Putin Uses Parade to Unveil Hardware

MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin presided over the grand unveiling of a new generation of Russian military hardware as part of Moscow's most extravagant Victory Day celebrations since the fall of the Soviet Union on May 9.

After weeks of encouragement by Russia's state-run media outlets, Muscovites swarmed the city center with profound patriotic fervor to pay tribute to the nation's hefty sacrifices 70 year ago in World War II.

When Putin took to the stage on Red Square to kick off the celebrations, he told a crowd of foreign dignitaries represented largely by nations such as China, Venezuela, India and even Cuba, it became clear that this year's celebrations were about more than the 2,000 veterans bused onto Red Square to watch the carefully choreographed spectacle.

Putin began the even with a subtly worded speech accusing the West of promoting an international system of double standards, before a Russian general — standing atop the passenger seat of a black Zil convertible in a dress uniform — led 16,000 troops marching across the square to the beat of patriotic Red Army wartime classics.

Soldiers mostly wore the usual parade garbs: a mix of World War II and more recent Soviet-style outfits. But one regiment donned the unmistakably new Ratnik military kit. The parade's announcer introduced these soldiers as the infamous "Polite People," the unmarked Russian soldiers who effortlessly seized Crimea from Ukraine last year.

Russian soldiers in period garb.

Photo Credit: Matthew Bodner

The message continued to be hammered home during the grand unveiling of Russia's new military hardware during the second part of the parade.

Each and every one of the new vehicles paraded through Red Square had painted on their sides the orange and black of the ubiquitous Saint George's ribbon, a recently revived imperial symbol of valor that has been co-opted by the pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine and the Kremlin's official line on the crisis.

Victory Day for the Defense Industry

Political showmanship aside, the parade was an important event for the Russian defense industry, which was given the most public of opportunities to unveil some of the first new military hardware to roll off Russian assembly lines in 30 years.

The equipment represents the first fruits of Putin's decade long 20 trillion ruble (US $400 billion) rearmament program, which he promises to use to refit 70 percent of the armed forces with new hardware by 2020. Economic crisis has threatened to derail aspects of the program, but so far there have been no reported cuts to procurement orders.

Without a doubt, the star of the armor column was the new Armata T-14 tank.

According to Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Moscow-based Center for the Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, the new tank represents a significant shift in Russian tank design.

A Russian general

Photo Credit: Matthew Bodner

While Soviet-era tanks like the T-72 favored heavier firepower and speed at the expense of armor and crew safety, Armata has adopted design philosophies enshrined in more modern Western tanks over the past 30 years.

These changes include a strong focus on survivability of the machine and its crew. This is achieved by sitting the three-man crew in an isolated capsule at the forward of the tank's body, from where the T-14's turret is controlled remotely.

According to manufacturer Uralvagonzavod and Russian defense officials, the tank's firing system is heavily automated, allowing the crew to fire faster and with greater accuracy than other Russian tanks.

Though touted by Russian officials in the state-run media as the greatest tank in the world, Armata has one key shortcoming according to Pukhov — its ammunition.

The T-14 features a brand new 125-mm cannon design, but it will be firing shells designed for the T-72. This means Armata's shells have a shorter range and lower impact velocity than its Western rivals.

Uralvagonzavod's UCP has already been used to field a replacement to the Soviet-era BMP infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) known as the Kurganets-25.

Like its predecessors, Kurganets is an amphibious IFV with heavier weapons and armor than an armored personnel carrier.

Kurganets was joined by a heavier IFV also based on the Armata platform, known simply as the T-15.

A Kurganets and T-15 IFV were seen by parade watchers on another square in central Moscow, Pushkin Square, to drop out of the formation and grind to a halt during the parade. They did not rejoin the column until it left the city.

Beyond the Armata platform, the Russian military showed off models of its new VPK-7829 Bumerang armored personnel carrier and the massive Koalitsiya-SV self-propelled gun.

Bumerang is reported to be a replacement for the iconic Soviet BTR-80, though it is still about two years away from serial production. According to Defense Ministry television station TV Zvezda, its armor can withstand a tank blast, and is armed with machine guns and anti-air weapons.

After several intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launchers allegedly loaded with the new RS-24 Yars ICBM rolled through Red Square, a rousing aerial flyover treated the crowds to dazzling smoke in the colors of the Russian flag and sparkling chaff. But nowhere to be seen was the new Sukhoi PAK FA T-50 stealth fighter.

Email: mbodner@defensenews.com

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