WitchaThe advantage of spherical arrays, in brief, seems to be that it can evenly emit sonar waves in the vertical plane(above and below) as well as the horizontal plane, as compared to cylindrical sonars where the emitters are only on the horizontal curve of the cylinder.
Coming to this topic, does anyone know whether there are any spherical sonar systems deployed on surface ships? Most modern nuclear subs have them, but what about warships?
WitchaSweeping statement.It took them over 20 years to get an advanced trainer. Whilst Indian Army may haveits procurment problems, the Indian Air Force is very far from perfect….
A further delay in this contract is unlikely in my opinion, but also a possibility. Especially if one of the losing bidders shouts foul play.
You’re forgetting a key point: the Armed Forces in India have very little control over defence procurement. All they can do is specify requirement and evaluate tenders; the actual contract won’t be signed and validated till it has passed through multiple stages of bureaucracy: the MoD ministers, the Defence Acquisition Council, the Cabinet Committee for Security and so on.
So long as the power over defence procurement rests in the hands of clueless civilians who only know how to count money and look for scams Indian defence deals will continue going at a snail’s pace.
And of course, there’s the issue of corruption allegations. In any other ministry a neta or babu accused of corruption will usually hold on to his post till the allegations are proven(which may be forever). But in defence even an accusation is enough to call of the deal and leave the Armed Forces naked. Never mind they may be unverified and coming from dubious sources with ulterior motives(like Denel being blacklisted due to unsubstantiated claims of bribery from a South African newspaper that happened to be run by a Pakistani-origin man).
WitchaAre JF-17s for export to third parties going to be built in China or Pakistan? Or will there be a work-sharing agreement?
WitchaOver-armed for its size?
We are actually 25th in the league table of armed forces by size, with 240,000 personnel. With the worlds 22nd largest population of 62,041,708That equates to one “soilder” per 2758 persons. Hardly earth shattering.
Compared to the US, where there is a soldier for every 210 citizens (309,826,000 people and 1,473,900 active bods), the UK is positively unarmed.
and just for fun the uk has….569,189 persons per UK warship (including RFA)
160,729 persons per Challenger Tank and if we needed to all rally round then 310 of us would have to share each L85A2….
Most of that population inhabits small land areas that don’t take all that much to protect and haven’t been invaded(not counting the Falklands) for over 50 years and are unlikely to be in the forseeable future unless for some reason Russia and China go ape**** on Europe.
WitchaStrongly disagree. The marines are actually far more likely to be used than any armored cavalry regiment. If they haven’t a beach to storm, they can be used as the best of all Light Infantries, and they have the advantage of being one of the logistically lighter units of the armed forces, relatively easy to deploy and sustain.
And then, sincerely, if you have no anphibious capability, what the hell do you build aircraft carriers for…? Projecting power only with a bunch of planes is something that never worked in history. At the end, land forces always have to do the work and hold the ground, and the Marines are the best at “smashing the door down” and set foot on the area you need to reach.
Again, the SDR is most likely going to assume that Britain risks no invasions. (Unless perhaps in the Falklands, where that can’t be ruled out) Fox keeps saying that Russians won’t come, and i guess he’s right enough…
The UK is far more likely to fight abroad. Africa, Middle-East… not Europe, we all are guessing. It is the least probable scenario.
With 70% of the world’s capital towns being less than 150 miles away from the sea, you’d lose the capability to land on the coast…?And even if you were right and the risk was to have a few islands invaded… Without anphibious capability means that the invasion is either stopped as it happens… or becomes definitive defeat.
Is UK willing to keep garrisons on the various Falklands, SOuth Georgia and so along…? Garrisons numerous and powerful enough to fight off an invasion…?I think it makes immensely more sense to keep the anphibious capability. Besides, ships like the Bay or Albion are the best at a wide variety of roles, included disaster relief. They are flexible like nearly nothing else.
It would be a crime to lose them after the RN fought so hard to build such fine capability up.
Because amphibious capability made such a difference in Iraq and Afghanistan? Seriously, the idea of the UK launching a sea-to-land invasion on its own anytime in the forseeable future is ridiculous. If it ever happens it will be a US/NATO-led operation, in which case I doubt HMS Ocean and such would make a huge difference.
And the UK already has assets in Falklands big enough to repel any invasion. One thing you folks keep quiet about during defence cuts and brag about everywhere else is that the UK has one of the top 5 armed forces in the world and is seriously overarmed for a country of its size.
WitchaThe loss of amphib capability is an acceptable price actually. Given it’s essentially a bunch of island chains(including the Falklands) the UK is more likely to be invaded by sea itself than to do the invading on someone else’s shores.
