Ukraine War Day #381: SBU Arrests Antonov Managers

Dear Readers:

Today I have this piece by reporter Rafael Fakhrutdinov. Former top managers of the Ukrainian aerospace firm Antonov have been arrested by the SBU (Ukrainian security service, heir to the Soviet KGB). They are charged with what looks to be treason; namely assisting Russian troops way back at the start of the Special Military Operation (SMO). Readers may recall that on the very first day of the SMO (February 24), in an act of derring-do, Russian commandos operating way in the front of the lines, seized the Hostomel Airport near Kiev, where the legendary An-225 airplane was stationed. The plane is a marvel of technology and goes by the name “Mria”, which is the Ukrainian word for “Dream”.

Sergei Bychkov: Has been arrested.

Now the SBU are claiming that this operation was an “inside job” and the Russian army had help. They have arrested the former Director of the Antonov Enterprise, a man named Sergei Bychkov. They arrested another man whose last name is Netesov (first name not given), he used to be the Director of Security at the famous aerospace plant.

The case for the prosecution: The Ukrainian General Prosecutor claims that the Antonov management, in January-February 2022, would not allow militants from the National Guard onto the property of the aerodrome in Hostomel. Who said they needed to be there, to strengthen the air and ground security around the airport. This willful negligence led directly to the Russian seizure of the aerodrome and their successful destruction of the largest An-225 in the world.

The An-225 plane is monstrously large.

Earlier, the Captain of this plane, Dmitry Antonov, described how, back in January 2022, some NATO representatives proposed that the Ukrainians relocate the entire airport to Leipzig, Germany, along with all its personnel and equipment.

Antonov: The NATO technical representatives received no reply to their offer. No decision was taken. None of the planes were moved, neither the An-225 itself, nor the smaller An-28’s, An-26’s, nor An-74’s. Nobody was around to make a decision: The top management of the company had left the country two weeks before the hostilities started, and had settled in a suite of offices in Leipzig. Their offices there are called Antonov Logistics Salis.

[yalensis: I don’t get it. If the top management had moved to Leipzig, doesn’t that mean they were planning to move the whole enterprise there? Maybe they just thought they had more time…]

Reporter Fakhrutdinov goes on to remind us that the Ukrainians themselves blew up the “Mria” An-225. I didn’t know that, I thought the Russian commandos had blown it up. Anyhow, this “Mria” was a legendary work of art and technology which the Ukrainians had inherited from the USSR. When Russian Spetsnaz commandos parachuted down into the aerodrome, located just 25 kilometers to the Northwest of Kiev, Ukrainian artillery accidentally shot right into the hanger where the Mria was housed, and the massive plane just burned up.

More Arrests

More than a year has passed since that thrilling day, but the Ukrainian wheels of “Justice” are just starting to grind. As villains (or scapegoats) are sought. Another important entrepreneur who now finds himself under arrest is a man named Vyacheslav Boguslaev. He is the ex-Director of another major company, Motor Sich, considered the “pearl” of Soviet engine makers. According to the SBU, the 83-year-old Boguslaev is a wretched traitor “who collaborated with a terrorist organization” by working with another company located in the Donetsk Peoples Republic. They say that his actions led to a technology transfer to a Russian company. His contract with the DPR company allowed the siphoning of over 290 million rubles (in the form of tax receipts) to flow into the DPR budget.

Vyacheslav Boguslaev

Ukrainian political observer Vladimir Skachko sees a pattern in the arrests and in the way the Ukrainian government is undermining its own technology enterprises: “The Ukrainian authorities are consciously cutting down their own high-technology enterprises, because they don’t want the workers of these company to leave and take their projects with them to places like Russia, China, Iran, and India. They operate under the principle of Nobody can have you! In this way the West is trying to obstruct the flight of specialists and technologies to their competitors.

“Do you remember how, at the beginning of the 2000’s, the U.S. accused Ukraine of selling to Iraq the Kolchuga system of passive radio-electronic reconnaissance? And ever since that time Washington has increasingly put pressure on the Ukrainian Military-Industrial Complex. The pressure increases with every day that goes by.

“What will happen with the Antonov? I think that the most valuable components of these enterprises will be relocated to the West. Some shells will be left behind to work on simple components. Perhaps the Antonov will become a filial of one of the Western aerospace companies.

Ukrainian journalist Vladimir Skachko

“And, by the way, the managers of any other Ukrainian enterprise might expect the same criminal prosecution to befall them. Because, in the actions of the SBU, one might also detect a warning to other Ukrainian specialists.

“The charges against the Antonov management are laughable on the face of it. The notion that anybody in this bordello would have the power to refuse entry to the National Guard, when they come bursting in, to check the defenses.” [yalensis: I’m not so sure. An oligarch like Kolomoisky would have had the power to refuse entry to the National Guard if they showed up at one of his factories. But maybe not somebody like Bychkov.]

Skachko: “And, by the way, this [arrest of Bychkov] is still further proof that American Intel, even before the start of the SMO, had warned Zelensky’s office and other Ukrainian officials, about the possible start of the operation, specifically in the Kiev Oblast.”

Roman Gusarov, who edits the portal Avia.ru, has a slightly different take on the arrests: He believes that they are just part of a banal witch hunt, in which the Ukrainian government is seeking to find scapegoats for their failures on the battlefield:

“Besides which, the SBU and the Prosecutor’s Office need to prove how useful they are in the struggle against internal enemies. They have to do this, otherwise they themselves might be sent off to the front. And it’s a very simple and obvious matter to accuse the leaders of industrial enterprises, former Soviet factories, of collaborating with Russia.

Roman Gusarov

“This incident [with Bychkov] is by no means the only one. Many managers who sought to maintain cooperation and [economic] ties with Russia, have been charged with similar crimes. One of the loudest cases is that of Vyacheslav Boguslaev, of Motor Sich.

“Of course, one important factor here, is that Boguslaev was a member of the Party of Regions. [yalensis: That was the Party of Yanukovych, and their loyal voting base was in the Donbass. The Party was banned after the 2014 Maidan coup.] And Russia happened to be his main customer. He imported all his parts from Russia [and exported the finished product to Russia]. As the Director he did everything in his power to keep Motor Sich afloat. But the SBU had it in for him.

“And now it looks like the Antonov management are getting the same treatment. Even though it is obvious that their accusation, that their actions led to the destruction of the An-225, is ludicrous. […] Especially since we know that the plane was destroyed by Ukrainian artillery.

“All the intelligent entrepreneurs understand that it is not possible to guarantee stable work for their factories, without Russia. For sure, people express the opinion that the West will help them. But the West is only interested in squeezing out the money. If the Europeans or Americans actually needed Ukrainian factories, then they would have bought them up a long time ago and got the production going again. In the whole of the past 30 years, everything that Antonov has produced, has been for the Russian market. [….]

“Meanwhile, the technology has advanced far ahead. Antonov is stuck at the level of Soviet technology of the end of the 1980’s. These models do not suit current European demands.” Gusarov concludes that Ukraine is no longer capable of engaging in massive technological projects, and that its aerospace industry is practically dead.

Advertisement