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Originally Posted by V.Narayan Very relevant question..
The above are just my thoughts and by no means the last word on this subject. Would love to hear expert comments from others. |
Just want to second all these points. As stated, US kit might seem expensive overall and we might view the claims attached to them as being typical American braggadocio, but in reality, a consequence of their 20 years of war has meant they're mostly all kit that's been proven in theatre. There's likely precious few platforms from other vendors where you could count on the current iteration incorporating actual user feedback from a decade of frontline use (not exercises, heat of the battle stuff). You'd probably need to look at Israeli systems there, maybe a few French and British ones from their African and ME-ern involvements respectively.
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Where Russia ends up with its first line of weapons is to be seen over the next 10 to 15 years.
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Think this is a key issue for most military watchers - it's a tough one to see just how the Russian military industrial complex copes with the far reaching impacts of the Ukraine aggression. They're adapting but as many observers on Twitter pointed out, their industrial complex is dependent on the West in many ways that might not be immediately apparent. For eg, a lot of their CNC equipment is comprised of off the shelf German units, and this is not even going into the higher tech more supply constrained aspects like chip supply.
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Originally Posted by dragracer567 |
A waiver from the house of reps is a good sign, especially if there's bipartisan agreement on this. Doesn't it need to pass Senate too? Just cautious of there being any roadblocks there. If both houses pass it and get it up to the White House then brilliant, just needs rubber stamping. My only other concern is if the waiver is time delimited - ie, is it only valid for a certain period (I mean it still buys vital time) or is it clause related?
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This should further bolster many offerings by US companies for many Indian defense contracts, especially to the Indian Navy, with the F/A-18 super hornet which according to Janes took off with a much higher payload than that stipulated by the Indian Navy. This along with the fact that the F/A-18 can fit in both carriers, has a lower CAPEX and OPEX cost, shares commonality with P8s and MH-60R and crucially will share engines with the HAL TEDBF (which means that the carriers can have a common inventory of engines where space is crucial) means that it seems to the front-runner.
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Interesting point this - the commonality with US kit from the naval side. Reducing the logistical strain in any way is a welcome move and if all the kit plays nicely that's all the better, considering the increasing impetus the IN will take on in coming decades to counter PLAN reach in the IOR. The claims about the Super Hornet lifting off with overcapacity are obviously fantastic but I'm cautious much the same way as V.Narayan - I'd like to see the final results of the fly off be announced by the IN itself, as well as hear from the French side. Easier to form a picture once we hear all aspects.
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Further 'on the directions of the PM's office', the contracts for the 30 MQ-9 Predator drones and the 6 additional P8is remain on hold... The indigenous drone in question seems to be an Indo-Israeli UAV developed jointly by Elbit and Adani (yes, that Adani!) according some reports on Twitter.
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Bit of a shame regarding the MQ-9s, could've been quite the force multiplier in terms of increasing IN ISR reach and capacity in the IOR coupled with the P-8I fleet. Still think getting a few would be beneficial, I've no idea on just how long it would take to field an Indo-Israeli UAV. Aren't Elbit primarily an electronic systems vendor, ie, radar and such like? Do they have any integrated platforms of their own? Also while I'm not surprised to hear Adani somehow has a defence division, just how wet behind the ears is this outfit and is it practicable to expect them to churn out a marine UAV?
Furthermore, given we're seeing the PLAN actively playing around with concepts for UAVs off their STOBAR carriers, I think India shouldn't sleep on any possibilities that arise in this space. We also know the Turks are looking to leverage similar UAV capability off their own LHD.
As for the P-8I, additional orders should be a no brainer. Last thing we want is to rue the line being shuttered down the line when we finally get off the fence about getting some more.
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Originally Posted by .sushilkumar They are wooing at the moment because Boeing need money to sustain itself & that too badly for obvious reasons. All their project are running in deep red and commercial planes division woes are well known. |
Boeing sure has raging forest fires in its own house to deal with still, but I feel the Super Hornet deal is but a drop in the ocean in that regard. A large part of this push is from the entire US military industrial complex because their whole retrenchment towards the Indo-Pacific means they need as many regional bulwarks against China to help the US military as possible. It took them long enough but the median position of the US body politic is starting to see that they need to engage in some pragmatic realpolitik wrt India (which means compromising on some counts like a CAATSA waiver or not expecting an outright condemnation of Russia from India), if they want to advance their own primary objective of containing China.