Huh…I got into this discussion when YOU started venturing YOUR opinions about the state of the flanker fleet and pilot training for “both countries”. I dont care what the chinese do or do not. But to paint the IAF with the same brush when the that whole nicks thing was a trivial OEM-Warrenty issue and insinuating that that the No.24’s were grounded and cannibalized is patently wrong. Just coz stuff like that happens in China does not mean the Indians also faced the same problems, its not equal equal as often painted on other issues like the MKK and the MKI.

Without getting into too many details that you need not be knowing (coz I donno what the equivalent PLAAF procedure is). There is a very strong russian presence at the Flanker bases because thats what the contract stipulated. There has been no grounding of the fleet (I donno what happend during the sulphur content in the fuel issue, but definately no grounding when the nicks happened). There are a/c on the ground (not the entire fleet) that are always undergoing routine maintainance from the IAF crew and more complex avionic “maintainance” from civilian contractors/OEM specialists/PSU.

It is my understanding that you dont bring an a/c to the flight line if it worthy of flying.

You don’t give me your freaking high and mighy horse how much better your high and mighty IAF and MKI is to everyone.

Grounding and cannibalization happens fairly common in all airforces, including the mighty USAF. Just because you have Russians on the scene does not change things as the Russians themselves are great plane cannibalists and many of their planes are designed with that regard for quick operation.

Anytime you have the slightest suggestion that a flaw in an aircraft might threaten the safety of the pilot, it deserves to be grounded. The USAF grounds planes on reasons less serious than engine nicks. If you have a problem, you simply don’t fly the plane at all. Even if the plane is not officially grounded, operationally it is, and it won’t be flying until it is fully certified once again. It strikes me while you give your high and mighty blah blah, you’re not even aware of some of the most basic procedures.

Harry, once you are at

http://www.kanwa.com/defr/

The link does not change no matter which article you have been reading.

Also since this is 2006, all the 2004 articles may have been archived now. But you can read the December issue magazine which has the PLAAF vs. ROCAF article, along with lots of nice pictures of various planes to boot.

I didn’t say it was in a link. I said it was PUBLISHED as in a paper magazine, and the text may be archived in the link. If you want to look inside the link, you go ahead. OKAY? The site has terms about replication of material without permission. But if you insist that I should post things that are not legally allowed, then I should question your credentials as a moderator then because you are asking me to break copyright.

There were/are teething problems but NONE of them have resulted in ANY grounding of the IAF Su-30K fleet (I sincerely cannot speak for other forces). I was on the flightline a few weeks after the first “nicks” report. It was a serious problem but nothing that affected the operational ability of the Su-30K fleet thanks to the very generous sparing factor. This was a problem specific to the K not the MKI (they had/have OEM support 24/7 till contracted date). The nicked engines were taken care of under contract terms.

There is no ego only facts. You want to mix your delusion with facts be my guest but please dont drag the IAF down to the level of other inept flanker forces and their mediocre training regimen.

Seriously dude, and you don’t think China takes care of their Flankers too? Whether or not the planes are taken care off, that’s beside the point that problems did happen. And when the problems happen, the planes remain effectively grounded as the problems are being resolved. Then they have to be tested then certified once again as being air worthy.

Dude, planes are grounded for less life threatening situations than engine nicks. If you don’t do what is needed then I guess you are less than responsible and will do anything just for a show of face.

Harry,

Go find it at http://www.kanwa.com.

Also recently in the published journal, KANWA also mentions that the training hours of the PLAAF now matches that of the Canadian Air Force. This is for January issue under the PLAAF vs. ROCAF article.

What would happen if other nations started Government run Sports schools and a system of conscription for the same?

Why don’t they? If you want to win, you got to pay the dues. While you may not have government run sports schools in some countries, they do have plenty of corporate sponsorship, athletic scholarships, expensive coaches and state of the art sports facilities. Just because you have sports schools do not guarantee you success.

And China never reported their casualties in the Sino-Indian border clashes. And it isn’t about AK-47s vs. .404s. You can read more about it here.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/1984/CJB.htm

Link please……

YOu would have pay the subscription online.

So, you doubt your own figure? Grounding and cannibalization may be an issue with the PLAAF but in the IAF, a normal Su-30 sortie lasts 10 hrs or more, doing missions around the entire country.

And this one is for that george who said this.

Gosh dont you just love it when some folks take it upon themselves to speak for “both nations”. I dont think the IAF has ANY of the problems you have listed for the flankers….nor does it find it difficult to make the hours its targetting per pilot.

