I don’t see it as a realistic scenario. Even with their constantly growing budget, they won’t buy yet another new carrier. For now.
I think 4 carriers are more than even their ambition envisages for the next years. Because a CVF, lasting no less than 50 years, would be still very young even when all their homebuilt ones are ready.

Also, it clashes with a simple concept: they want the Gorshokov to be the last carrier (and one of the last ships) they buy from foreign nations.
Differently from the UK were the shipbuilding industry is treated like a deadweight or almost, they WANT to create a strong indigenous shipbuilding capability.

That they do, but they aren’t shy of seeking imports to fill the gap when indigenous efforts aren’t fast enough. The main drawback of the Indian shipbuilding industry is speed, and that won’t change any time soon. If anything, it’s still a possibility.

As to the arms race bitter comment, it was a keyboard error. Yet a new carrier for India makes the bold “never again State-on State war” and “there’s no dangers anymore in the world” assumptions ridiculous.
The world IS experiencing an arms race.

I don’t understand this either. How can India buying the CVF fuel an arms race any more than if they build one themselves?

Their problem with the trainer was that the IAF asked for a more powerful engine. That’s not something that could be solved by indigenisation alone; they would have had to wait for the development whether it was an Indian or Russian engine. And HAL’s solution for the Dhruv problem seems to be to approach other engine makers instead.

My point was that only on the LCA was effort put in to get an indigenous engine. For all other aircraft projects HAL and IAF have gone straight to the market for engines.

The point was, which you missed, that the Kaveri, as a 40-50Kn dry thrust engine, has a variety of applications available to it, which open up the vista for Indian aerospace applications. That you chose to compare it to being used for the Jaguar re-engining, for which its clearly unsuited, was erroneous.

My point, which you missed, was to illustrate that using it to re-engine the MiG-29s was unlikely given the replacements had already been decided(along with other problems), which admittedly was not a good analogy.

Look, the crux of your argument is basically that I am wrong about the prospects of Kaveri derivatives. Well, time will tell, but I stand by my statement that the Kaveri in itself is not going to have many applications beyond KMGT. I’ll be the first to apologise if and when there is actual news of developing a non-afterburning version for a trainer or UAV, but at this time both look uncertain.

Actually, based so far on your posts on the issue, I do think your understanding is cursory

You’ve edited your post to be more civil. You are judging the extent of my knowledge based on statements given without considering what thought processes went on before they were made. That is ‘cursory’. I assure you I did think about the explanations you provided.

Again, unless you work at HAL or ADA, you cant state whats what with certainty about what is planned and is what is not. You speak of the HJT-39 CAT – has it been cleared, when will it come? Second, about the AL-55I, has a detailed agreement been signed for all 1000 engines already? Has TOT commenced, facilities been set up? Are these the only trainer studies that have come out so far?

Frankly, you are jumping to conclusions based on your own limited data set, which you then interpret to suit your own notions.

As I said to you once before, being so uptight about having only 100% confirmed, official, public domain knowledge on this forum is… ridiculous. To turn that back on you, where are the confirmed, public announcements on the acceptance and delivery of KMGT and other spinoffs? Absence of evidence cannot be taken as evidence of absence, but it cannot be taken as evidence of prescence either.

The IAF, DRDO/ADA, HAL and other partner organizations have had many needs, many of which were/are either in progress, or kept waiting, for the lack of a suitable, inexpensive, local powerplant. With its availability, many of these plans can be progressed.

This is what I meant when I said you dont understand the impact of this event.

I have seen that entire presentation,

Wait, so you knew the answer all along and yet withheld it and called me out on the truthfulness of that statement?

Now lets get to the point, that PPT says exactly that it is a partnership for technologies and infrastructure and for a TD, it says nothing about a series production engine being developed with Russia.
But there is an engine planned and it is clearly a different project from the Kaveri.

And, when you say: And the only future UAV project announced is AURA, for which this looks likely. that’s again depending on “announced” projects gleaned from the likes of what Aroor copy pastes from presentation decks. Do you seriously think ADE etc will put all the stuff they aim to develop or are developing in announcements? If so, you are mistaken. All these are pretty sanitized, we’d at best get a very limited view.

Again with the “only 100% confirmed and announced onlee”. While it’s difficult to explain in words, I know enough to make what I believe are fairly accurate deductions, even if they obviously aren’t fact: the IAF already has an IJT and AJT, so Kaveri-trainer is unlikely. The Auro MALE is about as advanced a UCAV project as you can go for, and it has a prospective engine design that will probably be different from the Kaveri. And I discounted civilian spin-offs(perhaps unfairly) since they are always there for military R & D.

Let me modify my previous statement: Until I hear of an actual derivative(as opposed to a new engine developing using the skills gained on the Kaveri, which is different from my opinion of the Kaveri itself and was acknowledged before) for trainers and UAVs, I do not think the Kaveri in itself has much of a future within the IAF.

As for the question of getting engines for domestic aerospace programs, outside of the LCA programme both HAL and the IAF have been relatively content to use foreign engines, as with the ALH, LCH, IJT and MTA. The Tejas was the only programme that was seriously held up for want of an engine.

Absolutely right, plus the Air Chief has gone on record stating that only two engines are being evaluated for the Jaguar upgrade, the newer Adour & its competitor from Honeywell. The Kaveri going on current Jaguars is moonshine.

If this is aimed at me, I hope you understood that my intent was to point out how unlikely the option was. As is Kaveri on MiG-29s, if for a different reason.

^Add it to the proposed list of derivatives, then. Alongside the version that will fit into a trainer.:D

You’d think differently, if you had a serious interest in aerospace systems and the overall intent of the program, which would allow you to grasp the magnitude of what the success of the current Kaveri itself represents.

I get the feeling you are/were trying to be derisive and dismissive. About the Kaveri, the AL-55 has already been earmarked for the trainers with upto 1000 engines in the pipeline. For UCAVs the GTRE itself had previously unveiled a ‘joint venture’ with Saturn. The Kaveri may have given the GTRE competence in engine design, but in itself isn’t more than an R & D project aside from the KMGT.

Wouldn’t the added weight and carrier-capable features of the F-35C be unnecessary baggage for the RAF?

I’ve been trying to fathom the logic of the change from F-35B to C and I don’t quite get it: if long-term savings are the goals with the Navy and RAF sharing resources then wouldn’t the F-35B be the logical choice? With the CATOBAR version there’s no hope of a joint F-35 force as the RAF would need to go for the A version. Immediate savings for the Navy may be more(due to lower cost price of the F-35C) but long-term they’ll end up paying more for that decision…

So exactly how many F-16s does the PAF have right now and how many more are being ordered?