Alabino, near Moscow - The Mulino combat training center in the Nizhny Novgorod region is 95 percent ready, therefore the German company Rheinmetall's decision to suspend cooperation with the Russian Defense Ministry will not impact the schedule of its going online, Lt. Gen. Yury Petrov, deputy head of the Defense Ministry's Main Combat Training Department, said on Tuesday, Aug. 5.
“All of the combat training center’s new-generation facilities are
95 percent ready. We are starting the state testing from Sept. 1 in its
entirety,” Petrov said at an exhibition of the Defense Ministry’s
innovation projects in Alabino near Moscow.
He said that laser systems simulating target acquisition which the
German company was to deliver under an agreement with the Russian
Defense Ministry are being replaced with Russian analogues. “We are
replacing laser systems simulating target acquisition with Russian
analogues. The combat training program will not be affected,” the
general said.
Petrov also said that the Mulino center will be ready to go online by Dec. 1.
German media reported earlier that the German Economy Ministry
recalled Rheinmetall’s license to build the military-training center for
the Russian Defense Ministry in Mulino near the city of Nizhny
Novgorod.
It was reported earlier that the agreement to build the training
center in Mulino was signed in June 2011 by the then Russian defense
minister, Anatoly Serdyukov, and Rheinmetall AG’s board chairman Klaus
Eberhardt. The German company was tasked with creating laser simulators
for weapons.
The center is expected to become Europe’s largest with a capacity of
training up to 30,000 troops each year. The new training center can
simulate any tactical environment on a battlefield without the use of
ammunition.
The Center’s basic training kit includes the developments made by
Russian firms, deputy head of the Ground Forces’ combat training
department Anatoly Khromov said earlier. In particular, the companies
involved in the construction of the center include Tulatochmash, the
Design Bureau of Instrument Building, the Moscow firm Logos (which makes
simulators) NPO RusBITekh which has created a unique software for the
Center, and many others. Total cost of the construction of the Mulino
center is over 7 billion rubles. The Russian Defense Ministry planning
to open three more similar combat-training centers in other military
districts.
