It seems like some countries like pakistan and China try their best to reverse engineer even complex weapons systems with fairly good success. The Chinese have taken it a step further by using the diaspora Chinese immigrants who are US citizens working for major US defense firms as a major source of technical espionage. The number of Chinese American scientists busted for transfering American classified technology is quite high. That's only the tip of the iceberg....who knows how many are still peddling secrets who have not been caught. Even when they are caught...its very hard to prove the case. India on the other hand does not seem to be very interested with reverse engineering, but more so because they want to develop everything themselves. Reverse engineering is a great way to close the gap on the learning curve that can take decades. Why cant India take the same route ??
reverse engineering should not be a problem for india but doing it lose respect and access to new technology which is ever changing.that explains why india has access to the west,israel and russsia while china has none.playing good helps!!!
Chinese quest to reverse engineering driven by their National Will, hence they can go to any length to make their Armed forces much more powerful. In contrast, country like India lacking in its National Will and hence still legging far behind as compared to China. At the same time, India have opted for reverse engineering, but it was a total failure.
I agree with ppgj. India has access to Russian and US weapon technologies while for CHina and Pakistan we have no choice.
True Reverse Engg is a process which is a short cut but at the end of the day you will not absorb technology with this process. Every time you get a new technology you will have to wait for a physical speciment for you to copy that technology. On the other hand the way India has gone through with emphasis on basic R&D the learning curve will be very steep but once the technology is mastered then further developments will be relatively easy. A case in the point is LCA -Tejas and the LCA Mark-2 development. For the JF-17 Paksitan at best will only be able to modify the aircraft they will never be able to develp a new air craft without Chinese help.
It is not morally right to reverse enginer. You need to respect intellictual rights. In long run it helps. When you reverse enginer you just modify a particular concept as per your need, you don't understand it. While you build things you actually understand things/concept and you can even implement the techonology else where. Similarly stealing other nations technolngy also won't help you.
By the time you get some weaponry and reverse engineer it, that technology becomes old. I mean the Chinese did that with the F-16s and are only now having something that flies. We dont know their capabilities but the Chinese call it 4.5 gen. The JF 17 is an upgrade of a rip off of a fighter that India plans to retire. Pakistan and China can only dream of getting a SH that India may get should it chose it in the MRCA deal. Indian scientists have been up to speed with technology. LCA is an example no matter what the delay. Its composites are the best in the line. The problem with reverse engineering everything is that the supplier country will finally get fed up and turn of the tap. Then you will neither get weapons nor any specimen to copy.
Guys, there is a fine line between re-inventing and reverse engineering. Blindly copying will definitely not help, but I don't think the chinese are doing just that. They are now building passenger jets alongwith fighter aircrafts. The point being, they are not blindly copying, but they are applying aeronautical engineering principles there. So there is a lot of applied engineering that is going on. While I agree that most of the work that goes on in that country is patented and designed in the US and/or Japan and just manufactured there, but that also gives them access to these technologies and its manufacturing, and you have to remember that is how Japan started in the automobile industry. It has grown to a point that the big 3 auto are bankrupt. There are advantages in reverse engineering and its not easy as some people think. It takes a lot of perseverance and intelligence to reverse engineer and if those processes are documented, can give an insight on how to improve the technology being reverse engineered. India has reverse engineered too. We bought the first PHWR reactors from Canada, and then reverse engineered it later on. After this, the indian scientists then started on the fast breeder program which still utilizes the PWHR technology. US and Russia will scoff at China, not because they are copying them, but because they are becoming self sufficient in defence design and production. So the revenue to these countries are drying up. India needs to do it too. Innovation is important, for e.g. use of composites by India was good in LCA, but when we are stuck, why not reverse engineer and save the deadline rather than scrapping the entire project (Kaveri)? There has to be a combination of both. Innovation is hard and reinventing all the time, will cost us a lot of time and effort. There needs to be a healthy balance.
The answer to this question is very simple. Reverse engineering leaves you a generation or more behind your competitors. Without the innovation to compete with the world's leaders, but rather copy what they already have, you will always be behind. You are basically, reinventing the wheel.
J-11 B is a copy of the SU-27 series. And reverse engineering without getting the proper permission is stealing, a nation should not promote stealing as a value. Unless the original equipment manufacturer is being a total A hole
The V-2 rocket designs plus stolen German scientists created both rocket/space programs for the US and Russia. The jet fighters are virtually the same as well. You only need to look at the Sabres and the early-gen Migs to tell that the Americans and Russians copied that German jet fighter.
The US industrial base expanded heavily using everything that was acquired from Germany and Japan. But it already had a very solid pre-existing scientific, academic and industrial base which then became even bigger. This is markedly different from simply reverse engineering in the classical sense as we know it (and what I'm assuming is being discussed here).
I was referring mostly to rocket developments, prior to which both the Russians and Americans had basically zero experience.
How does that change anything? The US and the Russians dismantled labs and brought them back along with a barrage of German scientists they captured (presumably ones who weren't indicted at Nuremberg). This is not similar to our current understanding of reverse engineering, or what is being discussed here.
Bringing home V-2 rockets and designs, and then trying to make domestic versions. If that isn't reverse engineering, then what is.
