Victor Komardin, deputy director of Russia’s arms export agency Rosoboronexport believes that the MRCA deal will be cancelled due to the extremely high cost associated with both the Rafale and Typhoon.

AviationWeek link

He calls it a waste of money. One can bet that wouldn’t be something he’d be saying if the MiG-35 was in the running..and the last claim, that the MiG-35 was “withdrawn” from the tender before the short list was decided sounds bogus considering what we’ve heard from MiG earlier about the IAF giving reasons as to why the MiG-35 wasn’t shortlisted.

And I don’t think that he needs to tell us whether or not India faces a threat to its sovereignty. One could use that logic to question why India has other deals going on with Russia. Why spend $1 billion on an Akula lease? Why spend $2-3 billion more for the Super-30 upgrades? Why spend $35 billion or thereabouts on the FGFA? The list is long..

Exactly, a big farce. Talk about coming up with weird explanations. Why can’t he just accept the fact the MiG-35 (which BTW did not impress the IAF evaluators at all) did not make the cut, and just come up with some other statements saying they are improving the product further. The American’s come off better at least, they didn’t sugercoat their loss in the MMRCA after an initial sulk, and at least sought to propose the F-35.

Oh dear. Neither Dassault nor EADS has such technology. They are not engine manufacturers. The technology has to come from Safran or Rolls-Royce.

Sorry Swerve, thats a somewhat irrelevant and pointless nitpick.

Karnad is absolutely right in what he is stating, when one considers the fact that EADS and Dassault are acting as the lead negotiators and overall program leads for both offers. As such EADS did indicate that it would transfer engine tech to India, when the actual vendors should be MTU/RR/ etc.

Similarly, Dassault offers tech., across the board for the Rafale, when “technically”, anyone & everyone knows its the vendors in question doing so. What that clearly means is that Dassault is the one guaranteeing all this and has previously secured pledges from the individual vendors and also secured Govt. guarantees.

Given the word limits on op-eds and the actual scenario as it stands, what he wrote is fairly plausible and indeed, logical. Both these deals come with significant political and across the board industrial support. The end result is that both consortiums come with significant tailored support packages & it’s really upto who is L1 and also meets offset proposals etc in a comprehensive fashion.

http://americainchains2009.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/sky0.jpg?w=450

Sintra, sent you a PM. Please check, thanks.

Trying to be overcautious to prevent people from determining the numbers of Sukhois in IAF service, most probably.

Seems to be beside the point considering events thereafter, wherein AK Antony in Parliament replying to a question noted HAL has supplied 99 out of 180 Su-30 MKIs contracted so far. Which, along with 50 original Russian supplies, should take the IAF fleet to 149 Su-30 MKIs. Another order of 42 is to be placed as well, these might come in the Super 30 configuration to begin with.

Thanks for the info Teer.

Regarding the two Akula’s from Russia; i had read there was interest to get two of them but seems like that plan didnt materialize. Only one will be leased.

Also the Hypersonic Air Launched Article missile would be competing with BrahMos 2 for resources. I doubt there are two different programs for the same purpose. Its possibly referring to the same project instead.

Totally different program (“Air Launched Article”) with just 200 km range, and a prototype by 2012. Can’t be the Brahmos 2, which is very much in preliminary development.

This will instead likely be a solid fuelled missile developed as a critical “local” alternative to Brahmos etc for the strategic mission.

When Dassault make less profit than expected, it means for them that they’ve lost money on the deal :D.

Less money on a deal is better than no money at all. I don’t know whether Dassault understands the importance of having a launch customer. 60 planes is no small amount, even if the MMRCA is around thrice that.

First, they didn’t keep developing the Mirage 2000 further – the Russians are keeping the MiG-29 marque alive with the MiG-35 and what not. Such a thing, could have been a useful adjunct to the Rafale, but even that option’s gone.

Second, they seem to really drive very hard bargains, at high prices. The Mirage 2000 upgrade for the Indian AF seemed fairly high as well, cost wise. Especially considering it didn’t come with new engines either.

I think all these radars around the plane will increase SA, radar based analogue of the EO-DAS ?

I wonder how many Tx/Rx modules the cheek arrays have? The front facing radar should at least have around 1400-1500 judging by the size.