Moscow: President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Russia’s powerful military-industrial complex is ramping up production and that is one of the main reasons his country will prevail in Ukraine. Speaking to workers at a factory making air defense systems in St. Petersburg, Putin said overall military equipment production was rising because of demand from Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine.
“In terms of achieving the final result and inevitable victory, there are many things … This is the unity and cohesion of the Russian and multinational Russian people, the courage and heroism of our fighters … and of course the military-industrial complex and your and The factories of people like you work,” Putin said.
“Victory is certain, of that I have no doubt.”
Putin noted that Russian arms companies manufactured about the same number of anti-aircraft missiles as the rest of the world combined, and three times as many as the United States.
Earlier, he paid tribute to veterans to mark the 80th anniversary of the World War II siege of his home city, then known as Leningrad, which was blockaded by Nazi German forces for nearly 900 days. Took part in a program together.
He told veterans that Russia was fighting to protect ethnic Russians and Russian-speakers in Ukraine, who Moscow says are subject to systematic discrimination in Ukraine.
Kyiv rejects the allegation and says Moscow is using it as a pretext for a colonial-style naked land grab.
“What we are doing today, including our special operations, is an attempt to stop this war and protect our people living in these territories,” Putin said.
“These are our historical territories,” he said – a reference to the fact that large parts of today’s Ukraine were once part of the Russian Empire.
Putin was born in Leningrad in 1952 and began his foreign intelligence career in the city with the Soviet KGB. He later held positions in the city administration while his political mentor, Anatoly Sobchak, was mayor.