India opens bids in $10.4-bn combat plane tender.

[Armand2REP]

Unit price of Rafale is €64 million.

 

[ace009]

is that the price paid by France or the one offered to UAE?

 

[Armand2REP]

That is what Dassault charges for them, it is a private company who sets their own price. That price doesn't include long term support.

 

[weg]

That price doesn't include long term support.

So multiply it by three and add the French shafting tax when you want an upgrade.

 

[Bhadra]

Bush era warmth over? US seen drifting from India (F-35 affect)?

Bush era warmth over? US seen drifting from India
Indrani Bagchi, TNN | Nov 9, 2011, 06.04AM IST

NEW DELHI: It was a walk-past that raised eyebrows. At the G-20 summit in Cannes, observers saw what they described as a strange scene -- Prime Minister Manmohan Singh standing to the side while US President Barack Obama strode past him to greet another head of state with nary a glance at him.

Although the two leaders enjoyed a quiet chat later and are slated for a bilateral summit in Bali next week, for many in the room, the "overlook" seemed to symbolize what is now popularly described as a "drift" in the India-US relationship.

Dirges have been sung over the India-US relationship for some time now. US makes no secret of a growing disappointment with India, while India realizes that the warmth in ties subsided with George Bush's exit. The newer phenomenon is that few tears are being shed in the top levels of the Indian establishment over the state of ties with the US.

So what gives? US remains shell-shocked over the MMRCA rejection while India's positions on Libya, Syria and Palestine -- and increasingly Iran -- draw scorn from Washington's administration elite. After Obama's soul-stirring speech in the Indian Parliament last November, at least on the nuclear front, India has not, according to the US, delivered.

India refuses to change its liability law, whose punitive liability provisions keep US firms out, even though they have thawed enough to carry out "early works agreements" with NPCIL. India has been at the receiving end of a harangue on ratification of the Convention on Supplementary Compensation. India has promised to ratify it but is yet to do it. Consequently, India's membership to the four non-proliferation regimes is still a twinkle in the eye.

India's disappointment goes beyond. In the government, there is little sympathy for US action in Libya or Syria, despite the fact that neither Muammar Gaddafi nor Bashar Al Assad are Indian favourites. India is now increasingly coming round to the view that a US withdrawal from Afghanistan might not be so bad for the region. The recent US move to strike deal with the Haqqani Network at ISI's bidding has not gone down well in India.

In the Asia-Pacific theatre, where India and US have the greatest congruence, the US is pushing for a regional security architecture which India is chary of, because it might mean that India would be sucked into a US-China rivalry, and New Delhi does not want to go down that path.

George Bush believed in the big picture where India was concerned even in the worst days of the nuclear deal. Obama is more transactional and this shows in the relationship. With mounting domestic political issues on either side, Obama's "walk past" is probably an accurate sign of the times.

Even as they cope with the perceived downturn in ties, Indians hope that things will look up. For, despite all the difficulties, US remains India's most important partner. The ties are deeper and multi-faceted. Just over the next few weeks, joint working groups on defence, defence production and procurement will be meeting while a civil aviation summit is on the agenda.

There is an intensive travel schedule planned. Francisco Sanchez, US undersecretary for international trade, is in town. US Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairman Gregory B Jaczko will lead a five-person NRC delegation to India, followed by Rajiv Shah, head of USAID, deputy secretary Bill Burns, not to speak of congressional delegations and a long line of Indian ministers going to the US. On the face of it, ties have never been as good

Incidentally, India was unusually quiet at the just concluded G-20 summit. At the last G-20 summit in Seoul, Singh was feted as the global economic savant. It was this time in 2010 when all P-5 leaders were beating a path to New Delhi as Singh seemed to have fresh ideas to rebalance the global economy.

A year later, India has dropped off the map. China was the sole toast of last week's summit as European leaders tried to persuade Hu Jintao to help bail out the Eurozone financial crisis, which now threatens to engulf Italy after Greece.

Even French President Nicolas Sarkozy inexplicably stood Singh up, despite the fact that their bilateral meeting coincided with the opening of the commercial bids of the MMRCA where French aircraft Rafale is in the running.

Indian leaders opted for a lower profile. While all the other participants made sure their positions were available to the global media assembled in Cannes, they stayed away.

