Armata soon to be in service.

[VladimirTarasov]

umm because she is a journalist and that is how journalists survive?  Man is that really the best argument you could make, heck I can listen to RT for free too.  This a Russian source, someone who was in the opposition for years has met with Putin on more than one occasion and the best you can dismiss her with is, she sells a book... wow.  Almost any well publicized anti Putin sentiment is going to be published in the west.  He isn't exactly promoting discussion or did you miss the assassination of Nemstov.  Yeah his killers will ever be brought before a court...sure. 

 

Have you actually read her book?

It is a propaganda piece easy as that, Putin won all his elections fairly, Just like Obama has, And George W. Bush has, Journalists are the scums of media propaganda, Sure Putin did some bad stuff but as always the west over exaggerates it. I honestly would get into more detail but you know after a while someone gets sick of arguing the same things over and over. This is a forum for a good game, I don't think we should take it this off track. If you want to continue you this lets type in messages.

[sburke]

LOL citing George Bush for winning a fair election is not exactly a selling point.    Yes we do have our own issues here.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_election_recount

 

Fair enough Vladimir and good point.  Maybe at some point I will take you up on that.  I am very curious to hear an alternative view from inside Russia.  Forewarning you may be unsuccessful at changing my perspective.  I am a stubborn pita at times... okay a lot of times.  No idea why my wife agreed to marry me.  She probably lost a bet.

[VladimirTarasov]

LOL citing George Bush for winning a fair election is not exactly a selling point.    Yes we do have our own issues here.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_election_recount

 

Fair enough Vladimir and good point.  Maybe at some point I will take you up on that.  I am very curious to hear an alternative view from inside Russia.  Forewarning you may be unsuccessful at changing my perspective.  I am a stubborn pita at times... okay a lot of times.  No idea why my wife agreed to marry me.  She probably lost a bet.

LOL 

[Battlefront.com]

I like how Western media is always suspect, but the country that has more journalists murdered than practically any other country in the world should not be suspect:

https://cpj.org/killed/europe/russia/

But we are digressing. The economic issue is about numbers and numbers only. As has been stated several times now, and dodged just as many times, Russia's income has dropped far more than the 10% across the board domestic spending cuts instituted by Putin this year. Russia's own numbers confirm this. So, if both Russia and the West are lying about Russia's economic situation, then who do we believe? Martians?

If you spend more than you earn, you have to borrow or you will be in trouble fast. Russia has very little potential to borrow because of sanctions and generally poor climate for investment. So if Russia is spending more than it earns, and can not borrow, then it will have to cut expenses. This is basic economics.

The reason this is relevant is that fancy new military hardware can not be bought without money. And the Russian government is fast running out of it due, primarily, to the massive decline in oil prices. Russia's own estimates show that cash reserves will be used up within a year unless there is drastic changes in the equation. Since nobody is predicting oil prices will go up (significantly) in the near future, it is reasonable to presume that Russia's money problems will not magically vanish within the next year. Because of this Russia will have to cut its budget by a lot more than the current 10% for non-military spending.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

It's entirely possible to live in a country and not have an especially good understanding of what's actually going on in that country.

Yup, and the US is no exception to that rule. I've said it many times, I saw the housing bubble forming and I predicted it would burst very badly YEARS before mainstream media was talking about it. To me, it was simply "what goes up, must come down" and "the bigger they come, the harder they fall". But most people told me I was daft because everything was going so very well for the economy and income. Why? Because they wanted to believe it was and there wasn't anybody telling them any different. Denial is a Human condition and, last time I checked, Russians are Humans just as much Americans.

I do not wish bad things on the Russian people, but bad things are happening now and will get much worse in the coming 1-2 years. Will it be as bad as the 1990s? Perhaps not, but there is a real chance that it could. And perhaps worse. I really, really, really hope for the best possible outcome of this current financial crisis. However, I'm a realistic and therefore not optimistic.

Steve

[A Canadian Cat]

Indeed your personal situation factors in a lot to how you perceive things are going in your own country's economy.  Take this latest down turn that started in 2008.  My wife and I did not loose our jobs.  So really our day to day life did not suffer much at all.  Most of my neighbours also were not personally effected so it was very possible to spend my days feeling totally fine about things.  if things had gone differently and I was one of the people that lost their job I would have perceived things very differently on a daily basis.  Even during the worst times of the last few recessions the majority of people were not directly effected and did OK.  It will be no different in Russia, recessions suck - for some people.

