TRISHUL

IAF's MiG-29UPG Upgrade Package Detailed

2009-11-14T14:10:00.000-08:00

PAF's First Block 52 F-16D Takes To The Skies

2009-11-13T14:46:00.000-08:00

It may be recalled that on October 13 Lockheed Martin had rolled out the first of 18 new Block 50/52 F-16C/D M-MRCAs being produced for the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) in a ceremony that was attended, among others, by the PAF’s Chief of the Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal Rao Quamar Suleman. The aircraft order is designated as Peace Drive I and it raises the total number of F-16s ordered by Pakistan to date to 58. The PAF received its first of 40 Block 15 F-16A/Bs in 1982. The Peace Drive I order is for 12 F-16Cs and six F-16Ds, all powered by the Pratt & Whitney F100-PW-229 turbofans. The first aircraft--a tandem-seat F-16D--will be delivered to the US government (as agent for Pakistan in the Foreign Military Sales process) next month, with the remainder following in 2010. Joining them by late 2011 (through to 2016) will be the first of up to 70 AL-31FN turbofan-powered FC-20 single-engined M-MRCAs from China, which will be ordered in two successive batches, with the first batch comprising 36 single-seaters and four tandem-seaters, along with a related weapons package that will include PGMs like LT-2, LT-3, LS-6, and FT-1/2/3/5 guided-bombs, and YJ-99 supersonic anti-radiation missiles. The FC-20 will also be capable of carrying two Ra'ad 350km-range air-launched subsonic cruise missiles.—Prasun K. Sengupta

M-SAMs of China, Pakistan & India Detailed + Spotlight on HQ-12/KS-1A

2009-11-08T10:42:00.000-08:00

Southwest of Kunming, one can find the latest evidence of the ongoing modernisation of the Chinese PLA’s air defence network. With the large amount of efforts underway to modernise the air defence network through the inclusion of long-range strategic SAM systems like the S-300PMU1, S-300PMU2 and HQ-9, the appearance of a cheaper, short-range complement designed to replace the HQ-2 and supplement the long-range assets is a logical development. The KS-1A can serve as a close-in area air defence system to complement the more advanced systems, as well as performing as a gapfiller to preclude the need for additional, expensive strategic SAM systems. The KS-1A represents the current configuration of the KS-1 SAM system. The KS-1 was developed in the 1980s as a replacement for the HQ-61 SAM system. Due to reasons which have not been publicly disclosed at this time, the KS-1 did not enter Chinese military service when development was completed in 1994. A likely reason was the poor manoeuvring capability of the missile. It could only engage targets with a 5g manoeuvring capability, making the KS-1 largely ineffective for defending against new-generation combat aircraft.

