KramerThe contract is for technology transfer apparently so why buy an aircraft whos engine you already are going to buy? Wouldn’t ej2000 engine be more appealing?
That assumes that the F-414 engine buy includes ToT. It doesn’t. the F-414 parts will be built in the US, and then shipped in CKD and SKD form to HAL, which will only do the job of assembling them together before bench testing and eventually putting them on the aircraft. There is no ToT involved in this process, only screwdriver tech.
The MRCA project on the other hand, seeks to gain technology that is currently lacking in India, technology that will help first in the development and then in the production of the Kaveri-M-88 hybrid. And of course, that technology will also help in in-country support for the bulk of the problems that the MRCA engines will face during service.
So, whether a F-414 powered jet or an Ej-200 powered jet is chosen makes no difference in terms of the eventual purpose. Its not like the LCA Mk2 deal has given India the technology for the F-414.
KramerHow much does the update from Tranche 1 cost, per plane? And how much is each T1 plane worth on the market, after several years of use? You’d think other Typhoon operators (e.g. Saudi Arabia) would jump at the chance of getting cheap barely used planes.
Take an average depreciation of 5-10% per year of usage and that is what those Typhoons will be worth.
KramerBecause of a lack of reliability of their ballistic and cruise missiles, a a/c capable to penetrate Pak or even China defense is a must have, and in order to decrease vulnerability, it must have good range to operate from bases that Pak cannot strike.
“lack of reliability of ballistic and cruise missiles” ?! wow, where did you pull this one out from ?? A couple of failed tests and suddenly we hear about lack of reliability of these systems ? Which cruise missile tests of India have failed to date ? 23 tests of the Brahmos and not a single failure. Prithvi and Agni are operational systems that have been operationalised in different variants.
F16 even a more advanced variant would still be to close in capabilities than the Pak F16, and can the Gripen IN be trusted to be survivable against JF17 and F16 50 ?
You’re really overestimating the threat from JF-17s to think that the Gripen NG will have issues surviving against it. All of the current MRCA contenders will have performance and sensor advantages over it. The F-16 Block 50 is the PAF’s biggest threat today and in the future, there will be J-10 versions that will have to be kept in mind.
Beside in case of war not only will India have to worry about Sweden politics (aiframe), but also US(engine), and maybe even UK (radar).
Can the Gripen offer so much in terms of technologies, economical and political benefits worth angering much bigger partners of India like France, US and UK ?
Have you ever heard India training with Sweden air force ? Have you ever heard Sweden sending a fleet in the pacific to train with India’ s navy or aeronautic ?
The countries part of the Typhoon consortium have all very strong ties with the US, with US bases on their soil. And I don’t see a day when they will continue supplying India with weapons and assistance should the US put a embargo on India again.
So you either buy Russian, or you buy US, or if you want the better of both world you buy Rafale.
There is something called WWR – war wastage reserves. Crucial spares and LRUs are stocked to enable high flying rates in times of crisis. Besides, the MRCA’s last 2-3 batches are to be made completely in India with only a few parts sourced from the OEM and its suppliers. The principal aim of ToT is to allow the fleet to be supported within the country itself and so it’s not like as if a war will begin and sanctions will ground the fleet immediately. But long term sanctions will have a bad effect on the fleet availability as we saw with PAF F-16s through the 90s.
Sweden has had no historical defence or strong political ties with India. Thats true, and that will be a telling factor in the final decision since the other nations have lobbies in places of power. However, buying a non-US fighter means only certain parts and weapons will be sourced from the US and these can be replaced with non-US parts if push comes to shove. If a US fighter is bought, not only is hte least amount of ToT pretty much guaranteed, but also the future of the entire fleet will be hostage to good Indo-US ties.
KramerThanks for clarifying that Swerve.
Kramercan india afford all the Su-30MKI’s and MMRCA’s ? I know its growing but i didnt think it was that fast that it can purchase all these heavy aircraft.
Whats the point of this post? If the IAF or the GoI cannot afford it, then they wouldn’t purchase it.
KramerMaybe not – a contract was being negotiated for 42 direct from Russia and that contract may have been signed already.
Even including that, the number of Su-30MKIs are 270.