 

Also has Steve says the timing of things like bubbles bursting can be tricky to predict.  So many people actively work to keep them going.  To add to Sreve's example of predicting the housing burst years before it happened I have a friend that pulled out of the stock market in the early 90s because he thought the bubble was getting out of hand.  Well that bubble burst in 2000 about 6 years after he felt it was "right around the corner".  Steve can see the writing on the wall with the Russian government's financial situation but I still think trying to predict when things will "burst" is going to be difficult.  On top of that in the mean time the majority of people in Russian are going to be OK at least while that happens. 

 

I agree with Steve too I really hope the Russian people do not suffer to much just like I hope the people in my country who are directly effected by a recession do not suffer too much either.

[sburke]

bubbles and perception is a funny topic, maybe for the general discussion thread. 

 

I remember watching the housing market in the bay area.  My wife and I were renting and we wanted to buy, but we wanted to buy to live in not to flip and just profit. So we watched all the mortgage rates and particularly the adjustable mortgages.  I can remember us talking about how anyone in their right mind would sign a mortgage like that.  It sounded like a recipe for a financial disaster so we decided to wait and if it meant we couldn't buy so be it.  Well 6 years ago we bought as the market crashed and we got a plain old fixed rate.  I now pay half on my mortgage than I would be paying rent for the Apt we lived in when we bought.  From my perspective - the housing bust was my ticket to buying a house.  Hardly the experience of most of the country.

[Battlefront.com]

There are books out there written about how economies collapse. They very often collapse after a period of "good times" which are, in large part, false. The economy basically gets better because people believe that it is better, not necessarily because it really is. Then something, or a series of somethings, happen to shake people's confidence. Then things go to Hell very quickly. Anybody that has studied the real nature and real cause of the housing bubble collapse know what I'm talking about. I've studied several other major economic collapses, and they exhibit similar cause/effect events.

The economic news out of Russia is bad and getting worse. How fast and how bad will it get? No way of knowing for sure, but as someone who has studied this stuff for a couple of decades... I don't think it's going to be nice.

An interesting sign things are getting bad can be seen with the Putinbot messaging. Last year (and before_) their message was all about how the USD was soon to be removed as the world trade currency and that BRIC was going to make the World Bank an irrelevant institution. That can be viewed as an offensive propaganda position. This year? It's all about how not bad the Russian economy is, how not bad the sanctions are, and how Russia is not waging a war. This can best be described as defensive propaganda. The shift from offensive to defensive messaging is not accidental.

Steve

[sburke]

well apparently the trade deal with China is not working out so well either.

 

http://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Russia-China-Gas-Relationship-On-The-Rocks.html

 

Note this is reporting what is already in Russian news so it isn't just Western negative news reporting- it is Russian negative news reporting.

 

This is according to Valery Nesterov, an analyst with the Moscow investment bank Sberbank, who spoke in an interview published July 22 in the Russian-language financial newspaper Vedomosti.

Edited July 27, 2015 by sburke

[Nerdwing]

Survival of the fittest.  Only the best journalists survive in Russia.

[Red Rage]

Just curious - how do our non-Russian friends know what the less mainstream Russian analytical sources are putting out without speaking a word of Russian? Goggle translate 10 page articles? Get the cherry picked Coles notes from Western media?

 

I wish life was simpler and i didn't have a  grasp of both perspectives. The amount of bull**** and misinformation is just too frustrating, from both sides.  

[sburke]

LOL As a non Russian friend I can still do basic math. a drop in income has to mean a drop in spending or you start heading towards a very bad financial state.  No rocket science needed and Russian is not a magical place where the basic rules of finance don't apply.

 

For some fun reading though you may want to try this one on.

 

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/27/the-double-sting

[Red Rage]

Well, the urapatriot Russian sources are beating the same "numbers" drum with regards to US 20 trillion debt and printing dollars. Now with an added twist of blacks and latinos on the verge of rebellion.

In reality, the picture is alot more complex than that.

My point was mostly addressed at lumping all the sources in the same basket and summarily dismissing them as propaganda.

[Sublime]

lol blacks and latinos are definitely not on the verge of rebellion. this is nothing compared to what was going on in the US in the late 60s and there was no organized rebellion or race war. nope not gonna happen. ill eat my hat

and sburke im really sorry dude you got my word on a turn arnd 5 pm est and ill start gettn them to you at least every other day if not every day. we oughta start thinking abt our next battle though as you really have me in a bind and Ive killed like one Pz. IV

Edited July 31, 2015 by Sublime

[Lethaface]

LOL As a non Russian friend I can still do basic math. a drop in income has to mean a drop in spending or you start heading towards a very bad financial state.  No rocket science needed and Russian is not a magical place where the basic rules of finance don't apply.

