Director Gerbert Yefremov Explains How the Scientific-Production Association of Machine-Building [NPOmash] is Surviving the Systemic Crisis
Moscow Nezavisimoye Voyennoye Obozreniye 30 Jul-5 Aug 99 No 29 pp 1, 6
Interview with Gerbert Aleksandrovich Yefremov, director, NPOmash, by Valeriy Aleksin
From NVO Files Gerbert Aleksandrovich Yefremov was born on 15 March 1933 in the town of Maloye Zarechye, Vologda Oblast. In 1956 he graduated from the Leningrad Military Mechanical Institute with a specialty in "rocket building," after which he successfully served until 1967 in all engineering positions at the NPOmash--from engineer to chief of the OKB-52 Design Bureau, and from 1967 to 1985 he served in positions from chief of the design bureau and deputy chief designer to chief designer of rocket complexes and general designer of NPOmash. Since 1985 he has been the general director and general designer and chief of the design bureau for machine building of NPOmash. He is a Hero of Socialist Labor, a recipient of the Lenin and USSR state prizes, a candidate of technical sciences, a professor, and an author of numerous inventions introduced in the center's enterprises. He participated directly in the most important developments of cruise and ballistic missiles and spacecraft of various kinds. He has been awarded three orders and five medals.
[Aleksin] Gerbert Aleksandrovich, what is your NPOmash known for?
[Yefremov] In September 1999 our association will be 55 years old. Academician Vladimir Nikolayevich Chelomey, an outstanding scientist and designer, was its creator and only leader for a long succession of years. He belonged to the class of creators of the scale of Sergey Korolev and Andrey Tupolev. Much of what our firm has accomplished in rocket building and cosmonautics can be described in three words: unique and first in the world. We introduced more than 25 missile complexes of different kinds with unified rockets into our army and navy. Including in the mid-1970s, when our country attained strategic parity with the USA for the first time. Seventy percent of the missiles of the Strategic Missile Troops currently on alert duty were developed by us.
The UR-500 launch vehicle developed under Vladimir Chelomey's leadership, known by the name of "Proton", has been carrying the heaviest artificial earth satellites into orbit since 1965, and it is universally recognized as one of the world's most reliable. According to international organizations insuring against space risks, the technical reliability of the "Proton" is the same as the French "Arianne" launch vehicle and the American "Delta-2". In the last 10 years there were only two failed launchings (unfortunately the second occurred quite recently, on 6 July of this year). Since 1961 we have developed and placed in service four generations of spacecraft of different kinds, including military.
[Aleksin] Please tell us about how NPOmash interacts with the Navy.
[Yefremov] Our relations with the fleet are strong and have a long history. Starting with our first cruise missile, the P-5, which was launched for the first time from a submarine to a range of 500 km 40 years ago, we have armed the fleet with 20 missile complexes to fight the enemy's ships, including his attack aircraft carriers. Domestically manufactured antiship cruise missiles (PKR), the P-15 and P-15M (with ranges of 40 and 80 km respectively), were supplied for the first time in the world to missile boats and to units of the navy's coastal missile and artillery forces (BRAV) (the "Rubezh" complex). It was not until after their stunning success in combat in the wars of Egypt against Israel and India against Pakistan in 1968-1971 that mass development of such weapons was begun in the world's leading fleets (the "Harpoon" in the USA, the "Gabriel" in Israel, and so on).
But we didn't stand in place either: By as early as the start of the 1960s we supplied our submarines with the operational-level P-6 missile complex with a range of 380 km, supersonic speed, and nuclear and high-explosive warheads, to be used against our fleet's main adversary--attack aircraft carriers of the U.S. Navy--in any region of the World Ocean. They were supplied to 29 project 675 nuclear-powered cruise missile submarines (PLARK) and to 16 project 651 diesel-powered submarines (PLRK). Project 58 ("Groznyy" class) and project 1134 ("Admiral Zozulya" class) guided missile cruisers (RKR) were armed with a similar complex, the P- 35. The "Redut" complex was also created for the navy's BRAV on the basis of this class of antiship cruise missiles. To extend the navy's striking power beyond the horizon, jointly with the "Kometa" NPO we developed the "Legenda" naval space reconnaissance and target designation system (MKRTs), which makes use of radio and radar reconnaissance spacecraft.
But these complexes had a significant shortcoming: Antiship cruise missiles could be fired only from surfaced position. This robbed the PLARK of its main tactical advantage--covertness. Consequently in the late 1960s and early 1970s we developed the world's first complex of underwater-launched "Ametist" homing cruise missiles for project 670 PLARKs, and then improved it by introducing the general-purpose "Malakhit" antiship cruise missile, which was "smarter," more powerful, and had a longer range. It began to be installed aboard project 670M PLARKs and project 1234 small guided missile ships.
