Indian Military News, Reports, Data, etc.
- Thread starter bd popeye
- Start date
Was the publication that published the report a reputable source?
PiSigma
"the engineer"
Lol 3rd. It's more like USAF is number 1 and USN is number 2. China is number 3.
I know USN is technically not an air force, but in reality it's more powerful than rest of NATO combined.
PiSigma
"the engineer"
They have to get all of them first. And have HAL do some fatal maintenance on them. I give the first crash in 4 years.
have you considered post Covid performance interms of maintenance and training to do high tempo low altitude flying?
No one has Su-25/Ka-52 combo that effectively deals with manpads and take out individual targets in forests and trenches built with German level of engineering. you just look at Ukraine diaspora to get idea.
No one has Mach 10 hypersonics and Mach 3.5+ supersonics that take out time sensitive targets.
Indians are really funny. Indian will happily admit france,UK or S.Korean airforce is better than Indian airforce but for some reason they think indian airforce is better than Chinese airforce. British empire surely left some ever lasting psychological inferiority complex.
Lethe
Captain
As a general principle I would agree, but in the early 2000s there may have been the opportunity for something more.
Dassault and India had been dancing around a major (>120 unit) order for Mirage 2000s throughout the 90s. In the early 2000s, as Dassault was transitioning to manufacture of Rafale, and in the wake of the Kargil conflict where by all accounts the Mirage was the standout performer for IAF, Dassault offered to transfer the entire Mirage 2000 production line to India. This offer was not taken up and the requirement ultimately morphed into the MMRCA/G2G Rafale/MRFA monster that we know today.
So far as I can tell, this was a massive missed opportunity for India. As a prior generation aircraft France may well have been prepared to offer fairly comprehensive technology transfer, while the platform itself remains not only very credible, but small enough to be affordable in numbers. If India had fully committed to such a deal in the early 2000s it could well be operating >200 indigenously-built Mirages today, with lower operating cost than Su-30MKI and with a solid technology base for future indigenous development.
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Yes Russia actually should be in front of UK and France actually, certainly in front of France. I forgot Mig-31 fleet.
Hundreds and hundreds are one thing but are they effective? France has about 200 Rafales which equal the number of Su-35 and Su-30. Issue for VKS is the Rafale is almost certainly more capable than the Su-30 and modernised Rafales are almost certainly more capable than Su-35.
That's just France. Bombers I did ignore so yes you're right, Russia's airforce should be top 3 just for the sheer size and variety of bomber fleet kept around since an airforce has to do a lot of air to ground but Russia's air to air component is severely lacking post Soviet Union. UK has over 100 Typhoons and now has F-35s. In air to air, I would consider France and UK to be both ahead of Russia despite France not having a 5th gen fighter even accounting for Mig-31s. If a single Rafale or Typhoon are effective at exchanging for even 2 Su-35, Su-30, or Mig-31, then the balance falls well into the favour of UK or France.
USN should be ranked higher than UK and France for sure... Russia's bomber fleet boosts their airforce ranking up yes. But USN isn't greater than PLAAF. Just going by gross firepower and capability of platforms, there are far more J-20s in service than F-35s onboard carriers. More than twice as many 4th gen and 4.5 gen fighters in PLAAF than USN has 4th and 4.5 gen F-18s. Even counting those not on carriers but in service and stationed in CONUS.
India ranked third is quite the joke though. IAF's numbers are about half that of PLAAF for modern and antiquated/obsolete aircraft. IAF has no bomber fleets at all and weaker smaller strike aircraft in smaller numbers than PLAAF has J-16 and JH-7, JH-7A. We won't even talk about drones, China has thousands and over 2 dozen types while India is barely able to build the Rustom, an equivalent of Chinese first gen MALE from 10 years ago ... if that.
IAF would struggle to compete with S.Korea's airforce overall, certainly far inferior in capability, training, funding, operational readiness, and industrial support for maintenance. Even in manufacturing, S.Korea and Japan are well ahead of India. While that's not a factor in ranking airforces, it shows how much more potential those east Asian countries have over India which has been trying to and unable to even fully license produce Su-30MKI without it falling apart.
So what's this obsession on ranking ? It's actually kind of bad way to describe how capable military are TBH, particularly when the metrics are subjective. To do a proper ranking one should resort to a method which -everyone- would agree with or at least be done in real academic environment and properly peer reviewed.
On the other side, ranks are easily accepted by mass and even politicians. e.g GFP's BS ranking system, which clearly made for entertainment purpose yet somehow it got into our government documents and actually used in lawmaking process.
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In the other news tho. So India finally orders the Astra AAM's. I would say a good move. tho kinda bit long overdue. However mass production helps bring down cost and keep indian missile industry busy for years to come.
On the other side, ranks are easily accepted by mass and even politicians. e.g GFP's BS ranking system, which clearly made for entertainment purpose yet somehow it got into our government documents and actually used in lawmaking process.
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In the other news tho. So India finally orders the Astra AAM's. I would say a good move. tho kinda bit long overdue. However mass production helps bring down cost and keep indian missile industry busy for years to come.