 

[ace009]

Bush era warmth over? US seen drifting from India
Indrani Bagchi, TNN | Nov 9, 2011, 06.04AM IST

NEW DELHI: It was a walk-past that raised eyebrows. At the G-20 summit in Cannes, observers saw what they described as a strange scene -- Prime Minister Manmohan Singh standing to the side while US President Barack Obama strode past him to greet another head of state with nary a glance at him.

Although the two leaders enjoyed a quiet chat later and are slated for a bilateral summit in Bali next week, for many in the room, the "overlook" seemed to symbolize what is now popularly described as a "drift" in the India-US relationship.

Dirges have been sung over the India-US relationship for some time now. US makes no secret of a growing disappointment with India, while India realizes that the warmth in ties subsided with George Bush's exit. The newer phenomenon is that few tears are being shed in the top levels of the Indian establishment over the state of ties with the US.

So what gives? US remains shell-shocked over the MMRCA rejection while India's positions on Libya, Syria and Palestine -- and increasingly Iran -- draw scorn from Washington's administration elite. After Obama's soul-stirring speech in the Indian Parliament last November, at least on the nuclear front, India has not, according to the US, delivered.

India refuses to change its liability law, whose punitive liability provisions keep US firms out, even though they have thawed enough to carry out "early works agreements" with NPCIL. India has been at the receiving end of a harangue on ratification of the Convention on Supplementary Compensation. India has promised to ratify it but is yet to do it. Consequently, India's membership to the four non-proliferation regimes is still a twinkle in the eye.

India's disappointment goes beyond. In the government, there is little sympathy for US action in Libya or Syria, despite the fact that neither Muammar Gaddafi nor Bashar Al Assad are Indian favourites. India is now increasingly coming round to the view that a US withdrawal from Afghanistan might not be so bad for the region. The recent US move to strike deal with the Haqqani Network at ISI's bidding has not gone down well in India.

In the Asia-Pacific theatre, where India and US have the greatest congruence, the US is pushing for a regional security architecture which India is chary of, because it might mean that India would be sucked into a US-China rivalry, and New Delhi does not want to go down that path.

George Bush believed in the big picture where India was concerned even in the worst days of the nuclear deal. Obama is more transactional and this shows in the relationship. With mounting domestic political issues on either side, Obama's "walk past" is probably an accurate sign of the times.

Even as they cope with the perceived downturn in ties, Indians hope that things will look up. For, despite all the difficulties, US remains India's most important partner. The ties are deeper and multi-faceted. Just over the next few weeks, joint working groups on defence, defence production and procurement will be meeting while a civil aviation summit is on the agenda.

There is an intensive travel schedule planned. Francisco Sanchez, US undersecretary for international trade, is in town. US Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairman Gregory B Jaczko will lead a five-person NRC delegation to India, followed by Rajiv Shah, head of USAID, deputy secretary Bill Burns, not to speak of congressional delegations and a long line of Indian ministers going to the US. On the face of it, ties have never been as good

Incidentally, India was unusually quiet at the just concluded G-20 summit. At the last G-20 summit in Seoul, Singh was feted as the global economic savant. It was this time in 2010 when all P-5 leaders were beating a path to New Delhi as Singh seemed to have fresh ideas to rebalance the global economy.

A year later, India has dropped off the map. China was the sole toast of last week's summit as European leaders tried to persuade Hu Jintao to help bail out the Eurozone financial crisis, which now threatens to engulf Italy after Greece.

Even French President Nicolas Sarkozy inexplicably stood Singh up, despite the fact that their bilateral meeting coincided with the opening of the commercial bids of the MMRCA where French aircraft Rafale is in the running.

Indian leaders opted for a lower profile. While all the other participants made sure their positions were available to the global media assembled in Cannes, they stayed away.

It seems the Journos are starting to notice the nose hairs of heads of states too - "the walkpast" - ehh? I guess the guy who wrote this partnered with a bottle of Gin before starting on this assignment.

 

[Armand2REP]

So multiply it by three and add the French shafting tax when you want an upgrade.

I would hope your wet dreams would be a little more creative than that.... but whatever floats your boat.