 

For some fun reading though you may want to try this one on.

 

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/27/the-double-sting

 

Agreed. Although Russia can always start the money presses like the rest of us do (US since eternity, EU since recently). However, the problem Russia has is that for many things it relies on imports. Imports need to be paid in hard foreign currency, currency Russia mainly gets by exporting oil and gas. Prices of oil and gas have dropped quite severely, so there is the problem right there. No media outlet with whatever bias can take that problem away. How big is that problem? I don't know for sure, but probably quite large. You could just calculate the amount of oil and gas that Russia exports and multiply that with the drop in price. That's how large the problem is at a bare minimum. Pumping up more oil can work for the near future, but won't help oil/gas prices going up. 

Apart from that the sanctions aren't really helping to stimulate the economy, nor is the conflict in Ukraine. 

 

Edit to add that I don't think this means Russia is going back to 90's type of economic problems. In 2012 Russia was doing great relatively speaking. Most important thing is that it needs to build up it's indigenous ability to add value versus just relying on exporting raw materials, so becoming less reliant on the export of crude oil and gas. From that point of view the further development of it's arms industries through the A/K/B program is a good thing. The world will always need weapons, unfortunately. 

Edited July 31, 2015 by Lethaface

[John Kettler]

A major Russian academic has waded in, in the context of a piece on China-Russia economic cooperation by Professor Alexander Panov for the state-owned tech firm Rostec's site . What he has to say about the backward state of Russian electronics is most revealing and confirms the very points several of us have made in this regard. And who is Alexander Panov? A very big gun indeed. 

 

(Fair Use)

 

"By Alexander Panov
Distinguished Officer of the Russian Diplomatic Service
Senior Researcher at the US and Canada Research Institute with the Russian Academy of Science, MGIMO Professor"

 

I looked him up myself, and his accomplishments are most impressive and long term. See UL corner of linked page. He served in the Soviet Union's diplomatic corps and now serves in Russia's.

 

https://books.google.com/books?id=jn_GG55gKm8C&pg=PA1282#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

His titles as presented in an Executive Leadership Course held in Moscow at the Diplomatic Academy. As Rector, he is what here in the States we call Dean.

 

http://www.dipacademy.ru/elc/rector_message.shtml

 

"Electronics

 

The sector has very strong significance to date. However, I believe that we would mostly have to rely on our own designs. We have fallen very far behind advanced technologies in this sector. So we have to move fast to catch up. Our component manufacturing is very faar behind global leaders. This is a very big and complex problem."

 

Mind, that isn't to say that Russia can't build high tech. It can and does, but this breaking story on a Russian microwave weapon on the Buk chassis, widely reported, even by one of the major networks here, is an exclusive from one state-owned firm to another. Russia is world class in this field, for it plays to Russia's tremendous depth and breadth in high energy physics.

 

http://www.ibtimes.com/russias-microwave-gun-can-disable-drones-warheads-6-miles-away-official-says-1967170

 

It so happens that I'm very well positioned to apply some sniff tests to the article, for Russian HPM (High Power Microwave) weaponry was not only part of my job, but I was one of the founders of the DEWWG (Directed Energy Weapon Working Group) at Rockwell International NAAO (North American Aerospace Operations) formed specifically to address the threats posed by Russian laser, particle beam and HPW weapons. The relativistic device referred to in the article is a vircator, which puts out microwave energy at breathtaking levels. That's without factoring in antenna gain, either.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vircator

 

"Power levels on the order of 10¹⁰ to 10¹² watts are possible."

 

While classically the vircator is a one shot system, it is possible to build one which can fire shot after shot, as this military-technical paper points out. 

 

http://aimt.unob.cz/articles/07_02/07_02%20(8).pdf

 

As such, the HPM weapon Sputnik reports is almost certainly an added capability for the Buk SAM system, in the form of a weapon system on the same chassis as the Buk, but which offers unique capabilities the Buk doesn't have, capabilities which complement each other in a SAM-HPM mix. Not only can the HPM wreak all sorts of havoc on its own, but it could also improve SAM effectiveness by overloading, or even damaging and destroying the sensors of the planned aerial target, potentially stripping it of SA and possibly much more. How much more? How about ordnance or fuel  detonating? Nor does HPM weaponry have a Rmin, whereas a SAM does. Nor is an HPM shot limited! 

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler

Edited August 1, 2015 by John Kettler

[L0ckAndL0ad]

Oh, you peeps are still going about economy? I see.

 

Presumably, inside T-15.

 

[VladimirTarasov]

Oh, you peeps are still going about economy? I see.

