Beyond military-industrial production and procurement, the Ukraine war and international sanctions have also damaged Russia’s military-scientific base. This damage, in turn, affects the rate of military innovation and R&D. More importantly, it determines how the Kremlin will wage war in the future.
Russia’s OPK never truly broke free from the Soviet legacy in its approach to military R&D and scientific innovation. The military-scientific base in fact carried over most of the negative traits and weaknesses that used to afflict Soviet research. These attributes still define the OPK’s approach to military technology and innovation today.
The Russian scientific and innovation base is highly securitized. Officials depict modern military technology in existential terms – military-scientific and -industrial innovation, R&D and the procurement of advanced technology are all understood as essential for ‘great power’ status and prestige, economic growth and sustained strategic competitiveness. Military innovation is therefore informed by the Kremlin’s worldview depicting Russia as a ‘besieged fortress’ and the need to protect national security interests from perceived Western encroachment on Russia’s ‘sphere of influence’.
Military technology applications must respond to Russia’s way of war – limited action, pre-emptive neutralization of threats, surprise and deception, asymmetric means and decisiveness. However, these concepts come with the caveat that the Russian leadership is acutely aware that it cannot sustain technological competition with either the West or, increasingly, China.
Military technology applications must respond to Russia’s way of war – limited action, pre-emptive neutralization of threats, surprise and deception, asymmetric means and decisiveness.
Russia simply does not have the military-scientific and innovation base able to catch up with the advances made elsewhere in the world. Nor does the Kremlin want to. Indeed, it has chosen to compete, often asymmetrically, in specific sectors as a way of leveraging what is left of Russia’s military R&D capacity.
Moscow has to employ such asymmetric methods because of the loss of conventional superiority in the context of the war and the ‘growing capability gap’ with the West. Such asymmetric advantages are therefore not a total replacement. Russia will not be able to keep up the pace by deploying these methods, but merely ‘narrow existing gaps’ in targeted sectors.
In this context, sanctions are weighing heavily on the OPK in terms of innovation and approach to military R&D. Furthermore, the war has revealed many shortcomings in Russia’s military-scientific base and innovation capacity. Accordingly, Russia can only ever hope to be ‘good enough’ in terms of competing with its rivals.
Russia’s military-scientific base
The OPK’s military-scientific base is overcentralized, which prevents it from achieving the flexibility and responsiveness required for genuine innovation. Despite several adaptations since the end of the Cold War, the present-day OPK has largely remained stuck in the state-centralized, top–down approach to innovation that characterized it during the Soviet era.
Military innovation in Russia mostly relies on traditional state-centric structures, divided between the myriad Soviet-legacy research institutes, design bureaus and scientific-production associations. The main coordinating and supervising body for military R&D is the Main Directorate for Innovative Development in the Ministry of Defence, while the Commission for Innovative Projects and Technologies supervises implementation.
Because research is heavily centralized, the scope for collaboration, synergies and spin-offs between civilian R&D and the OPK is limited. By contrast, civil–military conversion is a major driver of military innovation in Western countries. Furthermore, except for in a few technology sectors such as UAVs, Russia lacks vibrant small- and medium-size enterprises in the technology sector that could be absorbed by the OPK to foster greater innovation. Interaction with the civilian world rarely happens in the OPK, not least because of over-classification and mutual lack of trust.
The state-centric approach to military innovation goes against current worldwide trends: the Russian OPK is largely uncompetitive in the face of Western private sector start-ups and venture capitalism-based approaches to innovation. Russia’s scientific business model is simply not fit for technological competition.
In recent years, however, Moscow has tried to develop a network of platforms to foster greater innovation capabilities and better links with the civilian world. Following the ‘Skolkovo’ innovation model (which itself takes after the Soviet model of ‘technoparks’, closed cities and other Soviet monogorodie), Russia established the Foundation for Advanced Research in 2012 and the ERA Military Innovation Technopolis in 2018.
Both the foundation and ERA are intended to bridge the gap between R&D concepts and real-world military applications, as well as increase the technological feasibility of future military hardware. Both structures carry out fundamental research and application in priority fields such as AI, autonomous systems and military robotics, machine learning, quantum computing and nanotechnology.
ERA is tasked with facilitating civilian–military cooperation, and has been recruiting staff from universities and civilian research institutes. Its R&D capacity is directly supervised by the Main Directorate of Research and Technological Support of Advanced Technologies in the Ministry of Defence. Furthermore, the ministry transferred several of its special military-scientific units to ERA. These units were created in 2013 to boost direct military innovation applications for the armed forces. The main OPK companies and producers also maintain a presence in ERA through joint projects – which could potentially bring administrative hurdles and bureaucracy.
Much of the success or failure of the foundation and ERA rests on funding, however. Both are likely to be uncompetitive in this area: the foundation’s initial annual budget was only around $70 million, with about 40 to 50 projects requiring funding.