The PRC’s 2nd Aerospace Academy, now known as China Academy of Defence Technology, or CADT, (also known as the China Changfeng Mechanics & Electronics Technology Academy) of the 7th Ministry of Machinery Industry (now known as CASIC), in 1981 began developing a 57.5km-range tactical endo-atmospheric interceptor missile called the KS-1, which was meant to intercept incoming tactical ballistic missiles. The first test-firing of the missile took place in 1989 and the KS-1 system was first publicly revealed at Le Bourget during the 1991 Paris Air Show. All R & D work on the KS-1 was concluded in 1994, following which series-production of the M-SAM rounds began at the Gui Yang-based Guizhou Aerospace Industry Company Ltd. The KS-1’s TWS-312 engagement control centre (ECC) and its SJ-231 missile guidance system (that includes the C-band HT-233 active phased-array tracking-cum-engagement radar) were series-produced by the Xi’an-based Shaanxi Tianhe Industry Group. The latter two were mounted on TAS-5380 8 x 8 heavy-duty cross-country vehicles. The KS-1 employs a single-chamber dual thrust, solid-fuelled missile, weighing 886kg, and comes equipped with a track-via-missile (TVM) guidance system under which mid-course correction commands are transmitted to the guidance system from the ECC. The target acquisition system in the missile acquires the target in the terminal phase of flight and transmits the data using the TVM down-link via the HT-233 radar to the ECC for final course-correction calculations. The course-correction commands are then transmitted to the missile via a missile track command up-link. A control actuator system is located at the tail end of the missile behind the propulsion system. The HT-233 radar carries out airspace search, target detection, target track, identification, missile tracking, missile guidance and electronic counter-countermeasures (ECCM) functions. The HT-233 radar is automatically controlled by a digital weapons control computer housed within the ECC, and cable link is used to connect the SJ-231 to the TWS-312, which is the only manned station in a KS-1 Battery and it provides the human interface for control of all automated functions. The ECC communicates with all KS-1 Fire Units as well as with higher-echelon command headquarters, and has on board an Air Situation Display console and Tracking Display console that adopt customised BITE technologies, and have embedded simulated training software for engaging more than 100 airborne targets in various flight profiles, all of which can be used for operational training in peacetime. HT-233 radar, operating in the 300MHz bandwidth, has a detection range of 120km and tracking range of 90km. The radar antenna has 4,000 active ferrite phase shifters. It can detect targets in azimuth (360°) and elevation (0° to 65°). It can track some 100 airborne targets and can simultaneously engage more than 50 targets when used in conjunction with a Brigade-level ECC (which can handle automatic command-and-control of three subordinate KS-1 Regiments). In some cases a KS-1 Fire Unit receives early warning of enemy ballistic missile launch, along with direction and time-of-arrival data. Target engagement can be carried out by the HT-233 in manual, semi-automatic or automatic mode. When the decision has been made to engage the target, the ECC selects the Launch Battery or Batteries to be used and pre-launch data is transmitted to the selected missile via microwave line-of-sight data links. The target position data is downloaded to the missile to aid the missile’s target acquisition. After launch, the missile is acquired by the HT-233 radar. The missile’s track command up-link and the TVM down-link between the missile and the HT-233 allows the missile’s flight to be monitored and provides missile guidance commands from the ECC’s weapons control computer. As the missile approaches the target, the TVM guidance system on the missile is activated and the missile is steered toward the target. As the missile’s closest approach to the missile is reached (50 metres), a proximity fuze detonates the directional high-explosive blast fragmentation warhead. The missile’s engagement zone is between 300 metres and 27km in terms of altitude, while it has a slant range of between 7km and 50km, and a maximum speed of 1,200 metres/second. The KS-1 Fire Unit includes a 6 x 6 TAS-270A vehicle housing a slewable oblique under-rail suspension dual launcher carrying two missile rounds. The Fire Unit can deploy in three ways: the vehicle mode, the trailer mode, and the stand-alone mode. It carries two ready-to-fire missiles, is capable of remote operations, and is 360-degree slewable.

By the mid-1990s the 2nd Aerospace Academy began R & D work on developing two distinct derivatives of the KS-1: the ground-based 58km-range KS-1A variant that was to be optimised for use against manned combat aircraft and cruise missiles; and the 80km-range shipborne, vertically-launched HQ-9 long-range surface-to-air missile (LR-SAM) system (using the HQF-91 missile round) that was optimised for use against both manned combat aircraft and supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles, as well as tactical ballistic missiles. To make the KS-1A a cost-effective yet lethal M-SAM, it was decided to do away with the TVM guidance mechanism and instead, adopt the command-link guidance approach. Under this, the HT-233 radar (using an integral IFF transponder, a spectrally pure TWT transmitter, two-stage superheterodyne correlation receiver for channels, high-speed digital signals processor, real-time engagement management computer, secure guidance command up-link, and a radar data processor) would accurately track both the airborne target and launched missile, while a flight/trajectory control computer inside the SJ-231 would calculate the required flight-path corrections for the missile, which would then be transmitted via a data-link to the missile’s on-board digital flight control system (including a digital autopilot, telemetry command receiver and decoder, and a transponder) for bringing the missile as close as 50 metres to the targetted aircraft, following which the proximity fuze will trigger the HE fragmentation warhead. Presently, one KS-1A Battery can simultaneously engage three targets with missiles, and comprises 36 missiles, one SJ-231 ECC station and one HT-233 radar (for 3-D target search, detection, acquisition, identification and engagement; clutter rejection and missile guidance), one optional YLC-18 S-band 3-D mobile tactical air defence radar (with a 250km-range), three power supply vehicles, six 6 x 6 missile launcher vehicles (that are dispersed to launch sites located up to 10km away from each other, with the launch platforms being microprocessor-driven and controlled through an electro-mechanical servo system), six missile transporter-loading vehicles, one tractor, one missile-test vehicle, three missile transport vehicles, one electronics maintenance vehicle, two tools vehicles, and one power supply vehicle. When networked with a Brigade-level ECC, a kill probability of not less than 90% of small-formation airborne targets (less than four aircraft whose airspeed is not greater than 700metres/second) can be achieved (when ripple-firing two missiles against a single target), and more than 95% when the target’s speed is not greater than 560 metres/second and the intruding airborne target density is not greater than four aircraft a minute. In terms of performance, therefore, the KS-1A is in the same league as (but much cheaper than) Raytheon’s RIM-162 Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile (ESSM), while being superior to the 45km-range BUK-M2E of Russia’s Almaz Antey Concern. The improved KS-1A was publicly revealed at the Zhuhai Air Show in 2000. It is a command-guided missile with a range of 57.5km, capable of intercepting targets at altitudes of up to 27,000 metres. One identified KS-1A site is found southwest of Kunming in southern China at the following coordinates: 24 54’ 51.79” N 102 33’ 47.22” E. The KS-1A SAM system is deployed at a prepared site similar in layout to those constructed for the S-300PMU1 and HQ-9 SAM systems. A raised berm in the centre of the site is present to mount the SJ-231 engagement radar station and the TWS-312 Air Defence Command System’s Battery Control Centre engagement radar. Surrounding that berm are six square pads, each containing a single TEL. There are various structures present, ostensibly to house support equipment, power generation vehicles, and command-and-control facilities. The visible components appear to be connected via cables, potentially providing the system with a measure of communications security. The KS-1A enjoys a 15km increase in effective range over the HQ-61, and as such represents a relatively significant improvement in air defence capability.

