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FORBIN

Lieutenant General
Registered Member
Mazagon Dock delivers first Scorpene submarine to India

Indian shipbuilder Mazagon Dockyards Limited has delivered the first Scorpene diesel-electric submarine to the Indian Navy.

Named Kalvari, the submarine is India’s first new-build conventional submarine in 20 years.

Designed by French company Naval Group, the class of six Scorpene submarines is being built by Mazagon Dockyards Limited under a transfer of technology agreement.

Kalvari was handed over to the Indian Navy after she completed all sensors and weapons trials. As part of the tests, the submarine also test-launched her Exocet SM39 anti-ship missile and torpedoes.

INS Kalvari was initially set to be commissioned into the Indian Navy in 2016 but delays in sea trials postponed the boat’s entry into service.

The second Kalvari-class submarine, INS Khanderi, was launched on January 12 this year and is currently conducting trials.

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Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
If you don't have your own domestic defense industry, you will run the risk of running out of munition, spare part during war. This point clearly shown during Yom Kipur war when Israel was close to running out of munition and spare due to attrition. Only the massive airlift by US rescue Israel from defeat.
Because like they day amateur talk abut flashy weapon, strategy but professional talk about logistic.
This guy quote Charles De Gaulle former president and hero of France

India needs to grow its defence industry to grow its global clout
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OCTOBER 2, 2017 7:36 AM
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Does India matter? It seems like a rather silly question. Of course, it does. India is the world’s second most populous country, and it is on track to overtake China as the most populous by 2022. Its economy is either the sixth or third largest, depending on how you measure it. Its economy grew at a rate of 7.1% in 2016 and 8% the year before.

The strength of India’s high-tech industry is well known. In addition to being a major outsourcing business (that is, call centers), India’s IT sector is beginning to engage in real value-added activities, such as telecommunications and cloud computing. Add to this India’s growing capacity in automobiles and pharmaceuticals.

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On paper, India is a major military power. With more than 1.4 million men and women in uniform, it has the world’s second largest military. Its defence budget last year (according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute) was nearly US$56 billion, making it the world’s fifth largest military spender, outspending France, the United Kingdom, and Japan.

India’s military is impressive: more than 4,000 main battle tanks, 4,500 artillery pieces, 800-plus combat aircraft, 47 destroyers and frigates, 13 attack submarines, and even an aircraft carrier. More equipment purchases are in the pipeline, including at least one more carrier, new stealth, warships, nuclear-powered submarines, fifth-generation fighter jets, and a comprehensive missile-defence system.

And lest we forget, India is also a declared nuclear power, with perhaps 100 nuclear weapons. And it is developing a triad of air-, ground-, and sea-based delivery systems. India has already deployed short- and medium-range ballistic missiles, and it is developing a fleet of nuclear-missile submarines.

Great-power goals don’t add up to global clout
India is, like China or Brazil, an aspiring great power. Yet despite its growing economic, technological, and especially military power — and particularly its nuclear capability — India’s global clout is practically nonexistent. Delhi wields nothing close to the far-flung cultural, economic, or political-military weight that Beijing does. Even within southwest Asia and the Indian Ocean region — India’s backyard — it must share regional authority with other rising states, particularly Iran, nuclear Pakistan, and outside powers like the United States.

India has little sway in most international organizations. Despite its size and relative economic power, it holds no permanent seat on the UN Security Council and therefore wields no veto.

Meanwhile, India’s efforts to turn the BRICS group — the world’s most important emerging economies — into a global alliance of industrializing and developing countries have turned out to be a damp squib. The economies of Brazil and Russia have crashed, while China appears to be more intent on going it alone with its Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and One Belt One Road initiatives.

Achilles’ Heel: A weak domestic arms industry
Moreover, India lacks the strong domestic arms industry that is a prerequisite to becoming a great power. No country can aspire to great power status if it must still import most of its weaponry. This is not simply a matter of being less dependent on foreign arms suppliers, which means being vulnerable to embargoes or being cut off from critical military systems. Designing and manufacturing one’s own armaments goes to the very heart of appearing and acting as a great power. In other words, great countries must have great arms industries.

And yet India has failed repeatedly to become self-sufficient in armaments. Few countries have invested more time, effort, and capital in their defence industries and yet achieved so little by way of self-reliance and high-quality weapons. Despite more than a half-century of struggle and reform efforts, the history of India’s arms industry is a nearly unbroken story of ambitious overreach and spectacular failures.

India’s domestic Tejas fighter jet was in development for more than 25 years before it entered service. Most of the country’s missile programs have failed to get out of their R&D phase. Even something as simple as an assault rifle has baffled the Indian arms industry: the country’s homegrown INSAS (Indian new small arms system) rifle cost three times as much as an imported AK-47, and it consistently malfunctioned in extreme cold or rugged conditions (and therefore could not be used by troops in the Siachen glacier region of the Himalayas).

