MOSCOW, November 4 (AVN) -- Russia is likely to lose its combat aviation by the year 2004 if the Air Force receives less than 25 percent of the country's defence spending in 2000, Air Force Commander Anatoly Kornukov said on Thursday.
According to him, low level of federal causalties in Chechnya is mostly achieved thanks to aviation which performs over 70 percent of anti-guerrilla missions.
Foreign air forces usually recieve at least 30 percent of the defence spending, Kornukov told the Military News Agency, adding that the U.S. Air Force gets as much as 35 percent. Russia's 1999 military budget provided only 11 percent of defence spendings to aviation. Moreover, the Air Force has so far received only five billion roubles (about 192 million U.S. dollars) out of seven billion (about 269 million dollars) written in the budget, Kornukov stressed.