Golden Arrow

I had also stated that in the last thread which was locked that PAF is looking into two deals, one is picking up older F-16s thru MLU upgrade and bring the numbers of existing older models to 50+. They might buy older F-16s from Turkey as well who have provided them with spares during the sanctions.

I’m hearing it may be from USAF reserves, not a third country.

Let me clarify the process further since after reading my posts before I myself got a bit confused. There are many steps in an arms sale process, be it FMS or Direct Sales.

Step 1A – Foreign government sends a letter to DSCA asking for defense items. For major items, decision is made at higher levels. In this case, the Bush admin decided to formally approve F-16s as a system to Pakistan earlier this year. That got the ball rolling.

Step 1B At the beginning of each fiscal year – DSCA sends a report to Congress called Javits report. The Javits report is just a DSCA estaimation of what it thinks may be sold to what countries at the beginning of the year both under FMS as well as DCS.

99% of the time, things change, quantities may be varied and armamments, radars and other things are changed as well. So far the DSCA has told Congress that it expects Pak govt to ask for 18 F-16 Block 50/52 planes in 2005-06 and that the govt will consider any request favorably. That does not mean that Pakistan will ask exactly that amount.

Step 2 – Foreign country negotiates with DSCA the specifics of what it wants. In this case, Pakistan must come back with its specific list of items, spare delivery schedule, training and maintenance requirements, associated arms (AMRAAM etc.)

Step 3 DSCA discusses with State Dept and Commerce dept (if needed) and decides that they will sell x,y,z from Pakistan’s wishlist.

Step 4 – DSCA sends Congress a specific notification for each MDE. This is called a Section 36(b)(1) arms sales notification. This tells the Congress, exactly what items are sold, what is the cost and what is the justification for the sale. This also talks about the sensitivity of technology and what are the risks if they fall into wrong hands. Sometimes there will be a classified section of this notification as well. This is mandatory and you cannot split up sales to bypass this system. For example, by law notification is required for $7 million or more valued items. So if a country wants 200 bombs at 35,000 each, it cannot split it into two orders of $3.5 million each, spread over months, and bypass this system. Also the definiton of a MDE – Major Defense Equipment is – “Any item on the United States Munitions List with a research and development cost of at least $50 million or a total production cost of at least $200 million.” So even one AMRAAM or one JDAM will require notification.

Step 5 – Once Congress receives notification, it has 30 days to reject it otherwise it is automatically cleared. Usually Congress gets another 20 days “informal” notification, before the formal 36(b)(1) is sent. If necessary Congress can try to stop the deal at this time to avoid the embarassment to govt. This has happened in the past, but very, very rarely.

Important thing – The power of Congress to block sales is not absolute. By law the President can waive the 30 day delay and nullify the Congressional denial for “national security related emergency” reasons by a simple notice in the federal register. Many deliveries to Pakistan before 2003 were through this method.

This is why I said before that Congress cannot block the F-16 sale to Pak. At the very best they can cause some embarrassment to the admin. Even the India caucus will not want to annoy the President by making him take extra steps.

Step 6 – After the 30 day period, DSCA and Foreign govt sign the deal. DSCA signs a separate deal with the contractor. Usually, there is a “cut” for the DoD to pay for the whole process.

As you can see, we are just at Step 2 for the F-16 situation. The number 18 is just a placeholder. PAF can order what it wants and the admin has already made it clear that it will not restrict numbers – meaning DSCA will approve whatever number Pak asks for. Response and details from Pak is expected any day now. Usually DSCA will tell its counterpart on the other side what they will approve so that embarassment is denied. What I don’t know so far is if the DSCA has told Pak if AMRAAM or JSOW is okay. Because if it is not okay, Pakistan will not ask for it formally. The exact quote I have from my source is that as per DSCA head “AMRAAMs are not on the table now.” No comment of JDAM or JSOW. The Javits report also does not include AMRAAMs for Pakistan or India, but as I told above – it is not binding. We’ll see if that changes.

mav,

People like to talk. In Washington, procurement details always leak out well before they are made official.

I’m sure this guy I’m referring to is not in day to day contact with PAF people or knows all about their plans. But he was saying what he heard because virtually everyone was asking him questions on this matter. He informed what he has heard in the grapevine.

You should know this since Pakdef often has senior members giving hints on what is happening in GHQ 😉

BTW, I’m hoping to get some details on what the admin is actually going to approve along with the F-16s for Pak tomorrow sometime. Some more details are needed on the config and weaponry on offer.

The conversations were not for attribution as all attendees agree to it when they go to these meets. Besides, I don’t want any tracking back of my identity.

Let’s just say he is a frequent contributor to more than one Pakistani English language newspapers on the op-ed section and he is also popular with many American academics specializing on South Asia, including my boss :D. He is touring the US and is still here, atleast as of last week.

If you have your sources in PA, which I’m sure you have many, you should be able to find out who I’m referring to.

$9 billion is just about the minimum needed for 126 planes with ToT, arms and license for local production. The money is there and it will be paid for over two decades probably thru government to government arrangement.

And BTW, India will surely get atleast a 100% offset deal. These are political deals.

The key advantages – cost wise of the JF-17 for Pakistan is that they will not have to pay the markup associated with a foreign manufacturer as well as it will be manufactured locally. But radar and avionics as well as any non-Chinese weaponry will have to be paid for at normal rates. Any good radar, even in ordered in numbers like 200, will likely end up costing up to $ 5 million per unit and avionics too will be similar.

If I were to guess, I’d say the unit cost will end up in the low $20 millions range for the plane.

an F-16 question.
Is congress likely to pass a bill to halt the sale of F-16s to Pakistan?, Ackerman(Pro-Indian lobyyist) has announced the bill.

Two things – The F-16 sale will not be halted.

Secondly, Gary Ackerman is an elected representative and not a lobbyist. He is a member of the Congressional India Caucus. He might likely introduce a bill next week and it will probably hit the floor of the house as an amendment to some other bill and will be quietly defeated because the Bush administration has already got the buy in of majority Republican leaders.

Ackerman and others know this but the bill will be brought to the floor to set a precedent and put the issue on record, in case it is necessary at a later date. Most likely some kind of language would be added to say – “WE don’t object to the F-16s provided the President can certify that Pakistan is cooperating in the war on terror and is not involved in nuclear proliferation and that the F-16s are not used for aggression.”

People forget that when Congress passed the infamous Pressler Amendment, it was in 1985 and it was intended to continue aid to Pakistan but with strings. In 1985, US could not give aid to a nation that was simply developing nuclear fuel but Pressler’s legislation changed that to say aid can be given as long as weapon is not manufactured. The law was used six years later.

For now, the F-16s are a done deal.

Sameer,

Much of the Scorpene’s dollar value hike is because of the falling dollar versus the Euro. In terms of a Euro, a dollar has fallen nearly 20% since the first Scorpene rate was announced. With France you have to pay in Euros 🙂