So are you denying that problems ever happened? Even though it appears to have been handled, problems do happen on the engines and you cannot deny that it doesn’t. Whether or not it affects operational ability, which of course, the politicians would say otherwise because their jobs are on the line, is up to the reader to determine.

http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/sep07/n9.asp

Sukhoi-30s to stay, says
Air Force chief

CHENNAI, Sept 6 (PTI & UNI)

Chief of Air Staff Air Chief Marshal S Krishnasamy today asserted that there was no problem with the Russian-made Sukhoi-30s and the frontline fighters would stay in the Air force.

“There is no problem with SU 30s.They will stay in the force,” he said in a brief chat with a television crew soon after the Air-show in Marina, jointly organised by the Indian Air Force and the Tamil Nadu Government to create awareness about the force among the people of the State.

Air Chief Marshal Krishnasamy’s assertion assumed signifance in the wake of reports in a section of the press that SU 30s had been effectively grounded following the detection of “nicks” in the engine blades.

Meanwhile, an IAF spokesman in Delhi said that though some of the aircraft acquired from Russia faced warranty snags, the squadron was continuing with staggered flying. He said the rectification of the snags had been taken up with the Russians who had agreed to despatch a team of specialists to look into them.

The spokesman said the SU-30 were now almost on the verge of being sent to Russia for upgradation to MKI and added that both the SU-30 squadrons would be sent to Moscow starting February 2004.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/508399.cms

IAF recovering affected Sukhoi engines on fast-track basis
[ Friday, February 20, 2004 03:15:45 pmPTI ]
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NEW DELHI: Asserting that nicks in the engines of the just acquired country’s frontline fighters SU-30 were not affecting operational preparadness, Defence Minister George Fernandes on Friday said prompt action has been initiated on the recovery of the affected engines on fast-track basis.

Assuring that the SU-30 fighter fleet was never grounded due to engine problems, he said some engines of the aircraft inducted into IAF in 1999 were found to have nicks during routine checks.

Responding to Rajya Sabha member Rajiv Shukla expressing concern over the high rate of engine failure of the Russian made fighters in course of special mention in the house, the Minister said that two of the SU-30 squadron had been repaired and the balance engines would be reparied shortly.

“I am given to understand that the IAF had promptly initiated action for recovery of the engines on fast track basis”, the Minister told the MP in a letter.

Fernandes said the SU-30 contract was concluded in 1996 after fully evaluating the aircraft and that these aircraft were accepted by IAF after detailed flight checks as per the established procedure.

“The Security of the nation was never comprimised at any given time and the required number of aircraft were available to undertake operational commitments”, the letter said.

The Minister’s response comes in the wake of reports that SU-30 engines were developing nicks before completion of the time between overhauls, with the engines failing to log certified flying hours.

So, you doubt your own figure? Grounding and cannibalization may be an issue with the PLAAF but in the IAF, a normal Su-30 sortie lasts 10 hrs or more, doing missions around the entire country.

Grounding and cannibalization in the PLAAF is merely my speculation but it really happens in all airforces, including the USAF. And so why is the PLAAF and the IAF cannot be exempted from it? It is a relatively common procedure. You ground planes even if you suspect problems because that is for safety reasons and you wish to subject planes to detailed examination.

So, the IAF is indeed high above the rest that you do not need grounding and cannibalization? Perhaps the ego factor is just higher.

Well i have that sort of understanding of asian cultures that in there and elsewhere philoshophies and religions doesent differnce from their place at sosietyes structures. Its irrelevant what they preach, relevant is how the powersrtuctures are constructed. The ideologies of religions havent never been major factor by their silly ideas of idealism in world that is driven by forces of materialism.

Quite wrong. It does.

Religion is intertwined deeply into culture and it generally affects how one people treat the universe. Confucianism is more than a religion, it is actually a set of ethics and behavior, and more accurately, a philosophical ideology that tends to foster authoritarianism and central control.

Imperialism is a phase of market economy and private ownership of production, It has never been part of european cultures in the manner that cultures have charectaristics whatsoever.

But it is, since the time of the Hellenic and the Roman period. It was essentially how the early Europeans managed to survive, by invading and killing each other to make living room for their own tribe.

And that goes all the way to the 20th Century when Hitler invaded Russia for “Lebensraum”.

