Know Your 'Rafale'

[Superdefender]

Mostly I get traffic from India, hence Indians are paying .

Why do you think SH is a good option instead of Rafale? What is your view on Growler?

 

[Screambowl]

F/A-18 Super hornet was one of the contenders in MMRCa. It is as capable as the Eurocanards but the IAF found that it did not comply with some of its requirements (none of the plane actually fulfilled all the ASQ requirements.
F/A-18 is a capable and TRULY PROVEN PLANE, unlike some of the planes which are happy to be attacking undefended or old air defences and claiming to be capable and proven.

SH, was one of the most mature plane in the MMRCA competition, Having well proven weaponry.

IF IAF is to take SH then we have to "INDIANISE" the plane, to be modified to carry and fire Missiles and weapons used by IAF. which may not happen. SH, is also a capable naval platform, but then how would it stack up against

One advantage is that the Development cost of SH has already been recovered based on the number of units made. thus iit could be possible that we can now get SH with a lot of ToT (except Radar or avionics)

Also in terms of commonality, Tejas will be using similar engine as the one being used by F/A-18 and so there is good chance that the engine for tejas / SH is being offered to India as part of ToT

If they don't allow to modify the aircraft, then it is confirmed that no ToT for engine will come. SNECMA and GTRE had similar arrangements but later they denied the tech.

It is a proven machine but there are norms, like you cannot deploy it against their allies cannot market, you need to allow them visit research facilities, etc.

Remember Nuclear deal?

 

[Screambowl]

There is no change in policy. The Muslim aggression from West remains the primary threat.

When dealing with a country in defence purchases, overall picture is very important.

Nobody has the bandwidth to deal with multiple actors at the same time. Please consider that decision makers are few and have limited time.

The good thing about Americans is the deals are very clear upfront. There are no endless loops. It is yes or no.

Any kind of deal with US , where they are selling their primary machine of war, will become Nuclear deal type. 200 Norms and 500 compromises. @abingdonboy has already mentioned in a previous post

 

[Tactical Frog]

Finally someone renewing some faith in the Dassault ... even if it is not about planes

http://www.sail-world.com/Europe/Am...nd-Dassault-Systemes-renew-partnership/143239

Am having a bad day looking at all these anti-Rafale tweets ..

 

[garg_bharat]

The MoD and Dassualt are already talking for the follow-on 90 unit order to be made in India.

Don't beleive what the paid media wants you to think- "stalled" is grossly inaccurate.

Very interesting. Everybody except you is incorrect. The minister has said openly and clearly that 36 is all we can afford, but you seem to have superpowers that will make india consider extra 90.

France has changed since Kargil. France of today is no different than USA in sanctioning. India has made a big mistake by trusting France, this is why we have such grave issues in major programs.

USA is much easier to deal with despite its laws and regulations, this is what the govt. Is finding everyday.

Usa has much bigger defence industry, and can absorb India's irregular purchases much more easily.

 

[Superdefender]

Finally someone renewing some faith in the Dassault ... even if it is not about planes

http://www.sail-world.com/Europe/Am...nd-Dassault-Systemes-renew-partnership/143239

Am having a bad day looking at all these anti-Rafale tweets ..

Told ya twice before MOD is playing with ya. But ya replied - "we will see who will get the last laugh." Do ya remember? Now see it everyday.

 

[Superdefender]

Finally someone renewing some faith in the Dassault ... even if it is not about planes

http://www.sail-world.com/Europe/Am...nd-Dassault-Systemes-renew-partnership/143239

Am having a bad day looking at all these anti-Rafale tweets ..

Told ya twice before MOD is playing with ya. But ya replied - "we will see who will get the last laugh." Do ya remember? Now see it everyday.

 

[garg_bharat]

Russia is meeting its commitments despite sanctions. Where is France, good only in extracting its pound of flesh.

The biggest issue is nobody wants endless discussions. Nobody has time.

 

[ersakthivel]

Utterly, utterly untrue. If you honestly beleive that then you know very little about these matters.

The French don't have anything like the strings attatched to their products and the French government has almost no involvement.


Where the US is concerned, it is the exact opposite- the US government is fully involved at every stage in the defence sales and uses such sales as a foriegn policy device. The US WOULD make India sign agreements like CISMOA, BECA and LSA on condition of such a sale, they WOULD impose restrictive end-user agreements wherein only Boeing/LM staff can access certain sections of the IAF's planes (that would be digitally sealed and now IAF personell would ever be allowed to look at).



