After years of discord, London and Moscow are restoring military
cooperation and may even begin a bilateral arms trade later this year.
The deal enabling British and Russian arms industries to work together
on ‘unclassified’ issues is already drafted.
Britain’s Telegraph has revealed that sources in both Moscow and
London are confirming that the countries are ready to commence
military cooperation on a new level.
“Work is ongoing on a Military Technical Cooperation
Agreement (MTCA) between the UK Ministry of Defence and Russian
Federal Service for Military Technical Cooperation, which will
provide a framework for Russian and UK defense companies to
cooperate at an unclassified level,” British MOD spokesman
said, as cited by the Telegraph.
A landmark deal being hammered out right now will enable British
and Russian arms producers to buy components from one another and
exchange certain technical data, provided it does not contradict
the secrecy regulations of either country.
Experts from the two sides are busy examining the draft text and,
according to the newspaper, the parties are finding common
language quicker than was expected.
Cooperation would not go too far as both countries possess
technology, such as missile engineering or surveillance
electronic equipment, they would not share with a former Cold War
adversary. Still, bilateral relations would eventually gain from
the deal.
Russian-British relations are now gradually warming after the
‘polonium scandal’ in 2006, when former Russian security officer
Aleksandr Litvinenko, who allegedly was consulting
British intelligence, was murdered in London with a radioactive
substance.
London and Moscow started cautious mutual approach back in 2012
after meeting of Russian President Vladimir Putin and British
Prime Minister David Cameron in London.
Back then the leaders agreed to launch “strategic dialogue” in a
2+2 format of Russian and British foreign and defense ministers.
In March 2013, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and British
Defense Secretary Philip Hammond discussed bilateral military
cooperation, which was a bit step forward since Britain and
Russia do not even conduct joint military drills, whereas with
other NATO member countries Russia has much closer military
interaction.
In November 2013, it was announced that British and Russian
secret services are restoring ties and are going to exchange
intelligence on the Sochi Winter Olympics due to start on
February 7.
Both Russia and Britain are leading world exporters and actually
are rivals on the international arms market. In 2013 Russia’s
arms export agency Rosoboronexport reported $13.2 billion worth
of contracts (1,202 contracts with 60 countries), whereas
Britain’s exported military technology amounted to over 3,000
government-approved export licenses worth approximately $20
billion.
British business is currently far from using the Russian market
to its full potential. There are about 600 British companies
doing business in Russia today, whereas Germany is represented by
over 7,000 firms.
In the meantime NATO alliance is planning to mutually beneficial
cooperation with Russia in 2014.
“We had a very constructive and open dialogue on how to
strengthen NATO’s partnership with the Russian Federation and
vice versa,” said the chairman of the Military Committee
General, Knud Bartels, while addressing the 170th NATO Chiefs of
Defense meeting on January 22.
The chairman specified the priorities of such cooperation, namely
“counter piracy, counter terrorism, search and rescue at sea,
logistics and medical support” to NATO troops.
“We also acknowledged the value of the Cooperative Airspace
Initiative and the Afghan Helicopter Maintenance Trust
Fund,” added General Bartels.
Russia and NATO “committed to work together on the
Military-to-Military Cooperation Road Map for 2015-2017”
assured General Bartels and promised to sign cooperation
agreement with Russia during the Russia-NATO summit in May.
