Sunday, September 25, 2022

Mobilization Threatens Key Parts of Russian Economy, IT and Aviation in Particular

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 23 – Vladimir Putin’s partial mobilization threatens key segments of the Russian economy by pulling workers out of them for service in the Russian military. The IT sector has already asked for protection against this; and others, including aviation, are certain to follow, a reflection of how much his action is hurting them and the country.

            Within hours of Putin’s announcement, the leaders of major Russian IT companies asked the government to exempt their workers from being called into the military. Failure to do so, they said, would harm the branch significantly (newizv.ru/news/economy/22-09-2022/it-industriya-v-panike-ee-sotrudnikov-tozhe-prizyvayut-v-armiyu).

            Other branches of the economy are now following suit as they calculate their losses in personnel from the partial mobilization and the impossibility of filling the slots left vacant by the departure of veterans. One branch likely to be hit especially hard and quickly is aviation in which there are so many veterans with skills the military can use.

            Kommersant reports that almost all pilots of Russian carriers were trained in the military and that as many as 80 percent of them are veterans who could be subject to Putin’s mobilization order. If even a relatively small number of them are called up, Russia’s carriers won’t be able to continue to operate most routes (kommersant.ru/doc/5572535).

            Other categories of workers in the aviation sector are certain to be affected as well, including dispatchers and ground controllers, almost all of whom are military veterans. Without them, flying in Russia will either be impossible or significantly more dangerous than it already is.

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