India relies on imported military systems
India does produce most of its own armaments, but the majority of these are still predominantly licensed versions of foreign weapons systems: Russia’s Su-30MKI combat aircraft and T-90 tank, the Franco/Spanish Scorpène submarine, etc. In fact, the Indian military remains as dependent as ever on foreign systems and technologies. Despite several pronouncements made since the mid-1990s that India would greatly increase the “local content” of weaponry in its armed forces, the current level of imported systems remains about 70%.

In short, while the rest of India appears to be racing into the 21st century, powered by a dynamic, free-market-oriented economy, the defence sector seems mired in the country’s Nehruvian socialist and protectionist past. And this, more than anything, is holding back India’s emergence as a regional — and even potentially a global — great power that has a voice worth listening to and which wields subsequent influence.

It used to be said of Brazil that it was “the country of the future and it always will be.” This snide but depressingly true observation could be equally applied to India’s ambitions for its role in the world. Few countries besides India have put more time and effort into their defence efforts and have gotten so little back in return by way of global power and influence. If it truly wants to matter in the world, then it needs to find a better way.
 

Lethe

Captain
This is a rather silly article.

India's defence spending in 2016 was $55bn according to SIPRI. China's closest match for this figure, again according to SIPRI, was back in 2001 at $52bn. Both figures are adjusted for 2015 USD exchange rates and are therefore directly comparable.

Where was China on the world stage in 2001? How competitive were the products of its domestic arms industry?

The difference between China and India is that by 2001 China had laid the foundations for the reality that is flourishing today. India has not managed to achieve this to nearly the same degree, and its future trajectory will therefore be less impressive. The reasons for that failure are many and deserve serious discussion.

But what is not reasonable is to go 'omg India spend so much, where is it on the world stage, why is its arms industry not competitive???' divorced from any appreciation of the relevant contexts.

Also, you have to laugh at someone who condemns India's "socialist, protectionist" policies and extols the virtues of the free market while simultaneously asking the nation to wean itself off imports.
 
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Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
This is a rather silly article.

India's defence spending in 2016 was $55bn according to SIPRI. China's closest match for this figure, again according to SIPRI, was back in 2001 at $52bn. Both figures are adjusted for 2015 USD exchange rates and are therefore directly comparable.

Where was China on the world stage in 2001? How competitive were the products of its domestic arms industry?

The difference between China and India is that by 2001 China had laid the foundations for the future that it is today benefitting from. India has not managed to achieve this to nearly the same degree, and its future trajectory will therefore be less impressive. The reasons for that failure are many and deserve serious discussion.

But what is not reasonable is to go 'omg India spend so much, where is it on the world stage, why is its arms industry not competitive???' divorced from any appreciation of the relevant contexts.

Also, you have to laugh at someone who condemns India's "socialist, protectionist" policies and extols the virtues of the free market while simultaneously asking the nation to wean itself off imports. Like, how is this even supposed to work?

You cannot just compare the amount of money spent on military to draw the conclusion that eventually India will reach China's stages. It also beg the question why Indian GDP is so low when they start from the same staring point . Infact Indian has all the advantages compare to China . India is spared the ravages of WWII, Has good infrastructure,

China is forced to rely on itself by hook and crook because she is under technical embargo still is until today
That is important difference between the 2

It is just like a rich kid who inherit ton of money from their parent , They are under no pressure to take the initiative and be independent
On the other hand the poor kid they have but no choice to get ahead by themselves.It give them motivation and drive and with each success it bred more success

So even though they expend the same amount of money But the Chinese invest in basic industry, research establishment,university, etc
On the other hand the Indian just go and buy weapon from Russia and the west.

So just comparing expenditure has no bearing as to the future course of defense industry . It is the quality of the expenditure that count.

On the subject of private involvement even China now recognize the flaw in the soviet model and they now talk about Civil Military integration meaning they are opening the defense sector to more private company involvement and the result is spectacular. Read Henri K take on the wingloon II record speed from first flight to client delivery.

Indian defense research are all done by State company where initiative, good result and achievement is not rewarded. Instead they get salary whether they performed or not ! We see the consequence of this policy I don't have to said it. That is what he meant

You neo liberal idea that all people are created equal has no place in real world . It is noble aspiration but flaw. I though it was proven by a book call Bell curve long time ago.
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Lethe

Captain
You cannot just compare the amount of money spent on military to draw the conclusion that eventually India will reach China's stages

That isn't what I was said. In fact, I explicitly said that wasn't the case -- that India's future trajectory will not match China's. My point is that China is the gold standard, the best that India could reasonably be asked to achieve. And more specifically it is China of 2001 that is the relevant basis for comparison, when its military expenditure was comparable to India's today.

