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Monday, March 13, 2017
Updates On Pakistan's Air-Defence Artillery Force Modernisation Efforts
178 comments:
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ARPIT KANODIA: The above will answer several of your queries. Lap it up!
- March 13, 2017 at 2:02 AM
- Ravi said...
Another great article, Prasun, many thanks.
AFAIK, they got 6 x TPS-63s decades ago. SO what happened to 2 of them? Used for parts?
And they have only now got rid of the 89/100 radars?
- March 13, 2017 at 2:26 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To DAILY OBSERVER: 1) That was the case even when BrahMos-1's 300km-range variant was available. 1) Annual production rate isn't more than 16 but efforts are being made to increase it through outsourcing of completed sub-assemblies from the private-sector, because the BrahMos Integration Complex in Hyderabad has order backlogs right up to the year 2026. 2) The ideal number ought to be at least 500 for the Army, 300 for the IAF & 150 for the IN. 3) Because Russia won't sell the IPR. And there's no need to, for as long as end-users like the IAF don't keep on changing the goalposts (i.e. ASQRs). 4 & 5) Theoretically it can be done, but practically, it won't be possible unless & until there's a firm irrevocable commitment from the MoD to procure at least another 150 Tejas Mk.2s. Only this will create sufficient economies of scale for the private-sector to enthusiastically participate in the venture & this could well also lead to the establishment of a 2nd final-assembly line. 6) We don't need 42 squadrons, since standoff PGMs like BrahMos-1 & Nirbhay LACM can easily target & attack static installations like transportation nodes. Consequently, such weapons will themselves act as deep interdictors in the opening hours of any AirLand campaign. The IAF should increase its squadron-level aircraft assets from the existing 18 to 24 MRCAs per squadron.
To DUSHYANT HARDAHA & SHANTANU KUMAR: Several names are doing the rounds, like Suresh Prabhu.
To ANIK: Before TAPAS enters service, the Rustom-1 should. DRDO had promised that the Rustom-1 would enter service by late 2013, but this hasn't happened as yet. Turbofan-powered Tapas will be both unarmed UAS & armed UCAV, as per the DRDO's plans. Ghatak is the new name for the AURA UCAV.
To RAD: Why should Russia stop supplying the engines? I don't see any reason why Russia would even dream of taking such a step.
To SAM: 1) The Barak-8 now has 85km effective engagement range. 2) That will be possible when the Barak-8LR variant becomes available. 3) What for? 4) It's the Barak-8LR with an extra expendable booster.
- March 13, 2017 at 2:35 AM
- Sethz said...
Prasun, now that Parrikar is headed back to Goa, who do you thibnk would step in to fill in as his replacement ?
- March 13, 2017 at 4:14 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SETHZ: Could well be Suresh Prabhu. The MoD definitely needs someone who can fathom the deep-rooted systemic deficiencies & consequently can root out the administrative dysfunctionalities.
- March 13, 2017 at 5:17 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
Meanwhile, some interesting revelations in bits & pieces are coming out from Pakistan WRT the on-going internal turmoil on the issue of that country's blasphemy laws. There are 2 lines-of-thought circulating about this. First, given that next year there will be general elections there, the ruling PML-N wants to stay in the good books of the religious orthodoxy despite the on-going counter-extremist campaigns being waged by the PA & civilian & paramilitary forces & it is for this reason that it has conjured up this anti-blasphemy campaign with the help of the Maulana tucked away within Islamabad's Laal Masjid (a self-declared supporter of ISIS) & this Maulana has filed a case against some of those bloggers who went missing last January (it has now come out that they were abducted by the country's Federal Investigation Agency). One of those since-released bloggers is a Dutch citizen of Pakistani origin & this is what he now says:
It is not so difficult to make sense of what the PML-N wants to exploit, if one reads this:
The 2nd theory doing the rounds is that it is China, & not the PML-N, that is pressurising Pakistan to ban all social media & adopt the Chinese practice of erecting an electronic firewall that will insulate Pakistan from the rest of the world--identical to what China has done. This is very much possible if we are to accept that several tens of thousands of Chinese citizens will likely be based within Pakistan for several years WRT implementation of various CPEC-related projects.
Interestingly, Pakistan's ISI, IB & FIA are themselves known to collectively operate around 17,000 fake social media accounts/sites.
- March 13, 2017 at 5:46 AM
Hi prasun,
Regarding kalvari class sub , at Wikipedia it mentions the last 2 subs will be fitted with DRDO aip is it true? Since there was a news that it is still under development.if so is it technically equivalent to the ones of foreign ones
- March 13, 2017 at 6:36 AM
- Kaustav said...
The Goa poll results was the best that could be expected. All the maneuverings by the RSS and the formerly BJP allied parties they supported ensured that dear old Manohara Patrikar is back in Goa where all concerned including MP himself shall be the happiest and most effective. Good Ridance, what say Prasunda.
Hope we now get a tighter lipped Defence Minister who just might implement something more. While MP was better than Antony, the BJP could certainly find a better Defence Minister
- March 13, 2017 at 7:20 AM
Excellent detailed post, as usual.
what are the exact number of Launchers ?? You did mention 3 regiments of each........that is what 18x3 = 54 Launcher Vehicles each ??? or have I got this wrong....
Guess - we'll have to bump up from that miserably low rate of 16 Brahmos p.a. (a year's production would go up in seconds in any air-land battle !!) plus get additional PGM's ?? and all the EW equipment we can put on the Jaguars (and we really do need to re-engine them)...........
- March 13, 2017 at 8:02 AM
- Sanjeev said...
What are the Indian equivalents for FM-90, LY-80E and FN-16 respectively? And how do they compare?
- March 13, 2017 at 9:35 AM
Hi PS! Great article as usual.
I got few questions this time:
> Just as Layman's question:
US's Minutemen-3 missile weights around 36,000 kg while having range of 13,000KM.
While Agni-5 do have range of 5,500-8000KM still it weights 50,000KG.
So in what field we are lacking that our missile weights so much?
>How good/bad is Agni-5 compared to it's Chinese counter-part?
>If you look at Minuteman-3's missile launch video and Agni-5's missile launch video,you will notice that MM-3 does have higher Initial speed then A-5.Why so?
>I know you will be annoyed with little repeat of my question,but last time I asked only half question.Here another half: Which Engine is applied in Nirbhay and which company manufactures it?
>How much will you rate Astra BVRM with other BVRMs out of 10?
>Recently there is the news that Burmese Army crossed the border in Manipur and looted a mill.Sir what is happening in our neighborhood. SL is killing our fisherman. BD has home base for fake currency.Nepal is turning into whole anti-India.Their Media and politicians are spewing venom against us 24x7.
>Sir according to you, how can we eliminate Maoist problem?
Thanks in Advance....Happy HOli.
- March 13, 2017 at 12:28 PM
Prasun Da
1)Someone told me that because of its limited range armed forces are reluctant to Take in Rustum1. Is it correct.
2) T72Ajeya will start retiring probably in the late next decade. Which one Arjun mk2 or FRCV will Replace T72s.Is there some work going on FMBT (FRCV) or is it just a concept. According to the requirements given by IA on FRCV they want a Russian light weight tank with western capabilities. Do you think FRCV will become a reality it will it be cancelled???
3) will army order more than 116 Arjun mk2 tanks.
4) Pakistan is continuously increasing its air defence capabilities. Do you think they can match indian networked Radar Capabilities.
5) AFnet of Air Force Uses CISCO Reuters and recent reports by WikiLeaks says that all the CISCO Reuters have been infected by spyware of CIA...Do you think our AFnet is safe??
6)And what about Ghatak UCAV. Do we have the capability to make such advance systems. In an interview with FORCE magazine DRDO chairman said that they are making a full scale model of Ghatak. Do you think the design has been freezed and will it fly by 2025??
6) When on Facebook if you open a page of indian news agency (eg: TOI) you find a lot of fake accounts mostly operated from UAE or Pakistan and when you open a page of Pakistani news agency like Express Tribune you find a lot of fake accounts with indian names....What is this going around on Social media...If these accounts are really operated by ISI then how do they benefit by just commenting on indian pages..Are these cheap tricks by news agencies to attract more and more people.
- March 13, 2017 at 12:54 PM
HAPPY �� HOLI PRASUN DA,Can IAF crush Pakistani SAM batteries just like the Israeli air force dostroyed Syrian SAM systems in Beka valley operations in 1984. VINOD KUMAR
- March 13, 2017 at 1:44 PM
- Mayur Sukhadiya said...
Another great article, Prasun, many thanks.
AFAIK, they got 6 x TPS-63s decades ago. SO what happened to 2 of them? Used for parts?
And they have only now got rid of the 89/100 radars?
- March 13, 2017 at 2:03 PM
Sir is this true?
i read your previous article stating that the new arjun MK1A will be going to the army.
What is the difference between Arjun MK1A and Arjun Mk2?
Has drdo started working on the MK2 version yet?
- March 13, 2017 at 2:13 PM
- aniz said...
Hi prasun da,
Awesome post from you as usual, completely off topic when the crude prices were down world wide how come in India the prices were going up or remained stagnant ?
How do u rate namo governance ? Has there been any growth apart from rising inflation, not in terms of growth report but from the view of a common man like food price , schemes any thing which u have felt changed either good /bad for common Mann
Just want to clarify please iam do like modiji and don't need belligerent and bigoted Bhakts jumping on me , would kindly request prasun da to answer in his usual flair .One Thing i have noticed is that since bop came into power apart from some slight communal flare up mostly there is a sense of vigour and nationalistic pride in our younger generation , it's very heartening to see it but it's getting too overboard .
Looking forward to hear from the all seeing and all knowing embodiment of information, count me as one of your bhakts tongue in cheek ha lol
- March 13, 2017 at 2:16 PM
Dear Prasun,
Paki-Turks-Chinese is the next deadly combination slowly and steadily coming up challenging
India, Russia, Euro & US.
Next decade this trio will be more deadlier and India will be the final target. Is India already predicted this monster and ready to challenge them.
Already Turks & Paki start sharing their defense technologies.
Please share your thoughts.
S.Senthil Kumar
- March 13, 2017 at 4:48 PM
Prasun da,
How come Iran make such a sophisticated tank.
According to Mr. Shiv Aroor, Arjun Mk2 (or Mk1A) will soon be rejected by Indian Army on the ground of overweight "https://www.livefistdefence.com/2017/03/big-new-hurdle-for-indias-arjun-battle-tank.html". This news is totally opposite to what you have posted in your last blog.
- March 13, 2017 at 6:02 PM
- Arpit Kanodia said...
Your view on this
Here is original article
""""What's more, the relationships I forged with members of Obama's campaign team also led to closer cooperation between Pakistan and the United States in fighting terrorism over the 31/2 years I served as ambassador. These connections eventually enabled the United States to discover and eliminate bin Laden without depending on Pakistan's intelligence service or military, which were suspected of sympathy toward Islamist militants. Friends I made from the Obama campaign were able to ask, three years later, as National Security Council officials, for help in stationing U.S. Special Operations and intelligence personnel on the ground in Pakistan. I brought the request directly to Pakistan's civilian leaders, who approved. Although the United States kept us officially out of the loop about the operation, these locally stationed Americans proved invaluable when Obama decided to send in Navy SEAL Team 6 without notifying Pakistan.
In November 2011, I was forced to resign as ambassador after Pakistan's military-intelligence apparatus gained the upper hand in the country's perennial power struggle. Among the security establishment's grievances against me was the charge that I had facilitated the presence of large numbers of CIA operatives who helped track down bin Laden without the knowledge of Pakistan's army — even though I had acted under the authorization of Pakistan's elected civilian leaders.""""
- March 13, 2017 at 7:54 PM
- Ved said...
Dear Prasun,
What capital acquisitions can we expect in FY 2017-18?
- March 13, 2017 at 8:32 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To CHIRAG: There have been scores of statements made by both the previous & present-day IN CNS that clearly state that the 6 Scorpene SSKs won't have any AIP plug-ins. All this was repeated again by the IN when the Kalvari SSK was launched at MDL. Despite all these, I fail to understand why you are hell-bent on assuming that Wikipedia is the world's sole custodian of all the gospel truths.
To SENTHIL KUMAR: LoLz! Exactly what's the quantum of Made-in-Turkey weapons purchased by Pakistan so far? Most weapons developed by Turkish industry contain US-origin components & sub-systems & are therefore barred from export to Pakistan.
To MAYUR SUKHADIA: They tried to mounted those 2 radars on aerostats & after everything initially went well, both were heavily damaged beyond repair due to strong wind-gusts & bad weather, i.e. the aerostats got separated from their ground-based tethers & drifted away & collided against mountain ranges.
- March 13, 2017 at 8:44 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ANKIT SINGH & SIDDHARTH: LoLz! That is exactly what happens when a moron starts publishing OLD NEWS as new. You will recall that 3 threads ago, this is what I has posted:
This should be interesting: International Seminar on Armoured Fighting Vehicles Enabling Tech 2027 on March 02, 2017, FICCI, Federation House, Tansen Marg, New Delhi
Now, for those who attended this seminar, everything would have become crystal-clear. The IA's DG-MF himself stated most of what I had subsequently written about the definitive Arjun Mk.2 & the involvement of various private-sector & public-sector OEMs. Now, if the 'desi' journalists either don't attend such seminars or don't talk to the concerned officials during the customary tea-breaks & instead proceed to gobble up all the free snacks & refreshments, then who is to be blamed for spreading falsehoods???
Furthermore, during both DEFEXPO 2016 & at Aero India 2017, BEML confirmed that the Arjun BLT & Arjun ARRV will be procured & their definitive scale-model designs were displayed. Thirdly, in the Fenruary 2017 issue of FORCE, Dr S Christopher himself had stated on-the-record that a 7- or 8-tonne weight reduction of Arjun Mk.1A is very much possible from a technological & engineering standpoint. And that's where HNS & 3-D digitised engineering drawings come into play. Lastly, for those who bother to read GoI gazettes, it is clearly written there that the IA is committed to no less than 6 Regiments of Arjun MBTs--2 of Arjun Mk.1, 2 of Arjun Mk.1A & 2 of Arjun Mk.2.
So, after reading all of the above clarifications, who & what do you want to believe?
- March 13, 2017 at 8:48 PM
It is just absurd to have a minister and a ministry for Railways in India. Railways should be part of infrastructure, industry and development. This is just a ministry created by Nehruvian govt to milk the money. No benefit has been achieved by having a separate ministry. Every railway minister only promotes railways in his or her states, most notably Mamata Didi. In fact the railway does not make any profit in Eastern sector and the most affected by this "partisan" views taken Didi, are the North Eastern States. One Railway ministry person said that hardly 50% of people in Bengal purchase the tickets; whereas in Southern states like Kerala has 98% of people purchase tickets, but Railways allot the most used, depleted trains Kerala.
So it was a very good decision when this Modi government included Railway budget with Main budget. So it is high time to discard "Railway ministry."
I feel that Suresh Prabhu could be a potential Defense Minister. But I am not sure whether he is qualified (would be far better than AKA), and well versed with talking in foreign dignities.
- March 13, 2017 at 8:57 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SIDDHARTH: LoLz! That's not indigenous by any stretch of imagination. It is NORINCO's VT-4 MBT with a customised ERA package on the frontal hull & turret sections. The dead-giveaway is the gunner's sight design on the left-helf of the turret.
- March 13, 2017 at 9:01 PM
Prasun sir,
The press says they order 3 regiments - around 2012 (for ~240 mil ) & 6 regiments in 2014 (~ 350 mil). Basically 1 regiment per CORPS.
How do all these affect the IAF dominance strategy over Pak land?
- March 13, 2017 at 9:21 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To AMIT: What & which press? The ones ordered in 2012 were FM-90s. The ones ordered in 2015 were LY-80Es. I have seen the final contractual documents of both contracts. These MR-SAMs will be used for protecting only the static nuclear WMD storage/launch sites in central Punjab, northern Sindh & the Deosai Plains. The camouflage pattern shown on TV for the LY-80E clearly reveals that that particular Battery will be deployed in the Cholistan/northern Sindh areas to protect the nuclear WMD storage/launch site adjacent to PAF Masroor. The IAF is already well on its way to procure the SAAW DEW to neutralise such SAM networks.
To RAVI_N: Suresh Prabhu is far more articulate & choerent/cogent in his verbal interactions.
To KAUSTAV: I totally agree. It is one thing to say something substantial that makes sense to everyone while it is another to blurt out soundbytes that are either premature or are meaningless, like the statement he had made about Su-30MKI being good enough to make good the shortfalls in IAF's deep-interdiction capability.
To RAMAN: VMT. The deployment patterns of LY-80E are clearly shown in the slides above.
To VINOD KUMAR: The DEW called SAAW will effectively render the LY-80Es useless.
- March 13, 2017 at 10:28 PM
The Paki WMD storage sites are quite large and appear to be capable of storing 100's of warheads, going by satellite image analysis done by @rajfortyseven.
1) If true, how can there be just 12 warheads ? A shell game ?
2) Agree that Pak has no reprocessing capacity. What about their HEU (Uranium) based weapons ?After all, France in the 60's had a 700 kg boosted fission HEU based warhead
- March 13, 2017 at 11:01 PM
Hi Prasun,
In the recent attack on a Military hospital in Afghanistan, many people, around 100 killed in this gruesome attack. Attacking the hospital is a cowardice act. IS claimed the responsibility. But this article says, "People were talking Pashtu and talking with some Mullah handler, untouched the floor having Taliban fighters."
