Rotorcraft
Russian helo designs struggle to enter market
“I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia.

“I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma, but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest.”–Sir Winston Churchill, radio speech, 1939.

What was a trenchant observation when the great British statesman made it 64 years ago is still true, especially as regards to that nation’s aircraft industry. Awash in talented, highly trained engineers with heads bursting with ideas, budgets full of cobwebs and dust, factories full of rust and formerly captive markets suddenly enthralled with the shinier, higher-tech goods of the West, the design bureaus of the former Soviet Union found themselves in a completely new situation, that of a commercial entity trying to make its way in an increasingly competitive and economically turbulent world.