Couple of weeks has passed since Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has returned from a three-day historic state visit to Russia. The visit was historic in the sense that it took place after a lapse of forty-one years from a head of state or government from Bangladesh. The last such visit took place immediately after Bangladesh’s liberation in 1972 when Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur, the then Prime Minister of the newly independent country visited the then capital of former Soviet Union, Moscow. The visit took place between March 1 and 6 and though this was more of a goodwill visit Bangabandhu signed a historic bilateral agreement with USSR for economic, cultural and educational co-operations during his stay in Moscow. While Bangabandhu was visiting Moscow, the Soviet navy was busy clearing the deadly mines from the Bay of Bengal laid by the retreating Pakistan Army that rendered our two sea ports, Chittagong and Mongla totally unsafe for any kind of shipping. During this mine clearing operation there were quite a few casualties, one of whose remains (Redkin) have found an eternal resting place in the Bangladesh Naval Academy premises, Chittagong. During out Liberation War Soviet Union was the only superpower that openly stood by our side, besides our neighbour India and even vetoed three Security Council resolutions for cease fire by the friends of Pakistan during the last days of United Pakistan when the battle for Dhaka was in its final phase. An adoption of a ceasefire resolution in the Security Council would have meant a premature death of an independent Bangladesh. Soon after Bangladesh became an independent nation bulk of our much needed material and other aids came from Soviet Union and East European countries. In a span of forty-one years not only has Bangladesh drifted away from many of its old time tested friends but also the world witnessed the collapse of the mighty Soviet Empire in the early nineties. However, still Russia remains the most powerful of all the federating Commonwealth of Independent States of former Soviet Union. Bangabandhu daughter, Sheikh Hasina retraced her father’s footsteps after forty-one years though earlier she visited St. Petersburg in November 2010 to attend the Tiger summit. Before she left Moscow she spoke in the Moscow State University, the same university where once her father spoke of the oppressed people and humanity around the world in 1972. Not only Bangladesh drifted away from Moscow during last forty-one years, our relations soured to a great extent due to amateurship handling of our foreign policy, notwithstanding the fact that Russia is emerging as one of the economic powerhouse of the 21st Century. The relationship soured so much that even Bangladesh took an audacious step to expel some Russian diplomats in 1983 and 1984. In retaliation Russian prevented the new Bangladeshi Ambassador from joining his new post in Moscow and cancelled a visit by a trade delegation from Bangladesh.

During the prime minister’s recent visit to Russia ten agreements and MoU’s were signed between the two countries in the presence of Sheikh Hasina and Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on January 15. The deals included cooperation in the fields of nuclear energy, weapon’s purchase to the tune of US$ 1 billion and oil and gas exploration projects and space. The $1 billion dollar credit earmarked for purchase of weapon will have to be used by 2017 and the list of weapon’s to be purchased will be made by Bangladesh. The interest rate payable on the amount used is 4.5% and at any point of time Bangladesh can pull out of this deal and return the unspent money paying only 0.75% interest as service charge for the unspent amount. The repayment will begin in 2018 in 20 installments spread over ten years. Usually if the diplomatic relations are good between the two countries the supplying countries often writes off part of the remaining payment along with interest. Bangladeshi experts will also do stage inspection of all the hardware purchased before and during its assembly and hence there is no scope for supplying old or used goods to Bangladesh. This has been a standard procedure for all defence purchases in the recent past. This is the largest weapon’s deal in the history of Bangladesh and no sooner the deal was signed a hype was created in different media by the opposition and some self-styled experts, questioning the wisdom of such a deal and that too in the last year of the present government. One self styled ‘expert’ went to the extent saying why does Bangladesh need to buy so much weapon from Russia when Bangladesh is surrounded on all sides by friendly India? He went to the extent of discovering purchase of tanks and questions where will Bangladesh fight with these tanks, in Bay of Bengal? The truth is that there are no tanks in the weapon’s list to be purchased from Russia. Just a few weeks back Bangladesh purchased 44 tanks from China and surprisingly no one uttered a single word about this purchase though most of the Chinese weapons are inferior copies of the original Russian versions.

Russia is the second largest weapon’s exporter in the world (24%) after USA (30%). Even US has been buying military helicopters from Russian-government-owned company Rosoboronexport for sometimes. Since May 2011, the Pentagon has paid Rosoboronexport $411 million for 21 Mi-17 helicopters. Frank Kendall, a US under secretary of defence said on July 27, “At this time Department has not been able to identify a viable alternative to the Mi-17.” Bangladesh has planned to purchase an advanced version of this model, Mi-171. So far Bangladesh has been solely dependent on China for its military hardware and often entered into deals that did not go in favour of the country. During the Four Party alliance government Bangladesh signed a deal with China worth $117 on June 26, 2005 to purchase 16 F-7 fighter jets and the payment of installments began one month after signing of the deal, even though no jets were delivered till then. It will have to complete its final payment to China by 2013 as the contract does not have any grace period clause.

The purchase from Russia will contribute more to the mobility of our armed forces and bulk of it will be used by UN Peace Keeping forces. From uniforms to tanks to helicopters and furniture, everything the peace keepers’ uses are basically rented to the United Nations. For example an APC (Armoured Personnel Carrier) purchased in 1999 costing $ 0.45 million fetches $8 thousand per month as rent and within a period of 5 years the cost has been recovered. The APC still belongs to Bangladesh army. The shopping list includes APCs, helicopters, pontoon bridges, normally used during floods and other relief operations (during Tablig Jamaat). If everything goes on as planned the $1 billion dollar spent over next four years will be recovered from the rental before the last payment is made. The UN always emphasises that peace keepers should always be well equipped as insurgents in the fighting areas are often equipped with state of the art modern weapons. Bangladesh armed forces needs to be modernised not only for the UN missions but also for its own defence and gaining respectability in the region. The money planned to be used for this military hardware from Russia comes from the defence budget. Instead of depending on one source for supply of our military hardware it is always wise to diversify sources of supply and thus minimise our risk.

Some pundits argue that whether it would not have been wiser if the money was used for education or in the health sector. The fact is that it would have been ideal but the line of credit given by Russia is meant for purchase of military hardware and not for any other purpose. Some goes a bit further and questions why was the deal not discussed in the cabinet meeting or in parliament. In the past all such arms deals were never made public or discussed anywhere before it was signed. However, usually in all such deals representatives from ministry of finance, law, foreign affairs and defence are always involved. It is learnt finalising this deal took about two and half years. The prime minister and the arms forces division must be congratulated for making the deals public and clearing all the doubts in people’s mind. This is for the first time anything of this sort has been done. That is what transparency is all about. However, still there will be much of politicking with this deal for political gains.

The writer is a former Vice-chancellor, University of Chittagong.