Furthermore, every single US defence sale- no matter how big or small- has to go through the US Congress for approval- every single nut, bolt, windscreen wiper, bomb, fuse, LCD MFD etc etc is subject to this meaning any such sale can be vetoed by their legislature at anytime depending on their internal poltics at the time. Look at the drama the Pakistanis had to go through to get just EIGHT F-16s approved- do you want that for India?

WHen the same US comgress applies the pressure on US president , He transfers that pressure to French presdient & he will have to budge, The French cancelled heli carrier delivery to russia under US pressure,

Further Furthermore, the US Congress also has to approve any such ToT deals and they intentionally restrict the ToT on the most critical tech ie engines and radars, India would never get any such know how from the US- that is assured.

And the point about end-user agreements is often massively overlooked but this is very very critical unless you want to become a vassal state and another US poodle. These end-user agreements would include no customisation without US approval, as I have mentioned only specific (non-user (IAF) ) crew from the US OEM able to acsess certain sections of your own planes. Addtionally the US would have to be notified on the movements of your aircraft if they were to leave certain pre-designated bases/locations/areas. The US would also have a say in where their products are based ie they would want it to be in bases exclusively serving US equipment (ie no other OEMs around). Look at Hindon- serving just the American C-130Js and C-17s whilst the IAF's main transport hub had been Agra until then. This is perfectly fine for transports but fighters is a whole different story. The US would be impacting on the combat abilties of the IAF. This is a strategic issue.

And this point is perhaps worth making seperately although it relates to the restrictive US end-user agreements; what about nuclear delivery? The MMRCA is meant to serve as part of the Indian nuclear triad also and some units will defiently be going to the SFC. Does anyone think the US would ever allow India to mate air-launched nuclear weapons onto their fighters? NOT IN A MILLION YEARS. The French on the other hand have actively promoted this feature (nuclear delivery) as one of the Rafale's strengths to the IAF. I mean there could not be a bigger juxtaposition.

In contrast, the French deals are almost solely with private entities (Dassualt, Safran, Thales, etc etc) and thus adhere to the commerical deals both sides come to- with almost no interferance from the French government. Thus, depending on the terms you get from the private entities ToT can be agreed to or offsets or any other mutually agreed "sweetners". The US actively limits these. So India could get ToT for engines and AESA radars if they get the French OEMs to agree to such through commerical talks, there is no legal bar on such things are with the Americans.

The US has sanctioned India before, have you forgotten that? France has NEVER done so and in fact, when in 1999 (when India was still under sanctions) the French came to India's aid and actively aided them in modifying the Mirage 2000s to deliver precision muntions during the Kargil war.


The US does NOT do business as equals, it is not interested in partnerships- it is all about dominating the other side. I've made this point above but I'll make it again; sign up for a US fighter and kiss good bye to the Indian aerospace industry- bye bye LCA, bye bye AMCA and beyond. Look at the Israeli IAI Lave or the Canadian CF-105 Avro and ask yourself why they never entered service or look at what these home grown projects were replaced with (US fighters) the Aussies and Brits have the exact same expereince.


Look outside of the defence realm, look at the civlian nuclear area- the Russians and French have been happy to set up nuclear plants in India but the US has been stalling because of the liabilty issues that they don't want to agree to. And not only have they stalled their projects but they tried to stall others' as well- we all know what happened with foreign (American) funded Christian NGOs in Tamil Nadu and the Kudankulam power plant.

You are then in their "ecosystem", you are then at their mercy and they will use this to India's detriment, like the above "partners" they would then start to force the turd that is the F-35 down the throats of the IAF/IN and another other waste of space equipment they develop in the future and India will have no choice but to accept it.

The situation is almost the reverse with the French. They ARE willing to enter into genuine partnerships as equals as they can appreciate where India is and where it will be in the future and want to leverage this for their own benefit. As such, the Rafale deal will provide a great oppurtunity for Indian aerospace as the Rafale will be constantly developed for the forseeable future and a lot of this can and will be done with India's backing and expertise thrown in.