But then again its irrelevant to dig too deeply into matters that dont consider this question. Wheter yuo want to achieve any solution to the guestion, ‘Why is west dominator instead of others’ you have to acept certain level of generalisation and most of all looking behind different ideologyes and religions that are driving sosietyes to way or another.

But if you claim that China in stance had same evolution in sosial structures acpects as europe, it cannot be the key to answer then? But if we look at china, most important accpect of its history is the relatively stable power heritage. China was united wery early to come close to the ‘state’ -status, dynastyes ruled pretty much same areas and than previous ones heriting not just power vaccuum, but society along whit the power. There werent so much variety in changes of power centres and the nationality of those keepers than there were in europe. We can almoust say that Chinese empires achieved higher levels of societyes horizontal acpects than the ones in europe. The area become united.

Maybe we should then think what made China become united earlyer than europeans and try to find bad acpects of it to the chinese missed opportunity to become global power, If we want to keep social issues key to the proplem

I think you keep missing the point here.

For the ancient Chinese empire, they are the WORLD POWER. Hence the name, Middle Kingdom.

You have to remember that during their time, the concept of the world is much more limited. The Romans ruled and conquered what for them was the ‘known world’, while the Chinese conquered and ruled what for them was the ‘known world’.

All relative to their viewpoints.

Being united and forming an empire also results in staticism, and eventually, decay. Which is what happened when Rome faced the barbarians.

China actually fell into periods of division and civil war. Remember the Romance of the Three Kingdoms? That took place after the Han Dynasty fell. A period of chaos follows, then rebirth, and a new dynasty was born to take the empire once again into new heights. Then the dynasty decays again and the empire falls into revolution and civil war. So what happens in China is a cycle of chaos and rebirth, then decay and chaos and rebirth again. So essentially we are seeing rebirth here.

You have to ask yourself the same question, why Rome, which united the known world of its time, had all the economies, technologies and organization, would eventually fall and not progress.

If both Roman and Chinese technological progress remained uninterrupted, only to see the two cultures meet and share the technology, it is possible that by the 20th Century, we would be more advanced by centuries and already have viable interplanetary travel.

In case of Arabs, we propaply have to ask why did the Mongols managed to invade them and ruin their culture.

The Arabs at the time when the Mongols invaded them was much different from the Arabs at the time of Mohammed. At the time the Mongols invaded them, they were a rich and prosperous nation, with living conditions, luxuries, art and culture far better than the Europeans at that time. But they had gone soft and wasn’t prepared for the kind of warfare the Mongols brought with them.

But whit the effects of unification inside Chinise reing you become to close to the proplem, what differences china from european/middle east region in terms of power struggle. Could it simply be that after 15th century Chinese empire have become too united, too centrally controlled, too big athoritan rule whitout real neighbouring opponents? And when one man rules whitout any realistic ways to displace him from power, a slow degration of mental enthustiastism can crawl into ruling class mind so innovates become threats not prospects to win the rivaling prince like the case in europe.
So again I have to ask why this happen in China, but not in europe?

You already answered your own question.

You don’t need a camera to perform a reconnaissance mission. Ever heard of SLAR? ELINT?

It is a SAR and recon pod.

I never recalled it being a datalink pod like someone else here.

In 2004, Taiwan reported that a PLAAF Su-30 with an SAR pod made a recon flight along the Straits.

Here is the documentation for it

The M400 Reconnaissance System for the Su-30 aircraft

The M400 Reconnaissance System features:
1. Data acquisition, visualization, and storage system.
2. Side-looking radar plug-in module.
3. Video data storage system.
4. High-altitude multi-channel (multi-band) IR reconnaissance system
5. Low-altitude electrooptical reconnaissance system
6. Long-focus side-looking photo camera plug-in module

The Su-30 aircraft equipped with M400 system provides for:
• Detection of ground installations and strike confirmation in any weather conditions, day or night, at low, medium and high altitude without entering the range of enemy air defenses using radar, IR and visual sensors
• Integrated targeting information acquisition [for attack platforms]
• Visualization and on-board logging of reconnaissance data and its real-time transmission to ground station through a high-bandwidth link

Maximum detection range without entering the range of enemy air defenses:
Photo reconnaissance – over 70 km
Radar – over 100 km

Sensors:
• Side-looking radar
• Data acquisition, visualization, and storage system.
• Low-altitude electrooptical reconnaissance system
• High-altitude multi-channel (multi-band) IR reconnaissance system
• Long-focus side-looking photo camera plug-in module

