POLITICO: US still supplies ammunition and military equipment to Russia
Russian companies have received hundreds of thousands of rounds from Western suppliers, including American sniper ammunition, reports Politico.
Photo: IStock
In a 60-second video of the equipment review posted on Telegram, a masked sniper wearing the skull insignia of the Wagner Mercenary Army praises the Russian-made Orsis T-5000 rifle.
“The equipment has proven itself very well,” the sniper tells a military journalist from the Zvezda TV channel.
After pulling a clip from his weapon, he continues: “The rifle uses Western caliber 338 cartridges. Works very well. Can break through light cover if the enemy is behind it. And in open areas, it can hit the enemy at a distance of up to 1500 meters.
The Orsis T-5000 is produced by the Moscow-based Promtekhnologiya company, which is under US sanctions.
"Western" ammunition
Documents obtained by POLITICO indicate that Promtekhnologiya and another Russian firm, Tetis, purchased hundreds of thousands of cartridges from the American company Hornady, which uses the Accurate. Deadly. Dependable". Hornady, founded in 1949, summarizes its philosophy with the phrase: "Ten bullets in one hole."
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The findings add to a growing body of evidence that shipments of lethal and non-lethal military equipment continue to flood into Russia, despite unprecedented Western sanctions in response to President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine last year. Military difficulties have exposed Russia's lack of capacity to manufacture high-quality sniper rounds, military experts say, and this is fueling a thriving black market in Western ammunition.
Information about the purchase of such equipment is hidden in plain sight: the details of transactions - importers, suppliers and descriptions of goods - can be found online by anyone who has access to the Russian Internet and knowledge of international customs classification codes.
Where did the ammo come from
In a “declaration of conformity” filed with the Russian state register dated August 12, 2022, Promtekhnologiya stated that it plans to purchase a batch of 102 Hornady lead bullets to assemble “hunting cartridges” used in “civilian weapons.” Characteristics - 200 grain .338 Lapua Magnum bullets - match the specifications of the product from the Hornady catalog.
The second declaration with the same date refers to a batch of "unopened cases for the assembly of civilian firearms cartridges" made by Hornady with the same specification 338 Lapua Magnum.
The description is misleading: 338 Lapua Magnum is not just a "hunting cartridge"; it is also a powerful long-range projectile that was developed by the Western military in the 1980s and used by their snipers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Steve Hornady, CEO of the family-owned company based in Grand Island, Nebraska, denied selling munitions to Russia during the war.
“The moment Russia invaded Ukraine, we ended the sale,” Hornady said in a short phone call.
Hornady initially refused to go into details and, when asked to review the evidence, he eventually responded to the request.
“We categorically do not export anything to Russia and have not had permission to export to Russia since 2014,” he replied. “We do not support the sale of our product to any Russian son of a bitch, and if we can find out how they are acquiring it, if in fact they are doing so, we will take all possible measures to stop it.”
Hornady added that he contacted US authorities after the POLITICO investigation. He pointed out that current US law requires buyers to obtain permission from the Department of Commerce to re-export goods made in the United States. “To the best of our knowledge, none of our clients violate this law,” he said.
When asked what ammunition his troops used, Wagner's boss Yevgeny Prigozhin told POLITICO they had "a huge amount of NATO-made ammunition left over from the Ukrainian army." In a sarcastic voice message sent to a POLITICO journalist, the Russian military commander also asked for help in purchasing American-made F-35 combat aircraft and sniper rifles, machine guns and grenade launchers.
Promtekhnologiya denies filing any customs declarations for the importation of ammunition, it has stated that it is not related to Hornady, and that it has the ability to produce its own ammunition. The company also said that the Orsis rifle and ammunition the company manufactures are intended for "hunting and sporting" purposes and are freely available on the civilian market.
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Both Promtekhnologiya and Oleksandr Zinoviev, listed in the documents as the company's CEO, have been sanctioned by Ukraine, which cites evidence that Orsis rifles were "used in Russian military operations in eastern Ukraine."
Promtekhnologiya is also in Washington's field of vision. “We take any allegations of sanctions violation or evasion seriously and are committed to ensuring that they are fully enforced,” a National Security Council spokesman said in response to a POLITICO request for comment.
“We have taken steps to hold Russia accountable for its war in Ukraine and introduced an unprecedented sanctions regime to deny Russia access to the assets and weapons that fuel Putin’s war machine. This includes sanctions against companies such as Promtekhnologiya,” he added.
Trick
Criminal or willful violations of U.S. sanctions can result in fines of up to $1 million per violation, as well as up to 20 years in prison for individuals. Civil penalties can be either double the cost of the underlying transaction or around $350 for a breach.
According to military analyst Maria Shagina, describing military munitions as intended for hunting or sport, as is done in the documents, amounts to a thinly veiled ploy to evade targeted "smart" sanctions aimed at depriving Russia's military of the means to wage war. .
“Strictly speaking, smart sanctions should not be aimed at anything civilian to avoid humanitarian collateral damage,” said Shagina, a fellow at Britain's International Institute for Strategic Studies. “But in authoritarian countries they will really take advantage of this indulgence.”
tetis
Another Russian buyer of Hornady munitions is Tetis, which has reported two shipments since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022.
The main owners of Tetis, Alexander Levandovsky and Sergey Senchenko, each owning a 41,1% stake, are connected to the Russian military.