KramerA poster on Bharat Rakshak suggested that perhaps the US blocked the Elta 2052 radar for India (as mentioned in the IAF thread) because they worried it would find it’s way into the Mig-35 — just like SU-30mki has become a formidable fighter but relatively affordable fighter by combining Israeli avionics with a Russian airframe, Mig-35 may be able to do something similar.
However by blocking the Elta radars the US would prevent that from happening.
Any thoughts on this?
Its pure random speculation on that poster’s part (he being a known Russophile and US basher). The MiG-35 is already testing a Zhuk-AE radar and there have been no reliable reports that indicate that MiG (and not India since this is a competition and MiG-35 hasn’t been chosen yet) approached Israel to integrate the Elta 2052 on the MiG-35. If there had been anything of that sort happening, it would’ve been known, since integrating a new radar is a time-consuming and costly affair and will not be done lightly. From all known reports, the MiG-35 was tested with the Zhuk-AE, albeit a smaller one. Eventually, the full size Zhuk-AE is meant to be integrated.
India is not going to go around asking MiG to integrate Israeli systems on the MiG-35. It is upto MiG to do that and demonstrate it during trials. If they didn’t do that during trials, then there is little use doing that now.
The US move, if true, is mainly targeted at preventing Technology transfer from Israel to India. Pure and simple.
KramerIAF’s 3rd Phalcon AWACS tested in Israel. It has some additional classified capabilities that the IAF requested based on its experience with the first 2 Phalcons..
Kramerwell well well…:rolleyes:
The 2052 would have been a good option for the Tejas.
There was also some talk of an indian aesa under development ..not too sure about that or the details.
The Indian AESA radar program for the Tejas Mk2 was apparently codenamed “Uttam”. was reported on Livefist blog. Phazotron and Selex were eliminated and Elta and EADS were contesting the RFP for partnering LRDE on this program.
KramerBtw does anyone remember that Israel wanted to fit 2032 first and 2052 later on their F-16s but were refused by the US?
Oh yes, they were forced to go with the APG-68 instead of the Elta 2032 on their Sufas. Its nothing new, we’ve seen this type of behaviour afterwards as well.
South Korea were forced to abandon the idea of adding Selex’s AESA radar on the F/A-50 and were basically left with the option of going for a US radar or the Israeli Elta 2032 and they chose the Elta 2032..but the integration of the 2032 was to be done in the US by a US firm!
The reason was that there is some US law that forbids any platform that a US firm helped develop, from having a superior radar than a US platform does. And since KF-16s didn’t have AESA, the F/A-50 could’nt have it either. Strangely enough, SoKo has supposedly opted to go with a non-AESA radar for its KF-16 radar upgrades.
KramerThe IAF pilots clearly favour the Gripen according to the latest tribune report. If the decision is purely on merits of the aircraft cost effectiveness etc. Gripen stands a rgeat chance.
That report is not substantiated. Haven’t there been umpteen such rumour mongering reports in the past?
As far as IAF test pilots favouring Gripen NG, it must be BS, pure and simple. The same teams didn’t evaluate all the different aircraft, so even if some TPs liked the Gripen NG, they haven’t flown the other MRCA contenders, so their opinion is as good as this- “Gripen NG is a great aircraft to fly but I don’t know about the rest since I’ve not test flown those during evaluations”.
For eg. the TPs who test flew the Gripen NG weren’t necessarily the same guys who flew the F-16 Block 60 or the Typhoon. Separate teams were created for this purpose. So each TP would know how the fighter he evaluated flew and the rest would be by word of mouth through the fighter community.
KramerTwo explanations can be given that..
1.Its a win win situation for Saab even if Gripen NG is not selected
or else
2.Its an incentive to select the Gripen so that you share common systems and networking interoperability with the Tejas.
The first option sounds a little like they’ve accepted defeat, Ray. Its like they’re looking for a contract with much much lower value when the MRCA is still ongoing and might indicate that they know that they stand little chance in winning the MRCA.
The second is more of a smart option- they can show to the IAF and MoD that they are looking to make the Tejas Mk2 and the MRCA as interoperable as possible and utilise their experience and technologies on the Gripen NG on the Tejas Mk2 as well, to give the IAF a possible very large reduction in total Life Cycle Costs due to shared systems and their spares. That when combined with the existing lowest LCC for the Gripen NG will translate to huge savings overall. For instance, if the Tejas Mk2 is to use similar avionics and architecture as the Gripen NG (if chosen as MRCA) it will lead to lowered maintenance costs on them both together and there could be shared upgrade developments for both, once again leading to savings in cost.