I firmly believe that this was supported by ISI. But there is no proof. Whether it was IS or Taliban, what could be the reason for this attack on hospitals?
- March 13, 2017 at 11:12 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SANJEEV: For VSHORADS India already has Igla-M & Igla-S, against Pakistan's Mistral, QW-1 & QW-2. For SHORADS India has SpyDer-SR & in future the QR-SAM while Pakistan has the late 1980s vintage FM-90. In the MR-SAM arena, India has Akash-1 while Pakistan has LY-80E. In the LR-SAM arena, India has Barak-8 while Pakistan has zilch.
To ASMIT S: Agni-5 has several sub-structures built of maraging steel that are now being replaced by lighter composites-based materials. In addition, higher energetic propellants will be used. China's DF-31A is fully land-mobile & cannisterised * was developed in the 1990s with crucial Ukrainian R & D inputs & it is therefore a mature system, whereas the Agni-5 is still evolving towards maturity. For the first 5 launches of Nirbhay, Russia provided 5 38-01E turbofans off-the-shelf while concurrently it supplied design/production data of this engine to HAL & ADE & ADE in turn contracted Intech DMLS Ltd to produce this very turbofan with slight re-engineering under the designation SJE-350. Astra-1 BVRAAM uses the very same active RF seeker as that on the R-77. As for border skirmishes, effective border dominance is the only answer. The SLN using firepower to prevent Indian fishermen from violating SL's territorial waters is unpardonable & legally indefensible & India has to take a tough stand on this issue. It's no use blaming Bangladesh for FICN trafficking when there are thousands of Indian facilitarors all along the border in both WB & Assam. If Bangladesh was indeed involved in such activities, then why aren't similar activities taking place in Tripura, Meghalaya or Mizoram? WRT Nepal I had already explained earlier where the problem lies & how to resolve it.
To ANKIT SINGH: Didn't you read the prtevious thread? Wasn't it mentioned there that the Arjun Mk.1 & Arjun Mk.1A use imported RHA for building the hull & turret whereas the Arjun Mk.2 will use locally produced HNS? There's minimal re-designing reqd for Arjun Mk2 & 90% of the design will be the same as that of Arjun Mk.1A. Only the frontal hull & turret sections will use thinner HNS-built sub-structures because those sections are already very well-protected by ERA panels & IR countermeasures optronics. This in turn will further reduce weight. And all redesigning & re-engineering will be done digitally using Dassault Systemes' CATIA software that will tremendously cut down the time reqd for finalising the design & this will also lead to tremendous cost & time savings during the metal-cutting/machining phases. Due to all this being achieved in less than a year, the definitive Arjun Mlk.2 prototype will emerge within a year's time & its power-to-weight ratio ^ ground pressure parameters will be moderately superior to those of Arjun Mk.1A.
- March 14, 2017 at 12:33 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ANIK: 1) Totally untrue. Rustom-1 is a tactical UAV & therefore it can't be used as MALE-UAV & no one has ever demanded that the Rustom-1 be transformed into a MALE-UAV. 2) FRCV is a long way away, at least another 2 decades. In this period there's no other option but to acquire more Arjun Mk.2 MBTs. As clearly mentioned in the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence's latest report for the very first time—and something which I had been explaining since 2012 itself—the problem was NEVER the Arjun MBT's mobility i.e. there were never any performance deficiencies of the MBT. The deficiencies have always been the sub-optimal road infrastruc ture in the border areas, i.e. MLC-50 load-bearing standard bridges & culverts that the state govts had not upgraded to MLC-70 standard. Hence, if anyone is to be blamed, it should be the state govts that share borders with Pakistan, who have been very late in implementing such infrastructure development schemes throughout the external lines of roadways & railways. 3) So far Only 124 Arjun Mk.1s, 118 Arjun Mk1As & 118 Arjun Mk.2s have been contracted for. That's precisely why the DMRL developed HNS to replace RHA as the building material for hulls & turrets & that's why the DMRL has transferred its metallurgical expertise on HNS to Jindal Steel for bulk production of HNS. Had there been no reqmt for Arjun Mk.2, then all this industrial activity involving DMRL & Jindal Steel wouldn't have transpired. 4) Pakistan has an elongated but narrow geography that can never be overcome through any form of systems networking, especially in an era when the IA & IAF are acquiring supersonic standoff NLOS-BSMs like BrahMos-1 & SEAD/DEAD weapons like DEW-based SAAW & hittile NG-ARMs. 5) Those CISCO routers that are compromised concern only cloud-computing serves for the internet, & not the standalone servers used in AFNet. 6) Dr Christopher in that same interview also said that the DRDO wants to joint forces with Dassault Aviation so that it could benefit from the latter's Neuron UCAV project. Consequently, it can be inferred that the Ghatak is still in the conceptual design stage & nowhere near the detailed-design stage. 6) LoLz! Such fake accounts can easily be used for spreading rumours like the ones witnessed some years ago when fake news about northeastern students being targetted for violence in Bengaluru went viral. Similarly, such sites are often used to spread falsehoods on a mass scale WRT J & K.
- March 14, 2017 at 12:34 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ANIZ: VMT. That's because the final refined end-products have always been & are being subjected to various types of indirect taxes by both central & state govts & they constitute a fair bit of the revenues earned by the Union Ministry of Finance. As for governance parameters, unless foundational systemic changes are effected, there won't be any radical visible changes at the grassroots-level. For instance, the GST Bill should have been passed & ratified in 2013 itself but it could not be done due to vindictive politicking being practiced by all concerned political parties. Similarly, an over-arching law like that in the US that enables the Centre to take over land ownership whenever reqd from state governments in the supreme interests of national security should have been passed. The law on retroactive taxation should have been abolished. And WRT communal or caste-based flare-ups, this is where any PM is expected to Prime Ministerial, i.e. be a true leader & explain to his/her citizens how exactly the social contract between the executive branch of any central/state govt functions & how consequently, freedom & rights go hand-in-hand with responsibilities/obligations. To the best of my knowledge, no one Indian PM since independence has ever spelt out all these with clarity in any public forum. Instead, only sloganeering & cheap compromises have been resorted to since 1947. And so from dalit springs the Maha Dalit & who knows but in the tiome to come more sub-strata like Uttam Dalit, Param Dalit, Sarvottam Dalit may well spring up! All this needlessly further distort & fracture the social fabric. Above all, the existing mindsets require a drastic transformation. One needs to do away with terms like left-of-centre, right-of-centre, leftist, ultra-rightist etc etc & instead stay focussed on the objective straight ahead, i.e. devise ways of walking straight instead of meandering about in a roundabout manner & muddling through, just like what Dronacharya had instructed the Pandavas & Kauravas to do when looking at the reflection on the water of the fish overhead & then aiming for the eye of the fish. Drona could easily have pulled rank & said "Do as I say", but instead to set a personal example of logical, common-sensical intellectual compellance, he made each & very one of those 105 Pandavas & Kauravas go through the test by asking each of them "what do you see after taking aim" & only after this did he explain why Arjuna's answer was the right one. That's the essence of true unadulterated leadership. All else, like letting loose one's anger & rage will only end being self-defeatist. So, if one wants to de-pollute & purify a river, then start by stopping to pollute it. Had the Almighty indeed been all-forgiving & a mere 7 dips of a holy river was all that it takes to wash away one's sins, then words like 'Atonement' & divine phrases like "we reap what we sow" would never have existed in any dictionary or any religious text.
- March 14, 2017 at 12:34 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ARPIT KANODIA: He's presenting one-half of the real narrative by using the analogy of OBL & OP Neptune's Spear in order to justify that the achieved ends had justified his means/actions. What he is hiding is that the PPP-led federal govt had committed to abide by the foreign policy-making guidelines as articulated by the PA's GHQ WRT Afghanistan, China, India & the US, i.e. no civilian will be allowed to overrule what the GHQ had specified. Hence, the civilian govt was unable to prevent the US drone strikes talking place with impunity throughout FATA from 2008 till late 2013 because the GHQ had secretly agreed authorise such strikes (as subsequently revealed by Wikileaks). Due to such civil-military power-sharing arrangements, it was IMPOSSIBLE to bypass the GHQ on matters of internal security/domestic intelligence, i.e if there was a request by the US to station its military/paramilitary intelligence operatives inside Pakistan, then it was mandatory for the GHQ & ISI to vet the list of such folks prior to greenlighting their visa approvals. But the PPP did not adhere to this & the trio of Asif Ali Zardari, then Federal Interior Minister Rehman malik (who earlier was an ADG in the FIA) & Dr Hussain Haqqani hatched a plan that called for up to 4,000 US personnel being granted multiple-entry visas for as long as they were identified as members of NGOs & aid agencies. And for reasons of plausible deniability, Rehman Malik had then instructed the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), which was then responsible for real-time monitoring/recording of all arrivals/departures from all international airports in Pakistan, to switch off all the CCTV cameras surveilling the immigration counters at these airports whenever such inbound US personnel used to arrive in groups. When the GHQ & ISI came to know about this, they mounted counter-surveillance operations on folks like Raymond Davies & found out to their horror that all these US personnel were scouting for & obtaining Py-code GPS coordinates for all nuclear WMD-related sites throughout Pakistan. As for OBL, it is now public knowledge that the US got precise data on his whereabouts from a retired PA Brigadier who spilt the beans in exchange for political asylum in the US & a financial compensation package & on further digging, the US discovered that OBL had been living in Abbotabad only since 2009 (as revealed by all the paperwork & other data retrieved from the Abbotabad Compound by the SEAL Team 6 raiding party in May 2011).
- March 14, 2017 at 12:35 AM
Many of the sources in PDF, were saying that these are operational 2-3 years ago? They are reporting morethan 6+ units. they are also reporting the HQ-9 being present too. Your thoughts?
- March 14, 2017 at 12:43 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SATYAKI: Those are not mere standalone N-WMD storage sites, but are the PA's central Ammo depots within which the N-WMD sites are located for added protection. Nor did Pakistan ever develop or produce any HEU-based weapons. It is all detailed here:
To MONKEY: I don't go by baseless rumour-mongering by internet fanboys. Instead, I look out for & obtain irrefutable material evidence. Have any of these fanboys succeeded in laying their hands on the performance parameter slides of the LY-80E & FM-90 that I have uploaded above & which were precisely the slides that were shown in poster-format to the PA's COAS yesterday? The answer to that itself should be enough to prove who's right & who's wrong.
- March 14, 2017 at 1:39 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
After Dr Hussain Haqqani's recent revelations, the entire PPP-led govt of that time along with Dr Haqqani have now been labelled as traitors in India's payroll, according to what's been coming out of Pakistan since yesterday:
And here's more data on Pakistan's immediate water-shortage crisis & never-ending power shortages:
Meanwhile, the issue of blasphemy could well prove to be the final nail on the coffin of Pakistan's foundational ideology that claims to protect & straitjacket the universal brotherhood of Islam within the confines of a fortress called Pakistan. Perhaps it is Allah's will that Pakistan ought to be made a terrible example of. That country's totally fragmented social fabric is now beyond hope & beyond despair to such an extent that any act of blasphemy committed in any other part of the world will send fatal self-destructive shockwaves throughout Pakistan & thus one need not have to rely any more on the use of superior military force/power to inflict a decisive defeat ipon Pakistan. For those who argue that Pakistan is no pushover, in reality Pakistan is now already inclined downward at the edge of a cliff, requiring just a gentle nudge for hurtling down the abyss, as evidenced by this excellent Pakistani analysis:
And in a vain attempt to forge national unity, the security agencies of that country are peddling dis-information.fake news like this:
Lastly, Dr Ayesha Siddiqa's updated book on MILITARY INC is out:
- March 14, 2017 at 5:36 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
Look at this Pakistani train convoy of Al Khalids, Type 85IIAPs & T-80UDs & try to find out from their camouflage patterns where they are likely to be used:
- March 14, 2017 at 5:39 AM
- Rohan said...
Good Morning,
A slightly off topic question but one to which I have never found any answers on various forums
Why is it that despite generally Pro-Soviet leanings of GOI and MOD, did the IA never adopt Soviet type small arms and ammunition calibers (7.62x39 & 5.45x39) as standard, instead going for NATO 7.62x51 & later 5.56x45?
I ask this in context of the current brouhaha concerning the efficacy of the 5.56 round in COIN ops vs the 7.62 AK which is being increasingly fielded and also the upcoming transition back to 7.62x51.
By several (albeit unsubstantiated accounts) the Russian 5.45 round is surprisingly lethal (compared to the 5.56) due to some unique design features such as an air cavity / pocket in the nose cone which helps cavitation. There are also several 5.56 designs claiming increased lethality such as the old Serbian and newer US steel core M855 replacements. Has the IA (in all its infinite wisdom and bluster) ever considered scientifically studying the effectiveness of various ammunition types and launching a development effort with say DRDO towards a more effective / lethal type of locally produced ammo?
Arbitrarily wanting to change the standard caliber of an entire armed force is crazy. We have a million + soldiers and same number (if not more) of paramil and capf all currently using 5.56 INSAS + 7.62 AK as standard arms. The expense involved to change it over to 7.62 NATO with new rifles and magazines (while still retaining 7.62 AK for COIN) will stretch an already overstretched budget. And 10 years later when a new gen of IA brass starts whining about the problems associated with 7.62 NATO (heavy weapon, low ammo capacity, lack of automatic fire control-ability) which had originally caused it to be dropped in the first place then what? Back to 5.56?
The whole process just seems very immature to me.
Your thoughts?
- March 14, 2017 at 8:07 AM
- Sam said...
Sir, thanks for your reply and for the very informative post on the Arjun MBT. I have a few questions on it.
1. What is the new top speed and cruising speed of the Arjun mk2? Is it as good as the leopard in this parameter?
2. Now that the Arjun mk2 programme is progressing well, are we likely to see an SPH based on it that will eventually supplement and one day replace the K9 Vajra?
3. What number of Arjun mk2 will be inducted into the army until the FRCV comes along? (By that I mean above the present order of 2 regiments worth)
And lastly:
4. What will be the remaining service life of the BMP-2s that will soon be upgraded? And will it support the BMS and BSS systems that'll soon be implemented?
- March 14, 2017 at 8:28 AM
I have no idea what was shown or not. On the site they have all sorts of slides. Its just that I read on their site and then did a search, it was mentioned around 5 years ago (2011/12) about the land version of HQ-16 being tested and ordered (LY-80) with some changes needed. I am not here to compare or criticise anyone, just to learn.
- March 14, 2017 at 2:20 PM
- Senthil Kumar said...
Dear Prasun,
Thanks for your Reply.
Now finally PA is pulled inside Middle East chaos. So Sunni-Shia fight will see new dimension in coming days. Hope Iran Paki relation will touch the bottom.
Please share your thoughts.
S.Senthil Kumar
- March 14, 2017 at 4:01 PM
Prasun da,
1) Do you think Armed forces will support HAL's IMRH concept and don't you think the timeframe given by HAL to make the helicopter fly is quite ambitious??
2) Why is prototype development of LCH slow?? When will is be inducted??
3) Is Ka226T project in doldrums?? Do you think LUH will achieve IOC by 2019?
4)Construction of 6 SSNs was cleared by Govt. in 2015? What is the progress made?? Will they be ready by the end of next decade? It was reported that BARC is developing a new pressurised reactor for submarines. Will the power SSNs or the follow on of Arihant?
5) What will you say about the problem in Arihant's reactor.
( http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/ins-arihant-may-be-of-limited-utility/article6709623.ece )
6) Do you think Astra1 will be inducted this year because a test of the missile in December last year failed. I have the doubt on the credibility of the report be cause only one newspaper reported that the missile failed.Was the news correct (http://www.newindianexpress.com/states/odisha/2016/dec/08/astra-goes-up-in-smoke-1546815.html)
7) What is the status of Astra2, QRSAM and NGARM..Can we expect them to be tested anytime soon.
- March 14, 2017 at 4:20 PM
Hi PS
1)China has hundreads of IRBMs spread across the country. Do you think we have enough missiles to counter them.
2)Do you think we can effectively establish complete air superiority over Pakistan in case the war starts. In how much time??
3) Is the Amogh anti tank missile a re engineered Milan or Konkur missile..
4)Is the rumour of India exporting Askash SAM to Vietnam correct??
5)In 2015 Pakistani militants TTP released a vedio showcasing Igla MANPAD and Pakistan media claimed that India has provided them with the missile. Do you think RAW has been supplying Indian weapons to pakistani rebels???
- March 14, 2017 at 4:41 PM
- The Engdoc Society said...
Very very interesting article.and links u posted on Pakistan are very informative
Dada ur analysis on this debate and doubts on EVM tempering. now Mr AK has started complaining about it
- March 14, 2017 at 8:28 PM
- vishakh said...
Can you comment about this Chinese Dam in pakistan breaking down on inauguration..
- March 14, 2017 at 8:55 PM
Really...Do you think we are under constant surveillance.Can DRDO'S NETRA(Network Traffic Analysis) decipher highly encrypted codes of social media networks?
What is NTRO (National Technical Research Organisation)?? Reports from 2007 indicate that RAW and IB is not allowing NTRO to fulfil its duties and there was also a Rs. 450 crore UAV scam linked to NTRO..Is the organisation defunct?? Convert Ops by RAW were shut down by IK Gujral..Do you think we did a mistake..
