February 15, 2024: This is more a shouting than a shooting war. Russia recently banned the importation of Ecuadorian bananas. This is a big deal for Ecuador, where banana exports brought in 3.5 billion dollars in 2022. This was in response to Ecuador sending the United States some elderly but still functional (if repaired Russian weapons and military equipment in return for $200 million worth of new American replacements. Russia pointed out that the aid agreement Ecuador signed with Russia specified that, if Ecuador eventually decided to dispose of Russian military equipment, Russia could approve or block the transfer. Ecuador originally purchased these Russian systems from Ukraine, not Russia. Sending anything to the Americans would not have been approved, especially since the Americans helped refurbish some of the Russian anti-aircraft systems for use by Ukraine.

While the refurbished Russian systems are inferior to Western equivalents, Ukraine can use workable older Russian systems. The Americans know the details of where Russian designs fail and American ones do not. Russia would like to see those reports, which are classified. Russia has gained access to some of those classified analysis studies of their equipment and found them useful. The American reports found areas where Russian equipment designs could be improved by the Russians using the resources Russia has, so Russia wants more such American insights.

This is nothing new. A decade ago, in Syria Russia sought to demonstrate the effectiveness of its new and upgraded weapons. Eventually Russia revealed that there were 162 such systems there. Russia admitted that at least ten systems displayed problems that required production and export sales for these ten items to be halted until the defects could be fixed. The majority of these 162 weapons performed well enough that Russian state controlled media was ordered to describe the campaign in Syria as a wise business investment. That’s because much of the billion dollars the Syrian operation had cost Russia back then was expected to be recovered because of the news of how well Russian weapons performed. Those positive reports were expected to bring in over $7 billion in additional arms sales.

This is mainly about new Russian weapons gaining credibility because of the combat experience. This makes it easier to get export sales and always has. Such current Russia military hardware in Syria are Su-34 fighter-bombers, which are similar to the American F-15E and Russian Su-35S fighters, are low budget competition for the new American F-35. Others are electronic warfare aircraft like the Tu-204, which is similar to the American RC-135. Helicopter gunships benefited most from this because these are among the most profitable and expensive weapons exported. Another important category of weapons are many of the latest and most exportable Russian anti-aircraft systems. These have also shown up in Syria but had to wait for an opportunity to be tested in a combat situation.

Russia refused to publish a detailed list of the 162 new systems in Syria although that information will gradually come out as Russian arms sales personnel are provided with details when needed to close a sale. Favorable reports about individual Russian weapons in Syria will also be released to the media gradually, thereby keeping the good news widely available longer.

Russia does not like to see its equipment compared to Western, especially American, equivalents. The Russians know the Americans have an edge in design and manufacturing quality. Just about every time American and Russian weapons clash, the Russian gear proves less effective. One reason for this is that the Americans obtain Russian weapons and equipment at every opportunity and scrutinize to see how it operates, and what aspects of the Russian equipment are most responsible for failing to match or surpass similar American products.