 

[Immanuel]

Maybe you could pass around what you are smoking. Improving sensors is the easiest thing to do. The problem with the F-35 is its flight hardware which isn't upgradeable.

Delayed to 2020.



USAF To Extend F-16s To Cover F-35 Delays | AVIATION WEEK

Well if improving sensors is sooo easy, how come, EF still doesn't have a proper AESA or why is the RBE2 not even close to the APG-80 on the block 60 which has been in operation way before any one knew what AESA stands for. EF's IRST can pick up targets a max range of 180 km, compare that to the F-35's IRST detection and tracking range of over 1200km for ballistic missiles. Flight harware isn't upgradeable? ahaha, again load of steaming crap. Every modern aircraft can have hardware upgrades. Even our MKI will have harware upgrades to it very soon.

I don't share what i am smoking, it's way out of your league...to smoke what i am smoking you'll have to fly all the way in to Amsterdam to find me in a coffeeshop smoking some 'sunburst'.

 

[Immanuel]

Dear Immanuel: F35 does mean to replace F16/18 bulks as you mentioned. However, that does NOT necessarily mean it will hit that objective. Perhaps not that right comparison, but how much ratio of F22 been able to replace F15? Barely 1 to 10. Reason? still cost, national security (technology monopoly), and most of all, operability -- exactly like P2Prada mentioned fit in high altitude Himalaya... ...

As long as it makes sense to one country's defense strategy, we will see those 30 even 40 years old aircraft carrying their mission loyally. Example: Brazil is operating those A4 on its only carrier (if my information is still correct). Is it really that "improper", considering the threat Brazil faces? IMO it's smart decision. Another is China still retain those obsolete J7 and J8. Why, apart from cost concern toward J10/11/Sukhoi? they can still assemble some last strategic card: quantity advantage... ...

F-35's unit price will come down, a few cuts in orders won't shut down the entire program. Thousands are bound to be sold in the US alone. Through it's lifetime, they'll end up having around 4000 orders. Delays are normal, no fighter program has even been on time. F-22 was indeed meant to replace the F-15 however, the final order came down to 187. Firstly, due to the F-22 performing better than expected, secondly F-35 being multirole enough to compensate for smaller numbers of F-22. With full EW, AWACS and support elements, the F-35 supported along with the F-22 will even prevent enemy fighters from taking off in the first place. During the second gulf war, a small group of apaches flew in low level busted some Iraqi radars and opened a window for coalition aircraft to pour in. A few cruise missile attacks to begin with prevented the Libyans any early warning, thus keeping their AF pretty much grounded.

With the F-35 and the F-22, full EW growlers flying about, the enemy won't even know whats heading their way. Most of the aircraft will be destroyed while still on the ground. F-35 with its advanced sensors and fire power will hardly have to face a serious A2A engagement. US has become quite adept at neutralizing early warning radars, using full EW capabilities and there is no doubt they'll continue to enhance that. The US has a whole wide range of platforms and tactics they can use to cripple enemy air defences way before they enter contested airspace.

 

[weg]

Unit price of Rafale is €64 million.

Bid details are not yet public. But after the 3-hr. meeting at the Indian air force (IAF) headquarters, a ministry officer in the acquisitions office indicated that certain parameters, including the flyaway cost per aircraft, were not as disparate as might have been expected.

MMRCA Principals Pore Over Bids | AVIATION WEEK

 

[ace009]

F-35's unit price will come down, a few cuts in orders won't shut down the entire program. Thousands are bound to be sold in the US alone. Through it's lifetime, they'll end up having around 4000 orders. Delays are normal, no fighter program has even been on time. F-22 was indeed meant to replace the F-15 however, the final order came down to 187. Firstly, due to the F-22 performing better than expected, secondly F-35 being multirole enough to compensate for smaller numbers of F-22. With full EW, AWACS and support elements, the F-35 supported along with the F-22 will even prevent enemy fighters from taking off in the first place. During the second gulf war, a small group of apaches flew in low level busted some Iraqi radars and opened a window for coalition aircraft to pour in. A few cruise missile attacks to begin with prevented the Libyans any early warning, thus keeping their AF pretty much grounded.