- March 14, 2017 at 9:20 PM
Sir what are the various DRDO developed Precision Guided Munitions developed by DRDO and what kind of them are in service...I searched for it on Google but cannot find a clear description....
- March 14, 2017 at 10:32 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ANIK: If you go through all the past threads dealing with Aero India & DEFEXPO expos in this blog, you will get the answers.
To AVIRAL: Of course. Why are you surprised. And being under constant surveillance doesn't mean all the gathered meta-data is being analysed. Collection of such data doesn't automatically translate into snooping or violation of privacy for as long as the data is just kept in storage & isn't used for targetting innocent persons. C-DOT or NTRO can & do indeed hack through encryptions, but the high-end hacking is always outsourced by India to US-based agencies like the NSA. A very recent example was the way the ISIS sympathisers were nabbed in MP & UP. It is no coincidence that just 48 hours before the attack on theIndian Railways, the US Embassy in Delhi had already issued a travel advisory for its citizens, meaning that the NSA was monitoring all social-media traffic between ISI-controlled territory & India. The US has already admitted that its largest volumes of collected meta-data originates from Pakistan & India. Similarly, Indian security agencies are able to quickly authenticate the identities of slain Pakistani terrorists inside J & K because the Indian agencies have access to the NSA's capabilities as a result of inter-governmental agreements inked way back in 2009 & the NSA through the PISCES network has real-time access to Pakistan's national registration database (NADRA) as well as all immigration records from all Pakistani CIQ facilities—be it an airport, port or land-based border crossings leading to India, Iran & Afghanistan. It was through PISCES' help that India could zero in on all those Indians who had fled from Pakistan to Saudi Arabia & UAE & get them extradited.deported back to India. NTRO's mandate is not to get involved in domestic surveillance, but only to monitor electronic traffic of all forms emanating from neighbouring countries. It is a strictly defensive outfit & does not possess any offensive cyber warfare capabilities.
To VISHAKH: It wasn't the dam that collapsed, but one of the water-access tunnels. Now watch how the River Sindh too has reached the dead-water level: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ao0L9pzc3qg
To THE ENGDOC SOCIETY: Its very easy to engage in blame-games, but quite impossible to prove such allegations beyond reasonable doubt. Let AK prove that EVM tampering can be done via a live demonstration.
- March 15, 2017 at 2:06 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To McTAVISH: 1) Are you claiming that all of China's IRBMs are targetted only against India? 2) Where's the need for complete air superiority over the entire airspace of Pakistan when what's reqd is only air supremacy over the tactical battle areas & for purposes of tactical air interdiction? 3) It is called MPATGM & was shown in the AI-2017 thread last month. 4) Vietnam already possesses S-300PMU2s. Where's the need for Akash-1? 5) It wasn't Igla, but a captured PA QW-1 of Chinese origin.
To VASSILI: 1) HAL cannot IMRH on its own. It requires a strategic industrial partner from overseas that specialises in developing such helicopters. 2) It should be inducted by next year. Development has been slow because HAL first decided to develop the airframe & then hand it over to the DRDO for weaponisation, just as was the case with Rudra version of ALH. 3) Ka-226T should be rejected by any common-sensical person. LUH's certification should take place by this year's end. 4) The SSN programme hasn't been apprtoved as yet & no funding has therefore been released. BARC has never developed any PWR. It can't because it has been involved only with developing PHWR-related physics. 5) It isn't a problem. Since it is the first-of-type SSBN it will primarily serve as a testbed. 6) Astra-1 should be service-inducted later this year. Astra-2 won't be available for testing until 2020. Data on NG-ARM & QR-SAM has been posted in previous threads.
To SENTHIL KUMAR: LoLz! That's fake news.
To MONKEY: For the record, I was the first in this world to reveal data on the LY-80E here:
Before that, all fanboy retards like headless chicken in both China & Pakistan were only babbling about HQ-9 & HQ-16 & no one even used the designation LY-80E. Even the US DoD after viewing my report began using the LY-80E designation in its annual military report on China & that too since 2015. And till this day the retards haven't realised that the export designation of the HQ-9 is the FD-2000 that has already been exported to Turkmenistan & Uzbekistan but has been rejected by Turkey.
- March 15, 2017 at 2:07 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SAM: 1) Won't we all have to wait for the Arjun Mk.2 to be available for field-trials? Presently, the first prototype is in the fabrication stage. 2) How can it replace the Vajra when the K-9 Vajra hasn't even been ordered? 3) Should be at least 400. 4) After the upgrades, the BMP-2s will be usable for at least another 20 years. They will have BMS terminals.
To ROHAN: When India's domestic small arms production facilities were established in the early 1960s by OFB, they were meant to produce FN Herstal of Belgium's 7.62 SLRs & that's why the OFB's small arms families have always been influenced by Western design trends. 5.56mm SLRs are meant primarily to wound the enemy & consequently increase the enemy's support logistics chain. 7.62mm on the other hand is meant to kill terrorists & insurgents. Economies of scale now dictate that standardisation take place & hence the convergence on 7.62 for usage in both high-intensity war & also in low-intensity conflicts & COIN campaigns.
To BUDDHA: Watch this videoclip that reveals how exactly the Dalai lama was smuggled out of Tibet by a band of CIA-trained 'Buddha's Warriors': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jly4IBCRTDM
Video in Sikkim Scouts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWs37BPYPdA
- March 15, 2017 at 2:09 AM
- Anonymous said...
You said in the last thread regarding Brahmos:
"what was test-fired today was the BrahMos-1 Block-3 which has a certified range of 550km. So any talk of 450km or 800km is pure bullshit. Operators of this missile variant will be the IA (ground-launched) & IAF (both ground-launched & air-launched variants). The earlier BrahMos-1 Blocks-1/2 & BrahMos-A will continue to have a range of only 300km. "
1.) Just curious why variants Blocks 1,2 & Brahmos-A of Brahmos-1 cannot benefit with increased fuel content (like the Brahmos-1 Block-3s do). Don't they have the capability for extra fuel intake?
2.) You mentioned that the air-launched version of Brahmos-1 Block-3 is already certified for 550km range. Are the Su-30 MKIs strengthening tolerant to the increased weight of the missile (due to increase in fuel intake) or is the 2.5 tonnes of expected load on Su-30 MKI include the higher fuel load?
3.) What's the difference between "Brahmos-1 Block-3 air launched" version (which will have 550 km range) and Brahmos-A (which will have a range of 300 kms only)? Thought all Brahmos-A will be of the latest variant, as they're still being tested.
4.) Su-30 MKI being able to deliver a Brahmos with 550 km range would make it really formidable!! Will the Su-30 MKI also carry a Anti-ship variant or just a land attack one?
5.) When the latest/future Navy ships are equipped with Brahmos (for both land attack and anti-ship), will they all still be of 300 km range? Isn't a long ranged (550 km) land attack missile on the ships almost indispensable?
- March 15, 2017 at 2:19 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
Bangladesh Navy Commissioned its 2 China-supplied Type 035 SSKs on March 12, 2017, BNS NABAYTARA (S-161) & BNS JOYJATRA S-162:
- March 15, 2017 at 2:54 AM
- Srinivasa Nanduri said...
Hi Prasun,
I was reading your DEC 2012 blog of yours about Tata SED MGS. Seems like time has stopped for MOD since, as till date they could not decide on which one to procure. Why the delay? Are they trying to plan & make a desi version out of ATAGS?
Also, the comments in that blog spoke of 4 point formula and demarcation of LAC, peace between India, Pakistan & China. Military exchanges between India & China, What changed to stop all this peace related exchanges?
Srinivasa Nanduri
- March 15, 2017 at 6:53 AM
Do you think the HAL/NAL Regional Transport aircraft is screwed?? The last news I accessed was that HAL was looking for an overseas partner...RTA cabin was displayed at Aero India 2011 and similarly HAL displayed IMRH model this year..Don't you think these projects are over ambitious???
- March 15, 2017 at 9:51 AM
- 3rd ~ EyE said...
Certain 'authors' have mentioned that Arjun2's weight reduction process is a calculated move to kill the project. Its in contrast to your last blog post which is optimistic. Cant digest contradictory views. What is your take on it ?
- March 15, 2017 at 10:59 AM
Judging by the camo on tanks and the Physical map of Porkistan, I guess maybe they are headed for/from locations opposite thar desert.
- March 15, 2017 at 4:08 PM
- Senthil Kumar said...
Dear Prasun,
Your personnel estimate of Pakistan Nuclear arsenal is 12 numbers only.
You are justifying that Pakistan don't have Nuclear Fuel reprocessing facility
and all the bombs exploded on 1998 are Chinese supplied Plutonium.
So Chinese will never allow Pakistan to have more bombs.
I have following doubts.
Bhopal Khan is saying, Boosted fission devices using Uranium 235 exploded in 1998.
That means other than plutonium they are using Uranium 235 as explosive for boosted Fission. If that is true without china support, Pakistan must have mastered Nuclear Bomb using only Uranium as fuel. Pakistan has the stolen uranium enrichment technology to do that.
During 1998 I read one article, there is a fight between KRL AQ Khan and PAEC Munir Khan who should take the leadership for explosion. Nawaz & PA cleverly put both the team to jointly explode. AQ Khan's KRL want to take supremacy. So AQ Khan explode nuclear bomb which uses 100% Uranium as fuel. But bad luck it failed. Then Bhopali khan joined Muneer team for Chinese supplied Plutonium explosion.
And PA/ISI is ready to sacrifice anything to balance the WMD equal to India.
And China is going to Supply 8 Submarines with second strike capability to Pakistan navy. So they should possess more bombs to meet the demand.
By considering all this
1. Your estimation may be very very low.
2. May be 12 bombs kept in ready to explode condition.
3. But many Pakistan bombs are kept under Chinese control. (Supply on demand basis)
4. And some dirty bombs made by Pakistan using 100% Uranium in their stocks.
4. Overall Pakistan should have not less than 50 Bombs.
Do you agree? Please comments.
Advance thanks.
S.Senthil Kumar
- March 15, 2017 at 4:48 PM
>There's a recent terrible news incoming that a IAF's Su-30MKI crashed.Why Su-30MKI has seen so many crashes?And what's the solution?
>There's a recent news that DRDO is developed laser-based weapons for BMD system.The news article says: "The new interceptor can travel at the speed of sound and kill incoming missiles in less than one minute. It will have the flexibility to be fired from both airborne and seaborne platforms."What do you think,will it be possible?
>Do you think India should go for more Rafales in future if they(Dassault) are offering us local manufacturing?
>There are many offers we do have for AMCA's engine:Eurojet(EJ200),GE(F414),Safran(M88),NPO(AL-31).What do you think whom should we pick for JV?
>How many nukes do you think Pakis do have?
>How many nukes do we produce(approx.) in one year?
>In earlier thread,you once said that China and India couldn't make anything on it's own cause both the countries don't have R&D lackings.But China is able to make knockoffs of almost every product even in Defence whereas we can't even make a ATGM operational in 20 years.How do you think both the countries are equal?
>Like USSR got Nuke technology by spying on US's program,how did China got Nuke Technology?
>In 2014, Dr.V.K. Sarawat,then DRDO's chief said in IIT-B as following:
"our missiles are heavy because our propellant and material technology not to par. He gives 240 ISP for our propellants vs 260-280 for US/Rus/Eur. But that doesn't reduce capabilities of our missiles and also for the same reason our missiles costs much less. "
We earlier discussed about Material technology's backwardness that why Missile is heavy.What's the case of Propellant?
>As claimed by SOME western analysts,do you think Pakistani missiles are better then Indian?
Thanks in advance.....
- March 15, 2017 at 5:57 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
1st Su-30MKI crashed on April 30, 2009 at Pokhran near Jaisalmer district in Rajasthan. The aircraft was flown by Wing Commanders Siddharth V Munje and Pushpendra Singh Nara. The Court of Inquiry (CoI) found that the pilot, Wing Commander Munje, inadvertently switched-off the four switches that control the power-supply to the digital flight-control computer. Switching-off the power not only cuts off the power-supply to the flight-control computer, but is also irreversible. Switching them on does not 'power on' the all-important unit. The aircraft went into a forward bunt, lost control and crashed. During the flight, the aircraft is said to have experienced a technical glitch after a round of firing practice. The pilot, who was also under routine inspection by the DASI, is said to have then tried to switch-off the armament master switches, which are located just behind the pilot's seat and in close proximity to the switches that control power to the flight-control computer. Though the CoI's conclusion was that the crash occurred due to pilot error, a number of officials have questioned the placing of critical switches that are not to be used during flight and only for power-on when the aircraft is on the ground in the cockpit and also, the inadequate built-in safety mechanisms like a wire-lock or even a covering flap. It is unpardonable and a poor design to have such critical switches, which are not to be used by the pilot in such an accessible manner. The IAF should have insisted on design changes way back in 1998 itself. The probe also revealed that the ejection seat's harness had broken, leading to the death of Wing Commander Nara. The reason for the breaking has been attributed to material failure of the harness due to exposure to the sun.
2nd Su-30MKI crashed on November 30, 2009 near the Indian Army's Chandan firing range in Jaisalmer district, south-west of the Pokhran range, after it took off from Jodhpur at 16.45 Hours for a routine training sortie and it crashed around 17.30 Hours. The aircraft was being piloted by Wing Commander Shrivastav
3rd Su-30MKI crashed on December 13, 2011 after taking off from Lohegaon air base at 1245 hours. It crashed at 1310 hours in Wade Bolai village near Wagholi. No casualty was reported then. Wing Commander Suhail and Flight Lieutenant Nautiyal had ejected to safety and landed near Hargude Vasti.
- March 15, 2017 at 7:47 PM
Another grand article again. You super fineness never gets lost even in the huge crowds of the great details.
- March 15, 2017 at 7:49 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
4th Su-30MKI crashed on February 19, 2013 at about 1920 Hours. The aircraft was on a night flying training mission from Jodhpur. Wing Commander Chauhan and his flying mate Squadron Leader A.R. Tamta were cleared for a night bomb run over the Pokhran firing range in a Su-30MKI. With Tamta flying and Chauhan the designated weapons systems officer (WSO) in the rear cockpit, the aircraft was fitted out with eighteen 100kg bombs--six on each wing, and six ventral. The night training sortie involved a bombing run from an altitude of roughly 7,000 feet. As Tamta maneouvered the jet, Chauhan quickly programmed parameters for the bombing run. The run would see the bombs released over a stretch of the Chandan range from 7,000 feet. For the duration of the weapons release, Tamta would be required to press the fire trigger on his stick. When he pressed and held, the first bombs should have dropped. They didn't. Instead, both experienced two things. One, an extremely bright flash of light (bright enough that Chauhan could see only white when he closed his eyes for a moment). And two, the aircraft was jerked violently off its level heading. It was instantly clear to both that the ordnance had detonated on their starboard wing station, destroying much of the wing and sending high-speed debris smashing into the canopy.
5th Su-30MKI crashed at a village near Pune on the evening of October 15, 2014, with both the pilots ejecting to safety. The aircraft was on a routine training mission from the IAF's Lohegaon AFS near Pune. It crashed while coming in for landing at a distance of approximately 22km.
6th crash occurred in May 2015 near the Tezpur air base in Assam. Both pilots ejected safely. The crash was caused by a technical defect. The aircraft had taken off from the Tezpur at 12.17pm on a routine sortie when a technical problem forced the two pilots to abandon the aircraft that eventually crashed into a thick forest around 36km south of the Tezpur at 12.30pm.
7th crash occurred in Barmer on March 15, 2017 leaving three villagers injured. Both the pilots of the Su-30MKI ejected safely. The incident happened near Shivkar village in Sadar police station area in Barmer.
- March 15, 2017 at 7:51 PM
- himanshu vij said...
Sir is our AAD system is comparable to Chinese hq-9 coz both are actually same the altitude of interception for both the missiles of both the system is 30 km & 27 km respectively & range is 150 km ! , Why don't we manufacturer the AAD system in mass no ! & When will the system will go for massive production ?
By the way who manufactures Shakti engines ? Hal or the French company & if HAL manufactures then , so does it assembled them or completely manufacturer engine in India only ?
& Are we going to have any kind of short term war with Pak in near future !
- March 15, 2017 at 8:04 PM
- vishakh said...
POK is extected to be Part of Pakisthan officially ....
1) How will this help India or is bad for India??
2) What about UN resolution which pakisthan kept shouting for Free Kashmir?
3) What about India Stand to be ??
4) Is this reason there Kashmir hero is put in House arrest 2-3 weeks back ??
- March 15, 2017 at 8:19 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SCRUTATOR: 1) They will AFTER they are re-lifed when undergoing mid-life upgrades in future. 2 & 3) BrahMos-1 Block-3's air-launched version had to undergo weight reduction (removal of internal fuel tanks) to cater for the twin HPJ pods on the Su-30MKI's wingtips. The resultant BrahMos-A therefore has 300km-range. 4) Only LACM variant. The air-launched ASCM variant will be BrahMos-NG that can be fired from MiG-29Ks. 5) For that the Nirbhay's SLCM variant is being developed.
To SRINIVASA NANDURI: That's because there's no money available for importing the MGS now & hence priority is being accorded to the procurement of locally developed solutions like the Dhanush-45. The ATAGS is still another 3 years away from availability. What stopped the implementation of all those 4-point formulae was China's refusal to even acknowledge that J & K is a part of India.
