Russia to sell China air-to-air missiles

MOSCOW - Russia is close to finalizing a deal to sell China at least 100 medium-range air-to-air missiles. Pressure from both nations was a factor in President Clinton's recent decision postpone deployment of a missile defense system, the White House said. The U.S. officials also said they expected the president's decision to reduce tensions and lead to arms control agreements.

The Russian company Vympel NPO is the prime contractor in a deal to sell the R-77/RVV-AE [NATO reporting name: AA-12 Adder] medium-range [75 kilometer] air-to-air missile to China, company officials said.

The deal is close to being finalized, the London-based Jane's Defence Weekly reported. China will acquire an export version of the AA-12 Adder missile for its Sukhoi Su-30MKK Flanker-C fighters. China plans to assemble and eventually manufacture the missile.

India is also close to signing a contract to equip its Su-30MKI and upgraded MiG-21/93 Fishbed aircraft with the AA-12. Earlier this year, India conducted a test firing of the missile from a MiG-29SE Fulcrum-C.

Only 200 samples of the active radar guided AA-12 missile have been built to date and about half this number have already been used during development and evaluation trials, Jane's said. The Russian Air Force has tested the missile with its MiG-29M, MiG-29SMT, MiG-31M and Su-30MK aircraft, but Russia is not expected to put the missile into service until 2004 or 2005. Currently, Russia only has a few of the upgraded aircraft required to deploy the missile.

A smaller version of the missile is being developed for future stealth aircraft, and a surface-to-air version, designated the R-77-3PK, has also been demonstrated, but has yet to be offered for export.

In the United States, executives at Raytheon said the company will continue to develop a missile defense system despite Clinton's decision to postpone deployment of the $60 billion national missile defense system until next year.

"The president's decision does not affect the development and testing, which will continue" a Raytheon spokesman said. "Raytheon continues its confidence in our radars and hit-to-kill technology."

Raytheon was awarded the contract to build the 55-kilogram missile designated to intercept and destroy enemy missiles. But during a test in January, a leak caused Raytheon’s interceptor to miss a dummy warhead. Raytheon also is developing radar for the program.

Earlier, Clinton said international pressure from Russia and China and test failures convinced him not to on deploy the NMD system.

U.S. officials said Clinton's decision will reduce tension with China and Russia and lead to other arms control agreements.

In another development, Russia said it conducted three underground subcritical nuclear tests from Aug. 28 to Sept. 3 on Novaya Zemlya island in northern Russia. An Atomic Energy Ministry spokesman said the tests did not violate the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty on nuclear weapons, which Russia ratified in May.

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