry of Defense planning to scrap tons of military weapons and munitions
The Russian Ministry of Defense disclosed information about the plans and quantities of scrap weaponry which is “part of the movable property of the Russian Armed Forces, but is not required for state protection”.
The relevant information appears in an explanatory note for the proposal of amendments to the Russian president’s decree regarding “changing the order of the implementation of released military property, the corporatization and privatization of military trade”.
The text notes that the disposal of weapons which have not been needed by the Russian Ministry of Defense must take place by the end of 2020, and that more than 50 billion rubles ($890 million USD) are required from the budget in order to achieve this.
9,900 armored car units, 21,500 artillery units, nearly 7 million small arms, more than 150 million units of ammunition, 140,000 general military purpose missiles, almost 2,000 planes and helicopters, and a significant number of other types of weapons, must be disposed of by the end of 2020.
The note also specifies that in 2016 the Russian Ministry of Defense scrapped 207,800 tons of ferrous and 5,300 tons of non-ferrous metals, and in 2017 a further 230,000 tons of scrap metal are planned.
“The expansion of the geography of application and the volumes of tasks which stand before the Russian Armed Forces, including the Arctic zone and the regions of the Extreme North, the deadlines for the release, implementation and removal of scrap ferrous and non-ferrous metals from the military units’ territory do not meet the current requirements. The long periods of military equipment remaining in park and warehouse territories cause additional protection-related expenses, and create the preconditions for theft,” the document states.
According to the document, as a result of the amendment proposal being adopted, the only implementer of ferrous and non-ferrous metal scrapping belonging to the Ministry of Defense will be TransLom Ltd.
Public discussion of the document will last until April 13 and the anti-corruption expertise until April 5.
As Dmitro Tymchuk, MP of Verkhovna Rada (Parliament of Ukraine) from People’s Front noted on his Facebook page, in this way Russia plans to write off the thousands of units of weaponry and military equipment which were moved to the Donbas in the three years since the start of the conflict in eastern Ukraine.