It reads “After implementation of that contract, Indian Navy will operate six Project 1135.6 frigates.”

So, what they are talking about is Batch 2 (starting with Teg) following Batch 1 (starting with Talwar). First three frigates of that kind were built for India by Baltiysky Zavod shipyard. The second three by JSC Yantar Shipyard. This article does not INHO discuss any Batch 3.

“new contract with Indian Navy would be negotiated in case of successful delivery of the second three frigates.”

The second three frigates have not all been delivered. INS Teg has been delivered April 2012, INS Tarkash will be delivered later this year, and INS Trikand (= 6th ship of 11356, 3rd from this yard!) is scheduled in 2013. Deadlines were postponed for more than a year.

The wording of the article is fairly clear. It refers to Yantar expecting another potential 3-frigate order from the Indian Navy after the current batch is delivered.

Matt no offense, but your frequent outbursts of pessimistic views in Indian Threads, dunno why it makes me remember a character from sci fi series:

I know u care about India but dude have some faith on desi scientists. They are much more qualified & experienced than you and me in their respective fields to take such decisions

Cheers 🙂

Sadly, whether it’s called ‘pessimism’ or not I feel the same as him there. DRDO, HAL and the like don’t have anywhere near a steady track record in delivering outside of the ballistic missile programmes. Delays and cost overruns are the rule rather than the exception and often by the time something is ready for induction the armed forces has already substituted an import and is not all that enthusiastic about the domestic product any more.

Given the realities in almost every field in India except defence(automotives, for instance) I very much believe the government should cultivate the private sector with the same fervour with which it funds the DRDO and Defence PSUs.

Because Indian MoD has no technical expertise to tell what is suitable and what is not. Armed Forces do. There is only one way a country like India can work and open tendering is that only way, everything else is corruption happening or waiting to happen. Yes, that includes Govt to Govt deals as well if these are not joint development projects, follow-on orders or replenishing orders. Now you can say speed up tendering process and criticize it if it is slow. But I don’t get it How can you criticize open tendering.

Maybe…because the current one is just a show piece.

Until the UPA era there were a fair many quiet defence deals that happened through single-vendor deals or small closed tenders and no corruption resulted. Like the purchases of MiGs, Jaguars, Mirage-2000s, Su-30s, Hawks, Israeli UAVs and basically any aircraft prior to the MMRCA circus. T-90s, the INS Vikramaditya, the Talwar frigates and the Nerpa sub are other examples(What problems they had had nothing to do with corruption in tendering).

Even post-UPA there were scam-free closed tender deals like the P-8 buy(It was evaluated against an A319-based platform). Open tenders do nothing but get dragged out ad infinieum with the threat of cancellation and retendering every time(See the army’s howitzer drama). And in the end these don’t solve the corruption problem either, because corruption happens anyway and while the tender gets cancelled the guilty parties are rarely found or caught. In the long term the nation loses far more both strategically(Due to the long delays in acquiring even basic capabilities) and monetarily(Due to inflation in prices, do you know the MMRCA was originally valued at only $6-8 billion?).

The problem here is not with the process of buying arms but the government that does it. Closed tenders and single-vendor deals are fine for other countries, large and small. They have worked out well for us as well. Saint Antony and his MOD only adopted this policy because they were afraid of another Bofors and cared not so much about the armed forces’ needs as the need to avoid scandals(Which they failed in as well).

http://balancer.ru/forum/punbb/attachment.php?item=278545&download=2

Official response by MOD to a group of veterans concerned with fate of Kirov.

“Currently work is being completed on determining the scope and process of modernization for the Nakhimov cruiser”
“Inclusion of a second cruiser into the modernization project under GPV-2020, is planned for 2016”.

They’re still only ‘determining the scope and process of modernization’?:eek:

And it won’t be till 2016 that a second cruiser(let alone the third) is even brought into the project… Slow as molasses. This seems like another case similar to the two mothballed Project 941 submarines that the Russian Navy was interested in refurbishing but never found the funding to do so.

Why the need for 76mm guns anyway? The Vikramaditya isn’t an LHD; for personal defense against missiles a good CIWS would suit it best. If not Kashtan I’d strongly recommend the Pantsir-ME when it gets cleared for export.

Article on INS Vikramaditya, courtesy Trishul blog..

20 million man-hours for refit and refurbishment

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http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-uLQQxdOUDMA/T5rwMh_L4AI/AAAAAAAABQU/6B0Z-g-kpb0/s1600/10.jpg
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sLFQ4kq71oY/T5rwUK5MuPI/AAAAAAAABQc/fZ7B3Jbu3NQ/s1600/11.jpg

That blog always has interesting articles full of details, but sometimes I don’t know where the facts end and Prasun Sengupta’s fabrications begin. Thankfully everything seems accurate in this case…

Only 8-9 885Ms is too little to replace all the Akulas, Oscars and Sierras. Is this class going to be supplemented with a smaller attack SSN sans VLS tubes like was speculated until a few years ago?

A major problem with road-mobile TELs(and I believe this is the reason why Agni-3 thus far has only had rail-mobile versions) is that ballistic missiles, especially ICBM-class ones, are heavy, and most Indian roads and bridges aren’t designed for loads over 45-50 tonnes or so.

This was essentially the army’s main issue with the Arjun tank’s 58-tonne weight. The Agni-3/4/5 weigh upwards of 50 tonnes not counting the TEL and other mobile equipment.

Interesting about the R-27 deal. Why not just go for the longer-ranged RVV-MD/BD offered by Vympel that are likely going to be acquired anyway for the Super-30 and the PAK-FA a few years down the line? Or are these meant to be a temporary replacement for aging R-77s in stock?

Somwhat sad if true…

http://rusnavy.com/news/newsofday/index.php?ELEMENT_ID=14938

Aircraft Carrier Admiral Kuznetsov Received Secondhand Anchor

The violation was detected when Director General of JSC Nevsky Yakor Valentin Ponomarev tied a delivery contract for an anchor with JSC Zvezdochka Ship Repair Center. Procuracy says the businessman received RUR 4 mln from Russian Defense Ministry, but spent only RUR 1 mln.

….

Investigators found out that Ponomarev falsified a certificate with fictitious size and weight of the anchor.