ADA will be interested most in how the Gripen NG’s MTOW, fuel and weapons payload were increased without a significant increase in empty weight. They could also look to involve SAAB in weight reduction and in aerodynamic studies for the Tejas Mk2. Fact is that there is a lot to gain from SAAB and their likely involvement in the AMCA is also something I hope fructifies eventually. If they are involved from the study stage rather than after the design is frozen (sometime this year as per Dr Subramanyam of ADA), it will likely result in more benefits as their ideas and experience can also be takein into account.
KramerIt is not what you think it is I am afraid Kramer. America is offering advanced systems to India so it is not capability denying. Its basically Americans saying that a radar developed with their money Elta E/M 2052 should not compete with radars made by American companies in markets like India.
it is denying capability-the US will never offer full technology on whatever radar it offers to India. Either the APG-79 or the APG-80 through the MRCA programs or the Raytheon RACR or NG SABR as a Tejas Mk2 radar. They will always sell black boxes with contracts with huge maintenance budgets that will go to their OEMs or to their contractors. There will be legal penalties if the IAF or DRDO tries to access any of these black boxes and its not only a working AESA but also its technology and source codes that India wants access to. Israel would’ve sold India the technology if the Elta 2052 was directly selected or would’ve assisted LRDE in developing components/software and in finetuning the Tejas Mk2 AESA and that is what the US does not want them to do. That is a conflict of interests if I’ve ever seen one.
I am not anti-US but in this case, it is very clear that the backbone of the IAF and the technology gains of the MRCA cannot be built on an aircraft which is so heavily subject to the whims and fancies of the US Govt. and its Congress. The Super Hornet and F-16IN are mature and capable fighters and would’ve made a very handy addition had there been no true ToT requirements.
But like I said, there is a major conflict of interests here, and no US fighter will fit one of the main requirements of the MRCA contract- ToT and full and unfettered access to whatever systems the IAF or DRDO organisations want.
KramerVishal Kansagra: Are you extending support for indigenous AEW&C system being developed by Center for Airborne Systems (CABS)?
Inderjit Sial: We have not been approached by them. But we are in talks with ADA for supporting LCA Mark.2.
India Defence interview with Inderjit Sial, head of SAAB India
This is something new..Did’nt know that ADA had approached or been approached by SAAB to help develop the Tejas Mk2 version. It would a lot of sense though, since SAAB does have the Gripen NG program whose experience can be leveraged on the Tejas Mk2..Only question would be what does SAAB gain from such a contract? The value will be less and if the Tejas Mk2 is successful, it will definitely mean that the Gripen NG’s selection in the MRCA contest will be in threat as its role will overlap with that of the Tejas Mk2.
KramerComplete story:
http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2011/01/11/351666/israel-bars-aesa-radar-export-to-india.html
Could this hamper US-India relations?
Also, was this radar really considered for the Tejas?
What this article underlines is how untrustworthy and unreliable the US would be as a supplier for the MRCA program as well, since Israel is clearly acting under US pressure in this regard. This behaviour of preventing sales of weapons or systems not just from US suppliers, but also from other countries under the US influence in order to push its own agenda is what is most problematic. It always raises the spectre that if in the future India and the US don’t see eye to eye on some major issue, the weapons supplied will be obvious targets for applying pressure. I’m pretty sure that they also pressurised Israel not to sell the Elta 2052 to the South Koreans for the F/A-50 version of the T-50 Golden Eagle, instead offering the Elta 2032.
Elta 2032 components and software are already in use on the MMR used on Tejas Mk1, so the Elta 2052 might have been a logical step forward on Tejas Mk2. Elta and EADS were the only two contenders left in the RFP for partners for LRDE on the Tejas Mk2 AESA radar program. With this news, maybe they’ll withdraw from that RFP as well, leaving EADS as the sole contender, meaning the whole bloody tender will likely need to be re-tendered, adding another 1 year of delay.
I sincerely hope that both the Super Hornet and the F-16 IN Super Viper are shown the door when the MoD announces the shortlisted contenders for the MRCA.
Sign In
