Journalism at its worst - attempts to defame DRDO

[sgarg]

DRDO is responsible for the protection and security of India and its 1.2 billion inhabitants. You don't go to a war with excuses, you goto a war with weapons.

For this there are no excuses.

Instead of focussing on a 100 different things, and failing and then having to import from abroad, it would've be better and cheaper if DRDO concentrated on essentials and we imported non-essentials from the very start.

Let me tell you CLEARLY that Army and Air Force get very poor marks in managing procurements. The Services always hide behind confidentiality. The fact is Services have lost credibility.

When you blame DRDO, you forget that you yourself is the main problem. You cannot draft your requirements. You cannot plan. When you submit your requirements, that is a rehash from some brochure of a company that you like. Your planning should come from real analysis of needs from the field. Rather it comes from lobbying of foreign agents.

 

[Ray]

@Ray, China has sent students on government expense to USA for a very long time, with the sole purpose of learning and then return to China to build local factories.

None of that has ever happened in India. India spent money on BTech, these engineers went to USA and never returned.

ISRO and DRDO have been built by those engineers who did not fall into the trap of money. I agree some of these engineers and scientists may be mediocre but there are some brilliant ones too.

An army officer told me sometime back that army officers are basically mediocre (intellectually).

The best children of this country rarely become army officers. A question has to be asked why?

The military affects everything in this country including the industry. Its thinking and character molds the thinking and character of the nation.

It is not only about war and about matching weapons Pakistan or China has. The game is much bigger than that.

Do indicate some facts where the Chinese Govt sent students to the US for the sole purpose to learn and return.

One cannot compare India with China since India is a democratic country and when students go abroad to learn there is no way to guarantee they return home. In an autocratic country with a dictatorship it is very much o the cards that the parents could be held as ransom to ensure that students return.

Your army friend who claims that army officers are mediocre intellectually, must be talking of himself with his own personal experience of wallowing in mediocrity

People don't join the Army because the pay was not attractive and the rapid fluidity in location that leaves a disturbed family life not to their liking, when compared to a civil or a Govt job where life is comparatively stable. Further, there is every possibility that while folks oozes with national pride and bombast on the internet are actually in real life very scared of the possibility of a premature death under violent conditions.

if it is not 'only about war and about matching weapons Pakistan or China has. The game is much bigger than that, then what is it about and what is bigger game that you seem to alone know.

Since you seem to be knowledgeable the raison d'etre for having a standing army that is 'only about war and about matching weapons Pakistan or China has, I surely wait with bated breath to know that raison d'etre and the rational wherein not having matching weapon and better application of operational art is par for the course.

 

[Ray]

@Ray, I have seen this discussion for last 15 years with amusement. In my view, the primary constraint is not DRDO but public sector DPSUs. If India allowed private companies to build weapons, then a much better industrial infrastructure would have been created in the country.

All our successes in space sector and defence sector are in projects where private industry has been involved extensively. Even our SSBN is ready now due to work of L&T.

It is all about efficiency and commitment. Just as our soldiers are expected to do their job, other citizens must also have the same standards.

DRDO may have been wrong on many counts, but it is the products developed by DRDO that will make the difference in the next war. DRDO is as critical as army or air force. The reason is when DRDO develops a product, it also develops a whole industry with it. The knowledge base created in the country helps in further development of local technology.

This is the reason I want DRDO projects to be executed with private companies exclusively. Let the fabrication be done by a major private player (for example Tata) in aero-engine project. There should be extensive collaboration between DRDO and private industrial companies.

The services are guilty of ignoring locally made products. Even when suitable products are available, army has been ignoring. I have already written about that. Your argument about sincerity of army and air force are invalid.

You have seen discussion with amusement for 15 years while I have seen the DRDO with growing alarm for the last nearly four decades.

DRDO in most case is like an albatross around the neck, It is a white elephant that has to be pampered since it is Govt agency. Take the same people and put them in a competitive mode and in a hire and fire matrix and you will find that there could not be any better scientist than them.

One of my elder brother was in the DRDO and so I know the bureaucratic attitude and obstacles that prevents them for giving their best.

Instead of sweeping generalities, could you mention which local product that has cleared the suitability and acceptability test has been rejected by the Services?

For your information, the only area the Services are involved is the UserTrials. The Technical Trials are done by the DGI and that is a civilian organisation.

 

[Ray]

I have dealt with PSUs and also worked there.
The services look at everything with fogged glasses. Services have no real idea of ground realities.
There is no security if foreign policy is hostage to supplier countries. The first rule of security is self-sufficiency.

PSUs have squandered away nation's wealth. This is a fact. The constant labour problems, no incentives for innovation, and no vision have pushed Indian defence manufacturing into the ground.

HAL is no different from other PSUs. HAL suffers from poor productivity and quality issues.

When the government has come up with plan to buy from private companies, services are making up weird reasons. It is funny to see services who vehemently complained about quality of DPSU and OFB now taking their side.

The Services don't look at issues with fogged glasses. They can't for the simple reason is that on the equipment being designed rest their OWN LIVES. For the PSUs, it is a 10 to 5 existence with a guaranteed pay cheque at the end of the month and failure or success is just a matter of details.

If the Services don't know the ground realities, then who does? The ground reality is the weapon/ equipment performance where it becomes a matter of life and death.

 

[Ray]

Like what? Like what? being senior member of this forum,you know better what DRDO has contributed.

Agni/Arihant/Akash/Prithvi/pinaka/Nirbhay/PDV/AAD/LRTR - List goes on. Keeping a blind eye with biasdness does not help anyone.

That comes out something similar to Vadra's, 'Are you serious', 'Are you serious', 'Are you serious'.

I am not biased. Can't and could not have afford being so. Nearly four decades banked on weaponry to protect the Nation and its citizens.

Always wanted own indigenous weapons since I have seen the adverse, though not insurmountable, effects of not only sanctions but also impetuous blacklisting of firms.

Always remember, it is a very hard time for the soldier when you are left holding the can, while others acquire 'rear area patriotism' without caring to equip suitably those who are fighting for the Nation's cause.

 

[Ray]

There are a number of technologies which are not easily available from foreign sources. I hope you know that every weapons sale is a political deal. When somebody sells you something which you cannot make, it always comes with conditions attached. The West typically rushes to supply an item where DRDO is close to success, just to ensure that a local industry is not developed for the item.

None of the missiles that India has today could have been imported. But missiles are not the only example.
Even a simple item like a rifle. You are unhappy with INSAS, you can go for imported one. But you know that you have INSAS as fallback in case the import is blocked.

Have you interacted with the DRDO?

They are always close to success, but that success, as per our experience, is as elusive and distant that leaves what then Gen Maneckshaw noted the one liner on file to the Defence Minister, Jagjivan Ram - my Army is naked.

Everything in life comes with conditions. Is that a new phenomenon? The Americanism -there is nothing called a free lunch - is so apt to describe the conditionality.

The missiles may not be imported, but the know how is as I indicated by appending an extract from an article in an earlier post.

Again, you are half baked in your accusation. I am one who is a great votary for the INASAS since I have used it and I have no quibbles, more so since the defects have been rectified.

Further, I have repeatedly pointed out to the posters and others that one should not go for equipment based on the glossies. It has to be suited for our operational needs and the terrain that it has to be used in.

I am well aware of many foreign equipment that was thrust on us for trials, which though served some purpose in some terrain, were not found suitable in others. Such equipment were rejected.

So, quit generalisations and tout flashes in the pan.