To RAHUL: Both RTA & Saras are screwed for good. Models for display are not representative of fully functional flying aircraft.
To 3rd-EYE: LoLz! Those 'certain authors' should then be asked how come then commercial bulk production of HNS has commenced & for what? Also, if the IA was totally disinterested in the Arjun MBT, it could easily have said so & insisted that unless the concerned state govts undertook upgrades of India's border roads infrastructure, the Arjun MBT would never be deployable in those areas. But that did not happen. Instead, border roads inftastructure is being improved now as specified by the IA, & the IA is encouraging CVRDE's efforts to rope in public-/private-sector companies for developing the 60.8-tonne Arjun Mk.2. Firm contracts have already been placed with all these companies. What do all these indicate? That both the IA & all these companies are all wasting their time & money on a fruitless exercise?
To SID: Nor Thar Desert, but areas opposite India's Punjab state. The railway crossing shown was in the Kasur area.
- March 15, 2017 at 8:21 PM
- Ved said...
Dear Prasun,
How well networked are the three armed forces with each other. Can the NSA see at real time what any commander in any of the three services can see in his area of jurisdiction at a flip of a button? If not what is the constraint and what need to be done? Your assessment please.
- March 15, 2017 at 8:45 PM
Pakistan is set to declare Gilgit-Baltistan as fifth province. How will India react to this? Is this a move towards converting LoC into IB?
- March 15, 2017 at 9:05 PM
What is XRSAM....Can't find anything on Google.....Range??????????
- March 15, 2017 at 9:31 PM
1)DO you think Tejas mk1A will be armed with Astra1 or will have Derby like the curren MK1 version.......
2)Why do we use Israeli Laser Guided Bombs when we have Sudarshan LGB developed by ARDE and ADE....
3)How many Sudarshan LGBs were Ordered..
4)Has IAF inducted DRDO's Parachute Retarded munitions and Missile based PGMs....
5) Number of foreign submarines are increasing in indian Ocean....Do you think we can counter the development...Why can't we develop a conventional Submarines on our own???
6)Can't we use spin off of ATAGS or Dhanush to develop a tracked SPH based on Arjun?
- March 15, 2017 at 10:00 PM
- Srinivasa Nanduri said...
Hi Prasun,
Thank you for your reply.
As per news reports on WION TV & some pakistani newspapers, Pakistan, with active support from China, is now all set to declare G&B as its fifth province and still going to call western kashmir as Azad Kashmir, keeping the issue alive, but legalizing its status and CPEC in G&B.
Will this work or extend hosilities? Was the pressure from India so severe on China that first it gave news columns saying lets go for soft borders & trade for benefit of the region, then equated G&B to taiwan and now getting it notified as part of Pakistan.
What is the net gain for India out of this. Our transit routes are still closed. CPEC / OBOR / MSR are nothing but Chinese expansionism and we are being outwitted while keeping the Kashmir issue simmering. Even Hurriyat is now saying that India should join CPEC as it benefits Kashmiris.
Srinivasa Nanduri
- March 15, 2017 at 11:16 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To VISHAKH & VARUNN & SRINIVASA NANDURI: LoLz! It will be only a symbolic decision & not functional by any standard since 1) no referendum will be conducted inside GB to seek the popular views of its residents. 2) the Pakistani Federal Govt-appointed committee that has made such a recommendation did not even incorporate a single member from either FATA or GB & therefore transformation of GB into another province & FATA's accession into KPK lacks popular support, 3) Appointed members (not elected) from GB will be given ONLY observer status in Pakistan's Parliament. 4) As a result of all this, the people of GB will continue to be denied fundamental rights/freedoms by any constitutional yardstick. These are all explained here:
India's PoV is totally different: she has never made 2 different rules affecting territorial sovereignty & has consistently maintained that the entire state of J & K enjoys the same rights & priviliges as any other Indian state, & as per UNSC resolutions the state of J & K is defined as one that had earlier existed as the independent princely state of J & K even after its accession to India on October 25, 1947.
Needless to say, if one compares the present/future situation between PoK (inclusive of GB) & India's J & K state, any discerning legally-minded person hailing from any of the world's welfare states will, without fail, wholeheartedly support India's PoV. Thus, any such move by Pakistan now or in future to incorporate any portion of PoK by any means will not only be discredited, but will also further strengthen India's legally unopposed claims.
To RAVEN: It was explained 2 threads ago.
- March 15, 2017 at 11:37 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To VED: All 3 armed forces still operated within compartmentalised silos. They all have their own secure C4I networks that are not accessible to one another. Why else do you think the IAF posts Air-Tasking officers equipped with IAF-specific radios within Army formations for calling in CAS? Joint warfighting is still a distant concept in India at the moment. And if anyone wants to change things, then first & foremost a combined tri-services Joint Warfighting Simulation Centre has to be established where both command-and-control & battlefield coordination concepts can be worked out through simulation tools—just as both Russia & China had been doing since the mid-1990s. Only this will produce scientifically validated concepts, protocols & rules of engagement. It's that simple & doesn't involve raising one's BP, getting too emotional or losing one's marbles due to needless cockfights.
To HIMANSHU VIJ: The HQ-9/FD-2000 is a direct clone of the S-300P of 1980s vintage & it was never meant to target manoeuvrable combat aircraft, but rather to intercept high-flying strategic bombers & manned/unmanned surveillance platforms. Does India face any such threats? No. So where's the need to procure AADs for aircraft interceptions when the Barak-8's LR-SAM variant is already being procured? Ardiden/Shakti engines are all built by SAFRAN Group's Turbomeca subsidfiary in France. Only 10% of its components are built by HAL.
- March 15, 2017 at 11:38 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To RAJ: 1) None of the LCA-related posters shown to date by ADA or IAF show the Tejas Mk.1 or any other version of the LCA being armed with Astra-1 BVRAAM. 2) Haven't you seen the report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence? Sudarshan LGB project has been scrapped as per that report. 3) Less than 10 for the developmental phase. 4) Which ones are those? Kindly identify them by name. 5) Only counter to that is to build & procure SSNs. If you mean a fully indigenous SSK for in-house development, how can it be done when even for licence-assembled SSKs India continues to rely on off-the-shelf imports of engines, turbines, gearboxes, combat management systems & high-strength steel? 6) It can be done but it will take 5 years to get it done.
Meanwhile, this is how disinformation gets dessiminated:
All photos of the SA.316B Alouette-III show that it had made a controlled landing & therefore the airframe was largely undamaged, meaning it was repairable & will become airworthy again. As for the Su-30MKI, if there was powerplant malfunction within 15 minutes of takeoff, you can rest assured that this was due to foreign object damage (FOD) caused by the sucking in of stone pebbles by the Su-30MKI's AL-31FP turbofans during the takeoff run. And why do such FOD-related incidents occur? Because they don't occur in well-maintained air bases in the hinterland, where runways are well-maintained & landscaped. Instead, they occur in air bases that are not well landscaped & hence the the dusty environments there ensure that the runways are not constantly kept FOD-free. This is human negligence at its worst! Nothing to do with aircraft serviceability or human error.
- March 15, 2017 at 11:45 PM
Are these Tanks deployed there for some exercise or in anticipation of some kind of Indian adventure as you predicted earlier.
- March 16, 2017 at 1:35 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SID: They were returning from exercises that were held close to their pre-designated concentration areas last year.
- March 16, 2017 at 2:49 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
Did anyone take note of this?
- March 16, 2017 at 4:39 AM
Sir, a picture here shows Grey coloured Astra missile kept close to Tejas... http://www.airforce-technology.com/projects/astra-beyond-visual-range-bvr-air-to-air-missile/astra-beyond-visual-range-bvr-air-to-air-missile3.html
- March 16, 2017 at 9:56 AM
- spanky's Blog said...
Hi Prasun,
Another of your prediction coming true. Now Pakistan is being squeezed from all sides.
- March 16, 2017 at 10:03 AM
- spanky's Blog said...
Hi Prasun,
Just came across this. Not sure if you have seen but Might interest you. Quiet a few details have been provided.
Enjoy !!!
- March 16, 2017 at 10:29 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
o RAJ: LoLz! Yes, it was kept close to the LCA mock-up & kept CLOSER were the Derby BVRAAM & Python-5 CCM during the Aero India 2015 expo. This year the Derby was there but posters appeared showing the R-73E as the CCM. There was no trace of Python-5, even though the IAF & IN have officially confirmed that the Derby/Python-5 combination had been selected in 2010 itself. Since Astra-1 uses Russian Agat JSC-supplied active RF seeker, it cannot be cued/guided by either EL/M-2032 or EL/M-2052 MMRs. Nor can the R-73E be vectored in LOBL mode by ELBIT's Targo HMDS.
To SPANKY's BLOG/SWAROP. VMT. here's the clearer version of that same videoclip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYiAtVsObu0
And here are some more interesting ones:
Life on USS Minnesota SSN 783 Virginia-class SSN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhN2jGNv7lM
US SAC's Titan-2 ICBM Accident Inside Silo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRnoJk9N2Gg
Laser Weapons: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8m_zmZiHSM
Nuclear Weapons History: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrvgsk8eX24&t=46s
- March 16, 2017 at 8:22 PM
Why was sudarshan LGB scrapped?
A recent parliamentary report showed that do-228 has 60% import by value & 27% by number/components.
HAL has been making do-228 from a long time, shouldn't they be making it fully indigenous.
Sir, do you really think saras has any chance of coming back?
- March 16, 2017 at 11:52 PM
0) Very informative vid on IWT. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ho3rIiP1dTU
1) On this vid of advanced hawk, how can Hawk terrain mask without an MMR? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDO83cwKOsE
2) How does Barak 8 compare to Patriot PAC-3?
3) Whats holding up the mine sweeepr replacement ships? IN says that they have to retire the existing minesweepers this year or next year. Was GSL the right partner, and why did they not order 2 directly from Kagnam? We will lack minesweepers in the inventory for five years at minimum.
4) What happened to Spike procurement? Will this be cancelled?
5) Are the MANPADS RFI for SOF? The most advanced one on the market today looks like Verba.
6) Is the Storm Shadow or USA JASSM a loitering missile? If not, what are the other loitering missiles besides Delilhah and KEPD 350?
7) So, will NPCIL indigenously develop enlarged PWRs for IAC-2 from existing PWR for SSBN-5/6/7? But isnt the PWR technologically obsolete (Project 667BDRM is from 1980s… 50 years old by 2030…)? Also the fuel enrichment levels will be high for such old PWRs… and could be a problem for decommissioning and maintenance of such a large ship. If we could, it would make more sense to go for a 3rd gen PWR over 2nd gen PWR.
8) What modifications or how would we be able to deploy Arjun to Arunachal Pradesh? Arunachal Pradesh is mostly forested, hilly country so MBTs are still effective theoretically, assuming we had better NE infrastructure. Also can C-130Js and C-17s transport Arjuns to ALGs?
9) When the army and air force already has plenty of new Mi-17V5s isn't the need of the hour an IMRH optimized primarily for the IN? Considering that upgraded Sea Kings and Kamovs does not plug the existing NMRH requirement, which IN says is at least 50.
10) Will the FGFA be as stealthy as the F-35? Do the Russians actually have stealth tech for the FGFA? The T-50 is currently looks like a modernized Flanker with new avionics and redesigned frontal section.
- March 16, 2017 at 11:52 PM
11) What would AMCA and Ghatak UCAV materialize if we rope in Dassault or Mitsubishi? What sort of R&D sharing and profit sharing agreements would they work for in a JV?
12) What is the technical and operational difference between Brahmos A and DRDL LRCM? Both are air-delivered, supersonic ramjet-powered designs. And a tweaked or modified Brahmos A with more fuel would be lower risk development than a new design LRCM. When will LRCM testing surface?
13) Could ISRO use the PSLV as an ASAT? ISRO buddy says theoretically yes in times of emergencies.
14) What is preventing Kestrel from being used as an IFV, like the next-gen French VCBI or German Boxer wheeled IFVs? Install a 30mm autocannon turret, 2 HMGs, reduce passengers to 4-6, and use the extra space for ammunition and more protection. And add a rear mortar hole if space is left. Even today 4-wheeled MRAP type vehicles can have STANAG 4569 Level 4 protection. Also seems like Army will upgrade BMP-2's engine like I hoped for.
15) Recent meeting of Russian navy chief with Chief of Naval Staff in Dehli. Any news on SSN from this or was this on Talwar follow ups (that we honestly dont need)?
16) What are your conclusions from the recent radiation spike in Europe? The US is probing with their sniffer aircraft fleet near the UK, but Poland has the highest measure of radioactive Iodine.
17) Can the LPD be used secondarily as a helicopter ASW carrier, instead of primarily being an amphibious operations platform? Also can Chinook, Apache, or Rudra be deployed on these for the latter role?
18) So, is DRDO claiming the new HNS steel is superior or equivalent to the molybdenum-nickel-chromium RHA? Could you provide some link or info that can validate this? All I found was that HNS suffers less from oxidation during cooling down during forging so this improves grain characteristics and decreases micro fissures. What about HNS's ballistic macro characteristics? Will the use of Kanchan composites be reduced in mk2?
19) How would it be cheaper to import the diesel MTU engine from Germany than use an indigenous one? I am skeptical of this claim, especially when Arjun mk2 has the opportunity for 300-500 orders. Greaves Cotton could license manufacture new Ukrainian 6TD-3 that has 1500hp. Also is the DRDO turbobooster planned for use on the existing MTU 838 or for the nebulous Bharat Powerpack? http://www.janes.com/article/60525/ukraine-markets-mbt-powerpack
20) Does the modern Russian armed forces have this net-centric capability that we are trying to develop? What about China's efforts in net centricity? And joint warfighting for both of these countries?
21) Did HAL internally select a winner to the Tejas mk1a RFQ for MMR and defense systems? If not, this should be done in next 1.5 months if HAL is serious about LCA.
- March 17, 2017 at 12:00 AM
1) Will the IAs M777 come with the XM1113 extended range rocket-assisted projectile?
2) Will the MSMC/JVPC ever see action? What of the Vidhwansak AMR?
3) http://thediplomat.com/2017/03/the-plas-potential-breakthrough-in-high-power-microwave-weapons/
"...this HPM weapon could be intended for initial employment as a ship-borne anti-missile system. For instance, in 2009, ahead of its initial test, Huang co-authored a paper focused on the utility of HPM weapons against anti-ship missiles. The authors noted that HPM weapons could be used to degrade and damage the electronics of an incoming missile, interfering with, for instance, its data link, GPS receivers, and other guidance mechanisms"
Whatsyour take on this 'potential breakthrough'?
4) The Chinese Silent Hunter laser weapon which was showcased at the Dubai arms fair was claiming an output of 50-70 kw. It makes me wonder if China has more powerful laser weapons for domestic use and whether they are already operational.
5) Will the Chinese have naval-cum-airbase in Gwadar?
6) The HSTDV was supposed to be flight tested in Dec 2016. What happened?
- March 17, 2017 at 12:26 AM
In earlier thread, ou said that Pak doesnt possess a single nuclear fuel reprocessing plant.
Are you certain because they apparently have one at the New Laboratories complex at PINSTECH in Rawalpindi(possibly with the help of a Belgian firm named Belgonucleaire) By 1998, according to Khan, New Labs could extract about 8-15kg of plutonium per year from Khushab's spent fuel. An expansion of this facility between 2002 and 2006 has likely increased this capacity, and has possibly doubled it. A probable second reprocessing facility of much larger capacity has been built at the Chashma. Neither of these sites are subject to safeguards.
Indeed, then DIA Director Michael Maples told the Senate Armed Services
Committee on March 10, 2009, that "Pakistan continues to develop its nuclear infrastructure, expand nuclear weapon stockpiles and seek more advanced warheads and delivery systems." Similarly, Admiral Mullen confirmed during the May 14, 2009, hearing that the United States has "evidence" that Pakistan is expanding its nuclear arsenal.
BTW whats your estimate of Pak having only 12 nuclear warheads based upon`?
- March 17, 2017 at 2:08 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ANKIT SINGH: Why? Because of the very same reason the Trishul SHORADS developmental effort was terminated in the late 1990s, i.e. inability of the local industry to produce highly intricate sub-systems. And just because any companu produces a product for a long time doesn't mean that product will be 100% locally manufactured. If anyone thinks otherwise, then it only means that all the past Govts of India had successfully lied to India's citizens about the so-called benefits of licenced-production & the all those citizens who keep asking questions like you have, have now finally ended up as being suckers without investigating matters or without asking common-sensical questions & totally junking all laws of economics into the dust-bin! And the end-result is today we have several folks in this blog itself who never tire of asking questions about indigenisation of turbofans, airframes & avionics for UCAVs & AMCAs, but never even bother to ask if critical components like aircraft tyres or cockpit canopy transparencies or pitot tubes have been locally developed & produced. So what then comes out of all this official disinformation spread over the last several years? The admission at last that locally licence-built products all have very high import content & that too of the most critical parts without which the entire platform will stay grounded. If this, then is the stark reality, then do you really expect experimental platforms like Saras to transition to commercial successes?
To OLD MONK: 1) No. 2) JVPC is under production for the CAPFs. 3 & 4) The DRDO has developed similar products that were shown at DEFEXPO 2016. 5) Nope. No one builds naval bases in deep-sea ports. The naval bases accessible to the PLAN will be in Ormara, Pasni & Turbat. 6) LoLz! Who or which agency/institution had stood guarantor for the v12-2016 launch of this technology demonstrator?