Sensors resolution:
• Side-looking radar – 2 meters
• Visual sensor – 0.3 meters
• IR sensor – 0.3 meters
• Long-focus photo camera – 0.4 meters

End of Story

So can we drawn conclusion that China didnt became a powerplayer due its stagnated philoshopheys? Lack of innovative and adventure spirit? Well Im sure there were adventurous spirits but not much political breathing space for them so they would have helped chinese explorations? Idelogyes and philosophyes in China, thougth not much diffenring from theoryes from the ones in the west but in practical conducting raised a political culture that helped single man rule and kleptocratyes whit ultimate powers prevented any prospectous accept of expansions as they would have threathed the power of the rulers?
So what made these differences between European and Chinese power cultures if we can agree that its the route we should enter if we want to find an acceptable answer?

You asked these questions while you seem to have no knowledge of Asian culture, particularly Confucianism. Maybe you need to learn more about Confucianism, with its emphasis for harmony, structure, elitism, the elderly, and why, while it sounds great on paper in creating an ordered, harmonious society, also discourages innovation, experimentation, and free thought. Usually Confucianists are the nobles, and pushing this philosophy encourages development of their power base.

This is not to say Confucianism has its better qualities, such as the drive for self sufficiency, thrift, hard work, and education (want to compare how Asian students do in tests?) In fact, the rise of the C-J-K cultures in modern times, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong, and China, into global economic powers (collectively the region owns more dollar surpluses than in any part of the world) has much to do with this. Compare these with areas such as other parts of South East Asia and Latin America. In South East Asia, one can see the massive disparity of incomes between overseas Chinese versus the native populations, which leads to social tensions.

No one in Asia admits being a Confucianist, but Confucianism is so integrated deep into the culture that one practices it without any conscious thought or knowledge that such things originated from Confucianism. It is simply accepted as part of the cultural fabric, from the way Japanese schools operate, to the way governments in the PRC and Singapore operates. In fact, there are major commonalities with the way from these countries operate far beneath the surface once you get past “democracy” and “communism”, from Japan all the way to Singapore. For example, there are government managed super corporations and umbrellas. You have an economic system structured to discourage spendings and domestic consumption in favor of production, exporting and savings.

You cannot compare European cultures then and European cultures now. European cultures then were highly competitive and imperialistic. Today, its liberal and socialistic, which is why I wonder if the future Europe has what it takes to remain a dominant power in the next century.

After all the social evolution from all the wars in Europe, it was Europe’s turn being imperialistic. Social evolution works. You remember Greece? Prior to Alexander, Greece was a bunch of city states warring at each other. Social evolution toughened them, created things like the Spartan military, while the chaos created a fertile ground for new ideas and innovations which is where a lot of the classic philosophies were made. That evolutionary toughness defeated the Persian Empire when they tried to invade, and when Alexander came, the Greeks were ripe.

The Romans too were a product of social evolution, themselves fighting the Etruscans and later the Carthagians.

And if you look at China, the same thing. Prior to the unification under the Qin Emperor, China was in the Warring States period, where divided, various kingdoms contend for supremacy fighting each other. It was during this turmoil that China saw some of the greatest social and technological advances—pretty much all the stuff that defined them as “Chinese”. In this period that China transitioned from a Bronze age to an Iron age, where tribal warfare styles was replaced by large regular and well organized armies, when things like crossbows are born. And not the least, this was the era when Sun Tzu wrote the Art of War.

Of all the kingdoms, the Qin was the most powerful and effective, and its military conquered all the other kingdoms and united the entire region as one. This was the defining moment as being “China”. Because he was tyranical, the dynasty of the Qin Emperor was shortlived, and was overthrown. What replaced it was the Han, which became a golden age and conquered territories here and there to become a massive empire.

this is in effect, an example of social evolution affecting culture, society, technologies and philosophies.

Japan itself was a product of social evolution because it too suffered continious civil wars, forcing the creation of classes like the Samurai.

Even the USA was a product of social evolution. In her earlier years fighting the British, who also invaded again during Napoleon’s time. Then later came the Civil War, wars with the Mexicans and the Spanish, and the Indian Wars. One of the qualities of the American soldier then was because they damn knew how to shoot a gun. And they had a lot of practice.

Look at the Mongols before Genghiz Khan united them. A bunch of tribes fighting each other. Their skill in archery and riding the horse came from necessity and survival.

Look at the Arabs before Mohammed united them under a single faith. A bunch of tribes fighting each other.