Russia Plans Sharp Military Spending Hike

RUSSIAN MOVES

Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a replica of the Tupolev-160 strategic bomber jet at the at the Olenogorsk military airport, near Murmansk, 16 August 2005. President Vladimir Putin took off from Moscow for a supersonic flight in a cruise-missile carrying Tupolev-160 bomber jet, the latest in the Russian leader's action-packed public appearances. After a health check, Putin donned a flight suit and took the commander's position in the strategic bomber, which was piloted by Major General Anatoly Zhikharev, with a colonel and a lieutenant colonel in charge of navigation, Russian media reported. AFP photo / Itar-Tass / Presidential Press Service

Moscow (AFP) Aug 17, 2005
Russia plans another substantial increase in defense spending next year to pay for across-the-board military upgrades, development of new weapons systems and improved social benefits for defense-sector employees, news agencies said Wednesday.

A draft 2006 budget allocates 668.3 billion rubles (24 billion dollars, 19.5 billion euros) for spending on national defense, an increase of nearly 22 percent on this year's defense budget and a figure equivalent to about 2.75 percent of Russia's projected gross national product.

The draft 2006 budget heralds a third consecutive year of significant increase in Russian defense spending in real terms, and came as President Vladimir Putin reiterated that upgrading the country's armed forces remained a priority of his presidency.

"I remember a time when ships stood idle in port, when planes did not fly. At the beginning of the 1990s, servicemen had their caps snatched off their heads when they rode on public transport," RIA-Novosti news agency quoted Putin as saying aboard a naval cruise in the Barents Sea on Wednesday.

"A lot has changed since then. ... Problems remain, but critical changes regarding the combat readiness of the armed forces have been made."

In the past two days, Putin has underscored the priority his administration attaches to rebuilding Russian defenses, breaking the sound barrier as he took the pilot's seat of a supersonic strategic bomber on Tuesday and attending strategic naval exercises on Wednesday.

The headline figure cited by Russian news agencies is dwarfed by basic US defense expenditure, which has been well in excess of 400 billion dollars for years and projected to rise by at least five percent in 2006 based on pending Pentagon budget requests.

The United States alone spends about as much on defense annually as all other countries of the world combined, according to independent international defense specialists.

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AEROSPACE

Putin Plays Salesman As Russia Puts Aerospace Wares On Display

Zhukovsky, Russia (AFP) Aug 16, 2005
Russia put its latest aerospace wares on display Tuesday as President Vladimir Putin kicked off a major trade fair outside Moscow, telling prospective buyers that the best value for money in aviation and space technology was here.

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