On February 24, local time, Russian President Vladimir Putin officially declared war on Ukraine. Putin did not give an impassioned speech, only an emergency televised address earlier in the day, explaining to the international community the reasons for sending troops to Ukraine. It is worth noting that this operation is also the first large-scale military operation launched by Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the world is watching Russia.
Russian President Vladimir Putin
Of course, a large number of spectators also have their own thoughts, NATO naturally wants to spy on Russia's virtual reality through the Russo-Ukrainian War, and see if the former steel torrent is still worthy of its name. Some people want to find out the shortcomings exposed in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict through a third-party perspective, so that they can be improved. However, what is being discussed in this article today is not about tactics or Russian armament, but about whether the Russian economy can sustain long-term action in Ukraine in the existing environment.
Figure 22M3 inside the Khmeimim Air Base in Syria
As the saying goes, once the cannon is fired, the essence of war is the ability to mobilize, the ability to resources and the ability to produce. Unless it is a world war, these three points need to be supported by strong economic ability. Some may mention russia's military operations in Syria, which have been going on for more than 6 years, but there is no comparison between the two. The former is a security war similar to that of the United States, while the Ukrainian operation is a serious mechanized war, and the loss of the two is not at the same level at all.
In recent years, Russia's economy has fluctuated greatly, which is closely related to the price of the global energy market. It should be known that after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the long-term exposure to Western sanctions, Russia's economy as a whole is relatively single, and the pillar industries are mainly based on the sale of energy, of which the energy tax in fiscal revenue accounts for about 40%. If the international energy price rises, then the Russian economy will grow with it, and if the energy price plummets, it may even lead to negative growth in the Russian economy.
Gazprom facilities
It is worth noting that energy prices have to some extent influenced the means taken by Russia in the face of provocations. Both the 8-Day War in Georgia in 2008 and the current Russo-Ukrainian War have one thing in common, and that is that energy prices are on the upside. Since September last year, the global energy crisis has broken out, energy prices have risen sharply, and the cumulative increase of Natural Gas in Europe in one year has exceeded 729%! For Russia, the high price of energy is simply a "windfall".
According to data released by the Russian Federal Customs Service, Russia's cumulative oil exports in 2021 will be about 230 million tons, a year-on-year decline of 3.8%, but thanks to the continuous rise in oil prices, oil sales revenue not only did not decline, but rose 51.8% year-on-year, with sales of more than 110 billion US dollars. Also based on data released by the Russian Federation Customs Service, Gazprom exports reached $55.51 billion in 2021, an increase of 120% year-on-year. Its average annual natural gas export price was 272.8 US dollars / thousand square meters, while the export price in December was as high as 517.8 US dollars / thousand square meters. LNG LNG exports increased by 8.5% year-on-year to revenue of US$7.32 billion.
Vákol Oilfield, Russia (Photo by Xinhua News Agency)
As can be seen from the data released by the Russian side, the positive impact of the current sharp rise in energy prices on the Russian economy is extremely obvious. And with the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, the price of oil has risen sharply, and it has now exceeded $100 a barrel. It is foreseeable that with the continuation of the Russo-Ukrainian war and the white-hot confrontation between NATO and Russia, Russia may enjoy the dividends of high energy prices for a long time to come.
Of course, war does not take the economy as an absolute reference, but also depends on the scale of the outbreak and the duration of the war. Until now, Russia has basically focused on precision strikes, and there is no sign of large-scale flat pushing, which can be seen that the Russian side is more restrained. Because putin made it clear in his emergency televised speech that he would only target Ukrainian military targets and far-right groups, the infamous "Azov battalion." Therefore, it is particularly sensitive to civilian casualties, and a little carelessness may lead Russia to fall into further passivity internationally.
In addition, it can be seen from the speech of Russian President Vladimir Putin that the main purpose of Russia is a de-armed Ukraine, a neutral Ukraine, and the main attack is the ultra-rightist forces in Ukraine, not to seek the occupation of Ukraine. This dooms the War to be controlled within a proper range even if the Conflict in Ukraine escalates, with no scenes of mechanized armored clusters pushing flat, which means that the Scale of the War in Ukraine is not large and will not last very long. It also significantly increased Russia's sustainability in the war in Ukraine.
The main T-90A main battle tank of the Russian Army
As for the third factor, it is the price and cost of equipment. First, let's look at the cost of Russian equipment, a T90A main battle tank costs about $4.15 million, which is also the price announced by the Russian Ministry of Defense A battalion of Iskander missiles, including 6 launchers, 24 missiles, and other service vehicles, is about $120 million; the Su-27SKM has a unit price of around $27 million to $30 million; the BTR90IFV armored vehicle is about $1.5 million; the Ka-52 gunship costs about $35 million; and the Mi-17 transport helicopter costs around $9 million, which would be even lower if it were a low-end version.