And in fact China in 2001 had a rather modest presence on the global stage, and its defence manufactures were far from competitive. Indeed, its most formidable assets were *gasp* foreign imports (Su-27/30s, 956A, S300). And if this was true of China, why would anyone expect India to do better as the author of the piece seems to expect?

China is forced to rely on itself by hook and crook because she is under technical embargo still is until today
That is important difference between the 2

You and I both know the history of the development of China's military-industrial complex is more complicated than "we did it all ourselves because we had to". Nonetheless, it is true that India's access to the world market is as much a curse as it is a blessing. It would be more accurate to say that it is a temptation for short-sighted decision-makers and narrow interests -- a temptation that India has, alas, succumbed to repeatedly.
 
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Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
Another day another accident I don't know seem like they are plague by accidents
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India’s only nuclear submarine damaged in accident
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3 October, 2017

Submarine-696x440.jpg

INS Chakra | Source: Indian Navy
Taken on a 10-year lease from Russia, INS Chakra is currently berthed at Vizag; will sail after repairs

New Delhi: India’s nuclear-powered submarine, INS Chakra, has suffered “some damage” in an accident and could require substantial repair work to get it back in shape.

The attack submarine, obtained on a 10-year lease from Russia, has not sailed for a month and is berthed at its home port of Visakhapatnam for repairs.

Sources told ThePrint that the submarine — currently India’s only operational nuclear-powered vessel — suffered damage to its sonar dome in the accident. The sonar dome is located at the forward portion of the submarine, beneath the torpedo tubes.

While details of the incident are yet to emerge, sources said that the damage could be the result of either a collision at sea or accidental scraping while entering the harbour. The Indian Navy refused to comment on the incident.

Repair work on the submarine is likely to be complicated given that the sonar dome is made of titanium, a difficult metal that requires both specialised machinery and manpower to work on. However, the indigenous Arihant nuclear armed submarines are also being made in Visakhapatnam and that could help.

The Visakhapatnam harbour has recorded incidents in the past when warships have touched the bottom while navigating the tight water channel. In January 2014, the INS Airavat — a Shardul class amphibious warship — suffered damage to its port propeller while entering the harbour.

Inducted in April 2012, INS Chakra is a modernised Russian Akula-II class submarine, known as one of the stealthiest in the world after American vessels of similar class. While the submarine is nuclear powered, it does not carry nuclear-tipped missiles on board and is designed to be a silent killer — it lurks underwater to sink enemy ships and take out land-based targets.

The stealthy nature of nuclear-powered boats, along with the increasing traffic at sea, has meant that accidents have become common. At least two such accidents had taken place last year itself. In July 2016, a British nuclear attack submarine, HMS Ambush, collided with a merchant vessel off the coast of Gibraltar suffering external damage. A month later, the USS Louisiana nuclear missile submarine collided with a naval support vessel at sea, suffering damage to its starboard hull.

The story behind the Chakra
Taken on a 10-year lease in 2012, the Chakra has a displacement of 12,000 tonnes. It is powered by a 190 MW reactor and can reach speeds of over 30 knots. The vessel is manned by 80 crew members and is equipped with tactical missiles, a new fire control systems, sonars and contemporary optronic periscopes and surveillance systems.

Originally named the Nerpa, the submarine was launched in 1991 but was mothballed after the collapse of the Soviet Union. India later took it on a 10-year lease for close to $1 billion.

India is now moving ahead with its plans to lease another nuclear attack submarine from its old ally Russia for an estimated $2.5 billion that will include the refit of the boat at a Cold War era shipyard, followed by a 10-year deployment with the Navy. The new ship is likely to be inducted after the completion of the lease period of Chakra.
 

schenkus

Junior Member
Registered Member
India’s only nuclear submarine damaged in accident
...
Sources told ThePrint that the submarine — currently India’s only operational nuclear-powered vessel — ...

I thought the Arihant has entered operation - or has something happened ?
 
If you don't have your own domestic defense industry, you will run the risk of running out of munition, spare part during war. This point clearly shown during Yom Kipur war when Israel was close to running out of munition and spare due to attrition. Only the massive airlift by US rescue Israel from defeat.
Because like they day amateur talk abut flashy weapon, strategy but professional talk about logistic.
This guy quote Charles De Gaulle former president and hero of France

India needs to grow its defence industry to grow its global clout
By
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OCTOBER 2, 2017 7:36 AM
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This article is just using a broad statement of fact about India's defense industry to push some equally broad and unsupported political biases including China threat and blaming "socialism" for everything that doesn't work.

It should take into account the grooming of entire private industries as well as individual companies based on the very socialist practice of government support in many forms before those private industries and companies reach a stage where they have something to contribute. And the very capitalist practice of the international arms trade facilitates plenty of corruption which increases the likelihood of compromising national interests.
 
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