It Is The Devil You Know--II.

Let's continue a bit of rationalization and reasoning which we started in the previous post with the same title  and get back to our global commercial airspace matters. Here is the MC-21 cockpit:

here is more:

This is largely Honeywell avionics and Honeywell is extremely proud to be a part of MC-21 program as main avionics and some other aggregates provider. For now. Honeywell is proud to be part of Chinese aviation too. For now.

This is how MC-21 or, for that matter, any other commercial aircraft flies. Straight and slow.

For this kind of flying commercial aircraft need all kinds of computerized on-board systems which control all mechanics and engines, which also provide monitoring and representation of the state of on-board systems visually. They also require radar, collision avoidance system, altimeters, navigation (usually inertial navigational complex with various correction systems, GPS, GLONASS Et all)  and the list goes on and on this is what Honeywell, plus some Israeli and French avionics companies pride themselves on doing it better than anyone in the world. When speaking about Russian commercial aircraft, however, one should be fully aware of the presence of Western avionics and some other systems not because Russians are so dumb and can not make their own, but primarily because having Western "partners" helps the process of certification and of reaching foreign markets. After all, there is also a reasonable want of many potential customers to deal with avionics, aggregates' and engine packages they got used to. But let us continue:

Here is a standard cockpit of SU-35:

 here is more:

This, meanwhile, are SU-35 (and SU-30SM) engines, or rather engine exhausts:

And this is how this damn aircraft flies:

If you want to get the point without watching the whole thing, get to 6:30 mark and try not to drop your jaw to the floor. Avionics of SU-35 presented in the photos above is 100% Russian-made and overwhelmingly, including elemental base, including processors, Russian-designed and produced. So now, let's cut to the chase. Not only modern combat aircraft such as SU-35 can do any commercial aircraft type flying easily (well, without passengers, of course) but they fly in such a way and carry an astonishing array of cutting edge sensors and weapons, that any commercial aircraft avionics and what it can do compares to SU-35 avionics as a horse and buggy compares to the top of the line Ford truck. In other words, try to develop AI based software and then realize it in own produced hardware for all-aspect thrust-vectoring engines. I can tell you immediately, it is much harder than producing pretty much unified and fairly boring avionics package for commercial aircraft. 

Here we are coming to this very important juncture at which we have to ask this straight-forward question: if KRET (part of Rostec mammoth corporation) is capable to make avionics which makes SU-35 fly like an alien spaceship while simultaneously using fully integrated sensor and weapons suite which commercial pilots (unless they are former military) have no grasp of, isn't it reasonable to assume that, say, KRET and UAC will have no serious problems removing US (or Western) made avionics from Russian made aircraft, together with 100% Russian designed and made engines, thus removing them from the sanctions which are coming? What sanctions you may ask? Well, the US has the right to prohibit any sales of aircraft to anywhere if they contain more than 10% of US-made parts. And this is the next step Trump Administration will take against Russian airspace.  

Russian know it. But once you remove P&W engines and Western avionics and aggregates from MC-21 (and, accidentally, SSJ-100) you get almost fully Russian-made aircraft which will not be affected by sanctions, at least not this way. And here is the trick. Look at PD-14--not a single foreign piece in it. In fact, this engine pushes boundaries of what is possible and promises enormous savings for customers. Some say as high as 17% over any Western analogue. Well, even if it is 10%--it is gigantic in commercial aviation terms. US plane makers know it. Moreover, PD-14 already launched another mini-revolution of sorts in commercial engines design (is it possible that it is somehow connected to Russian combat aviation, wink-wink) and materials. So, make your own conclusion if the makers of avionics and aggregates for SU-35 or SU-57 will be able to replace western parts on commercial jets? I guess it is always harder coming up in complexity than down and that is your answer. But perspective is even more threatening for the end of the next decade once PD-35 and CR-929 go on-line. 