- March 17, 2017 at 2:27 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To KAMBAR: 1) The very same way LACMs without MMRs can fly terrain-hugging profiles. 2) PAC-3 is far more complex design that Barak-8 as it uses TVM technique for fire-control. 3) Lack of financial resources & the fact that Kangnam can't manufacture 3-inch thick GRP panels reqd for hull construction. Only Intermarine of Italy has that technology. After all, Kangnam's MCMV design is nothing but a clone of the original GRP-hulled MCMV design of Intermarine. 4) If the Indian PM wants to make a big-bang announcement (about co-developing the MPATGM with Raytheon) during his future meeting with POTUS Trump, then there's no hope for Spike ATGM. 5) No. It's for all 3 armed services. 6) LACMs are not meant to be loitering. PGMs are loitering only when they are searching for their yet-to-appear targets, like the HAROP drone. 7) The design of life-long PWR for IAC-2 & the 6 projected SSNs will be of Russian origin. 8) If the enemy cannot deploy any MBTs in that state, why should India bother to deploy MBTs there? 9) All 3 armed services have presented their own QRs for their respective MRH reqmts. Reconciling all these3 QRs into a single unified QR will be a nightmare, rest assured. And that's why HAL showed only a civilian version of the IMRH last February. Not even conceptual designs of any military version exists. 10) The FGFA's airframe is still evolving. It's too early to compare its stealthiness to those platforms that have already been developed. 11) Not before 2035. 12) LRCM is meant to be a tactical air-delivered munition with nuclear warhead. None of the BrahMos missiles can be nuclear-armed as per the agreement between India & Russia. 13) LoLz! India is part of a multilateral coalition along with the US & Japan that advocates a ban on ASAT weapons. 14) One cannot have a single vehicle to act as both ICV & APC. They have to be specialist vehicles due to their totally different missions & the type of weapons they are meant to combat or avoid. That's why worldwide,far heavier new-generation ICVs are being developed & fielded. 15) That was just a ceremonial visit. 16) Am not aware of it. 17) LPHs will always be escorted by DDGs & FFGs. No LPH will ever sail the seas on its own. So on-board ASW helicopters are not reqd. Yes, utility helicopters & attack helicopters can always be on-board LPHs. 18) Do a Google search on that topic. What more validation is reqd by anyone if HNS has already entered commercial production? Do you reckon the management of Jindal Steel is made up of idiots who will blindly undertake production of HNS without even ascertaining the superior quality of HNS? 19) Exactly how many types of indigenous diesel engines are made in India, be they for automobiles, railways, two-wheelers or any other industrial reqmts? Are the diesel-engines of Dhanush-45, ATAGS or Kestrel locally developed & built? 20) Of course they do. 21) Not yet.
- March 17, 2017 at 2:27 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To GERALD SHASTRI: Whatever kind of a name is that!!! Before asking such questions, kindly take the trouble to find out when was the 1st of 4 PHWRs at Khushab/Chashma commissioned into service. Secondly, Do highlight what kind of industrial infrastructure can you spot at the old/new PINSTECHs that justifies any claims of any kind of industrial activity being undertaken there? Also, what all these non-proliferation ayatollahs of the West are claiming about fuel reprocessing plants at Khushab/Chashma are in reality heavy water production facilities. All spent fuel bundles are sent to China for reprocessing & this was confirmed 4 years ago by some Pakistani physicists & journalists on a Pakistani TV programme aired at that time & I had even web-linked that programme. And interestingly, none of the US officials that you have named have so far committed to any firm or estimated numbers for quantifying the Pakistani WMD inventory. They day they or you can come up with figures that can be backed up with material evidence in a public forum, that same day I too will share similar data with everyone for proving my claims.
- March 17, 2017 at 2:39 AM
Whats will be the the potency in KW for this DRDO's conceptual truck mounted laser system you posted during DEFEXPO 2016?
I read that DRDO's LASTEC is still working on 10kw chemical oxygen iodine non-lethal lasers so when will we see a high powered fibre optic based laser such as the Silent Hunter or better a solid state laser DEW of potency in the range of 100Kw?
Also, Does India possess any HPM weapon?
- March 17, 2017 at 3:25 AM
Whats in a name? Its about getting the numbers right.
In 2000, U.S. military and intelligence sources estimated that Pakistan's nuclear arsenal to be around 100 warheads.
In 2003, the U.S. Navy Center for Contemporary Conflict estimated that Pakistan possessed between 35 and 95 nuclear warheads
In 2007, retired Pakistan Army's Brigadier-General Feroz Khan, previously second in command at the Strategic Arms Division of Pakistans' Military told Pakistan had "about 80 to 120 genuine warheads."
A former top official of the CIA is quoted in the September 2009 ―Bulletin Of The Atomic Scientists‖ as saying ―It took them roughly 10 years to double the number of nuclear weapons from roughly 50 to 100."
http://projectalpha.eu/wp-content/uploads/sites/21/2016/11/20160929-Pakistan-public-version.pdf (see the maps)
https://fas.org/sgp/crs/nuke/RL34248.pdf (pg 6)
AQ Khan has already confirmed about the reprocessing plants at Rawalpindi and Chasma in the book "Eating Grass"`
So pls kindly take the trouble to share some data to prove your claims.
- March 17, 2017 at 4:47 AM
BTW 'Gerald Shastri' is a FICTIONAL character from Ibn-e-safi's 'Jasoosi Duniya' series. He had a penchant for penning such quixotic characters with striking names. I know you are not into Detective novels and all that but just FYI he is a larger-than-life baddy, scientist and scholar who invents a method to turn men into gorillas. Just began reading his novels now available in English for the first time from Penguin
- March 17, 2017 at 5:47 AM
- Ved said...
Dear Prasun,
I believe Targo HMDS is also selected for Indian Rafales. How does the fusion of TARGO with MICA and Meteor happen? What needs to be a must have in between an HMDS and missiles both with RF seeker and IIR seeker for their complete fusion? as both are from different OEMs.
Till date no news on the torpedo for Kalvari class. Do you have any info?
- March 17, 2017 at 7:41 AM
Sir,As reported by DAWN Pakistan yesterday test fired an anti ship missile which they have named Zarb..Is it a Chinese copy..Can you pleasplease give some information about the missile.
- March 17, 2017 at 8:17 AM
Prasun da
1)There was a news in 2015 that the MOOG actuators for Rustum2 were to be imported from US but later Pentagon blocked the deal which lead to delay in Rustum2 program. Was the news correct?? (http://www.news18.com/blogs/india/saurav-jha/india-is-finally-looking-to-enter-the-era-of-armed-drones-10879-995842.html)
Have we developed indigenous actuators or we still import them???
2) Do you think US is a reliable partner and will not hesitate in transferring technologies like the Soviet Union??
3) Are we going to get IL76 or Mig29 as a flying test bed for jet engines??
4)What is the status of development of COMINT,ELINT and SAR payloads of Rustum2??
5)When do you think Rustum2 powered by manik jet engine will appear??
6) According to retired army officer and satellite imagery expert @rajforteyseven China has deployed IRBMs 350km away from indian borders in Tibet and 850km from Delhi..Do you think it is a serious threat to us and how to counter it..
7) Pakistanis claim that Buraq UAV, Zarb missile as completely Pakistani even though they are Pakistan built Chinese maal..Why?
8)Do you think Pakistan has MIRV tech??
9) Will Pakistan respond with nuclear weapons when india carries out large scale quick strikes inside Pakistan and imposes a naval blocked..
- March 17, 2017 at 8:55 AM
Prasun Da,
Why Rustum1 has not been ordered..It lacks something or the forces want something better???
- March 17, 2017 at 9:13 AM
In the above thread you had said that you will upload a picture of NGARM..Have you uploaded?? I tried to find out the picture but can't find it anywhere...
- March 17, 2017 at 10:23 AM
- spanky's Blog said...
Hi Prasun,
Highly interesting links. Going through them 1 by 1. BTW i forgot to thank you for the excellent last few articles which you have posted. Very insightful and interesting.
Also your opinion on the reported buzz about 4 star permanent CoSC instead of an CDS. Do you think it is a regressive step. I for 1 cannot see how it will increase the joint operation between services. But again I might be missing something.
- March 17, 2017 at 10:56 AM
Hi prasun,
Out of curiosity which sub is best suited for indian navy under 75i program. Thanks
- March 17, 2017 at 11:50 AM
- Sam said...
Sir, I have a doubt regarding the answer you gave(10) to KAMBAR regarding FGFA. Did you mean that as the new powerplant for the T-50 becomes available, the aft portion of the aircraft will be redesigned according to the principles of planform alignment? Also, what about TVC nozzles that reduce the IR signature of the aircraft(like the ones the F-22 use)?
- March 17, 2017 at 12:24 PM
- Srinivasa Nanduri said...
Hi Prasun,
Can you please elaborate on the latest fiasco MOD is involved in regarding FGFA. All this talk of full TOT, so on. Which country in the world will do that.
What is the real story behind this? First IL214 and now FGFA, why is MOD backtracking on good projects and backing KA226 like project?
Srinivasa Nanduri
- March 17, 2017 at 1:11 PM
- RJS said...
What logically follows then @your response to @Gerald Shastri's query is if Pakistan is in possession of a handful of N weapons on fairly low yield , surely the GoI must be aware of it if we are discussing this here - why didn't we escalate the conflict then in 1999 or back off in 2002 after mobilising the IA for 9 months ?
- March 17, 2017 at 1:51 PM
- Anonymous said...
You said "None of the BrahMos missiles can be nuclear-armed as per the agreement between India & Russia."
But isn't it curious that the 40 Su-30 MKI fighters that are being modified for air-launching Brahmos will be under the Strategic Force Command (SFC)? Why place these aircraft under SFC if the Brahmos specific aircraft cannot be nuclear armed? Both the missile and the aircraft are being modified with Russian help.
- March 17, 2017 at 2:13 PM
Not sure why people keep questioning when PKS says pak have 12 nukes. Its his view point. Its his blog, he/she can say what they like. Pak gov has not even admitted to any number nor has India. I don't see the point either way. Rest assured they both have enough "nuclear material" to make the region a hell hole. Its MAD not for the whole world but for the region.
- March 17, 2017 at 2:41 PM
- Pierre Zorin said...
Whatever name is that will be more sense considering the fact that the same person is using either initials or last names of defence reporters, writers, critiques or similar found on the web - e.g. John, McTavish, Vassili, Old Monk, Sid. This is why you'll see none of them have a blogger account such as Spanky's Blog, yourself, myself etc If you read Iranian blogs Iranians pretend to be Aericans and post all sorts of anti-US rhetoric under names such as James, McDermott, Michael, Colin and so forth. Gerald Ford and L B Shastri - two leaders morphed into our blogger dignitary!
Bizarre because they want to ask questions but scared of being ridiculed for the 10 page exam papers that are posted for your further dissertation!
BTW hard to watch the YouTube clips especially anything to do with Pakistan for the illiterate rants in the comments section.
- March 17, 2017 at 3:25 PM
since over the years its becoming clearer to people that paki ballistic missiles were/are chinese, maybe the chinese are trying to change the narrative and position it in a way where they can now/in future claim that these were not secretly transferred but in fact openly 'authorised' to be produced in pakistan
- March 17, 2017 at 4:15 PM
BTW, atleast 55 years ago "GERALD SHASTRI" was the name of a world class genius villain in the spy fictional novels of famous/infamous Indo-Pak writer Ibne Saffi. "GERALD SHASTRI" has fought against the hero characters named Col. Vinod, Capt. Hameed and Secret Agent Rajesh. Lol....
- March 17, 2017 at 6:10 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To GERALD SHASTRI: First, kindly develop the balls to identify yourself by your true name & he ready to be held accountable for all your claims/assertions/perceptions. Secondly, all those sources you've quoted are only presenting estimates that are not backed up by empirical evidence/data. So, the day any one of them presents such data on oath to any US congressional body, I will reciprocate. Until then, you will have learn how not to compare apples with oranges. And if you have any patiemce, then kindly browse through the previous threads of 2016 & this year in which I had already stated/explained why I stand behind my figure of 12 warheads. And Brig (Ret'd) Feroze Khan was the 2IC of the SPD's Arms Control & Disarmament Division & he has also participated in several IDSA-organised seminars in India. A Q Bhopali Khan's claims cannot be the gospel truth & all his previous on-record interviews as well as those of Dr Samar Mubarak Mand that have publicly rebuked & dismissed all such claims of this metallurgist are weblinked in several previous threads. Do go through them & get illuminated for a change.
To OLD MONK: All developmental works on such laser-based DEWs always begin with systems designed to shoot down mini0/micro-UAVs, followed by those designed to destroy PGMs & MBRL-launched rocket artillerys, followed by those that can neutralise ASCMs & ultimately those that can destroy MIRVs. DRDO is just taking baby steps along this roadmap. All EW jammers, especially those that are ground-based, are HPM=emitting.
To RAJ: ZARB is the name of the C-602 ASCM.
To ANIK: 1) Correct. They are now being imported from France. 2) What ToT did the USSR/Russia undertake for India? 3) None. Such testbeds will be made available to GTRE INSIDE Russia. 4) They are still being developed. Have any of them flown as yet on the Do-228 testbed of CABS? 5) In the following decade. 6) He is no expert & is a blithering idiot who can't distinguish between the weather-protective radome of a PSS & an identical radome of an airspace surveillance radar. Nor is he a retired officer from any of India's armed services. 7) Why? How should I know why they suffer from inferiority complex? Maybe it has something to do with their DNA or they are suffering from some congenital disease. 8) No. 9) Why is any naval blocade reqd? And why should large-scale strikes be carried out inside Pakistan when the area of operations for the IA & IAF will be only PoK? 10) Rustom-1 is still under development.
To AVIRAL: No, I haven't yet done so.
- March 17, 2017 at 7:17 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SPANKY's BLOG: VMT. Creating just the post of XDS won't usher in joint warfighting or theatre commands. As I had explained earlier above, without the usage of simulation technologies to first try out concepts in a scientific manner, such cursory appointments will be counter-productive.
To SAM: Why should the aft portion of the fuselage require any re-designing? The TSAGI/Gromov Glight Research Institute has already flight-tested several types of TVC nozzles since the mid-1980s.
To SRINIVASA NANDURI: Back-tracking is usually resorted to when their financial scarcity & therefore excuses have to be found to delay the decision-making process. It's that simple & that's what has happened even with the S-70B Seahawk NMRH project.
To RJS: Because the politicians of the NDA-1 govt had no understanding of military matters, i.e. they never understood bthe difference between exercising military force & military power.
To SCRUTATOR: That's because folks are getting confused between the 40 locally modified Su-30MKIs that will carry BrahMos-A, & the 40 Super Su-30MKIs that will go to SFC & that will be armed withy Nirbhay nuclear-armed LACMs. These are 2 separate reqmts.
To BHOUTIK: Apart from changing the narrative, it is also proof now of Pakistan's plans for using conventionally-armed BMs & CMs for deep-strikes since the PAF does not possess any twin-engined deep-interdictors nor is it going to get the FC-31 MRCA because 1) the Ruskies have stopped China from using the RD-93 turbofans on this aircraft & 2) China itself does not possess the funds required for transforming the FC-31 into a functional MRCA. Hence, it is not because of the Agni-V, but because of the continuing series of PDV/AAD interceptor tests & the decision to acquire the S-400s that has rankled both China & Pakistan. And you should also note that the photos showing the PA's COAS in Beijing (posted in the ISPR's website) show him meeting meeting only officials from the PLA Army & PLA Navy. The PLAAF was not represented in these meetings.
- March 17, 2017 at 7:17 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To VED: TARGO's interfacing with MICA BVRAAMs isn't a problem since France & Israel closely cooperate with one another for shring source-codes reqd for interfacing different avionics LRUs. But that isn't the case between Israel & Russia. The decision on Black Shark HWT will be announced in the near future.
- March 17, 2017 at 7:23 PM
- AVIRAL SINGH said...
Do you think HAL has the capability to develop Sagar Aircraft???
- March 17, 2017 at 7:54 PM
1)Defence Communication Network designing a good step towards integrated network system enabling the army, air force, navy and the Special Forces Command for faster decision making....developed by HCL
2)why japan is shying away from providing its subs under pro-75I
- March 17, 2017 at 8:38 PM
Using stand-off weapons is the only options open to PAF to target Bharat. This why they keep 50 year old mirages for RAAD. Now they are playing extended range glide bombs. Have H2/4 and BABUR. I saw an interview with one of the PAF's retired that they plan to have RAAD and BABUR in low thousands to target Bharat. He was talking about the target list they have, this was a year or two ago. If there deal with Chinis allows them to build the numbers, how can we encounter it?
A JF-17 footage with camera's on flying c-130 ramp: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2ywXe6yMLE&feature=youtu.be
On the ground its one ugly fighter but in the air it looks very different. Here it is armed with BVRS
- March 17, 2017 at 8:49 PM
- Srinivasa Nanduri said...
Hi Prasun,
As always thank you for your reply.
China seems desperate to get India to talking table with Pakistan on G&B, on CPEC and in general is trying to negate the indian approach with pakistan, terrorism & NSG entry.