Both were previously shareholders in another company called Campo, which, according to company documents, owns licenses for the production of weapons and military equipment and does business with the Ministry of Defense and the Special Flight Squad that operates Putin's presidential jet.
Although Tetis does not offer Hornady ammunition on its website, it advertises itself as an international distributor for RCBS, an American manufacturer of reloading equipment.
The Russian trade bureaucracy allows local firms to vouch for the goods they import by filling out declarations of conformity, such as those that mention Hornady products. This means that the supplier listed on the form may not be aware of specific shipments that may have been processed by the reseller.
Matt Rice, a spokesman for RCBS owner Vista Outdoor, said Tetis is no longer the international distributor for RCBS. "Following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, our business has made the decision to stop all sales of goods to the country," Rice said in an email, adding that RCBS will remove Tetis from its website.
Are available
Hornady ammunition or components are freely available in Russia, along with other high-quality foreign military equipment.
Take Telegram's Sniper Shop, a popular encrypted messaging app in Russia: it has an up-to-date offer for the entire Hornady product range, and the seller invites buyers to visit the showroom in Sokolniki, Moskovsky district, and offers delivery within Russia by courier or mail . In response to POLITICO, the author confirmed that Hornady ammunition was in stock, but declined to comment on where it came from.
Then there is Anton, who advertises Hornady and RCBS products on his profile. He also advertises equipment from Nightforce, a manufacturer of thermal imaging riflescopes, Lapua, MDT, a manufacturer of chassis systems, rifle magazines and accessories, and AREA 419. All American except for Lapua, which is based in Finland and owned by the Norwegian company Nammo.
POLITICO, in the course of its research, also found declarations from several other Russian companies for ammunition produced in Germany, Finland and Turkey.
A thriving black market reflects the structural deficit of the Russian military economy. Its military-industrial complex can produce good small arms like the Orsis rifle, but it lacks the capacity to produce the amount of ammunition needed by an army fighting a front that stretches for thousands of miles.
“Despite the quality of the rifles produced, a successful hit directly depends on the components used in the cartridges, which, unfortunately, are imported,” complained a correspondent in a post on a Russian military news website a few months after the start of the war. Russian-made gunpowder lacks stability, the correspondent added, stating that this "is unacceptable in the context of high-precision shooting."
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Continued access to specialized Western-made rifle cartridges such as the 338 Lapua Magnum for a sanctioned Russian small arms manufacturer such as Orsis manufacturer Promtekhnologiya is "egregious," said Gary Somerville, a fellow at the Royal United Services Institute. (Royal United Services Institute), a British defense think tank.
“Currently in Russia there is only one manufacturer of this cartridge,” he added. “Preventing the supply of these types of munitions from Western countries to Russia is an easy victory for those seeking to limit Russia’s ability to wage war in Ukraine.”
Balkan route
The front around Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine is not only receiving ammunition from the United States.
Apparently there are also patrons from the European Union, which has imposed at least 10 rounds of sanctions on Russia in a so far unsuccessful attempt to deprive Putin's war machine of the means to fight.
Since October, Promtekhnologiya has filed four declarations for 460 units described as "Orsis hunting cartridges", most of which are type 000 Lapua Magnum. They list the Slovenian company Valerian as a supplier.
The first of the applications, dated October 13, 2022, includes an air waybill number, the first three digits of which - 262 - indicate that the consignor was the Russian airline Ural Airlines. However, it was not possible to trace the flight route immediately.
Valerian was founded on the eve of Russia's invasion of Ukraine with paid-in capital by Gasper Heybal, who previously worked for US military equipment Voodoo Tactical. Valerian's homepage states, "Our goal is to prepare you for your mission, whatever it is and wherever you go."
In online posts over the past decade — including on a Facebook group called EU Guns with a stated mission of "facilitating the transfer of arms between European gun owners" — Habal has done little to dispel the impression that he is an active small arms dealer.
Heibal's phone number in these messages matches that of Valerian, who is registered at an address in a village about 40 minutes southeast of the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana.
Calling this number, Heibal denied that Valerian sent ammunition to Russia: "We do not sell any ... firearms or ammunition, and there is an embargo on Russia."
In a follow-up email about declarations of conformity, Heibal said: “First, we must emphasize that we do not know or understand how our company name Valerian doo appears in the document. Secondly, Valerian is listed there not as a supplier, but as a manufacturer, and this is impossible, since we do not manufacture ammunition. At the same time, it is still completely incomprehensible to us how our name could appear there. We're glad you brought this to our attention so we can figure out what's going on."
The Slovenian diplomat said that while Valerian had never applied for permission to export weapons or ammunition to Russia, she had sent "single parts" to Kyrgyzstan.
The Central Asian state is one of the countries the EU has in mind when discussing the 11th round of measures against third countries that are suspected of helping Russia evade sanctions.
“The competent services of the Republic of Slovenia have already initiated the appropriate procedures to investigate the facts concerning the company,” the diplomat said, adding that they will check the possible diversion of goods to the Russian Federation. “Slovenia is firmly committed to supporting Ukraine, we support all sanctions packages, and especially this anti-bypass package,” he said.
A spokesman for the European Commission declined a request for comment. “Because this looks like a very specific case, these allegations should be further investigated by the competent authorities,” the official said.
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