If Russian commercial aviation market is large--its loss for Western commercial aircraft manufacturers is painful but survivable, the loss of Chinese market, on the other hand, talk about tectonic shift in commercial aviation and that is what CR-929 will do. Well, that plus I have some difficulty believing that all issues with COMAC 919 will be solved in timely manner (they will be solved eventually) but one way or another it is not real competitor to MC-21, A-320 Neo or B-373 Max 8. So, it's impact will be limited. The reason? China does not have modern engine, Russia does and, in fact, it is being certified as I type this. So, the trend is being set and, considering the fact that DJT doesn't control his own government, there is very little necessity of any kind of cooperation, especially with upcoming November sanctions and, I don't think, Putin really believes Trump anyway. But it was stated many times before--sanctions are good for Russia, well, except for the last vestiges of some so called liberal (in reality criminal) and so called "business" (mostly money making and laundering) circles of Russia who, as I said many times before, should worship Putin who is the only obstacle between this public and lamp posts on which they might be hanged the minute he steps down if they trespass. But that is a separate topic altogether. 

To Be Continued...

Military Power (Cont'd 6)

Incomparable Corelli Barnett wrote in his "The Collapse Of British Power": "As Adam Smith, the founder of liberal economics, put in 1776:"By pursuing his own interest (an individual) frequently promotes that of society the more effectually than when he really intends to promote it." It was Adam Smith who formulated the doctrine of Free Trade, the keystone of liberalism, which was to exercise a long-lived and as baneful effect on British power as Wesley and Whitefield's preaching. Adam Smith attacked the traditional "mercantilist" belief that a nation should be generally self-supporting.... According to liberal thinking, a nation was no more than so many human atoms who happened to live under the same set of laws.."

It is not an accident, that liberal economics has its origins in the Anglo-Saxon world, the world for centuries protected by water and insulated from the horrors of the continental warfare. We will touch upon what real nation actually is later, but for now we have to define, if to follow Barnett's thought, what is self-supporting, especially so in terms of military power? Well, I already gave an idea. The greater the number of the enclosed (or complete) technological cycles nation has, more independent it is and more claim it has to the title of a true military power. Consider this example: in previous post it was pointed out that Brazil has a very respectable output of steel. This means several things:

1. Brazil has a serious extraction industry, which extracts all components, including, of course, iron ore itself, required for production of steel;

2. Most likely, Brazil has a fairly advanced chemical industry, since steel production requires a number of chemical elements and products;

3. Brazil, certainly, has a respectable (especially considering this nation's mostly tropical and subtropical climate) energy production;

4. Brazil, certainly, has a substantial machine-building sector (the bells should be ringing now) which produces some of the industrial machinery, cars and even airplanes, such as globally renown Embraer. 

Now, let's imagine that Brazil wants to become not just regional, which she is, but major military power. Could she? After all, Brazil fits CINC criteria. The answer is not as clear cut but still, most likely, it will be no. In modern world, Brazil lacks what really defines a true military power--a genuine (that is enclosed or complete) Military Industrial Complex. Modern military industrial complexes are built on the foundation of almost complete industrial-technological autarky. What does it mean? It means, first and foremost, a full spectrum machine building complex. While the United States is not as huge military power as it constantly claims, it is true military superpower none the less. US claim to military superpowerdom is not in its Armed Forces, however impressive they are. No. It is in the fact, that the United States produces completely on its own practically the whole spectrum of weapon systems, ranging from fairly simple (M-4 rifles or laser range finders) to very complex (Strategic Missile Submarines or BE-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft). United States can produce all of that WITHOUT any assistance from abroad. This is the country, mind you, which declares Free Trade to be one of the pillars of its economic policy. Yet, in the weapons' production, the US remains very autarkic as... it should, if it wants to remain globally militarily relevant well into the 21st Century. But then again, Free Trade and economic liberalism are the figments of imagination of economic schools of thought, which almost always originated in places which never experienced a good carpet bombing or being ravaged by the invasions. Accident? I don't think so, in fact--it is a pattern. 

So, Military Industrial Complex, which is a euphemism for advanced machine building complex, is Alpha and Omega of any serious military power, it is also a euphemism for a complete (or enclosed) technological cycle. Brazil may produce some industrial machines but, in the end, Embraer still flies with Pratt And Whitney, Rolls-Royce or any other engines produced not in Brazil. In fact, nobody in their own mind will share this technology with Brazil. 