With the F-35 and the F-22, full EW growlers flying about, the enemy won't even know whats heading their way. Most of the aircraft will be destroyed while still on the ground. F-35 with its advanced sensors and fire power will hardly have to face a serious A2A engagement. US has become quite adept at neutralizing early warning radars, using full EW capabilities and there is no doubt they'll continue to enhance that. The US has a whole wide range of platforms and tactics they can use to cripple enemy air defences way before they enter contested airspace.

The most famous and most sold western aircraft in the last 50 years is the F-16, having produced 4450+ units. Yet, the initial order for the F-16 was 11, then reduced to 8.

The U.S. Air Force initially ordered 15 "Full-Scale Development" (FSD) aircraft (11 single-seat and four two-seat models) for its flight test program, but this was reduced to eight (six F-16A single-seaters and two F-16B two-seaters).

wikipedia

Compared to that the F-35 has enormous support and orders pending.

However, I am not sure I agree to the threat perception of the F-22 never having to face a serious A2A opponent. remember, the US has NOT faced a serious opponent in the last 30 years (Iraq, Serbia. Afghanistan, Iraq again, Libya). Of these the Serbians offered the most resistance and the Iraqis the next - but on the scale of a threat from China or a resurgent Russia, these are nothing.
The last time the USAF/ USN did face a sizable opponent, their record was not so good - the Vietnam war.
In that same vein, what works for the USA, will NOT work for India. Pakistan will be no pushover and IAF will have to work hard to gain a costly victory (Air-supremacy). Against China a air-supremacy will not be achievable, leaving the strike fighters like the F-35 vulnerable without adequate defense.
On the other hand a PAK-FA squad (air superiority) and a F-35 squad (Attack) hunting together can be VERY effective.

 

[Neil]

Why is US peddling a hangar queen?

A multi-role combat aircraft is one of those things air forces the world over love for no good reason other than the desire to fly a plane that can do everything. Some 30 years ago, when the Indian Air Force selected the Jaguar as an MRCA (Multi-Role Combat Aircraft) when plainly it was only a low level short range strike plane, I had pointed out that the trouble with aircraft designed for multiple missions is that they cannot perform any particular role very well.

Nothing has changed, except now "medium range" is added to the Air Staff Quality Requirements, two planes have been shortlisted, and the US is trying to scramble the competition by offering the Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) F-35 Lightning-II just as the bids by Dassault Avions for its Rafale fighter and by the European consortium EADS for its Typhoon warplane were being opened. This offer, while sudden, was not entirely unexpected, and has a whiff of the spoiler even though there's a more substantive reason behind it. In any event, if aircraft quality and performance is what matters, scrutinising the JSF makes sense.
JSF can, at best, be considered a work in progress, and at worst an enormously expensive failure, that has already racked up 89 per cent cost-over-run and time delays of several years, with no end in sight to major design and technology problems confronting it. Winslow Wheeler, a combat aviation expert formerly with the US' government accountability office (GAO) and ex-staff adviser to several US senators, deems this aircraft "a bad idea that shows every sign of turning into a disaster as big as the F-111 fiasco of the 1960s."

The serious nature of F-35's troubles is not a secret. According to news reports, the Pentagon's director of operational test & evaluation earlier this year pointed to a raft of problems afflicting the JSF, among them, the "transonic wing roll-off (and) greater than expected sideslip during medium angle of attack testing", unreliability of the components, the after-burner on the Pratt & Whitney F-135 engine disrupting the air flow causing severe vibrations and preventing realisation of maximum power, helmet-mounted display that has restricted testing to the preliminary Block 0.5 and Block 1 mission systems software, and the inability of the on-board inert gas generation system to obviate the buildup of oxygen in fuel tank that can result in fire and explosion.

A news story additionally revealed significant structural weakness in the "forward root rib" providing "core strength of the wings", and a recent GAO report referred to the faulty manufacturing of the outer mould of the aircraft that has undermined its stealth characteristics, rectifying which, it said, has major cost and time impacts.

