The matters under discussion:

The well-known Russian defense enterpriser and scientist, Igor Ashurbeyli, who celebrated September 9 his jubilee, covered in his interview to RBC the current state of the Russian military-industrial complex, the change of the defense minister, the Dmitry Rogozin’s idea to unite the air and space industry and much more.

- How do you assess the situation in the Russian military-industrial complex?

- As in the famous fairy tale - "the patient is more alive than dead".

But the Russian military-industrial complex is still a patient who requires a treatment. There are more healthy organs of the body, there are less healthy organs. But in general, the crisis has not yet been over.

- Has the situation with the defense state contracts changed after the change of the Defense Minister?

- I'm not going to join those the "brave", who now throw stones at the back of the previous defense minister, in spite of the fact that our relationship were far from being good and I had a lot of problems because of it. There were internal reasons for it caused by some liars and hypocrites. I’m sure that the current leader of my near and dear ministry will take care to avoid recurrence.

As for the defense state contracts they found stability and precision even when Sergei Ivanov was the defense minister. In particular, for the “Almaz” Scientific Production Association named after Academician A.A. Raspletin which I headed that time it was resulted in very concrete actions. The Air Defense Missile Complex S-400 was brought into service in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and the serial production of the S-400 was begun. The defense state order in the field of the development of the directed energy bean weapons was resumed after a long break. And the most important thing was the approval in 2007 and 2009 of my Concept of creating the integrated system of air and missile defense AD-ABM (IS IMD AD-ABM) of the fifth generation including "S-500", "Vityaz", "Morpheus" and others by two visiting sessions of the Military-Industrial Commission (on ​​the territory of the SPA “Almaz”).

The stability and predictability of the defense state orders established that time continued when Anatoly Serdyukov was the Defense Minister and Sergei Shoigu as the Defense Minister develops it now consistently and crucially.

- What is the average age of the employees in the enterprise? Do today’s graduates go to the defense industry?

- When I was the Director General of SSDB "Almaz-Antey" named after Academician A.A. Raspletin, I announced at the ordinary meeting of the shareholders in 2009 the slogan: "Almaz is a youth firm!" It happened when we had overcome the crisis and moved to the stable development of the company.

Many old-timers then laughed good-naturedly, because even during the period of my previous seven years as the director (2000 to 2007), the company which was deeply advanced in years rejuvenated "only" up to 56 years old (before that the average age of the employees was 62). It was considered a real great achievement - 1.8 years for each of the seven years. What’s more?

So, I can report that by 2010 the amount of our developers who were younger than 40 years old had become equal to the amount of their senior (up to 80 years old) colleagues. I can’t tell the exact number for the security reasons, but my heart filled with joy in the corridors of the enterprise - so many young people! That way, the instruction of Putin I was given during the discussion at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in 2009 has been fulfilled. When I complained about the lack of state protectionism in the staffing of the defense industry, the president told me: "Create the conditions".

I do not know what the staffing situation in "Almaz" is now, but in my private holding "Socium" all conditions have been created for youth. One of the facts: I delegated control to my 29-year-old son. And young people from universities go to the defense industry, especially in the Russian cities and towns (I hate when such places are called “backs” - with the offensive word of Varangians). This is not the backs - this is Russia. For example, at the Arzamas Instrument Plant, part of the defense sub-holding of "Socium" - Military-Industrial Company, the average age of workers in a large-scale floor is 28 years old.

- It is considered that the Russian defense complex survives only thanks to the reserves of the USSR, which are close to the end. Do you agree with this statement? Whether is the Russian industry competitive?

- Essentially, yes, we are parasitic upon the remains of the military-industrial complex (MIC) of the USSR. Instead of MIC we formed a kind of defense parasitical complex (DPC) of the Russian Federation. But it is not so awful yet, it is not the reason for panic. So the main thing is to have clear and workable brains. Developers are our brains and that is important! And nothing is irrecoverable because our people are still able “to cook soup from an ax” and “to shoe the smallest fleas”… As for our bones it’s the industry, factories, equipment. We’ll build it up, fortunately, the money in the budget is provided for it. What is more dangerous: there are a lot of "company’s head management", holdings and all other "organizers of processes and sales". They simulate the brain. And they are created to control developers. That’s a danger - to transfer MIC of the USSR into some organizational corrupt complex. After that it’s not so long way to the organizational criminal complex.

- How do you feel about the idea of D.Rogozin to combine the air and space industry?

- Let’s remember the classics again: it’s the musicians who should be changed, not the places where they are, or, excuse me, the beds.

But if seriously, the problem is in dilettantism. If you do not want or have no ability to delve into the details, the enlargement is the easiest way. The less "tick boxes" in the diagram you have, the easier to have control. That is the problem of our time. In crisis periods any managers ever, of any company, have always done the opposite - segmentation, specification, deepening.

But it is easier, of course, to enlarge, to appoint some "control machine", to give him a "purely concrete" task and to monitor the current result. Is it familiar? It’s the time of temporary favorites.

And as for the basis of the Rogozin’s idea, I think, it is different. It supposes the strategic and systematic correspondence between the structure of the customer - the Ministry of Defense - and of the contractor - the defense industry. It means that the number and substance of the services and branches of the Defense Ministry should fully and mirror-like comply with the number and substance of the holdings in the industrial complex. I do not like foreign names - holdings, corporations, integrated structures. It is the Union of the Industrial Complex - Russia's Defense Industrial Complex, because the division of the industry into civil and defense parts is outdated. We need the integrated high-tech industry of the country.

- Tell us about your charity work. Is it compatible - charity and MIC?

- I won’t tell about my activity in this field. I began to be engaged in it long time ago - both before joining the military industrial complex and after leaving the public component of the MIC in 2011. As for the compatibility of these and many other spheres of the human activity, everything is compatible that is to the benefit. When serving in the military-industrial complex, I created a defensive weapon intended to protect the physical borders of Russia. When being used of God, I defend the spiritual frontiers of Russia. Let it be so pathetic.

- You do a lot in the area of the religious pilgrimage. What is the place where you have been most impressed? Tell us more about your work in this direction. How did you manage to involve Prince Michael of Kent in your project?

- It’s not true that I was so much engaged in the religious pilgrimage. But it’s true that I appealed to the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, Kirill, with the initiative to organize the first ever pilgrimage to the sorrowful posthumous path taken by the Great Princess Elizabeth Fyodorovna - from Alapayevsk through China in Jerusalem - and have received his written blessing. It took place in the year of the 400^th anniversary of the Romanov’s House and the 95^th anniversary of the tragic death of the Royal Family, specifically - Saint Elizabeth: in her honor the church was built with my sponsorship in Pokrovskoye-Streshnevo in Moscow.

As for Prince Michael of Kent, I am extremely grateful to this honorable representative of the British Royal Family who sincerely supported my project. We have been acquainted for over 10 years beginning from the time when "Almaz" became the oldest member of the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber had been recovered under his patronage after the decades of interruption during the Soviet era, and I’m still is a member of the board. This relationship is even more important with due regard to the historical strategic and geopolitical confrontation between Russia and the UK, in spite of the fact that Russia has thin but strong threads of spiritual ties with the UK. One of them is the granddaughter of Queen Victoria, the sister of the last Russian empress and the wife of Grand Duke Sergei, Holy of the Russian Orthodox Church, Elizabeth.