In the wake of the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the West imposed crippling sanctions on Russia's aviation industry. While there may be ways around many of these sanctions, they have been devastating to Russia's ability to produce aircraft. Simple Flying recently reported that the heads of Yakovlev and Tupolev had been dismissed for the "failure of civil aviation." Now, the Russian news outlet Kommersant reported that these dismissals follow a Russian report showing civil aviation is in competition with military aviation, and it's even worse for Russia's civil aviation industry than previously thought.

Russia's civil aviation industry competing with military

One of the recently dismissed directors was the director of Yakovlev, which produces the MC-21 and SJ-100 aircraft. These are critical for Russia's plans to domestically produce around 1,000 passenger jets by 2030. According to Kommersant, not only has Russia not produced a single Russified MC-21 or SJ-100 - it hasn't delivered a single Soviet-era Tu-214 since the sanctions were put in place. Much of Russia's ability to produce commercial aircraft rests on "suppliers’ workload with state defense orders."

"...it turned out that a number of components [for passenger aircraft] are not produced in the Russian Federation or are used by defense enterprises..." - Kommersant

Russia is running a wartime economy, and the civil aviation market is competing with the defense market. The auditors called the existing financing scheme for the civil aviation program "largely dysfunctional." The publication states that just making personal changes will have no effect on the situation.

In fact, it suggests that sacked Andrei Boginsky had managed to solve some of the issues the best he could. It also says he was unable to "question or adjust the forecast" for aircraft production. It seems Russia is more focused on firing those who have missed production targets than investigating and fixing the reasons why those targets were missed.

1,000 aircraft by 2030 not be questioned!

According to a Russian audit reported by Kommersant, "It turned out that the limited capacities of six first-tier suppliers allow for the production of only six MC-21 aircraft per year. If the problem with them is solved, then without further 'corrective actions,' Yakovlev will be able to produce up to 12 MC-21s per year from 2026."

This compares to Russia's current plan to produce 22 MC-21s in 2026 and 36 in 2029, ramping up to 72 annually starting in 2029. In total, Russia plans to deliver 270 MC-21 passenger jets by 2030.

Kommersant also says Russia has attempted too many programs (eight—the MC-21, SJ-100, Tu-214, Il-114, Baikal, and others) and needs to reduce them to better focus resources. However, it notes "the aviation industry is unlikely to admit that the projects are redundant in the foreseeable future."

In WWII, the US solved the issue of civil production competing with military production by issuing measures like banning the production of civilian cars for the duration of the war. Russia does not have this luxury (it is officially not even at war—just involved in a 'special military operation').

Russia is also facing a ticking time bomb: Being cut off from parts and services for its Boeing and Airbus fleets will cause a crunch as they are withdrawn from service (as is already happening with its Airbus A321neo/A320neo fleet). Russia needs a functioning commercial passenger aviation industry to keep the sprawling country connected.