Innovation pathways
As the foundation’s meagre budget shows, military innovation remains relatively underfunded in Russia. Capital investment from the state is lacking and foreign direct investment is limited by sanctions. Meanwhile, the funding that is available is diverted because of well-known issues such as systemic corruption, ill-adapted legal and regulatory frameworks and unnecessary bureaucracy.
Overall, the OPK’s pathway to military innovation is, and will remain, incremental: a series of gradual, small-step evolutions rather than big, sudden breakthroughs. Innovation generally takes the form of integrating technological solutions directly into proven, older-generation systems – which in turn makes them ‘modern’ (see above).
Russia’s military sector has been forced to adopt a ‘retain-and-adapt’ approach, as military production is no longer innovation-led. In other words, Russia ‘innovates’ through ‘smart adaptation’ under technical and economical constraints that have a negative, cumulative effect at the tactical level.
Some limited ‘high-risk/high reward’ experiments have been conducted in targeted sectors (for instance, those focusing on hypersonic glide vehicles), which display some willingness to take risks for the sake of innovation. But, under sanctions, Russia must rely on lesser-quality components. This reliance limits the ability for the OPK to carry out innovative projects like these. This will eventually translate into a form of ‘gradual stagnation’ of the OPK’s ability to manufacture advanced hardware, as well as a qualitative degradation of its industrial outputs.
Weapons systems also remain beset by failures affecting development cycles and their operational life span – for instance, the Losharik submersible tragedy in 2019 and the August 2019 explosion at the Nyonoksa range during weapons testing that released radionuclides into the atmosphere.
‘Degraded science’
Considering the factors weighing on Russia’s approach to military innovation, continued shortened production cycles necessary to sustain the war and the impact of international sanctions are gradually leading to a form of innovation stagnation of the OPK.
Russia’s military R&D and innovation base is in a state of ‘degraded science’ – a phrase that refers to the continued deterioration of the quality and quantity of military science undertaken in Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Several explanations for this situation stand out, primarily linked to the shortage of qualified scientists and young engineers and the continued exodus of capable individuals from Russia.
This loss of intellectual capital is compounded by the decrease in the overall quality of higher scientific and technical education. Although Russia had an excellent inheritance from Soviet science, R&D remains focused more on theoretical research and less on practical application. Finally, the high average age of scientists in most design bureaus hinders the development of a culture of innovation and modernity.
Russia’s standing in the Global Innovation Index has steadily declined since 2017, with the country ranking 59th out of 133 countries in 2024.
This state of degradation can be seen in international measurements of innovation potential and capabilities. For instance, Russia’s standing in the Global Innovation Index has steadily declined since 2017, with the country ranking 59th out of 133 countries in 2024. The number of military-related R&D patents filed by Russia and scientific publications has also collapsed since the 1990s (although many remain classified), as have Russia’s overall advances in critical technologies such as advanced materials or AI-enabled systems.
The OPK is not yet facing an existential crisis in terms of military innovation, but remains unable to project the Russian armed forces into genuine technological modernity. Indeed, innovation in weapons design will continue, although the capacity of the OPK to bring its designs to serial production levels remains in doubt. Russia’s multiple R&D structures generally have no difficulty in thinking innovatively and creating blueprints, but there remains a wide gap to bridge in the ability of the OPK to develop those ideas into actual systems.
External partnerships will not solve the OPK’s systemic issues. Russia will have to bridge the technological gap on its own – especially when considering the implications of a growing dependence on China. The industry will also have to rethink its approach to human capital to better support military R&D, since current solutions to the ‘brain drain’ are far from sufficient.
The state of innovation in key sectors
Despite the state of general decrepitude of the OPK and to the gradual degradation of innovation, the Russian military industry should not be completely underestimated in its ability to continue producing weapons systems and hardware able to hold Western forces at risk of destruction.
Innovative systems and hardware do still find their way into practical use. Indeed, Ukraine has become something of a testing ground for the Russian military innovation that does exist. It remains to be seen, however, whether the OPK will be able to design, engineer and produce the next generation of weapons systems capable of sustaining strategic and technological competition in key sectors.
Space technology
Space is hardly a place where ‘good enough’ is good enough, especially in light of the strong Soviet scientific legacy in this field. The Russian military relies on space operations for many of its activities, including ICBM technology, military navigation, positioning and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (GLONASS constellation), remote sensing, ballistic missile early warning systems, communications, signal intelligence and reconnaissance, and sub-threshold warfare (such as inspector satellites and counter-space capabilities).
Russia continues to suffer from the breakdown of space cooperation with Western partners. The industry is struggling financially as a result: in July 2024, Russia adopted a law on public–private partnerships to reduce the amount of state financing in the space industry, which will potentially restrict options further. The state-owned space agency Roscosmos no longer focuses on scientific space exploration, but rather on sustaining Russia’s comparative advantages in space – particularly those in communications satellites and launch vehicles.