I mean how blatant can China be about its open support providing Ballistic and Cruise missiles to Pakistan for the so called strategic stability in South Asia, giving false equivalance to Pakistan vis a vis India. Below article was put forth with a view to raise eye brows in India.
And then some indian reactions:
All this talk of G&B becoming fifth province of Pakistan, even though its legally or practically untenable, seems like Chinese way of nudging this idea to get a reaction from India and from there get India to start dailogue with Pakistan and slowly suck it into OBOR / MSR / CPEC. I can be naive about it and reading too much into a non issue, but just wanted your views on the above.
Again, appreciate your replies to my queries.
Srinivasa Nanduri
- March 17, 2017 at 9:12 PM
Lets stick with nicknames. I prefer privacy in public forums. Nothing to do with Balls or Bollocks. And lets be Objective.
So it seems probable to me that the spent fuel bundles being sent to china, if its true as you said, is for further strecthing their stocks qualitatively and/or quantitatively with composite warhead designs with deuterium/tritium gas or irradiating lithium to boost the warhead's yield with China's helping hand. Have you considered this? Also most of Pak's nuclear warheads are fuelled with weapons grade HEU.
(Pakistan is also said to have acquired or were trying to acquire US origin tritium originally destined for H-bombs as well as tritium recovery equipment from West Germany according to a congressional hearing in 1989)
Moreover, this classified and heavily redacted CIA report from way back in 1985 states that "New Labs contain a pilot-scale fuel reprocessing plant that is potentially capable of giving Pakistani scientists experience in reprocessing spent nuclear fuel. The facility contains labs for fuel handling, waste management, and plutonium metallurgy."
Lastly, Why do you take the word of 'some Pakistani physicists/journalists on a Pakistani TV programme' as the gospel truth, which anyway might be ISPRs handiwork, over all other assertions available in open domain?
And can you change the search function on this blog the way it was before? Its not possible to search the comments section now with word hits. And pls provide us those weblinks so that I may be enlightened on your perspective.
- March 17, 2017 at 9:49 PM
@Pierre Zorin
And who are you? Pierre Salinger and Valerian Zorin, two dignitaries of the Cuban Missile Crisis fame morphed into one? Lolz!!
- March 17, 2017 at 10:18 PM
Is the final number of the "proposed strength of 80,000 soldiers" still the same or are they going to cut the number of solders because of lack of money and the Indian army being too bloated with manpower already? Thanks.
"The mountain strike corps, designated as 17 Corps, is meant for the northern border and is headquartered at Panagarh in Bengal. It was approved by the government in 2013 with a proposed strength of 80,000 soldiers at a cost of Rs 64,000 crore to be spent over a seven-year period."
"We are moving fast from a threat-based to a capability-based army. The mountain strike corps is a part of that change and can be used in any mountainous region, which means all the northern borders. It would augment our posture along the borders, stretching from Arunachal Pradesh in the east to Ladakh in the northwest," said the official.
- March 17, 2017 at 10:31 PM
1)Agni 4 weighs 17tons and Agni5 weighs 50tons..Why so much difference.. Can't we use high energy propellant and composites developed for A4 in A5??
2) With the increasing pressure from US do you think we will continue to further develop Agni series version like Agni6.7...
3)There was a news last year that Prithvi 1 will be retired and will be replaced by Prahaar missile...
4)Why DRDO has ceased the developmental trials of Prahaar missile..
5) NGARM drop tests we carried out in December last year..There is a rumour that its design is same as Russian Kh-58..is it true?? It uses indigenous seeker??
- March 17, 2017 at 11:07 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To GERALD SHASTRI: LoLz! So you're indeed so shy so as to live in obscurity just in case you are reqd to be held accountable/answerable for your assumptive assertions! And if as you claim most of Pakistan's WMD are fuelled with HEU, then where's the need for fissile materials like Plutonium for which the 4 HWRs at Khushab/Chashma exist? As for authentic statements made by Pakistanis, they're not 'some journalists/physicists' by any stretch of imagination. They are Dr A Q Bhopali Khan (the one & only you had earlier quoted) & Dr Samar Mubarak Mand, NESCOM's leading UK-educated experimental nuclear physicist. In case you don't know who exactly they are, then you will never be able to figure out all they have been saying against one another all these years post-May 1998. And lastly, unlike you, I don't deal with 3rd-party assertions or suppositions or conjecture. The day you produce undeniable paperwork from any source in support of your claims, I will reciprocate. Until then, do refrain here from quoting estimates that dwell only upon 'said-to-have' potentialities.
To THE HUNDRED: The number is now down to 35,000. Furthermore, every Corps is theatre-based & therefore Ranchi-based XVII Corps (raised on January 1, 2014) under HQ Eastern Command, if it includes Panagarh-based 59 Mtn Div & Pathankot-based 72 Mtn Div will find it impossible to command & control two offensive divisions spread nearly 3,000km apart In the event of a conflict with China. Therefore, to assume that both these Mtn Divs would strike across into TAR from both Ladakh to the west & the Chumbi Valley to the east will be fallacious & self-deluding. Therefore, in terms of practicality, the IA will be reqd to entrust 2 different Corps HQs with offensive mountain warfare taskings—one to the west & one to the east. For the former, the Leh-based XIV Corps will have to command 72 Mtn Div if the tactical battle area (TBA) in east off Ladakh. If the TBA is PoK, then the Nagrota-based XVI Corps will command/control 72 Mtn Div. If the TBA is further north of the Chumbi Valley, then XVII Corps will be reqd to command/control the Panagarh-based 59 Mtn Div & Missamari-based 71 Mtn Div (now under the Tezpur-based IV Corps. The 56 Mtn Div that was raised in 2009 at Zakhama under Dimapur-based III Corps will then become a defensive formation for preventing PLA ground offensives developing from staging areas east of Walong, as had happened in 1962.
Late last year, after conducting an exhaustive operations analysis of all PLA exercises carried out around India in 2016, I had drawn up a detailed appreciation whose abridged version was later published by FORCE, in which I had stated the following:
Cont'd below...
- March 18, 2017 at 12:23 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
The PLA's 2016 exercises have also revealed unmistakable signs of the PLA's Western Theatre Command's efforts to develop two staging areas for offensive air-mobile campaigns: one in Qionglai air base in western Sichuan that will become the fourth permanent base for the PLAAF's XV Airborne Corps; and Feng Huang Shan helicopter base to Army Aviation Brigades equipped with Z-19WZ 'Black Cyclone' tandem-seat light attack helicopters (LAH), plus Mi-17V-5 and Z-8K utility helicopters for ferrying the PLA Army's Battalion-sized light mechanised infantry regiments (LMIR, or kuaisu fanyin budui, also known as Resolving Emergency Mobile Combat Forces, or REMCF) whose principal role will be to seize and hold the string of advanced landing grounds (ALG) and gapfiller air-defence radar stations belonging to the Indian Air Force (IAF) in Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram and Nagaland. Since mid-2009, the PLA's mechanised formations located in TMD and Sichuan province have been inducting into service new-generation tracked armoured vehicles, like Type 96A medium battle tanks (replacing the earlier Type 85 tanks) and ZBD-04A/B ICVs (replacing the ZBD-89 ICVs) equipped with integral, mast-mounted battlefield surveillance radars and anti-UAV radars. First to be re-equipped was the 2nd Armoured Battalion of the 54th Mountain Brigade (Unit-77625), located in Duilongdeqing County; followed by an armoured regiment of the Chongqing-based 13th Group Army's 37th Mechanised Infantry Division and another armoured regiment of the 149th Light Mechanised Infantry Division (located at Leshan, Sichuan province) that also comes under the 13th GA; and lastly, the armoured regiment of the 14th Group Army located in Kunming, Yunnan province. These formations every year in December undergo mobility-cum-firepower exercises at the Yanggong Plateau (at an altitude of 5,000 metres) in northwestern Yunnan, where the cold and dry environment of the type prevalent in the Dolam Plateau and Chumbi Valley along the Bhutan-China-India tri-junction along the Siliguri Corridor offers a realistic training ground in terms of both climate and terrain. A medium battle tank with a 105mm rifled-bore cannon and powered by water-cooled 780hp diesel engine that has been undergoing user-evaluations throughout TMD since 2012 is the ZTQ-105, which has now begun entering service in limited numbers. For the swift insertion of mechanised forces specialising in blocking/choking operations in the highlands along mountain passes inside TMD that are facing Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh, the PLAAF's XV Airborne Corps (presently headquartered in Xiaogan, north of Wuhan in Hubei province) plans to relocate one of its Divisions near to Qionglai air base in western Sichuan so that they can be airlifted by the PLAAF's Y-9 and Y-20 transport aircraft belonging to the 10th Air Regiment and 12th Air Regiment of the 4th Transport Division that is located at Qionglai. Since late 2008, the PLA Army's LMIRs located in TMD, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces have been hard at work on devising innovative ways and means of undertaking offensive air-mobile, especially heliborne, operations across wide frontages. Formations that have already undergone 'transformation' include the battalion-sized LMIRs of the 52nd Mountain Brigade, 53rd Mountain Brigade and 54th Mountain Brigade, all spread over the military sub-districts of Shannan, Shigatse and Nyingchi in TMD; plus the 149th Highland Mechanised Infantry Division, located at Emei in Sichuan province.
- March 18, 2017 at 12:24 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To AVIRAL SINGH: LoLz! The answer should be YES if anyone can conclusively prove to me that a human being can first learn to jog & then only feel the need to start learning how to crawl on all fours.
To RON: What is P-75I? Haven't you figured out as yet that the IN does not require six additional SSKs any more? Haven't you read about the SSN project? The question that should be asked is why did India's political decision-makers between 1998 & 2005 prevent the IN from acquiring more MDL-built Class 209/Type 1500 SSKs? Which rule or law had stated that such procurements were no longer possible? Had such procurtements taken place, then there would have been no need for the 6 Scorpenes & that money could easily have been used for funding the SSN procurement project. Now we all are paying the price for the NDA-1 govt's sheer stupidity.
To SAMS: LoLz! Imagine incoming salvoes of BrahMos-1 knocking out all the long-range airspace surveillance & ATC radars in at least six major PAF air bases within 20 minutes, followed by offensive sweeps by thye IAF's MRCAs to locate & destroy the PAF's AEW & CS platforms in mid-air, since without GCI cues, all PAF MRCAs will be flying blind. Only other option is to escort the AEW & CS platforms with CAPs & that too along the Durand Line which will limit the AEW & CS' battle management capabilities to be restricted to only 80nm within Indian airspace b& that too in selected corridors. Neither Ra'ad nor Babur have been procured in the thousands nor will they ever be. If you were to do a scientifically-based aircraft-to-weapons matching ratio, you will realise exactly how many Ra'ads can be carried by a severely limited fleet of Mirage-3/5. Nor can the Ra'ad be carried by F-7Ps or F-7PGs or F-16s or JF-17s. Furthermore, neither Ra'ad nor Babur nor any of the BMs of Chinese-/North Korean-origin have on-board IMR seekers for precise targetting. Instead, the China-supplied missiles use RLG-INS using GPS receivers for course-correction while the Ghauris use dry-tuned gyros for navigation. Such missiles, therefore, are meant for use as terror-weapons for targetting large population centres, i.e. attacking innocent civilians. Therefore, they will never be able to degrade the IAF's war-waging capabilities/capacities like air bases or command-n-control nodes.
To SRINIVASA NANDURI: It's no use making a fuss about what the PRC's official mouthpieces are uttering, since all this has been known & been in the public domain since the late 1980s. Both China & Pakistan don't ever want to have dialogues/talks with India on PoK. They both want negotiations, because time is fast running out for them to make any meaningful gains on this issue. The PRC is practicing the same type of brinksmanship that the DPRK displays. All that India has to do now is to reduce her bilateral trade with China & proportionately increase it with RoK & RoC & you will see the panic button being hit in Beijing. That's how high-stakes poker ought to be played without flinching & blinking.
- March 18, 2017 at 12:30 AM
BTW I am happy with 'obscurity' in this blog. Lets just say that you know me since the past and that I have never shied away from being accountable/answerable for my assertions.
- March 18, 2017 at 1:56 AM
Hello Prasunji,
1) Any chance that India and US collaborate on HPM and EMP based DEW weapons? I hope that dont stay in our perpetual wishlist forever.
2) The new XVII Corps was to be supported by three independent armoured brigades, three artillery brigades, an engineer brigade, an air defence brigade, an aviation brigade and logistics support units and a corps normally has three divisions so will IA in future add one more division from another corps and convert it into mountain division and allotted to 17 Corps?
3) You earlier said that the Tejas cant fly with the airworthy Kaveri even by 2019 but why when the at least 1 JF-17 is already test flying for quite a few years I believe with the WS-13 in China?
- March 18, 2017 at 3:06 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To GERALD SHASTRI: You are shying away from being accountable & unless & until you stand up for scrutiny, your queries won't be entertained. You can't have the cake & eat it as well, at least in this blog. So RIP in utopia in your beloved total privacy.
To OLD MONK: 1) Not yet, but Israel & Russia are. 2) As I explained earlier, this entire MSC concept as it now exists is a misnomer. The reality is something totally different since the envisaged concepts of offensive operations in various TBAs both to the north & the north-east cannot be implemented if one is to believe all that is being peddled about the MSC. 2) WS-13????? Even the WS-10A is far from being fielded as a mature design & you're jumping straight to WS-13! China still is years away from service-inducting a home-grown turbofan that can match the AL-31F in terms of operating parameters & service life.
- March 18, 2017 at 3:33 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
"A beginning was made at the Conference by signing of two agreements between HAL and United Aircraft Corp and United Engine Corp of Russia, for general terms and conditions governing long-term supply of spares and rendering technical assistance over five years for the IAF's Su-30MKI fleet."
At last the guaranteed integrated logistics package has been inked, following negotiations that began (believe it or not) in 2009. Under this scheme, the JV called Indo Russian Aviation Ltd (IRAL) will own & manage complete bonded warehouses (for both the IAF & export customers) containing ALL reqd rotables & consumables for the Su-30MKI, in addition, to spare AL-31FPs. So by the year's end, Su-30MKI fleet's serviceability/availability levels will go beyond 75% even during peacetime.
- March 18, 2017 at 3:42 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
A 13,000-year old 15-tonne satellite called BLACK KNIGHT (discovered in 1960) in polar orbit around Earth:
- March 18, 2017 at 3:55 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
2 Indian Sufi Clerics MIA in Pakistan:
They weren't detained by the ISI, but by the Federal Interior Ministry's Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).
- March 18, 2017 at 5:46 AM
He says that ADE has initiated programmes for Solar UAV and that 1 prototype is being raised for flight test and that inhouse testing has been completed. Do you have anything more on that?
- March 18, 2017 at 6:09 AM
- Pierre Zorin said...
Gerry Shastri - Eh bien Monsieur détective que je n'avais aucune idée sur les personnes. Il se trouve être mon nom !
Now let me see - possibly over 50, academic background, frequented the UK or even based in the UK, somewhat finds whiskey quite delectable? How am I doing?
Anyway-this is a PKS shrine so hopefully we can all approach the throne of PKS to get our appetites filled and not distract him by any personal jibes :)
If I was able to, I would have no hesitation in conferring Foreign Ministry, Defence and Ministry of technology Industry and Commerce to Mon. PKS LoL
- March 18, 2017 at 8:09 AM
hi prasun
give us a write up of the raad misile , as w e know is it is of south african origin . Also now the hq-9 missile adds a new dimension of threat ow do we deal with it .does it have a active seeker?.
why cant the IMR seeker of the brahmos be jammed ?
Israel and russia in collaboration for emp warheads? strange bedfellow indeed.Why isnt US complaining ?. why cant we join them at lest with money?
why should russia stop th e engines supply to the chinks for the fc-31 is there any reason?
you mentioned brahmos block3 had to remove internal tanks for weight reduction? can you explain this ?
- March 18, 2017 at 11:34 AM
ministry's efforts to bring about the desired reforms have, however, shown mixed results so far. While the revenue outlays have been increasing, the capital outlays have seen troughs and crests in the last four years.they have been unable to build up the infrastructure required for capacity building such as training schools and laboratories, and procuring additional vehicles and boats, arms and ammunitions, computers and surveillance equipment, etc.
how do compare this with china internal budget and ur analysis in this subject?
- March 18, 2017 at 11:44 AM
- Senthil Kumar said...
Dear Prasun,
Is it true that Pakistan stops shelling because of DRDO Swathi Radar.
S.Senthil Kumar
- March 18, 2017 at 12:03 PM
Prasun da,
India's corps headquarters in Ladakh have noticed a steady build up in the launch pad facilities for artillery armour and aircraft across the Aksai Chin border. It estimates that the Chinese have reduced their launch time from a previously estimated two to three weeks to ten to twelve days. The Indians have noticed a bunching of military exercises closer to the Line of Control, which again shortens the time the Chinese need to start an offensive. And most ominous of all, a sharp increase in unmanned surveillance and missile defences against aircraft.
Against this activity on the other side, much needed and long promised weaponry has yet to reach the XIV corps from our side. Nor has it received any instructions on what is happening and what to prepare for. Today its military planners fear that were hostilities to begin in Ladakh, Pakistan may not be able to resist the temptation to pour Mujahideen into Kashmir.India's only advantage is that its airbases are at low altitudes and its aircraft can carry more fuel and weapons when they take off than their Chinese counterparts. But their capacity for giving Indian soldiers air cover has been severely eroded in the past two years by China's rapid buildup of ground-to-air missiles and very sophisticated cyber war capabilities.
