site.btaParliament Approves Amendment to Stryker Investment Project

Parliament approved on Thursday an amendment to the investment expenditure project related to acquisition of Stryker combat vehicles. The reason for the change is a price increase requested by the US side. A total of 156 MPs voted in favour and 11 Vazrazhdane MPs voted against.

Defence Minister Dimitar Stoyanov told MPs that there is no point in discussing the need for this project. The Bulgarian Armed Forces have been underestimated for many years, as a result of which modernization processes began only in 2018-2019, he said.

Progressive Bulgaria MP Hristo Simeonov said that the increase is less than 3% of the total project amount and is due to objective reasons. The Defence Ministry's negotiating team achieved a very significant reduction for some project items. Nearly 20% less will be paid for ammunition and 12% less for Javelin anti-tank systems, Simeonov said. Fourteen million US dollars will be saved by postponing the purchase of unmanned aerial vehicles. Deferring the purchase of this equipment guarantees that, at the right moment, we will introduce much more up-to-date technologies, Simeonov said.

Vazrazhdane MP Ivelin Parvanov noted that his party had warned that there would be a price increase and a delay. In his words, "with these old vehicles, the Bulgarian Armed Forces are preparing for the war before last". The price increase amounts to about USD 37 million, although Bulgaria has not yet received anything. "We could have developed something new instead of buying old vehicles," Parvanov said.

The motives to the draft resolution state that on November 9, 2023, the National Assembly approved an investment expenditure project for the Acquisition of Main Combat Equipment for the Formation of Battalion Battle Groups within a Mechanized Brigade. The project was worth USD 1,376 million and covered the design, production, integration, equipment, training and delivery of Stryker-family armoured combat vehicles. The investment expenditure project includes three international contracts.

The Stryker Programme Office for Bulgaria in the US provided a detailed justification for the change in the price of some of the contracts, citing shortages of certain raw materials and global inflation as the reasons.

As a result of the changes to the three contracts, their total value will increase to USD 1,393,140,192, which makes the current amendment necessary. Taking into account inflation and the effect of economic conditions in the updated investment expenditure project, projected contingency costs of USD 20,897,103, or 1.5% of the total value, have been included, bringing the financial value of the amended project to USD 1,414,037,000, the motives further state.