However, the Russian satellite industry is not in good shape. Sanctions are constraining Russia’s access to space-grade components and equipment, and particularly electronics, onboard equipment, and optical and radar imaging systems. Non-Western supplies do not fully match Russian requirements and standards. Roscosmos will therefore likely be forced to either prolong the service life of existing space platforms to the point of failure or create newer, but simpler satellites with shorter life cycles and, potentially, reduced capabilities. Meanwhile, the future of modern Soyuz and new Angara launchers remains unknown. If the availability of launch vehicles is reduced, the number of satellites placed into orbit will reduce and related support missions will become less viable, especially since commercial launches are not currently an option for Russia due to the constraints of sanctions and the low quality of Russian-made equipment.
Military robotics and autonomous systems
Since its invasion of Georgia in 2008, Russia has made tremendous progress in its approach to uncrewed technology and military robotics. The 2008 war was a wake-up call to the need for drone support for intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance (ISTAR) operations. Since then, the OPK has structured an indigenous military-industrial base for ISTAR and loitering drones. The use of UAVs is now an integral part of Russian warfare, and drones have demonstrated their effectiveness during both wars against Ukraine and in Syria.
Russia’s approach to drones is focused more on the robotization of the armed forces than on genuine autonomy through AI-enabled systems. Indeed, systems currently deployed are not designed to be autonomous, but remain remote-controlled by a human operator. Discussions around autonomy, for now, retain a ‘human-in-the-loop’ approach to military robotics – not least because autonomous systems require a technological leap Russia is unlikely to make under current conditions.
Continued developments in the robotization of the armed forces and in the autonomous regime depend heavily on the continued procurement of advanced microelectronics, semiconductors, microchips and computing power, as well as drone engines – access to which is restricted by international sanctions.
Advanced military-industrial partnerships with external partners and Shahed drone supplies from Iran will not solve all of Russia’s problems in this area. Indeed, continued developments in the robotization of the armed forces and in the autonomous regime depend heavily on the continued procurement of advanced microelectronics, semiconductors, microchips and computing power, as well as drone engines – access to which is restricted by international sanctions.
AI-enabled systems
Further to the autonomous regime, military innovation is putting considerable effort into developing AI-enabled systems, as well as related projects such as advanced machine-learning and computing, big data analytics and supercomputers. In each of these areas, Russia depends on access to Western-made technologies, and therefore the availability of critical components is heavily restricted. Nevertheless, the development of AI capabilities is a source of prestige for the Kremlin.
Military R&D focuses – mainly via ERA – on the development of AI-enabled solutions in the field of electronic warfare, robotics and uncrewed systems, command and control and cyberwarfare. As elsewhere in the world, AI technologies are understood as incremental enablers aimed at ‘augmenting and amplifying existing capabilities’, rather than replacing them altogether.
These stated goals, however, are impeded by the impact of sanctions in parallel sectors. Indeed, AI cannot exist without advanced microelectronics, semiconductors and microchips, or the IT specialists and scientists the OPK is lacking. Furthermore, the sector is severely underfunded, with few state resources available and private investments devoted to AI-related R&D – although the war against Ukraine is offering valuable operational experience that could feed into the latter.
Other priority areas
Russia’s so-called ‘super weapons’ and other ‘doomsday’ systems unveiled in 2018 are also impacted by both sanctions and the demands of the Ukraine war. Despite these problems, Russia has deployed several hypersonic systems against Ukraine, notably the aero-ballistic Zircon missile and the air-launched semi-ballistic Kinzhal missile.
However, the novelty of these systems must not be overstated. They should generally be understood as ‘upgraded versions of existing technologies’, rather than battlefield or strategic ‘game-changers’. As often with official Russian communications, the message that these ‘super weapons’ convey is the most potent capability. These systems must also be placed into the reality of procurement cycles under the next round of GPV and caveated by the impact of sanctions.
In electronic warfare (EW), lessons learned from Russian operations in Syria and Ukraine have demonstrated the continued ability of Russian forces to degrade the operating environment and disrupt adversarial C4ISR capabilities. Designated EW troops have been instrumental in the second invasion of Ukraine, and several systems have proven effective for proximity jamming, radio and GSM isolation and anti-drone warfare.
Yet like other systems, EW relies on access to high-quality microelectronic components, computers and microchips, receivers and advanced circuitry that is severely restricted by sanctions. In the short term, therefore, Russian EW operations might decrease in quality due to shorter life cycles for EW equipment, lower operational tempo and reduced mobility for mobile systems.
Through ERA and other structures, the OPK continues to invest where possible in the development of breakthrough technologies such as quantum computing, sensing and cryptography, nanotechnology and composite materials, human enhancements and neural networks. In these fields, as in others, Russia trails other countries in the number of patents, and actual military applications remain undetermined. Other key areas of focus for the Russian armed forces are the development of advanced computing, data storage capabilities and encrypted cloud-based services for sensitive communications, for all of which quality microelectronic components are also required.