To support the high combat effectiveness of a naval grouping equipped with operational-level antiship cruise missiles in the face of intensive electronic countermeasures (ECM) and the air and antimissile defenses of the naval adversary with the least material outlays, we re-equipped their carriers twice during this time. And each time the main characteristics of the missiles were approximately doubled, and new possibilities presented themselves for installing onboard digital computers and countermeasures (the "Bazalt" missile complex equipped with P-500 antiship cruise missiles, which were supplied, besides to project 675MK PLARKs, to project 1164 "Slava" class guided missile cruisers and the TAVKR [heavy carrier cruiser] "Admiral Flota Sovetskogo Soyuza Groshkov").
[Aleksin] Nonetheless, the weapons you've described lost their effectiveness with the advent of a series of "Nimitz" class nuclear-powered attack aircraft carriers (eight units are already in service, and their construction will continue into the 21st century), "Ticonderoga" class guided missile cruisers, and "Arleigh Burke" class destroyers in the U.S. Navy, and their air and antimissile defenses based on "Tomcat" deck-landing fighters equipped with "Phoenix" missiles and "Aegis" SAM systems.
[Yefremov] We recognized this, and by the start of the 1980s we developed a third-generation general-purpose [universalnyy] missile complex, the "Granit", with regard for past experience and research. It was distinguished by excellent tactical performance characteristics (range 500 km, speed about 2.5 M, flexible adaptive trajectories), universality of launch position (submerged and surface) and launch platforms (nuclear-powered submarines and surface ships), volley fire with a rational spatial distribution of missiles, and a selective interference-resistant control system. A deep systemic approach based on mutual tie-in of the components of the complex system (consisting of the anti- ship cruise missile, the launch platform, and target designation equipment) was used for the first time in the creation of this complex. As a result the new complex was able to carry out any task of naval combat for the first time using the set of fire weapons of a single launch platform. According to the navy's experience of combat and operational training it is practically impossible to knock down such an antiship cruise missile.
The "Granit" general-purpose complex was supplied to a new generation of our project 949 and 949A nuclear-powered cruising submarines (APKR), project 1144 ("Petr Velikiy" class) heavy nuclear powered guided missile cruisers (TARKR), and the flagship of the Russian Navy, the heavy aircraft-carrying cruiser (TAVKR) "Admiral Flota Sovetskogo Soyuza Kuznetsov". This is our asymmetrical and economical response to the aircraft threat: Each APKR costs 10 times less than a "Nimitz" class attack aircraft carrier. The created grouping can effectively function all the way into the '20s of the next century. This naval grouping is a mighty and unique resource, the only one in the arsenal of the Russian Armed Forces able to realistically oppose the adversary's attack aircraft carrier task forces. In addition to this, the grouping's fighting units can operate against ships of all classes in the course of conflicts of any intensity, and when necessary, they can serve as a reserve with which to carry out strategic missions of naval strategic nuclear forces (MSYaS), and in the future, hit ground targets with non-nuclear ammunition with high precision.
This provides for non-nuclear deterrence and repulsion of aggression against Russia from the seas and oceans in peacetime. In wartime we are assured of keeping air and missile strikes from the sea against targets on Russian territory from happening, of achieving supremacy on our coastal seas, and of foiling assault-landing and strategic transport operations on the adversary's ocean lines of communication.
We are preserving the high fighting effectiveness of this grouping by modernizing its principal weapon--the operational-level antiship cruise missile. The foundation for this work has already been laid. We will increase the potential of the missiles by a factor of three and reequip the launch platforms right at their bases. The time and material outlays of rearmament are minimal.
[Aleksin] That's all well and good, but what if the military budget provides practically no money for state contracts for new weapons for the navy?
[Yefremov] That's the most difficult and interesting question. The Ministry of Defense owes around R120 million. As a result we have had to work with our own money for the last 8-9 years. To be able to do that, we had to "tighten our belts," decrease nonproductive outlays, and take responsibility for the entire life support system of the enterprises. In short, as Ilya Klebanov, the vice premier responsible for the defense-industrial complex, said very precisely: "Compress the production base until it no longer operates at a loss." Money can be found only through credits from weapon-importing third countries, since Europe and the USA don't need us or our military production. In this case of course we mustn't have any debts when it comes to taxes and wages for our workers.
We are solving this problem through foreign economic activity. It is also referred to as military-technical cooperation, which we were permitted to engage in within certain bounds by an order of the RF Government dated December 1997. The NPOmash has such a permit in relation to naval, shore-based, and air-based missile complexes equipped with "Yakhont" and "Alfa" antiship cruise missiles. The "Yakhont" was described sufficiently well in Nezavisimoye Voyennoye Obozreniye, No 26, 1999. We are developing the general-purpose missile complex jointly with a foreign customer representing third countries, which significantly increases the reliability of our foreign economic activity and the interest of customers in long-term, effective cooperation, to include in specialist training and in all phases of creation and operation of the complexes and their launch platforms. This is a global trend: The entire world is gradually integrating, including in the production of weapons and military equipment. We must not fall behind.
Submarines, surface ships, airplanes, and mobile and permanent land-based launchers can serve as launch platforms for the "Alfa". The complex is able to hit ground targets with high precision and selectively destroy any class of the adversary's ships, up to attack aircraft carriers inclusively. The complex is combat ready in less than 2 minutes. The onboard control complex of the "Alfa" consists of a highly protected multichannel homing complex; an inertial navigation system using navigation satellites to adjust its precision characteristics; a system of radiotechnical protection against the adversary's electronic countermeasures.
