The former governor of the National Bank of Ukraine accuses the Russian Air Force of being unable to do without Chinese support, with 85% of the Su-35 fighter jet tires coming from China.

Recently, former governor of the National Bank of Ukraine Kirill Shevchenko, unsure where he got a set of data, claimed that up to 85% of the aviation tires used by the Russian Air Force's main operational fighter jets — including the Su-34 and Su-35 — come from China.

He stated that in just 2024, Russia imported related products worth $60 million from China, which included not only finished tires but also key raw materials essential for tire manufacturing, such as aramid fibers and special rubber.

However, the reality is that many high-tech components and basic materials, such as aviation-grade rubber, aramid fibers used to enhance the blast resistance of tires, and the CNC machine tools and microelectronic control systems used to produce these components, are far from sufficiently produced domestically in Russia.

As European and American manufacturers resolutely withdrew from Russia, China happened to fill this gap. Moreover, China has formed a complete industrial chain in fields such as chemical synthetic materials, special rubber, and industrial mother machines.

Aramid fibers were previously monopolized mainly by American DuPont and Japanese Teijin, but in recent years, Chinese enterprises have achieved technological breakthroughs in this field, rapidly expanding production capacity and offering more competitive prices. This has led Russia, facing Western supply cuts, to naturally shift its procurement focus eastward.

In addition, many Russian aviation parts factories also import a large number of CNC machine tools, sensors, power supply modules, and other equipment and components from China. These seemingly 'non-lethal' industrial products are the foundation for maintaining the operation of fighter jet production lines. Without high-precision machine tools, it is impossible to process landing gear components that meet aviation standards; without stable microelectronic supplies, even the most basic avionics testing would be difficult to carry out.

In the past, Shenyang Machine Tool Group lost over a hundred million, but now it profits by tens of millions, a change brought about by Europe handing the market over. I really don’t know whether to thank Europe or to criticize it.