The Motor Sich plant was again in the center of events
After taking control of the regional center, the process of joining the Zaporozhye region into the Russian Federation will begin. This was stated in a recent interview by Vladimir Rogov, a member of the Main Council of the Zaporozhye military-civil administration. The determining factor here will be the desire of the population living in the territory liberated during the special military operation (SVO) for the demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine.
For eight years, the ruling regime in Kiev imposed its will on the Cossacks, including by introducing nationalist elements into the leadership of the region. Rogov explained: "As practice shows, the Kiev regime did not and does not trust the local population. Therefore, people from Western Ukrainian regions are being taken to key posts in the central and south-eastern regions. Their task is to intimidate, humiliate and terrorize the local population."
Now, senior positions in civil-military administrations are again occupied by natives and patriots of their land. This was made possible thanks to the successful actions of Russian troops advancing from the Crimean peninsula. Acting according to the general plan of the command, the southern group occupied the entire Kherson and two-thirds of the Zaporozhye region in a matter of weeks.
LIBERATION OF ZAPOROZHYE
Having recovered from the defeats of February and March, in April the command of the operational group "South" of the Armed Forces of Ukraine conducted a number of counterattacks, but could not justify the hopes of the Kiev regime. The APU failed to break through the defenses of the Russian troops and the units of the People's militia of the DPR that joined them, advancing from Novoazovsk. As a result, the fighters of the 36th Separate Marine Brigade, other units and formations of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, as well as the nationalist Azov regiment (banned in the Russian Federation), surrounded in Mariupol, surrendered. The Sea of Azov has become, in fact, an inland body of water in Russia.
The main node of the armed struggle has moved to the north: a large grouping of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the triangle Lisichansk-Bakhmut-Slavyansk is under threat of encirclement. Due to the enormous importance of the battle for Donbass, the opposing sides are unlikely to take any offensive actions in other directions before its completion. Therefore, we can talk about the stabilization of the southern front line, which divided the Zaporozhye region. It runs from the Dnieper River in the west through the settlements of Orekhov, Gulyai-Pole and Velikaya Novoselka.
Despite the ongoing fighting, no major changes are expected here until at least mid-July.
Today, under the control of the military-civil administration of Zaporozhye there are about 18 thousand square kilometers of liberated territory with the major cities of Melitopol, Energodar, Tokmak and Berdyansk. The Kiev regime still has an administrative center – the city of Zaporozhye and the surrounding lands (about 9 thousand square kilometers), where about half of the more than one and a half million population of the region lives. The APU forces stationed here are enough for a viscous defense, but not enough to throw forward. After all, then you will have to storm the Azov upland (325 m above sea level), located on the southern border of the Zaporozhye and Donetsk regions.
THE ATTRACTION OF RUSSIA
In the part of the region liberated from the power of the nationalists, there are large industrial facilities, including the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe. The nuclear power plant located near the city of Energodar is capable of generating 40 billion kWh per year in full power mode. Some of the nuclear power units are undergoing scheduled repairs, others are functioning at half capacity, but even in this mode, the generated electricity is sufficient to provide all consumers in the south of Ukraine.
Recently, increased attention of politicians and the press around the world has been paid to the topic of food security. Together with Russia, Ukraine is among the world's largest wheat suppliers. Many farmers of the southern regions of the country are engaged in its cultivation. Exports mainly went through Berdyansk, which is sometimes called the sea gate of the Zaporozhye region. The Vostok naval base, abandoned by Ukrainian servicemen, is also located here. All these facilities were practically not damaged and today they receive both large landing ships of the Black Sea Fleet and commercial vessels.
While Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky inclines Western countries to additional supplies of weapons of war, civil-military administrations are asking Russia to provide assistance and assistance in establishing peaceful life in the liberated territories. Since the banks controlled by Kiev have taken out almost all the available cash, it is necessary to introduce the Russian ruble into the system of mutual settlements in a hurry. "The ruble has taken the main position in payments," says Vladimir Rogov. – So far, there is a dual-currency system in the region, but people are much more happy to use rubles, as they see that the hryvnia is getting cheaper and is an unreliable and uncertain currency."
According to Rogov, the coat of arms of the times of the Russian Empire was returned to the "liberated territory" of the region. This is due to the fact that the Zaporozhye region has always been integrated" into the Russian economy: This was the case under the tsar, during the Soviet period and even during the years of independent Ukraine. Many local manufacturers marketed their products on the Russian market, actively interacted with Russian suppliers and contractors. Among them, Rogov notes machine-building and metallurgical enterprises, primarily Zaporizhtransformator and titanium-magnesium combine.