Embraer Selects Pratt & Whitney’s PurePower Engines for Second Generation of E-Jets   

Enter Russia. Russia's GDP (PPP), as reported by IMF, is slightly (by about quarter of a trillion of US Dollars) larger than that of Brazil and yet, Russia's "recent" passenger jet Sukhoi SSJ-100, which competes directly with Embraer E-Jets, while benefiting from international cooperation has its engines SAM-146 developed by the JV between Snecma and legendary NPO Saturn. What is most important, Russia, which produces a range of aircraft, produces own engines--some of them decent, others--excellent. Moreover, the trials of PD-14 engine, which is very competitive against the best Western analogues, is proceeding with success. And here is some really strategic hyperlink--Aviadvigatel, which developed this engine, shows cooperation:

PD-14 Cooperation    

As you can see--not a single foreign participant. And here is the difference. Brazil and Russia may have relatively insignificant difference in GDP, but Russia not only produces the whole line of jet engines, but develops new ones (both civilian and military) which not only compete but, in military aviation, can, and very often do, surpass their western analogues. In fact, Russia produces some of the best helicopters in the world, both military and civilian, and leads the world in the number of cutting edge aerospace technologies--be it super-maneuverability or ECM (ECCM). That opens another can of worms in this comparison business. Radio-electronics. Russia, which sells its SSJ-100 internationally and is expected to start flight testing of her MC-21 jet soon, is capable on its own to provide avionics to her aircraft. Concern KRET does this kind of things.  

KRET to Upgrade Russia’s Tu-160 Strategic Bomber Avionics

And it did. 

TU-160 upgraded (In Russian) 

And while Brazil is renown for many fine things, including, of course, real football, producing for decades one of the finest artisans in this sport (Socrates is my favorite of all time) radio-electronics or electric generating equipment of Brazil are not that famous. You can take a look at Brazil's exports in this field here:

Statistical Data Electrical and Electronic Industry 

In the same time, when comparing Russia's exports in power generating equipment, which is as high tech as it comes, the portfolio of orders of Rosatom reaches $300 billion. 

ROSATOM’s overseas orders worth $ 300 billion and growing – Kirienko 

If that is what Obama meant by proclaiming Russia's economy to be "shredded" to pieces and Senator McCain calling Russia a "gas station", then they better check their facts. So, for humanities "educated" "experts" of all kind, who think that iPhone is a pinnacle of high tech, it could be a very rude awakening to recognize that real high tech is a bit different thing. World can live, and, in fact, like me, lives just fine without "smart" phones (good ol' basic, still "smart", phone is just fine), but it can not live without energy generating equipment. Obviously, unlike Brazil or, for that matter, India, whose GDP is much larger than that of Russia, in fact, it almost double that, it is Russia who hauls everybody to the International Space Station and back to Earth. Plus, of course, Russia is the one who, together with NASA, built said ISS. And then comes this OTHER issue--weapons' trade. To sell those weapons, one has to produce those and, like the US, Russia doesn't sell just AK-74s (those, too, of course), she sells full spectrum of weapon systems, from small firearms to the most complex conventional weapons ever created on Earth. Not only Russia is the second weapons' trader in the world, right behind the US, but she is also a direct competitor to self-proclaimed sole superpower of the world. Here is some statistics from famous Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. 

10 Countries That Export the Most Weapons 

The key word here is export, as in produce in own country and sell it abroad. This is possible only for the nations which have a complete industry capable of extraction all necessary raw materials, processing them and then turning them into the most complex finished product humanity knows--a weapon. There is a reason why Russia, who has much smaller GDP than China, sells five and a half times more weapons than PRC, who likes to sell them too. In fact, China is one of the major customers for Russian-made weapons. The reason is--Russia has one of the most advanced military industrial complexes in the world, capable of turning out some of the best, if not the best, weapons in the world. 

     

Is Going To Help To Waste Your Life Away

 

Is Going To Save Your Nation From "Democratization"

Or, as India's Navy knows, this is worth a lot, much more than money. 
        

Now ask yourself a question. What is going to happen if even France, who claims GDP very close to Russia's (short by about $800 billions) will try to have the whole fleet of these:

         

3 completed, 4 building. 

 Or these: 
     

Completed 2, building 4

Yes, the bottom of the French economy will fall off. Why doesn't it in Russia? Remember, in the last post--strategic positioning of the weapons in the house? It is back to the expenses--how much you are willing to pay for your and those dear to you freedom, independence and life? This calculus is beyond the grasp of those who never held anything, other than own satisfaction and ambition, dear and sacred in life. 

To Be Continued.......