JSF, it turns out, is an over-weight (49,500 pounds at takeoff in air-to-air role), under-powered (with an engine rated at 42,000 pounds of thrust) aircraft with a relatively small wing span (460 square feet), rendering it, in Wheeler's words, "appallingly unmaneuverable" and in the same league as the short-lived F-105. Worse, it has only two tons of ordnance carrying capacity in its internal bays; loading additional bombs and weapons on outer wing stations will light up the aircraft like a Christmas tree on enemy radar, making nonsense of its vaunted stealth qualities. And in ground support mission, it is seen as a "non-starter" — "too fast to independently identify targets, too fragile to withstand ground fire", and too lacking in payload capacity, including fuel, to pull useful loiter time over battlefield.

The crux of the problem, according to Wheeler, is that the JSF "has mortgaged its success on a hypothetical vision of ultra long-range (air-to-air) radar"¦ that has fallen on its face many times in real war", eventuating in performance that is "embarrassing in the air-to-air role" even when compared to "elderly" aircraft such as the A-10.

But that's not the half of it! The F-35, when it enters service, will be the least test-proven of any new aircraft. In this regard, the GAO report mentions that "Open air testing (is) constrained by range limitations that are incapable of providing realistic testing of many key (Block 3 systems software-driven) capabilities" that are available, but mostly on paper. What this means, according to Wheeler, is that 97 per cent of "flight testing (is) still unflown" and eventually only 17 per cent of JSF's flight characteristics will be physically tested and proven. Dismayed as much by the sub-standard aircraft in the offing and the escalating costs as by the unwillingness of the US to share "critical technologies", many of the Nato partners have reduced their requirement of this aircraft. Britain, for instance, has cut back to 40 F-35s from its initial order of 138 aircraft, and Israel, which contracted for 20 JSFs, is seeking refurbished F-16s and F-18s instead, as a near and middle-term solution.

The F-35 has been pushed into a virtual death spiral also by the seemingly insurmountable difficulties facing its vertical take-off variant, compelling the Royal Navy to junk it, a decision the US Navy and the US Marines are expected to soon follow. Costly attempts to rectify design flaws and to meet performance criteria amidst slashed domestic and foreign sales have raised the programme expenditure to the one-trillion-dollar level and the unit price of this platform to a "catastrophically high" $200 million, leading the US Congress to threaten a cut-off in funding.

It is the imperative to save the JSF programme that has prompted Washington to offer this plane to IAF. Delhi has to decide which combat aircraft industry — American, French or European, it will play the white knight to. Lockheed will flourish even if India rejects the F-35. But failure to sell Rafale or the Eurofighter will respectively put the survival of future combat aircraft development and production in France at risk and severely dent the prospects of EADS.

With so much at stake and the urge to recover some of the costs, France and the consortium of European countries will be prepared to give far more in return and by way of offsets to get a deal done.


Why is US peddling a hangar queen? | idrw.org

 

[Dark Sorrow]

I am of the feeling that we should hold the MMRCA deal for sometime at least till economic conditions are stabilized.
What's your opinion?

 

[SpArK]

MMRCA Principals Pore Over Bids





Nov 10, 2011




NEW DELHI — The cost of acquiring the winning aircraft for India's Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) competition is no longer a secret — except to the public, for now.


With final bids in for the Dassault Rafale and Eurofighter Typhoon, the offers of both European companies were opened Nov. 4 and their contents revealed for the first time to the two European rivals, as well as the Indian government's MMRCA program team, and three defense ministry officers who will spend the next 6-8 weeks boiling the two offers down to a common, comparable form.


Bid details are not yet public. But after the 3-hr. meeting at the Indian air force (IAF) headquarters, a ministry officer in the acquisitions office indicated that certain parameters, including the flyaway cost per aircraft, were not as disparate as might have been expected.


Officials from the two firms would not comment on the bids, though EADS Cassidian released a statement minutes after the meeting, saying: "Our offer for India's MMRCA tender is backed by the four Eurofighter partner nations as well as their respective aerospace and defense industries. It is competitive and designed to deliver maximum value to India."


Privately, officials at both companies said they were confident with where their bids were placed. That is not surprising, especially since the biggest factor is still an unknown: how the ministry will arrive at the ownership/life-cycle cost of both aircraft over a 40-year/6,000-hr. run — an exercise it has never attempted before. Mystery also shrouds the benchmark price, a figure that the ministry and IAF jointly formulated this year, and one to which the bid prices of the Rafale and Eurofighter will be compared with, to focus on the more competitive proposal.