To say the US and French are comparable is absolutely absurd. The French and Russians are India's most trustworthy friends and I would say France is now more important than Russia given the latter's steep economic decline, absurd foriegn policy and recent history with Indian defence deals. I would have included Israel but they are far too close to the US and entirely at their mercy (they stopped the sale of an Israeli radar for the SAAB NG as part of the MMRCA bid because of US pressure for example). The US does have some world class equipment thant should be bought (M777, S-70B, C-17, C-130J, P-8I) but one shouldn't extend that to the strategic domain- fighters and such.


@Tactical Frog @PARIKRAMA @BON PLAN @Gessler @Kunal Biswas

1.prime Air to Air missile of rafale Meteor is an EADS or EU effort, with britan, france, germany , etc, etc all having veto over it.

rafale also consits of many US parts, & parts from EU nations.

2.We are getting GE engines with no CISMO, LSA

3. When the same US congress applies the pressure on US president , He transfers that pressure to French presdient & he will have to budge, The French cancelled heli carrier delivery to russia under US pressure

4.Also in future France will exposed to huge commercial pressure from China in case of future indo-china war, a situation which is carefully concealed by all our French kiss loving "Strategic ANALysts" like Rajat pandit.

5. can india ask for an explicit guarantee from france like," In future france will supply critical parts to india facing chinese N threat, commercial sanctions, in case of indo-china war? " hell no, The French are not even ready to give performance guaranteed backed by financial penalties, in case of failure.

6. If at all India faces china in any make or break situation with China Only two nations in the world can withstand Chinese pressure to supply india with critical stuff, They are US, Russia that too for the present time only. Not very long into the future.

7. Thats why I laugh a lot when some Jackass strategic experts bluffs that rafale deal is all about "Strategic Diversification of critical defence supplies".


8.US doesn't treat any one as equal. if that is the case we should go straight to russia for FGFA , not to france for rafale.

9. thats why it makes hell a lot of sense to fill 400 tejas mk1As, mk2 in place of the retiring 400 migs & jags , slowly replace every imported component with indian ones in step by step 10 year program including engine, radar, missiles,

10.Then only we can aspire to be atleast regional strong power leave alone the delusions of becoming "Super power airforce with 100 odd rafales"

11. It makes extreme sense to do so, since we are facing only chineseers with low enough tech for at least a couple of decades. And when china introduces J-20 with full fledged engines we too will be in position to field AMCA with full fledged indian engines thanks to the help from mil aviation industry sprung up with 400 odd tejas.

I challenge you to post these points to any Strategic ANALyst in india , get a decent reply and post it here.

I have interacted , commented with these ANALysts in twitter, with a twitter handle @ersakthivel1, So far when asked pointed questions these guys go to deep sleep and wake up only when "French kiss" is awaited!!!

Only @writetake, Saurav jha you can get neutral views on these tricky matters.

 

[Superdefender]

@ersakthivel, Rafale was finalised as a stopgap fighter until our AMCA comes. After Kargil, IAF realised that they needed a medium multirole fighter that can do both air & ground mission equally. Alas, one decade had passed but nothing happened. You can't compare FGFA with Rafale. It is a heavy fighter with more operational cost per sorty. That's why need medium fighters badly. All three T-50 prototypes will be delivered by 2020 end. After that, we can build FGFA as soon as we can gear up.

 

[ersakthivel]

@ersakthivel, Rafale was finalised as a stopgap fighter until our AMCA comes. After Kargil, IAF realised that they needed a medium multirole fighter that can do both air & ground mission equally. Alas, one decade had passed but nothing happened. You can't compare FGFA with Rafale. It is a heavy fighter with more operational cost per sorty. That's why need medium fighters badly. All three T-50 prototypes will be delivered by 2020 end. After that, we can build FGFA as soon as we can gear up.

No. rafale was originally a deal for 124 Mirage-2000s after their good work in kargil war, now tejas mk1A can more than handle that role.

Now with GOI backing full fledged tejas production, IAF has SU-30 MKI for deep penetration, air superiority, Mig-29s for tactical air superiority, mirage-2000, tejas mk1 A for multi role tactical fighters, striker roles, No need for ubber costly rafale.

