REPORT: India Finally Stands Up To Russia’s After-sales Whims

A report by friend and colleague Vishal Thapar in the latest edition of SP’s Aviation©.

10 thoughts on “REPORT: India Finally Stands Up To Russia’s After-sales Whims”

  1. You can't trust anybody. That's why we have need to develop our own technology; on a war-footing (pun intended).

  2. We are mistaking Russia for USSR. Russia is taking the advantage of our nostalgia for Indo Soviet relations. Russia is today a country run by oligarchs and mafias. You only have to look at all Indo Russian arms deals to know that Russia cannot be trusted anymore.
    No sign of delivery of Nerpa, even though we have paid billions. It's delivery is being deferred under one pretext or another.
    Ditto same story with delivery of M17 choppers.
    Groshkov is a junked missile cruiser cum helicopter carrier, which they sold us as an "Aircraft Carrier" for 2.3 billion$s with connivance from our own corrupt defense personnel. No sign of delivery of this very old boat which was supposed to join IN in 2008.
    Several of the advanced missiles bought from Russia have proved to be duds to performing far lesser than their stated capabilities.
    MTA and FGFA projects have also not progressed due to lack of trust and reluctance on part of the Russians to part with key technologies.
    Hence we need to look for new allies and stop the practice of keeping all our eggs in one basket.

    We can use the MMRCA for building new strategic relationships.
    We can split the order between USA and France. We should award the contract to only those countries who will help us in developing not only state of the art combat aircrafts but also share technologies pertaining to nuclear submarines and missiles. France has advanced capabilities in these areas and they will be more willing to share such technologies with India than other countries in the MMRCA competition.
    USA has already mentioned that MMRCA will determine India's strategic relationship with USA. Hence, giving a part of the contract to USA, will ensure that India gains access to technologies not available for a price. We also need to be one of the partners for F35 programme. This will help India gain access to critical 5th gen fighter technologies.
    Russia will start respecting India, just like it respects China. Russia was earlier willing to part with critical technologies, not because of our past good relations with that country, but due to their desperate need for cash. Now due to rising crude prices, they are economically quite stable and hence they are showing their true colors. When they see that India has also come out of the shadows of USSR, they will have a healthy respect for India and stop taking us for granted. Our biggest obstacle is our own low quality and extremely corrupt babus, netas and sipahis who can be literally be bought for a song.

  3. China also operates Russian fleet in large Nos. We should follow the chinese example,,, Though it is unclear to me

  4. Its time for India to STOP buying military hardware from Russia. There should be no hesitation to name it for what it truly is; Inferior to American and French technology. Sure, they have the basics right, but when it comes to advanced and reliable systems, the Russians are far behind. Russian arms are at best good for conflicts in Africa, the Middle East and banana republics, not for a sovereign, democratic, culturally rich and ancient and an emerging super-power like India. There is only one path for India to take and that is it OWN PATH, forging one where there isn't. That is the only way, we can ensure that India will be beholden to no-one and that we get the respect from the rest of the World! More importantly, the guarantee that we will dictate the pace of our own development. Thanks but no thanks, Russia. It was good while it lasted. Time to sign the divorce papers.
    Jai Hind!

  5. No body will help , I don't understand what is this hang over of asking other countries to save our souls. Can we put private entrepreneurial defense infrastructure fund start ups , encourage people to take up. It an area as big as telecom waiting to be worked on.

    TOT is a joke , foreign players also know the TOT happens to gov't babus who would'nt be able to put it to use to cause any significant threat in next sales cycle.

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