"Both companies now know the unit cost of each other's aircraft," the ministry officer said. "That was closely held information so far. But the real calculations, which will include [the] cost of flying these aircraft over their lifetime, plus inputs from technology transfer and offsets, will provide a final picture. We have a formula and process. It will now be applied to both bids."

Industry observers suggest that the government is now well-placed to make a decision, though others indicate that the only real political decision made in the competition so far was the elimination of the two U.S. contenders, Lockheed Martin and Boeing, in April.


"If the two final offers from Dassault and Eurofighter are roughly comparable, the government will perhaps want to leverage more strategic benefits from the potential winner," says an adviser to the Confederation of Indian Industry, which counts among its members several firms that will be offsets partners to either Dassault or EADS Cassidian. "You couldn't ask for two aircraft that are more comparable, or bigger rivals in the aerospace market today. It's an opportunity for India to truly gain something here, over and above the 126 airplanes."


The lowest bidder, and therefore the one poised to win the $10.4 billion deal, is expected to be formally announced before the new year. Price negotiations will follow with the lowest bidder, leading to contract signature by March 2012, and bringing to an end a 10-year effort by the IAF to buy a stopgap fleet to stem fighter squadron depletion.



The government has not formally announced lowest bidders in arms competitions, but it had apparently decided unofficially last year to begin the practice as an exercise in transparency. In September 2010, the government revealed that General Electric had been identified as the lowest bidder in a competition against Eurojet to power the indigenous Tejas Mk. 2.


As for the MMRCA's final contract value, it is likely to be well more than the originally budgeted $10.4 billion. It could reach roughly double that figure, taking into account factors such as inflation, currency fluctuation adjustments and the possibility of a larger buy.


MMRCA Principals Pore Over Bids | AVIATION WEEK

 

[thakur_ritesh]

I am of the feeling that we should hold the MMRCA deal for sometime at least till economic conditions are stabilized.
What's your opinion?

no special budgetary allocations will be done for MMRCA.
with the shock of 6th pay commission over, the proportion of capital expenditure will only increase of the total defence budget.
the payment will not be made in one go or in one financial year.
indian real gdp growth is expected to clock around 7.5% this fiscal, nothing very dramatically low that MMRCA should be put on hold.

 

[Immanuel]

The most famous and most sold western aircraft in the last 50 years is the F-16, having produced 4450+ units. Yet, the initial order for the F-16 was 11, then reduced to 8.
wikipedia

Compared to that the F-35 has enormous support and orders pending.

However, I am not sure I agree to the threat perception of the F-22 never having to face a serious A2A opponent. remember, the US has NOT faced a serious opponent in the last 30 years (Iraq, Serbia. Afghanistan, Iraq again, Libya). Of these the Serbians offered the most resistance and the Iraqis the next - but on the scale of a threat from China or a resurgent Russia, these are nothing.
The last time the USAF/ USN did face a sizable opponent, their record was not so good - the Vietnam war.
In that same vein, what works for the USA, will NOT work for India. Pakistan will be no pushover and IAF will have to work hard to gain a costly victory (Air-supremacy). Against China a air-supremacy will not be achievable, leaving the strike fighters like the F-35 vulnerable without adequate defense.
On the other hand a PAK-FA squad (air superiority) and a F-35 squad (Attack) hunting together can be VERY effective.

Sure Vietnam was trouble, but lot has changed, weapons have improved, tactics too. Besides, after they begin to scale down in Afghan and Iraq, i think for quite sometime they will try not to go to war for unless Iran begins to bitch. Offcourse what works for the US won't for us. For us we'll need a powerful MRCA and eventually i hope the Navy gets the F-35. I also think a quick order of 30 Super mki should happen as well, take the number to 300. MRCA should touch atleast 200.

 

[Yusuf]

I am sure they would have asked this question

 

[p2prada]

I am sure they would have asked this question

This is indeed a very important question.

 

[Galaxy]

Why IAF does NOT need either Eurofighter or Rafale

November 11, 2011

The J-20 fighter prototype, a 5th generation combat aircraft built by China's Chengdu Aircraft Industry, made its first flight on January 11, 2011. This necessitates a re-evaluation of the IAF's procurement of 4th generation medium fighters, which is close to being finalised.

