The golden trades of Czech military sector, thanks also to the national Defense growing budget
It is no secret that the current international tensions are actually a huge business for manufacturers and arms dealers around the world, including those in the Czech Republic. In this country the military exports have been growing at huge speeds in recent years, and according to professional estimates, in 2014 the total figure reached 360 million Euros, more than double the results of 2011.
In this international market, the Czech Republic has much smaller dimensions than the EU’s major exporters, since its military exports represent a value of one-twentieth of those of Germany and about a tenth of France and Italy. However, the positive trend in recent times is awakening the pride of domestic producers, in a country that in the field of the arms industry boasts traditions of excellence dating back to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which was maintained during the period of national independence, until the eve of the Velvet Revolution. Czechoslovakia in the 80s was the seventh largest exporter of weapons worldwide. Back then the major sales markets were the Soviet Union and all member states of the Warsaw Pact, as well as many of the so-called developing countries ideologically close to the Communist Czechoslovakia.
The decline came after the fall of the Berlin Wall, with the end of the Cold War and the international détente. In Prague in the 90s, the policy that prevailed was to remove the image of global power in arms from the country, which proved to be fatal for many companies in the industry. “Behind the pacifist intent, some of today’s insiders speculate, in those years the interest in weakening our military industry and encouraging some international competition was concealed”.
Business is blessed by politicians and criticized by Amnesty International
Regarding the recovery of recent years, the indicative pride displayed by Jaroslav Strnad, founder of Excalibur Army, a holding company which owns some of the most important Czech Companies specializing in the production, repair and sale of tanks and armored vehicles, as well as bombs, missiles, bullets and so on and so forth: “Today the Czech Republic is no longer ashamed to produce quality weapons. It is clear that the conflicts and tensions of today’s world are giving prosperity to our industry which has not been seen for some time”.
It must be said that the products used in war, traded by Czech Companies, are not always produced domestically. A typical example is the stocks of weapons abandoned by the armies of the former Soviet bloc, which even today the Czech Companies buy and then remodel and resell abroad.
Compared to the past, the experts note, there is also increased political support. It was indeed the Excalibur Army who recently rose to the headlines thanks to two big operations of modernization and supply of combat vehicles in Nigeria and Iraq. In both cases the orders were made with the full consent of the Prague government, on the grounds that Czech arms would be used to meet the threat of Islamic extremists: in Iraq against Isis and in Nigeria against the fundamentalist movement Boko Haram. Representatives of Excalibur Army have stated that they had got the better of foreign competition due to the affordable value for money, as well as for the speed of delivery of armored vehicles. Excalibur should also provide the redevelopment of tanks available to the armed forces of Afghanistan, according to preliminary agreements made during a recent visit of the Minister of Defense Martin Stropnický in that country.
The rise of the Czech Republic in the international arms market however, perhaps inevitably for this type of trade, results in mishaps and highly controversial operations. In February, the newspapers revealed the story of three Czech Companies that despite the embargo applied by the EU to all member countries, continued throughout 2014, to export aircraft guns and ammunition of various types to Ukraine, before seeing the suspension of the export license at the beginning of 2015. An embarrassing situation for the government, for which there were also discontent among the majority, so much so that the Social Democrat deputy, Stanislav Huml, protested, demanding, although without obtaining them, the resignation of three ministers: Lubomír Zaorálek (Foreign), Jan Mládek (Industry and Commerce) and Martin Stropnický (Defence). Regarding this story, the comments of Jiří Hynek, chairman of the CzechDefence and Security Industry Association , displayed the utmost pragmatism “We Czechs are not the only ones in Europe to have sold weapons to Ukraine”.
To remain on the subject of controversial aspects, the Czech office of Amnesty International last year announced a letter to Foreign Minister Lubomír Zaorálek, lamenting the fact that more than half of Czech military exports have so-called “rogue states”, as their final destination ie. countries with authoritarian regimes and where there are violations of human rights.
The shopping desires of the Czech military
The armed forces of the Czech Republic, after years of cutting down costs, have been pressing lately with some insistence for more money. The generals, on the other hand, know that the time is ripe to seek improvements in the budget and this is also a factor that makes the mouths of the Czech industries water, and not only the military sector.
At the time of the Cold War, the armed forces of Czechoslovakia had, just to mention a few figures, 200,000 soldiers, 4,500 tanks and nearly 5,000 armoured vehicles. Today, with the end of compulsory conscription, the actual army consists of about twenty thousand, while there seem to be less than 600 combat vehicles.
When commenting on international tensions and conflicts, in particular the crisis in Ukraine, General Petr Pavel, the Chief of Staff of the Czech Defense and the next head of the Military Council of NATO, during a security conference in the House, was clear. “Today we are already at war, it is just that we never even noticed. If we were to end up in real combat, we would not be ready, and our chances would be very slim”. The same general Pavel, repeatedly said that the country must soon solve the current shortcomings of the arsenals.
The government is trying to be sensitive to this situation, and in the last updated version of the strategy paper for national security, set a goal to bring the defense budget to 1.4% of GDP by 2020 (compared to less than 1% today). Already this year, investments are planned for billions of crowns with the purchase of combat helicopters, radars and armored vehicles. The Defense Ministry also wants to buy more than a billion crowns of ammunition in the next few months, mostly for ground forces, but they also speak of missiles, bombs and decoys for aeronautics.
by Giovanni Usai