Pravin Sawhney and Ghazala Wahab, authors of a recent book, Dragon on our Doorstep, have concluded that India will lose in case there is a war with China........
Although most likely China will not go for war against india but What do you think of our own capability against China and can we counter China If the hostilities arise?????
- March 18, 2017 at 2:04 PM
Dear Sir
There is a RECENT News of PAF getting Many New Stand Off Weapons Integrated with JF 17
Please Read this Link and Give your Views
PAF's strategy is to get as many Stand off Weapons as It can
It does Not want its JF 17s to come near IAF Fighters
- March 18, 2017 at 4:53 PM
- buddha said...
Really shocking to know the truth of innumerable incidents of broken arrows....
I have seen previously few of them documented on YouTube...sir is there any such incident regarding Indian nuclear project...
- March 18, 2017 at 6:29 PM
You are way off. I am 21, middle class background, India based, love beer and wine, find whisky unpalatable.
And I'm grateful that it's not upto you to confer titles on anybody.
- March 18, 2017 at 7:07 PM
- Sam said...
Sir, as always, thank you for your reply. Regarding the FGFA, it was that several commentators (like Carlo Kopp) have said that from a tail-on aspect, the aircraft being distinctly unstealthy and more akin to the Su-27 family. So, that is why I asked whether the Russians would consider redesigning the aft portion of the aircraft to make it competitive with F-22 and F-35 in the stealth department. (I'm no expert in stealth tech. So if the question is stupid, please excuse me)
Thanks in advance!
- March 18, 2017 at 7:12 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To OLD MONK: That is just an experimental endeavour without any identified operational application, i.e. none of the 3 armed services have such a reqmt.
To RAD: The write-up already exists since 2009 in my previous blo (trishulgroup.blogspot.com). Not HQ-9, but FD-2000 & it is not being made available to the PAF, rest assured. FD-2000 is a clone of the 1980s era S-300P & it can be jammed with today's high-power jammers of the type developed by DARE & shown at Aero India 2017. Any IMR seeker can be jammed but fact-of-life is that there will hardly be any time left to initiate jamming. Plus, jammers can't be installed along every road, bridge, culvert, or runway. The RD-93 turbofan is of 1980s vintage that emits highly visible plumes & so it is not the engine of choice for stealthy platforms. Russia also does not want any twin-engined MRCA from China to pose any competition to its Su/MiG families of MRCAs. Weight reduction was for BrahMos-A.
To RON: China faces a far greater & bigger problem due to the sheer size of its People's Armed Police. In India, the CAPFs aren't used the way they ought to be, i.e. CAPFs are not meant for border management or border domination. Such roles are best fulfilled by paramilitary outfits whose officer cadres hail from the Army.
To SENTHIL KUMAR: LoLz! Deliveries of Swathi WLRs began only last year & in mountainous terrain such radars are next-to-useless, as dictated by the laws of physics. They are effective only in the plains.
- March 18, 2017 at 7:28 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To ANIK: LoLz! Those inferences are all of 2010 vintage when the IA under Gen V K Singh as COAS was trying out all means in order to secure funding for the envisaged MSC. Consequently, all kinds of worst-case scenarios devoid of logic/common-sense were peddled around. Most of the books that have been published since then have all made such doomsday scenarios as their foundational benchmarks. In reality, what is almost always discarded are on-the-ground factoids like these: 95% of the PLA exercises mimmicking deployments inside TAR have been carried out in Xinjiang, Sichuan & Yunnan provinces & only 5% inside TAR & this is because only ethnic Tibetans can sustain long durations of stay inside TAR since they have been acclimatised over several generations for surviving such harsh living conditions. The average Han from everywhere else in China does does not have the biorhythmn reqd for enduring such conditions. That's why back in 1962 the PLA could not muster more than a Brigade worth of troops for offensive operations in Aksai Chin. The only area where the PLA was able to muster overwhelming strength was in the lower reaches of southeastern Arunachal Pradesh (then called NEFA) bordering Yunnan & these are all highlands, not exactly mountainous terrain. And that's why the GoI is now carrying out mammoth railway track-laying activities throughout north-east India. As these make good progress, they will act as catalysts for the creation of new ground-based infrastructure like radar stations, field/air-defence artillery & armoured vehicles storage facilities, helicopter bases, etc etc.
To VIJAY: That's typical propaganda emanating from a national security state! REK from GIDS is nothing but the FT family of PGMs that have been available from NORINCO since 2008 & they all make use of FOG-based navigation systems of Norwegian origin. Only difference is that the FT family of PGMs are orange in colour, while the REK-based PGMs are green in colour. Using guiding fins and a FOG-aided inertial navigation system, a range extension kit-equipped bomb can land within 30 metres of its target. It has wings that unfold in flight to triple the range from 15 miles (24km) to over 45 miles (72km) whern launched from altitudes above 14,000 feet. The modular nature of the kit means that it can be easily upgraded as technology improves and options such as improved laser sensors, GPS jamming immunity and an all-weather radar sensors can be added later. Hence, if a layered, in-depth AAA network is in place, then hostile aircraft armed with such PGMs will be engageable from a distance of 80km away from targets like air bases.
To BUDDHA: India's strategic weapons are always kept in a disassembled, recessed state & therefore there can't be any Broken Arrow-type incidents occurring in India.
- March 18, 2017 at 7:33 PM
Isnt the solar powered UAV ISTAR platform that can undertake long missions?
"Yes, Army and IAF have asked us to develop the solarpowered HALE UAV. Initial work is in progress for such a drone which can undertake a 15-day continuous flight over 30,000-feet," DRDO's chief controller R&D (aeronautics) Dr Prahlada told TOI in 2011.
- March 18, 2017 at 7:42 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SAM: LoLz! When any inbound target is detected, what comes first, the frontal section or tail-section?
To OLD MONK; In the list of on-going DRDO projects, is there any mention of such a platform being developed?
To JOHN: Only those countries that are NATO member-states or that are partners of the US through formal military treaties will be able to access all the force-multiplier capabilities of the F-35 JSF. Since India does not come into such categories, the F-35, even if acquired, won't give the IAF or IN any decisive edge due to the absence of force-myltiplier capabilities. If the RAC MiG proposal for AMCA was better than that of Sukhoi OKB's, then don't you think the Ruskies themselves would have opted for it?
- March 18, 2017 at 10:31 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SAM: LoLz! When any inbound target is detected, what comes first, the frontal section or tail-section? Is the inbound aircraft advancing towards its target in reverse, i.e. the tail-section in front & the nose-section pointing rearward? Maybe Carlo Kopp reckons it does, but certainly not the rest of the world.
To OLD MONK: In the list of on-going DRDO projects, is there any mention of such a platform being developed?
To JOHN: Only those countries that are NATO member-states or that are partners of the US through formal military treaties will be able to access all the force-multiplier capabilities of the F-35 JSF. Since India does not come into such categories, the F-35, even if acquired, won't give the IAF or IN any decisive edge due to the absence of force-multiplier capabilities. If RAC MiG's proposal for AMCA was better than that of Sukhoi OKB's, then don't you think the Ruskies themselves would have opted for it?
- March 18, 2017 at 10:36 PM
Arent only the details of Major projects that cost more than Rs. 100 Cr gets mentioned in the list of DRDO projects?
- March 18, 2017 at 10:44 PM
- Gd said...
Hi Prasun,
I found this analysis interesting... What's your take?
- March 18, 2017 at 11:32 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To OLD MONK: So in your estimation, is it possible to develop a fully functional prototype of a HALE-UAV under a Rs.101-crore budget? Has such a feat been accomplished by anyone else in the world to date?
To PIERRE ZORIN: LoLz! Punters like GERALD SHASTRI are like those water fountains that sprout out every now & then & then lie low for prolonged periods due to their paranoia WRT exposure in public life, meaning they inevitably have a very low sense of self-esteem. And there's nothing we can do about them except condemning them to their insecure states of existence. If only they could take modest steps to upgrade themselves--like reading books like these (http://www.amazon.in/Pakistans-Procurement-Military-Buildup-1979-99/dp/0333731727/ref=sr_1_7/256-3283094-4555248?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1489856860&sr=1-7&keywords=ayesha+siddiqa), then they would not have bothered to have themselves self-certified as thoroughbred arseholes. Not only do they excel in marketing themselves as the world's laughing stock, they also without fail do so at India's expense.
- March 19, 2017 at 12:36 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To GD: Here are the observations:
Claim: While they cannot and will not change the territorial dispensation of Kashmir, they do effectively focus international attention on the so-called 'Kashmir dispute,' which in turn prompts international calls for dialogue.
Reality: Totally untrue, because at the UNGA's annual session every September, only Pakistan raises the J & K issue. None of the other UN member-states even mention this issue in their speeches, meaning they just don't care.
Claim: Finally, the use of proxies confers some degree of plausible deniability which hinders India's ability to argue persuasively for punitive actions bilaterally or by the United Nations. Complicating this scenario is Pakistan's explicit reliance upon its ever-expanding nuclear arsenal to raise the cost of Indian action and to draw in international actors to shield Pakistan from the consequences of its actions.
Reality: How can Pakistani citizens caught alive inside J & K along with traceable GPS receivers & I-com sets bought in Pakistan (as confirmed by their Japanese distributors) be denied, leave alone plausibly?
Claim: To date, India has generally opted to use "strategic restraint," which has generally involved not responding to Pakistan-sponsored terrorism militarily.
Reality: Totally wrong. India has also responded diplomatically & economically.
Claim: Whether India is making a strategic decision or simply making a virtue out of inability to act otherwise, India is essentially accepting that dozens, if not hundreds, of Indians will continue to die as a transaction cost of India's economic growth.
Reality: Totally wrong. Since August 2014 Indian retaliatory artillery fire-assaults have exacted a heavy toll on Pakistani military/civilian lives across both the IB & LoC, which forced Pakistan to back off for prolonged periods.
Claim: Does it make sense for India to initiate war over a terrorist strike? If India were to launch a limited aims war with the intent of seizing valuable territory before the international community intervenes and use that territory as a bargaining chip to force Pakistan to concede to a comprehensive peace, would that peace hold? How can India ensure that the war remains limited?
Reality: Wrong interpretation of ground realities & international law. It was never about seizing valuable sovereign territory of Pakistan, but about recapturing what is occupied territory, i.e. PoK. And post-9/11, the right to self-defence legally authorises India under various UNSC resolutions to pre-emptively strike inside Pakistani territory close to the WB & LoC, & also undertake hot-pursuit military operations.
Cont'd below...
- March 19, 2017 at 5:03 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
Claim: For these reasons, I argue that India should pursue military operations other than war in the near term.
Reality: No way. Doing so will make lose all moral ascendancy in the eyes of the world. Instead, India should exercise her legal right to militarily liberate PoK from Pakistan's illegal occupation.
Claim: One of the puzzling aspects of Indian behaviour is that it has generally demurred from engaging in sub-conventional operations in Pakistan in the recent past.
Reality: Such sub-conventional operations have been undertaken several times before since 1991 but they have yet to be made public. Only some have come into the public domain so far.
Claim: In the 1980s, then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi ordered the Research and Evaluation Wing (RAW) to establish two covert groups: one to target Pakistan generally and another to target Khalistan groups in Pakistan. The two groups were responsible for carrying out insurgency inside Pakistan. A low-grade but steady campaign of bombings in major Pakistani cities, notably Karachi and Lahore, were carried out.
Reality: That's the popular perception propagated by Pakistan. In reality, R & AW was primarily tasked to monitor the terror-financing trails/sources that were based in Canada, the US, the UK, Germany & Southeast Asia. No Indian agency ever took part in any form of direct plausibly deniable kinetic operations anywhere outside India.
Claim: In recent years, India has flirted with giving a fillip to the Baloch insurgency.
Reality: Wrong again. India has never financed or supplied any hardware for any Baloch insurgency. Lending moral or political support does not automatically translate into direct material military support of the kind Pakistan has engaged in within J & K.
Cont'd below...
- March 19, 2017 at 5:04 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
Claim: Instead, India should focus its efforts on degrading groups like the LeT, Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) as well as their enablers in and out of uniform.
Reality: It won't work as replacements for such expendables can easily be found inside Pakistan today. The only way coercive compellance will work is to directly attack & degrade the overall commanders & controllers, i.e. the personnel of the PA along the IB in the Chicken's Neck Area & all along the LoC.
Claim: Additionally, India's historic ties to Afghan intelligence may also be a propitious partnership to undertake operations in Pakistan.
Reality: Not necessary at all. Instead, India should militarily help beef up the conventional capabilitirs of the ANA & Afghan Air Force so that they can militarily dominate the Durand Line everytiome the PA or FC launch artillery fire-assaults inside Afghanistan.
Claim: Clearly these kinds of raids are not adequate to degrade the terrorist organisations' ability to conduct strikes even if they are an important kind of operation that must be performed routinely.
Reality: Declaratory corss-LoC raids by India in a sustained manner over a 6-month period will come as a debilitating psychological shock to the already stretched PA, especially at a time when the PA is financially constrained due nto the need for spending money on raising the CPEC-related Special Security Force & the new wings of the FC for the Durand Line.
- March 19, 2017 at 5:05 AM
Dear Prasun,
I really like reading your accounts on what IAF/IA/IN and action plans, but it is very important to preempt the enemy. What in your assessment would be the targets of PAF and PA ..... and what will be there goals ....... and what do u think if you are on the other side would do with your resources.......
Kind regards,
- March 19, 2017 at 11:00 AM
hi prasun
there are
literature that claim that the raad is already integrated on the jf-17. it should be possible as they make it .?
how can the Brazilian mar-1 be integrated will they give them codes?
now there is talk that the super su-30 mki aesa radar is open architecture and any missile can be integrated like the meteor and astra etc , fantasy?
there seems to be confusing literature on the engine of the sukhoi upgrade! 1 ) the su 35 engine 2) the engine that powers the future pakfa?
why will not the chinks supply the fd-2000 to pak? what stops them ? after all they will try do the same thing if we supply missiles to vietnam
indian companies have pics of laser guided bombs in their product list ? is it so complicated to make one? what is the critical system tough to make ?
- March 19, 2017 at 11:53 AM
- Harsh Kumar said...
Hi Prasunda,
please see the link below from Hindutan Times
Need your help to understand the repercussion of this on our claim on Gilgit Baltistan.
Thanks and regrads,
Harsh Kumar
- March 19, 2017 at 12:19 PM
- The Engdoc Society said...
Very Good Info on Su30 MKI spares part. U keep updating us on range of topics
Sometimes I wonder is there something u do not know?
PZ is right in proclaiming the following above
"If I was able to, I would have no hesitation in conferring Foreign Ministry, Defence and Ministry of technology Industry and Commerce to Mon"
It's being requested to do a further post on Su30 MKI Upgrade program viz.
1. How many will be upgraded In India And how many in Russia
2. Features and Improvements wrt current Features mainly radar, Missiles, Stealth, Strategic Weapons Delivery
3. How many aircraft will be upgraded
4. Cost of Upgrading the Same and When will the contact be signed, start and Finish of the deliverables
5. What league it will put upgraded Su30 MKI into
6. Any alteration of Infrastructure, Bases and enhancement of training Required for IAF
7. Advantage IAF will get over PAF and PLAAF
- March 19, 2017 at 2:55 PM
You have any picture of the new OFB 7.62x51 mm rifle undergoing tests for the IA that you can post here? There is a complete absence of it on internet or maybe I have not come across it.
- March 19, 2017 at 5:04 PM
- Senthil Kumar said...
Dear Prasun,
Is India-Israel Barak-8 is equivalent to Arrow Anti Missile System or more advance than that.
S.Senthil Kumar
- March 19, 2017 at 5:16 PM
- himanshu vij said...
Hi sir
What's your view on recent announcement by OFB REGARDING
1 export of artillery she'll to uae for 235 crore
( Will this deal take place ? if yes then will we supply them only she'll or ready to fir ammunition ?
2 OFB Trichipalli recent announcement of Indian am version is that ghatak slr or a different one ? & They are manufacturing some 4000 units , how much more would be ordered according to u.
3 yesterday OFB said in attaining complete self sufficiency in ammunition , when will we would be able to achieve complete effeciency in ammunition ?
4 what's your view on war like scenario arising in between Pak & India , ( I asked u earlier u didn't answered )
5 when is new blog will come up ? Regarding LCA Tejas ??? Or any other issue ?
Thank u
- March 19, 2017 at 6:27 PM
China is set to increase the number of its marine corps from 20,000 to one lakh for planned overseas deployment.Marines to be deployed at Gwadar port in Pakistan and military logistics base in Djibouti in the Indian Ocean.Chinese navy ships expected to dock at Gwadar in the near future.Zhang Huachen, deputy commander of the East Sea Fleet, said, "With our naval strategy changing now, we are going from coastal defense to FAR SEA DEFENSE." He added, "With the expansion of the country's economic interests, the navy wants to better protect the country's transportation routes and the safety of our major sea lanes."
Please give your views.