Knife-edge tension was guaranteed as senior executives from Eurofighter GmbH and Dassault assembled on November 4 in the office of Vivek Rae, Director General (Acquisitions) of the Ministry of Defence. The purpose of the gathering: to open commercial bids for the world's most ill-conceived and biggest international arms purchase.

I refer to the Indian Air Force's harebrained proposal to buy 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) that will be outrun and outgunned by Chinese fighters soon after they enter Indian Air Force service. The opening of bids in any big contract is a tense moment.

Eurofighter's and Dassault's inordinate anxiety also stems from the fact that the IAF buy is crucial to their future.

Eurofighter GmbH faces serious internal problems with partner nations scaling down their orders.

India is desperately needed to restore the economics of production. Britain's Royal Air Force has already slashed its order for Typhoons.

And, couple of weeks ago, The New York Times reported that Germany's Luftwaffe (which ironically spearheads the Typhoon campaign in India) is trimming its purchase from 177 to 140 Typhoons.

Dassault is in even direr straits, with Rafale having failed to find a single international customer; there are just 180 Rafale fighters on order, all for the French military, which hardly has a choice.

The only relatively carefree man at the start of that meeting on Friday might be Mr Rae himself, who will be sitting on the defence ministry's war chest of Rs 42,000 crore.

But his good cheer may not survive the opening of bids because the MoD's estimate -- arrived at some six years ago -- will almost certainly be dwarfed by the lower bid.

Last month, the MoD re-valued its original estimation in a process called 'benchmarking'. But Mr Rae knows that if the winning quote emerges significantly more expensive than the MoD's "benchmarked" figure, the process will begin anew.

Such an eventuality would be a blessing in disguise; and the best way to sidestep this cockamamie purchase of overpriced fighters that will take heavy casualties in any future conflict with China.

Both the Typhoon and Rafale are "4th Generation-plus fighters", inferior in crucial aspects like stealth to the J-20, China's "5th Generation" (Gen-5) stealth fighter that took to the skies this year.

Admittedly the J-20 would need a decade of flight-testing before it enters operational service, but the first MMRCA would only be delivered to India by 2015-16.

Five years after that, operational J-20s, of the People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF), will be dominating the Himalayas. The IAF MMRCAs, already outclassed by 2020, will limp around the skies till 2050 since the MoD will rightly protest that Rs 42,000-84,000 crore have been spent on them

The IAF sadly is shutting its eyes to this even as China's rising aerospace profile informs the security calculus of other regional air forces.

Japan, South Korea and Singapore are realising that a Gen-5 fleet is needed for a credible defence capability against the PLA.

South Korea is set to choose Lockheed Martin's F-35 Lightening II, the only Gen-5 fighter on offer in the global market. The Japan Air Self Defence Force (JASDF) too is veering around to the F-35 after Lockheed Martin was denied export clearances to supply Tokyo the F-22 Raptor, unarguably the world's most advanced fighter.

In 2003, Singapore invested money into the F-35 development programme; it is on course to buy the aircraft.

Given that a rising China makes choosing Gen-5 a no-brainer, why then is the IAF (presumably a rational actor) inexplicably buying Gen-4+ fighters?

The reason, sadly, is the political-bureaucratic stranglehold over procurement in which any IAF re-evaluation carries a penalty of years of delay. In the early 2000s, when the IAF framed the case for buying an MMRCA, no Gen-5 aircraft were available for sale.

The F-35 was under development but was not ready for flight-testing, an essential part of India's procurement process.

Unwilling to wait for a Gen-5 fighter, the IAF scaled down its requirements and initiated an impartial multi-vendor contest for whatever Gen-4+ fighters were there in the market.

Years later, as the IAF finds itself choosing between two Gen-4+ aircraft, it must also note that the F-35 is on the cusp of operational clearance. Its manufacturer, Lockheed Martin, has signalled in multiple ways that it would supply the IAF that fighter at a fly-away cost of $65 million per aircraft (significantly cheaper than the Rafale and the Typhoon) with deliveries beginning by 2015.