The KS-1A M-SAM is extremely flexible in employment and deployment. It is best employed as a Regiment. However, its three Batteries can be employed for independent tasks if required. This is called the Autonomous Mode. The three Batteries can be deployed in various geometric formations, as suited to the vulnerable area/point being protected and the extent desired to be sanitised from hostile airborne threats. Similarly, the Battery can deploy its launchers in a way as to be optimal for target engagement as the threat is perceived ab-initio, or as it evolves during combat. Cross-country Mobility enables quick re-deployment and the radar-based sensors can be so positioned as to achieve the optimum kill zone. The KS-1A Batteries can protect static, semi-mobile as well as mobile assets. These may be critical national assets in the hinterland or large mobile armoured formations (either Integrated Brigade Combat teams or Armoured Divisions) thrusting into enemy territory. The Regimental ECC and the Battery-level ECCs must be deployed in a manner, which will provide a clear line-of-sight (LOS) to the Batteries, which may be placed up to a maximum of 30km away from each other. This requires the mast of the microwave communications antenna (on the radars, ECCs and Firing Units) to be raised to the required appropriate height. The YLC-18 radar must be sited while keeping in mind the screening constraints. The radar’s antenna must be aligned accurately by knowing its position and orientation with respect to the north. This information is made available to the YLC-18’s mission computer from a fibre-optic gyro-based autonomous land navigation system (ALNS). Care should be taken to align the YLC-18’s antenna with the ALNS and the system must be calibrated. The levelling of the YLC-18’s antenna needs to be accurate in order to avoid any tilt, which would introduce a bias. The SJ-231 is also provided with ALNS to measure its latitude, longitude and orientation with respect to the true north. This information is required by both Battery-level ECC and the YLC-18’s mission computer. The M-SAM Firing Units operate automatically and are remotely controlled by the Battery-level ECC, which may be up to 1.5km away. Control is effected via microwave LOS radio or line-cable links. The YLC-18 automatically starts tracking targets at a distance of around 250km providing early warning to the KS-1A system and its operators. The target track information is transferred to Regimental ECC, which automatically classifies the targets. The three HT-233s start tracking targets around a range of 100km. This data too is transferred to Regimental ECC, which then performs multi-radar tracking and carries out track correlation and data fusion. Target position information is then sent back to the HT-233s, which use this information to acquire the prioritised targets with the help of the Battery-level ECC, which can engage a target(s) from the selected list at the earliest point of time, and is is assigned the target in real-time by the Regimental ECC. The availability of missiles and the health of the missiles are also taken into consideration during this process. Fresh targets are assigned as and when intercepts with assigned targets are completed. A single shot kill probability (SSKP) of 98% has already been achieved by the system taking into consideration various parameters of the sensors, guidance command, missile capabilities and kill zone computations. There are a number of possibilities for deploying the KS-1A in autonomous Battery-level mode and in Regimental-level mode for neutralising the threat profiles with optimally defined multi-target engagement scenarios. In the Regimental-level mode there are a number of proven configurations to defend vulnerable areas depending upon the nature of the expected threat pattern and characteristics of the threats. Similarly, up to four B batteries in autonomous mode can be deployed to defend vulnerable areas/points.