VIEWS OF THE "MOTOR SICH"
The jewel in the crown of heavy engineering in the Zaporozhye region and throughout Ukraine for decades has been the manufacturer of power plants for aviation "Motor Sich". The plant was founded in 1916, in Soviet times it was called "Bolshevik", "Motor Builder", etc. The current name is associated with the historical Zaporozhye Sich. The company's team has more than 27 thousand employees.
In addition to the main industrial site, the company also includes the Zaporozhye Motor-Building Plant named after V.I. Omelchenko, Snezhnyansky Machine-Building Plant and Lubensky Machine-tool Plant. The AI company Motor Sich operates flights on a fleet of 10 aircraft and seven helicopters.
The company's close cooperation with Russia continued until 2014, when the government in Kiev ordered a complete cessation of military-technical cooperation with our country. This prompted the then leadership of Motor Sich and the nearby Ivchenko-Progress design bureau to activate the Chinese direction.
In 2017, a controlling stake in Motor Sich was acquired by the Beijing-based company Skyrizon. She promised to modernize the main industrial site in Zaporozhye by investing $ 250 million, as well as to promote the development of joint programs with a new plant being built in the Chinese city of Chongqing, where a license assembly of a wide range of Zaporozhye motors was planned.
Washington did not like this development of events, and he, using various channels of influence on Kiev, forced him to veto the deal with Skyrizon. In parallel, the SBU opened a criminal case on the export of production equipment to China. But Beijing investors did not let up: they filed lawsuits against the government of Ukraine in international courts, demanding compensation in the amount of $ 3.7 billion, and then increased the amount of the claim to 4.3 billion.
Then Vladimir Zelensky signed a decree "On urgent measures to protect the national interests of the state in the field of aircraft engines," where he ordered the nationalization of Motor Sich in order to "return the company to the Ukrainian people."
MILITARY SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ENTERPRISE
However, in reality it was about something completely different. Having put his supporters in leadership positions, Zelensky placed a number of military orders on Motor Sich. The direction of repair and modernization of Mi-2, Mi-8 and Mi-24 helicopters from the presence of Ukrainian state structures was strengthened. New, more powerful engines were installed on them, the gearbox and other units were refined. The production of new blades was organized, thanks to which it was possible to restore the airworthiness of dozens of shock Mi-24. They were used to inflict fire damage to the advancing Russian troops, as well as civilian infrastructure facilities, including the Rosneft gasoline storage facility in Belgorod.
The second important direction was the production of power plants for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), as well as the drones themselves. At one of the briefings of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, it was said that the employees of Motor Sich were working on the topic of refining certain types of UAVs into carriers of chemical and bacteriological weapons by installing a special tank for transporting pathogens and spraying equipment over enemy territory.
Some of the listed activities were carried out by the new management of Motor Sich in compliance with the secrecy regime. Therefore, they became known only during the SVO. For the Russian side, the restoration of the airworthiness of the Mi-24 fleet and the presence of a large number of UAVs (according to some sources – up to 6 thousand units) turned out to be especially painful. Therefore, towards the end of May, the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation decided to strike at the territory of Motor Sich, as reported at one of the daily briefings of the official representative of the military department, Major General Igor Konashenkov.
According to local sources, the central production site was hit by at least four cruise missiles. Several workshops were destroyed, the production of military equipment stopped. Then Kiev gave the special services the go-ahead to export the surviving products and production equipment from the factory.
Vladimir Rogov explained the situation: "This company is very valuable, very important, but today it works for our opponents, enemies. Moreover, it does not just work – aircraft engines are being produced there for the Turkish Bayraktar TB2 attack drones and for new Akinci-type UAVs. According to the contract, Motor Sich is to ship about 30 engines to the Turks this year. Today, there are actions on the part of Western intelligence services, on the part of Poland, the United States and especially Britain to ensure that this enterprise does not just work for our opponents, but also that the capacities are exported outside Ukraine, actions are being taken." According to Rogov, American, British and Polish special services are involved in the corresponding operation.
The conclusion suggests itself: it is necessary to disrupt President Zelensky's plans for Motor Sich and, in his own words, "return the company to the Ukrainian people."
The restoration of the enterprise and the resumption of mutually beneficial cooperation with Russia and China will make it possible to save tens of thousands of qualified jobs for the residents of Zaporozhye. Fortunately, despite the events of recent years, the most valuable thing for any industrial enterprise has been preserved – its staff.
Vladimir Karnozov