 

Presumably, inside T-15

 

Could be Kurganets or Bumerang too.  

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

Interesting.  It seems to lack any sort of internal storage, seating, or the like.  I imagine that's on par for a prototype though.

[L0ckAndL0ad]

 It is unlikely to be a Kurg, because then it should have boxy stuff near the door, for water jets. Boomer should have hatches in the roof in that area. So it's likely a T-15.

Edited August 1, 2015 by L0ckAndL0ad

[VladimirTarasov]

 It is unlikely to be a Kurg, because then it should have boxy stuff near the door, for water jets. Boomer should have hatches in the roof in that area. So it's likely a T-15.

Quite true, Can't wait till these beasts enter service.

[Battlefront.com]

Oh, you peeps are still going about economy? I see.

Because it's still relevant and some can't figure out why, the answer is "yup".

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Agreed. Although Russia can always start the money presses like the rest of us do (US since eternity, EU since recently).

Correct, but Russia doesn't have the sort of good will and future hope that the US does. When the US increases its money printing the world might not like it, but they have very little choice but to put up with it and adjust. Russia is not in the same position of strength. In fact, capital flight out of Russia indicates the opposite is true.

However, the problem Russia has is that for many things it relies on imports. Imports need to be paid in hard foreign currency, currency Russia mainly gets by exporting oil and gas. Prices of oil and gas have dropped quite severely, so there is the problem right there. No media outlet with whatever bias can take that problem away. How big is that problem? I don't know for sure, but probably quite large. You could just calculate the amount of oil and gas that Russia exports and multiply that with the drop in price. That's how large the problem is at a bare minimum. Pumping up more oil can work for the near future, but won't help oil/gas prices going up.

Yup, and it's not even certain Russia can pump more. In fact, gas production is in decline big time. Mostly because Russia can't find enough demand for its product at pre 2014 levels. If you read the oil/gas info sources they have been critical of Russia for years for not investing enough in new capacity. Now Russia doesn't have access to foreign investment which it so desperately needs. Gazprom is now being talked about as a candidate for bankruptcy if things don't get better soon.

As for putting numbers on what Russia spends on imports, that's pretty well known. It's been a while since I saw the numbers, but the one that really stuck with me was medicine. Russia spends about 70% of its medicine budget on foreign imports. Which means the budget is highly susceptible to flux in the Ruble's value. Which, BTW, is on the way back down against the USD:

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/russia/currency

Apart from that the sanctions aren't really helping to stimulate the economy, nor is the conflict in Ukraine.

Yup.

 

Edit to add that I don't think this means Russia is going back to 90's type of economic problems. In 2012 Russia was doing great relatively speaking. Most important thing is that it needs to build up it's indigenous ability to add value versus just relying on exporting raw materials, so becoming less reliant on the export of crude oil and gas.

This is what analysts have been saying Russia should have done for the last 15 years, but in fact has done much the opposite. When money was flowing in Russia opted to buy what it didn't already make. Worse, in some cases it started buying what it already made and put pressure on the domestic industries. This was very good for a fairly impressive and quick rise in the standard of living for Russians. But it now is going in the opposite direction. We just don't know how far it will go down before it levels out. Though there are indications.

A recent survey of 20+ economists predict that if oil goes to $40 for even one month that it will have negative GDP for the next two years. Problem with that is at Russia's current losses it has only enough cash for less than one year and nobody to lend it more when it runs out.

From that point of view the further development of it's arms industries through the A/K/B program is a good thing. The world will always need weapons, unfortunately.

At several points in this thread I've challenged anyone to make a case for a strong export market for these vehicles. Presuming, of course, that Russia actually makes them available for export. So far, not much to refute my position that the export market for these vehicles doesn't look very good.

In any case, the relevance to this is Russia will have to deal with the economic reality sooner rather than later. And that reality will necessitate more changes to the defense spending side of the economy than is currently envisioned by the Kremlin. If they do then that will no doubt have an impact on A/B/K. And if they don't, probably even worse for A/B/K.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Interesting.  It seems to lack any sort of internal storage, seating, or the like.  I imagine that's on par for a prototype though.

What, that gas can isn't the intended crew seat? BMPs have gas cans for doors, so why not seats?

Seriously, I don't even see fold up jump seats. I would have though those would be in the prototypes already. And if there isn't supposed to be seats in this area, I find that very curious indeed!

Steve

[Sublime]

hate to say it but in bottom right corner that green thing looks like part of a bench. just looks like he.s sitting on gas can so he can take his 'Im l33t on vacation in the ukraine er sochi' pic.