The above weapons are basically the equipment participating in the Ukrainian war, it can be seen that the procurement cost of Russian-made weapons and equipment is relatively low, a considerable part of the weapons and equipment is only half of the price of similar equipment in the West or even lower, and many weapons and equipment have greater advantages in the cost of life. Therefore, although Russia's military expenditure is low, the military expenditure in 2022 is only 48.2 billion US dollars, but thanks to the advantages of equipment cost performance, it can also meet the needs of the Russian army for the replacement of conventional weapons and equipment.
Russian-made TV guided bombs
Of course, due to the objective fact that the scale of military expenditure is limited, although the Russian military equipment does not drag too much hindsel in the replacement of advanced equipment, it is still lacking in various types of precision guidance weapons. In particular, air-fired precision guidance ammunition is not only small in number, but also in quantity, which leads to the embarrassing situation of new equipment and old ammunition often appearing. Before the Ukrainian side announced the capture of the Russian T80BVM tank, you can see through the pictures that the matching ammunition is even an "old antique" such as 3BM26. In addition, the ground strike weapons of Russia's air and space forces are still mainly conventional unconditioned navigation bombs, but this has also become a "small trick" for the Russian air and space forces to save money.
Russian-made tactical aircraft subsystem
In order to improve the accuracy of the projection of conventional aerial bombs, Russia updated the navigation/bombing aiming system of existing tactical aircraft. The bombing and aiming system of the SVG24 model, combined with the widely used high-resistance bombs in Russia today, was able to deliver accuracy comparable to precision-guided ammunition at specific altitudes. It is also thanks to its powerful performance that the current Su-24, Su-25, Su-33 and even the Tu-22M series, Tu-95 and other models are equipped with the system, which can allow Russia to significantly reduce the cost of war and control it within an acceptable range.
Su-24 front-line bombers ready to load high-resistance bombs
In summary, the use of precision guidance munitions to strike high-value targets or key node targets, conventional bombs to carry out strike missions, has become a cost-saving but efficient approach, in fact, Russia is doing the same. On the first day of the war, that is, on the 24th, Russia used a series of high-precision technical equipment such as cruise missiles and ballistic missiles to carry out high-intensity strikes on Ukraine's high-value targets and key node targets, including military airports, radars, anti-aircraft missile systems, arsenals, command headquarters and other targets, and achieved good results. As can be seen from some of the videos that have been leaked recently, Russia is playing at a very high level at this stage.
In a video released by Russian media, several MiG-29 fighter jets parked at the airport of Ivano Frankivsk in Ukraine were attacked by missiles, and the missiles exploded in the fleet, and at least 5 MiG-29 fighters completely lost their maintenance value. Judging by the craters on the ground, it should have been attacked by weapons such as cruise missiles.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg
Moreover, war is the will of the state, depending on what purpose is achieved, and cannot simply be measured by the "economic account". For Russia, the War in Ukraine is a game-breaking battle, and once Ukraine falls to NATO, it will be catastrophic for Russia. Unlike the peculiarities of the three Baltic states, geographically speaking, Ukraine's side facing NATO is a group of small NATO countries, and later it is Germany and France, two European powers. If Ukraine falls, there will be no buffer zone between Russia and NATO, and in this case, if Russia and NATO come into conflict, Russia will fall into great passivity. It can be seen from this that in the case of continuous provocation by Western countries, Putin has only one way to fight.
The above is purely from the perspective of the war economy to see Russia's combat potential. At present, however, Putin has encountered a big problem, that is, the Western countries have united to impose comprehensive sanctions and even isolation on Russia, first of all, banning some Russian banks from using SWIFT.
SWIFT's full name is the Global Interbank Financial Communication Association Payment System, which is the most important financial payment system among members of financial institutions around the world, and if it is kicked out of SWIFT, it means that economic and trade exchanges between Russia and other countries will be greatly restricted. In addition to kicking out SWIFT, many Western countries have closed their airspace to Russia, which also means that Russian aircraft cannot transit and stop at relevant countries, creating an isolated situation in the international community.
On March 1, local time, the government of the Russian Federation decided to allocate 1 trillion rubles from the state welfare fund to buy shares in Russian companies that were sanctioned. At the same time, Russia's major commercial banks have raised interest rates on the ruble to withstand joint sanctions by Western countries. But for now, at least, comprehensive Western sanctions will not deter Russia from military action.