- March 19, 2017 at 10:57 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To SUVO: The expansion of the PLAN's Marine Corps has nothing to do with regional expeditionary capabilities, instead it is all about garrisoning, i.e. positioning armed personnel on the reclaimed islands in the Spratlys & Paracels for anti-seaborne invasion missions, & guarding of China-owned shore-based infrastructure (like warehouses & berths) in areas like Djibouti & Gwadar. In Gwadar, which is a deep-sea port, no sane navy will position any warships there because one cannot construct breakwaters that are reqd for securing the warships while they are berthed alongside. So, the PLAN's Marines will be employed for providing proximate security to all Chinese civilians that will be based at Gwadar. The PLAN warships will secure logistics replenishments from the naval base at Ormara, not Gwadar.
To HIMANSHU VIJ: 1) Yes,. It is signed-n-sealed deal for live 155mm rounds. 2) OFB Trichy's SLR is called the Trichy Assault Rifle & it's meant for some CAPFs only. Ghaatak SLR is from OFB Ishapore. 3) It's a pipe-dream. Till this day all ammo (which are reqd in very limited quantities every year) meant for all 20mm & 30mm cannons of all IAF combat aircraft are being imported & it is impossible to produce them locally. 4) After all the weblinks I have posted over the past 1 year that describe in great detail the parlous state of Pakistan's economy & its financial indebtedness, how can any sane person even imagine that Pakistan will be able to wage any kind of war against anyone! 5) Very soon.
To SENTHIL KUMAR: They are two different types of SAMs meant for 2 totally different missions.
To MANU SINGH: I had already posted its photo in the Aero India 2017 thread.
To The ENGDOC SOCIETY: 1) The first two Su-30MKIs will be upgraded in Russia while the rest will be upgraded by HAL. 2) Those were all detyailed in an earlier thread sometime in 2011 itself. 3) All will be upgraded but this does not mean that all will be able to fire BrahMos-A or Nirbhay ALCM. 4) About US$12 million per aircraft. 5) It will be best available air-dominance MRCA. 6) No. 7) PAF does not & will not possess any twin-engined MRCA in the foreseeable future, while the will have to make do with PESA-MMrs at best.
- March 20, 2017 at 4:00 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To HARSH KUMAR: LoLz! That's known as creating/inventing fake news through false insinuations. In my view, such writers should be sacked for spreading blatant falsehoods. For instance, the CPEC isn't even mentioned. Here's what is mentioned:
Besides the BRI, the resolution also mentions other projects like "regional development projects, such as the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project, the Central Asia South Asia Electricity Transmission and Trade Project, the Chabahar port project agreed between Afghanistan, India and the Islamic Republic of lran".
In other words, it is all about multilateral regional connectivity. CPEC on the other hand is a bilateral project between China & Pakistan. In fact, Indians should rejoice due to the mention of the Chah Bahar FTIZ.
To RAD: LoLz! There was a very good reason that the Ra'ad was designed & developed by DENEL of South Africa: this ALCM was originally meant for use by the SAAF's Atlas Cheetah MRCAs (South African clones of theDassault Mirage 3/5) & hence all its mechanical & electrical interfaces are specific to the Mirage-3/-5 MRCA families. They therefore cannot be replicated for any other type of MRCA. Hence, all visuals of JF-17s carrying Ra'ad are photoshopped artworks by fanboys. WRT MAR-1, doesn't Brazil too fly Mirage-3/-5 families of MRCAs? Has PAC Kamra ever shown any JF-17 armed with MAR-1s during any air show abroad? It only showed the MAR-1 alongside a JF-17 during the IDEAS-2016 expo last year & that too only for ornamental purposes! And folks without any technical background are obviously confused between an open-architecture avionics suite (i.e. a reprogrammable MIL-STD-1553B digibus) & fire-control MMRs! Such delusional jokers should be asked that if ineed any MMR is 'open-architecture' then where's the need for sharing any source-codes? And Russia has never shared source-codes for any of its MMRs that have been supplied for the IAF to date. The turbofans powering the Su-35 now also power the T-50 PAK-FA & will also power the Super Su-30MKIs in future, i.e.the AL-41F. And don't equate the T-50 PAK-FA with the FGFA. The two are totally different. As for FD-2000, Russia in late instructed China to desist from selling the FD-2000 to anyone else. The sale of S-400s to China was conditional on thast note. As for gliding LGBs, they are fast becoming obsolete since they can glide up to only 12km. Rocket-powered PGMs using laser/TV/IIR guidance like AASM/HAMMER can be launched from areas 50km away from their targets. Hence most of the new-generation PGMs now available are rocket-powered.
To SJ: The PAF's targets will be the very same that were targetted in 1865 & 1971, i.e. the IAF's forward air bases in J & K. Punjab, Rajasthan & Gujarat. The PA's TBAs will always remain the Shakargarh Bulge & Chicken's Neck area.
- March 20, 2017 at 4:01 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
India's Longest Road Tunnel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=in3dHvbli34
It has taken nearly 6 years for the project's completion, since the work started on May 23, 2011 in the lower Himalayan mountain range. The twin-tube tunnel, at an elevation of 1,200 metres and part of a 286km-long four-lane project on the highway, has been built at a cost of over Rs. 3,720 crore. The 9.2km-long Integrated tunnel control system (ITCS), which is hallmark of selective few countries in the world, will ensure automatic control of tunnel lighting, ventilation, communication, fire-control, vehicle monitoring et al. The tunnel will cut down the distance between two points on the highway from 41km to 10.89km. It will eventually make the Valley accessible by an all-weather road and avoid the biggest stumbling block, the landslide-prone stretch at Patnitop. The tunnel and approach roads provide 11km alternative route for 41km of the existing national highway. In addition to the main tunnel, it will have a parallel escape tunnel for the evacuation of commuters in case of any eventuality. The two tubes of the tunnel will be internally connected through 29 cross-passages (each after a gap of 300 meters) and the escape tunnel will be used exclusively by pedestrians. Everything is automatic. There are two ducts in the tunnel –one for fresh air and another for exhausting the polluted air. There are CCTVs, fight fighting equipment and communication systems installed all along the route. If anything goes wrong the people sitting in the control room will come to know instantly. The NHAI is also constructing another major road tunnel--8.45km-long Banihal Qazigund stretch--on the Srinagar Jammu national highway, which will again cut down the distance between two towns by 16km. The Kashmir Valley is also being connected by a 292km-long train link from Udhampur in Jammu to Baramulla in Kashmir. The Rs 11,000-crore rail link is divided into three sections—Udhampur-Katra, Katra-Qazigund and Qazigund-Baramulla. The first and third stretch of the rail link has been made operational. But the train to valley will become reality only when middle 148km-long section will be completed. This stretch will have the world's tallest railway bridge–359 metres tall--on the Chenab River in Reasi district.
- March 20, 2017 at 4:02 AM
- Pierre Zorin said...
Prasun did you mean S-300 sold to China conditionally? Didn't realise they had s-400 as well ahead of India.
- March 20, 2017 at 6:50 AM
hi prasun
if the mars -1 arm and the raad missile are purpose built for the mirage 3 series then i deduce that once the air frame life is over, then the missiles will be of no use? how will they let it happen after spending so much time and money>
how will the x band aesa radar of the sukhoi be able to jam the s band pesa radar of pak like the yl-2 series that are in s band ?.
how will the active expendable decoys of russian origin be integrated with dare ew stuff? are the good enough to the selex models.Does israel make them>?
can you give us dope on the latest Israeli aesa jammer equal to the spectra and vigilius?
what band will the wing and trail mounted aesa radars work on? i presume jamming is also a function of the aesa radars as well? how do they compare with jamming capability of the virgilius system?
i very much agree that the glide bombs are short ranged ! but why is the DRDO making them ?
If gwador is guarded by chinese marines and battle ships, what is the situation in a war with pak ? will they dare us to bomb them ?which very likely.what can we do?
as kalyani is making a small jet engine does it make sense to use it to make a jet engine powered glider bomb for increase range fired at low level or make air launched decoys by the hundreds? i am sure it is do able.
is super sukhoi deal done ?when will be receiving the first samples?
- March 20, 2017 at 11:35 AM
Hi Prasun,
Is there any truth to this report claiming that Brahms's was integrated with SU30-MKI without any help from the OEM?
Best Regards
- March 20, 2017 at 6:52 PM
Prasunda, What is the so called Pak's New Concept of War Fighting (NCWF), its operational relevance, limitations and challenges, and how does it aims to safeguard itself from India's Cold Start Doctrine and the 'Proactive Operations' (PAO) strategy to wage a 'Limited war' against Pakistan in the near future?
- March 20, 2017 at 6:53 PM
hi prasun
brahmos integrated without russian help??!! i belive they went to russia for structural mods. either it is a big lie or something that should be congratulated!!? what about the interfacing of Russian radar with brahmos avionics!?
- March 20, 2017 at 11:15 PM
- Gd said...
Hi Prasun,
Thank you so much for helping me understand the outsiders perspective vs insiders perspective.
Thank you once again for taking pains to explain it all in detail.
You are a very generous man Mr. Sengupta.
- March 20, 2017 at 11:31 PM
What are the current developments regarding the following mentioned in the TECHNOLOGY PERSPECTIVE AND CAPABILITY ROADMAP :
1. In future, HPM weapons may be used to counter incoming anti-ship/anti-aircraft/ anti-tank missiles or to prevent other ships/aircraft from approaching too closely.
2. With the advent of anti-satellite weapons (ASAT) a concept of 'watchdog satellites' to guard other satellites could also be explored.
3. The next generation of submarines could carry a number of UUVs capable of penetrating shallow rivers or canals while the mother submarine lies safely out in deeper water. The UUVs could also be used as forward sensors, as a means to detect minefields or as weapon carriers.
4. Develop advanced precision delivery ASW weapons for all-altitude attack of target at any
depth and at long ranges with high success criteria. The weapons would need to
be light-weight, perform engagements at high speeds and be equipped with
intelligence, loiter and self detection capabilities.
5. Development of super-cavitating air-launched underwater weapons including high speed torpedoes with extended ranges.
6. Development of intelligent air launched torpedoes with loiter and self detection capabilities.
7. Sea Glider which can achieve 1-3 knot cruise speeds, a 1200-1500 km range, and the ability to remain on-station for up to 6 months in loitering glides at partial buoyancy.
- March 21, 2017 at 1:00 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To PIERRE ZORIN: China has since the 1990s procured the S-300PMU1, S-300PMU2 & S-400 from Russia. Vietnam too has procured the S-300PMU2. And (LoLz!) unlike many in India, no one in China & Vietnam cribs & cries about why has Russia supplied such weapons to both countries.
To RAJ & RAD: LoLz! It has happened like this: airframes of all Su-30MK family-members are certified & built for accommodating belly-mounted missiles like Yakhont or BrahMos-A. So the only outstanding piece of work reqd to be done is to achieve pneumatic (for the BrahMos-A's ejection pylon), electrical (for powering the pylon) & electronic (i.e. by ensuring that there's no EMI from the wingtip-mounted HBJ pods that will affect the BrahMos-A's avionics inside the missile) for systems integration. This again is easily done since BrahMos Aerospace is a JV between NPOM & DRDO & therefore NPOM—which has all the reqd quantum of validated data for such integration-related/launch-related systems due to its earlier involvement with the Yakhont—has already supplied all the reqd data to HAL via the DRDO.
To JABAR: Didn't you know what's NVWF? Essentially, it means fighting a virtual war with imagined enemies. Any country that's financially bankrupt cannot sustain any kind of conventional military conflict. So, the only available option then is to keep bluffing, via posturing. Therefore, at the policy-level, there's no warfighting policy. The posturing takes forms like this:
And the best way to nullify/discredit such posturing is to call the bluff, by for instance launching declaratory cross-LoC raids as was done on September 28 last year. And what then was the response? Total panic, followed by stringent denials by the PA of such raids having taking place. Why these denials? Because if no such raids took place, then there was no need to retaliate in kind or proportionately. Had Pakistan admitted that such raids took place, it would then have been forced to retaliate militarily, but it chose not to simply because it was incapable of doing so. Why was it incapable? Because it today suffers from a substantial degree of both numerical & qualitative inferiority on land, at sea & in the air against India. Let this therefore be the best explanation for every MORON who believes when commenting in this blog that military skirmishes between India & Pakistan will lead to/escalate to all-out war!!!
- March 21, 2017 at 4:39 AM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
Meanwhile, tantalising revelations by certain former Pakistani ministers from the PPP party are now throwing new light on why the spate of beheadings of IA soldiers along the LoC began in mid-2011 & what was the objective of launching such missions by the PA. Let's see if the 'desi' journalists are going to cover this issue or not.
- March 21, 2017 at 4:46 AM
- The Indian said...
Prasun,they will for the Indian media is the worst in the world!It appears to me that they are functioning on the basis of payments and favours from our enemies!Eg M/s Barkha, Rajdeep & party!Could you kindly post links for the above mentioned subject!
- March 21, 2017 at 10:49 AM
Prasun da
1)Please put some light on this:
2) In 2005 Army had ordered 43 NAMICA launchers and Nag missile but they are still not inducted. Do you think Nag missile will be inducted this year.
3) Test of K4 missile was supposed to happen in February but it was postponed.Why?? Probable date of the rescheduled test??
4) What is RudraM 2 project undertaken by DRDO??
5) Do you have any pic of NGARM.
- March 21, 2017 at 11:08 AM
cant this be used by GTRE or HAL for development of Jet engine or flight testing?
- March 21, 2017 at 5:03 PM
there is this talk of the jf-17 being modified into a fly by wire system ,i understand it has got fbw in pitch , but can a normal aircraft be converted into a fbw ac ?
the rd-93 is not a reliable engine, have there been crashes due to that because we have had some crashes on the mig-29 due to engine problems.
the indian version of the pakfa seems to be a totally new design as per some russian reports, is it affordable to do that?
- March 21, 2017 at 5:15 PM
India's access to force-multiplying conventional military technologies will make it increasingly easy for India to wage limited, high intensity, short wars but don't you agree that ending such conflicts, however, will not be as easy and will depend on highly fluid dynamics that neither India nor Pakistan can adequately predict before the conflict starts, such as the use of TNW or NBMs which can make India go for massive preemptive counterforce first strike against Pakistan and escalate it to an all-out war?
Is it true that Pak has real-time intelligence and accurate target acquisition capability for its missiles and other strike platforms, provided by the BeiDou-2 sats?
- March 21, 2017 at 5:28 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
To GOPICHAND: LoLz! Looks like you have no desire to break out of your MORONIC state of existence! Don't you even know that the wars of 1965, 1971 & 1999 were all terminated at India's initiative, i.e. when India wanted hostilities to end? In all these instances there was no international intervention or intimidation & the decision was only for India to make. The only fluid dynamics therefore seems to be inside your skull, which explains the absence of any solid matter like a brain. And BeiDou in Mandarin means Compass. It is a GPS navigation satellite constellation & not any kind of overhead recce satellite. Need any more proof that you're indeed afflicted with terminal stupidity???
To RON: Why should any engine developed for supersonic flight regime be subjected to tests in a hypersonic wind-tunnel? Secondly, what are wind-tunnels used for? Testing airframe designs or engines?
- March 21, 2017 at 7:06 PM
- Prasun K. Sengupta said...
What the writer fails to mention is that unlike the Sino-Nepal border that is totally fenced & monitored in real-time by a layered array of perimeter surveillance systems, there's no such thing along the India-Nepal border. If Nepal wants the India-Nepal border to be as peaceful & trouble-free as the Sino-Nepal border, then it should agree that unrestricted free movement is bizarre & unmanageable & therefore this border should be fenced as well.
- March 21, 2017 at 7:20 PM
- SUJOY MAJUMDAR said...
According to this recent ToI report, Bangladesh has informed New Delhi that close to 2000 Jihadis (backed by ISI) have entered Tripura, Assam & West Bengal.
In your opinion how can India effectively terminate these Jihadis both in India & Bangladesh?
Thanks, Sujoy
- March 21, 2017 at 9:25 PM
Thanks for the reply.
"The only fluid dynamics therefore seems to be inside your skull, which explains the absence of any solid matter like a brain."- Gola.....bolechhen dada.
- March 21, 2017 at 11:02 PM
The 2-seater jf17 has the re-designed airframe. taller tail, larger cone to hold the ASEA, irst. Apparantly still holds the same level as a single seater. The picture and commentry in the current AirForce Monthly. It looks like they are going to use this as the strike aircraft. Are they following the same mode as the F-16?
- March 21, 2017 at 11:56 PM
As per C4Defence, TAI is optimizing the PAF F-16's cockpit for night flights. Part of this program, TAI will install night-vision goggles. Thus far, two PAF F-16 Block-15s have been upgraded, with the work taking place in Shahbaz Air Base. In tandem with training, TAI will provide the PAF with 43 upgrade kits, enabling the PAF to carry out the upgrade in Pakistan. They are also reported to have sold advanced targeting pods and towed howitzer to Pakistan last year. Can you specify the details?
- March 22, 2017 at 12:45 AM
Weird- the Western names continue to surface without any blogger ID meaning identical people with multiple personalities- Finch, Antony, Ron, Leonard, John, McTavish, Vassili, - are we all morons not to be able to identify from the writing style etc that this is one and the same person with multiple identitites? What's wrong with asking under one name? Fear of being ridiculed? Let me prove by assuming a similar name and see who this is!
- March 23, 2017 at 12:38 PM
Though ur right in a way, but you are getting the names all wrong! Commenting with multiple names is totally different from having multiple personalities. What's wrong with asking under one name? Fear of being prejudiced. Ask Mon PKS.
- March 25, 2017 at 2:17 AM