Add to that we now have brahmos, nirbhays, for strike roles,which were not there when MMRCA was floated,

There is nothing that a MMRCA at 250 million can do that can not be done by 60 million heavy SU-30 MKIs

WHat matters is total lifecycle cost, there is no justification for medium MMRCA which has more total lifecycle cost than heavy SU-30 MKI whose total lifecycle cost is less,

It is not for nothing that manohar parrikar openly said the he has a plan B of Su-30 MKi+ tejas mk1A combo in case rafale deal falls through.

The light-medium-heavy analogy is not practiced by even french airforce, Will they buy a few grippens which have low operating cost to compensate for the high cost of MMRCA rafales in french airforce?

And go for few F-16 silent eagles as heavy component/ No They are standardizing on Rafale after phasing out their mirages.

 

[SajeevJino]

Why do you think SH is a good option instead of Rafale? What is your view on Growler?

F 18 is better in procurement cost, but Rafale is best in operating cost,

I always love to be have an dedicated jammer in our fleet for escort and SEAD roles

 

[Superdefender]

@ersakthivel, relax I am too against Rafale. You have just edited your post before my reply. I was reply to your point that we should go to FGFA instead of Rafale. That's why the confusion.

 

[Superdefender]

F 18 is better in procurement cost, but Rafale is best in operating cost,

I always love to be have an dedicated jammer in our fleet for escort and SEAD roles

So why is US not proposing Growler instead of Super Hornet?

 

[Superdefender]

F 18 is better in procurement cost, but Rafale is best in operating cost,

I always love to be have an dedicated jammer in our fleet for escort and SEAD roles

So why is US not proposing Growler instead of Super Hornet?

 

[ersakthivel]

So why is US not proposing Growler instead of Super Hornet?

OK, Then. There are no such things as guaranteed supply from small powers during crunch time!!!

 

[Yumdoot]

Finally someone renewing some faith in the Dassault ... even if it is not about planes

http://www.sail-world.com/Europe/Am...nd-Dassault-Systemes-renew-partnership/143239

Am having a bad day looking at all these anti-Rafale tweets ..

Believing that you are a real frenchman, I think you french have messed up the India relations badly and marching towards even bigger disasters.

France had an excellent start in the Helicopter engining business in India. HAL had already learnt to make helicopters and we needed a lot of helicopters for multiple needs. Mi-26 successor was offered first to India but our own people rejected it. At that time France should have stepped in offering a joint venture in the heavy class. Similarly the ASW helos now being bought from the Americans could have been taken from the french lead effort Sensors on the NH-90 were an excellent base that the Americans could never have matched.

It was the same for submaries. When your people (on the excuse of internal restructuring) forced our political leadership to look idiotic. Having paid for Subs but with nothing in hand. The new govt. had to work overtime to get to launch the first Kalvari (Scorpene) with a 6 year delay.

Instead of going up the tried and tested route the French were lead by incompetent dalals (touts) and the MMRCA farce happened. Then even when the Rafale was being discussed, you french began hob-nobing with Mukesh Ambani of all people. Your intel agencies perhaps thought Mukesh Ambani has links and that is good. What they did not realize is that Mukesh Ambani image has suffered terribly as a result of his businesses being in constant touch with the politicians.

Now you guys are walking into Jaitapur with your uber-expensive Nuke plant. France will have to deal with Shiv Sena there. Good luck with that. In all this noise, idiots in your establishment and dalals in our establishment have effectively killed the real working relations.

Missiles and sensors is another area where India is in a good position to pay cash upfront (the way you people like it) and yet keep the whole thing under wraps (useful to protect you people from the Americans) but again you french were slow.

 

[Superdefender]

OK, Then. There are no such things as guaranteed supply from small powers during crunch time!!!

So what are your thoughts? If you have better plans then tell what India should do. Don't start like we should procure more Tejas Mk.1A and Su-30MKI in medium department!

 

[garg_bharat]

Any kind of deal with US , where they are selling their primary machine of war, will become Nuclear deal type. 200 Norms and 500 compromises. @abingdonboy has already mentioned in a previous post

That can happen with any country.

The government finds Americans easy to work with.

The deals with us government actually shields mod from complexities.

It is better that a government backs a military deal. Governments have far more clout and stability compared to a single company.

Mod will find itself seriously challenged enforcing a 10000 page contract full of legalese.

Common people do not understand these things.

 

[garg_bharat]

The basic wrong assumption about France is that a deal with India is sanctions proof.

It is not. You can use services of your esteemed mp to find out by raising question in parliament.