in the next few years indian army will first add about 50-100 armed Dhruv helicopters – 4 nag ATGMs (with infra red imaging seeker – fire n forget), 3-barrel gun under nose, night vision. in
the light anti armour role. Nag has a range of 4km and is top-attack once beyond 1km. it has already cleared user trials.
in 5 years the LCH which HAL is presently working on will appear.
it is a tandem-two seat derivative of Dhruv and was shown in
crude form last year in bangalore defexpo03. looks like a rooivalk / tigre style dedicated attack chopper. the armanent will likely be the same but will be more armoured, nimble and survivable, having some israeli avionics . again around 200+ are likely to be ordered because army has 20 divisions and each
needs some, strike divisions need more.
the Mi35s will be retired within the next decade. Alouette-IIIs
are long in tooth and will all be gone. Mi17V armed with the
Vikhr atgms(iirc) are coming in quantity now.
thats the comparison going fwd. Mi17V in medium logistics and
hi-altitude attack, Dhruv and LCH-Dhruv for light logistics and
gunship. a new LOH(light observation heli) tender is out to
vendors for license making a light helicopter for scouting duties
(kinda like kiowa warrior?).
old UH-1s, AH-1s and unarmed MI17s do not look impressive
in comparison today and certainly not in future.
Pak needs to get modern helicopters to have any hope of matching indian quality and quantity. I suggest something like
Rooivalk + AH1Z in attack role with latest hellfire ATGMS and
loads and loads of Mi17 to improve their weak logistics.
but they dont have the budget for it from internal resources
and USA doesnt seem interested in lavish aid packages lately,
just loan bailouts and reschedules.
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