WitchaIsrael, U.S. sign deal to upgrade Arrow missile shield
Israel and the United States have signed an agreement to make the Arrow II ballistic shield capable of shooting down missiles at a higher altitude, the Israeli Defense Ministry said on Sunday.
The Arrow III will allow Israel “to deal with the threat of ballistic missiles with long range” and will give it “the ability to shoot down weapons of mass destruction outside the atmosphere,” the ministry said in a statement.
Israel, which describes its Arrow system as a defense against Iran, says the upgraded version will cap off its multi-tier air defenses.
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Good for the Israelis. They’re among the lucky few who get an exemption in Uncle Sam’s rules by virtue of being strategic allies. No doubt if some country India tried to acquire similar assistance to protect its much larger population from the threat of rogue nukes it’d be rebuffed on MTCR or other such flimsy grounds. Like nukes, the US is making missile defence the privilege of a few.
WitchaFigures; the USN is the first to finally operationalise this much-discussed technology. 😎
But I’m not convinced of the merits, though. Aren’t these essentially just larger, more expensive, recoverable sonobuoys? What can USVs do to aid in submarine detection that a pair of ASW helos couldn’t?
WitchaNavantia Launches Final EEZ Patrol Vessel for Venezuela
The “Karin” is 98.90 meters in length, displace 2,200 tonnes and have a top speed of 25 knots
The Navantia shipyard in Puerto Real on July 13 held a ceremony for the christening and launch of the fourth and final EEZ patrol vessel for the navy of Venezuela, the “Karin”. The ship was sponsored by Petra Elena Medina de Paz, wife of the Inspector General of the Navy of Venezuela, Vice Admiral Alcibiades, also present at the launching. [/I]
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Navantia is a Spanish firm, right? Interesting that the US isn’t protesting one of its allies supplying its enemy.
WitchaAdmiral Gorshkov saw only 10 years of service and needed all its wiring, electronics and propulsion systems replaced.
These three cruisers are the same story. The Russian Navy will need to spend billions to get fully operational again. And even then they’ll only last another 15-20 years compared to an new-build ship that can be made to last upto 40 years with refits. A massive waste for money that seems to be done mostly for the sake of pride.
Then again, like the Typhoon subs that are supposedly going to retrofitted into SSGNs, this may never happen.
WitchaExpect CSL to win. The five PSU shipyards and their union votebanks have enormous power over the MoD. Otherwise the contract for the aircraft carriers would have gone to Bharti Shipyards instead.
WitchaI thought the MiG-27 had recently been temporarily grounded? They were certainly grounded in 2005/2006, the IAF are not at all happy with its safety record – it’s worse than the MiG-21’s!:eek:
I believe the Indian air force are on the verge of retiring the type, despite having recently modernised the type at great expense.
Part of the blame lies with the IAF and the MoD. The MiG-27 is an obsolete aircraft that’s at the end of its life cycle. If the IAF intended to continue operating it they should have had a proper, thorough modernisation plan. Like, for instance, replacing the old unreliable engines. There have been at least two proposals to re-engine the MiG-27, first with some Turmanski model and second with AL-31s, but neither were followed through despite firm interest by the IAF. I blame the penny-pinching, indecisive MoD crooks for the deaths of Indian MiG-27 pilots.
WitchaWith the Tristar being maxed out supporting the air bridge to the ‘Stan, would you really want to lose our only AAR capability (which is currently far more valuable than would seem at face value), seeing as it’s active in theatre and the only realistic way we have of deploying fast jet assets overseas?
Considering you have pretty much assured access to US and NATO tanker assets, why not?
WitchaThe issues quoted(dollar value fluctuation, inflation, poor cost-evaluation) are all significant but I think the core of the problem was that the SevMash shipyard just wasn’t equipped for building aircraft carriers. I read some very informative posts on the subject on some Russian forum which I’ll see if I can find the link for.
Basically SevMash had little experience in building and refitting aircraft carriers(Historically that was done at Nikolyaev in Ukraine). They also lacked much of the infrastructure needed for such a task, including a dry dock capable of berthing carrier-sized vessels.
So they instead drained a lagoon used for floating submarines for testing. Unfortunately the lagoon had no heavy machinery like cranes(That explains why there are hardly any large cranes in pics of the Vikramaditya over the years) available so moving equipment became an expensive and time-consuming process, which was am important reason for the time and cost overruns.
The realisation that SevMash may not capable of reliable aircraft carrier construction is probably the main motivator in Russia seeking to include Ukrainian shipyards for its warship-building plans.
Witcha^Then having only a few operational blue-water warships and sending them off to desired locations in such situtations would be a far more cost-effective option than building a huge, fully crewer top-of-the-line navy solely for the sake of diplomatic flag-waving. That’s the strategy the Russian Navy’s followed in its recent cash-strapped state.
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