In this case we are strictly observing the existing requirements on nonproliferation of missile technology. According to comprehensive evaluations the world market has no worthy competitors of the "Yakhont" and "Alfa" antiship cruise missiles, and in the next 15 years the market volume will be over 6,000 units. In this way, we are not only supporting the high technological level of our development and retaining scientific and production personnel of the highest qualifications, but we are also obtaining a possibility for keeping work going in the cooperative system of development and manufacture of the latest antiship cruise missiles for the Russian Navy. Thus we are both earning a living for ourselves and supporting unpaid state defense contracts.
[Aleksin] It's now become fashionable to talk about dual-use technology at enterprises of the defense-industrial complex. How does the NPOmash fit in with this?
[Yefremove] To us, dual-use technology is not a fad but a natural way to sustain economic development, all the more so in the conditions of the country's systemic crisis. After all, none of the world's developed countries now have firms that manufacture nothing but military products. In addition to filling very profitable military orders, Boeing, Hughes, Thomson, and Thyssen-Krupp manufacture civilian products of different kinds. In this case each sector of activity of such companies is not self-contained: On the contrary they supply each other with technology and developments from their own areas. Our defense products are no less suited to industrial production, and the activity of many enterprises and institutes is rather diversified. Hence the solution--moving toward a sensible ratio between defense and civilian products based on dual-use high technology.
One of the main areas of activity of the NPOmash in this work is creation of small spacecraft weighing up to 1 tonne and launching these craft into orbit in the first phase--until creation of a new light launch vehicle--by the "Strela" launch vehicle. Small spacecraft are a relatively inexpensive means of highly detailed observation on a regional scale in behalf of a large number of customers, to include of operational target designation for the fleet's high-precision antiship weapons. The "Strela" launch vehicle, which is being created out of RS-18 ICBMs (SS-19 or "Stilleto" under the NATO classification) presently being reduced under the START-II treaty, was developed by NPOmash. It is not only a means of inserting small spacecraft and other commercial loads into orbit but also a way of carrying out urgent tasks associated with lengthening the useful life of ICBMs currently on alert duty. We have already reserved the "Svoboda" launch center in Amur Oblast for this project, and are supporting it. Thus we are continuing the traditional area of the activity of NPOmash, though at a new level.
Another direction in restructuring the activity of NPOmash is creating new, complex technical systems intended purely for civilian purposes. Here, our efforts are directed at creating remote Earth sensing systems for monitoring, cartography and geodesy, agriculture and forestry, oceanology, navigation, fish industry, space communication systems, satellites of a new generation, alternative power systems, information and reference systems, integrated information and analysis systems, promising systems for agriculture and food industry, and software. For example we placed the first generation of an information and analysis system for the RF Ministry of Economics in service after winning the contract in stiff competition. Our information systems have now been installed in terminals in Novosibirsk, and in the Kazanskiy and Rizhskiy terminals in Moscow. By the way, we are hiring young specialists for work in the areas that are new to us; in particular, this year we even hired geophysicists graduating from Moscow State University.
Thus in today's difficult conditions we are orienting ourselves not on elementary survival but on further development, striving to once again become world leaders in high technology. Our new economic policy allowed us to find a means for survival and development in a time of crisis in the country, and to preserve the nucleus of the collective and its capability for carrying out new, complex tasks. We have enormous intellectual potential and a strong foundation of the latest technology, and we will certainly find a worthy place for ourselves both in the country and on the world market.
[Aleksin] What conclusions have you reached from the war experience of the USA and NATO against Yugoslavia?
[Yefremov] The conclusions are simple: Just like 100 years ago and 60 years ago, the world is controlled by force, and not by some mythical "general human values." Each state and its government are concerned first and foremost for the protection of their own national interests and the security of their own state and society. Adoption of the new global doctrine of the North Atlantic alliance and expansion of the aggressive bloc eastward right up to Russia's borders are creating a direct threat to our country's national security. Given the present crisis in the economy, we will never be able to catch up to the USA and NATO in the numbers of high-tech, high-precision weapons as the principal resource for waging modern war. To provide for the country's defensive security, and so that we wouldn't be used as a doormat like happened with Yugoslavia, we need to make an asymmetrical and economical response with regard for the advances we have already made.
From my point of view we need to develop super-low caliber nuclear ammunition with a TNT equivalent of from 5 to 50 tonnes, and equip some of our missiles with them. In the event of a threat of armed aggression against Russia and the impossibility to avert it by political, diplomatic, and conventional military means, we would be able to stop aggression at sea only with the use of available tactical nuclear weapons, and on land, with land- and sea-based ICBMs carrying nuclear super-low caliber individually targeted re-entry vehicles. Such a weapon will guarantee destruction of a building or district occupied by the aggressor and his headquarters. In this case none of the civilian population, which would be notified in advance of the humanitarian nature of the operation, nor adjacent facilities will suffer. Thus each country will maintain its own national security in accordance with the resources available to it.
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