Washington has indicated that any F-35 sale to India would be expeditiously cleared. But for an insecure IAF, used to being shoved around by the MoD, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

The MMRCA purchase would bring in six squadrons of reasonably good fighters, even if they were outclassed by the PLAAF in war. Any change at this state, or so the IAF believes and accepts, would require fresh MoD clearances and financial sanctions that could take another three years.

The IAF must frankly tell the MoD that the situation has changed, and that national security demands scrapping the overpriced MMRCA procurement and buying the F-35 through a single-vendor contract.

The defence of the realm cannot be held hostage to the procedural requirement of multi-vendor bidding; nor is overpaying justifiable if it was done through competitive bidding.

New Delhi has recently procured several fine aircraft on a single-vendor, government-to-government basis: the Sukhoi-30MKI from Russia; and the C-130J and C-17 transport aircraft from the US. The procurement of a new fighter that will form the backbone of the IAF for decades must be treated with the same urgency.

Why IAF does NOT need either Eurofighter or Rafale - Rediff.com News

 

[Kunal Biswas]

[h=3]MMRCA Principals Pore Over Bids[/h]

NEW DELHI — The cost of acquiring the winning aircraft for India's Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) competition is no longer a secret — except to the public, for now.


With final bids in for the Dassault Rafale and Eurofighter Typhoon, the offers of both European companies were opened Nov. 4 and their contents revealed for the first time to the two European rivals, as well as the Indian government's MMRCA program team, and three defense ministry officers who will spend the next 6-8 weeks boiling the two offers down to a common, comparable form.
Bid details are not yet public. But after the 3-hr. meeting at the Indian air force (IAF) headquarters, a ministry officer in the acquisitions office indicated that certain parameters, including the flyaway cost per aircraft, were not as disparate as might have been expected.


Officials from the two firms would not comment on the bids, though EADS Cassidian released a statement minutes after the meeting, saying: "Our offer for India's MMRCA tender is backed by the four Eurofighter partner nations as well as their respective aerospace and defense industries. It is competitive and designed to deliver maximum value to India."


Privately, officials at both companies said they were confident with where their bids were placed. That is not surprising, especially since the biggest factor is still an unknown: how the ministry will arrive at the ownership/life-cycle cost of both aircraft over a 40-year/6,000-hr. run — an exercise it has never attempted before. Mystery also shrouds the benchmark price, a figure that the ministry and IAF jointly formulated this year, and one to which the bid prices of the Rafale and Eurofighter will be compared with, to focus on the more competitive proposal.


"Both companies now know the unit cost of each other's aircraft," the ministry officer said. "That was closely held information so far. But the real calculations, which will include [the] cost of flying these aircraft over their lifetime, plus inputs from technology transfer and offsets, will provide a final picture. We have a formula and process. It will now be applied to both bids."
Industry observers suggest that the government is now well-placed to make a decision, though others indicate that the only real political decision made in the competition so far was the elimination of the two U.S. contenders, Lockheed Martin and Boeing, in April.


"If the two final offers from Dassault and Eurofighter are roughly comparable, the government will perhaps want to leverage more strategic benefits from the potential winner," says an adviser to the Confederation of Indian Industry, which counts among its members several firms that will be offsets partners to either Dassault or EADS Cassidian. "You couldn't ask for two aircraft that are more comparable, or bigger rivals in the aerospace market today. It's an opportunity for India to truly gain something here, over and above the 126 airplanes."


The lowest bidder, and therefore the one poised to win the $10.4 billion deal, is expected to be formally announced before the new year. Price negotiations will follow with the lowest bidder, leading to contract signature by March 2012, and bringing to an end a 10-year effort by the IAF to buy a stopgap fleet to stem fighter squadron depletion.


The government has not formally announced lowest bidders in arms competitions, but it had apparently decided unofficially last year to begin the practice as an exercise in transparency. In September 2010, the government revealed that General Electric had been identified as the lowest bidder in a competition against Eurojet to power the indigenous Tejas Mk. 2.


As for the MMRCA's final contract value, it is likely to be well more than the originally budgeted $10.4 billion. It could reach roughly double that figure, taking into account factors such as inflation, currency fluctuation adjustments and the possibility of a larger buy.

:: Bharat-Rakshak.com - Indian Military News Headlines ::