In all its deployment patterns, the KS-1A offers a multi-target and multi-directional area air defence capability. All its ground-based and airborne components are integrated in a plug-and-flight architecture under which the software-based integration of all hardware-based elements permits the autonomous management of various functions such as programmable surveillance, target detection, target acquisition, target identification and tracking, threat evaluation, threat prioritisation, interception assignment and target engagement. Depending on the operational scenario—whether to defend a vulnerable area or vulnerable point—the KS-1A’s operational deployment pattern can be selected from either of the three above-mentioned types. In all the three patterns, up to four KS-1A Batteries (with 48 ready-to-fire missiles and four SJ-231 stations) can function together seamlessly even when deployed over a wide area and are linked to a Regiment-level ECC by secure microwave line-of-sight data links as well as mobile troposcatter communications terminals. When an entire Regiment of KS-1A M-SAMs is deployed, use is made of a YLC-18 ‘gapfiller’ airspace surveillance radar to provide a single integrated airspace picture to the Regimental ECC. The YLC-18 and four SJ-231 stations can be networked with a Sector Operations Centre (SOC) via a DA-6 tactical internet controller using either underground fibre-optic links or land-mobile broadband, multi-channel, beyond line-of-sight, digital troposcatter communications terminals. This same type of systems architecture using the above-mentioned tools can be employed to develop an integrated, hierarchical air defence network that seamlessly integrates the M-SAM, E-SHORADS and VSHORADS into one monolithic guided-missile-based air defence system. To make the HT-233 radar virtually invulnerable to hostile electronic jamming, a number of ECCM features have been incorporated, including narrow transmit and receive beams, very low sidelobe antenna, automatic frequency selection mode, interference analysis and mapping, and randomness in frequency, space and time.--Prasun K. Sengupta

More Data On MiG-35, AL-31FP-117S Turbofan & DASH HMD

2009-11-06T12:53:00.000-08:00

Unnecessary Fuss

2009-11-02T20:51:00.000-08:00

It is the ultimate irony, isn't it? On one hand there's all kind of anti-China hysteria in the India-based mass-media and on the other hand, a MoD-owned defence PSU lke BEL is procuring CETC-built SEC-33 bulk encryptors off-the-shelf! But such encryptors are dual-use items that are procured commercially and many a time even the OEM (CETC) is unaware of the final export destinations of such encryptors. But as long as the encryptor's integral encryption chip is not pre-programmed (and the encryption software is locally installed by BEL in India), there is no operational risk whatsoever to the end-user as BEL is the sole custodian and designer of the encryption software's crypto keys (which is embedded by BEL within the encryption chip)—Prasun K. Sengupta

Ka-52 Alligator Detailed

2009-11-01T11:45:00.000-08:00

Where Is The MiG-35?

2009-10-31T06:33:00.000-07:00

No one from Russia, it seems, can give a convincing answer to this very simple question. Earlier last February during the Aero India 2009 exhibition, Mikhail Pogosyan, who presently wears two hats—Director-General of RAC-MiG and Director-General of Sukhoi Corp—had made two interesting revelations: one, that the MiG-35’s single-seat and tandem-seat variants will be rolled from the Nizhny Novgorod-based Sokol Aircraft Plant by August this year; and two, there would be maximum mission systems commonality, inclusive of the AESA radar, between the MiG-35 and the Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft (FGFA) that will be co-developed by India’s Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) and Russia’s United Aircraft Corp (UAC). Both these revelations have since been contradicted with the passage of time. The Indian Air Force (IAF) had expected the roll-out of the single-seat and tandem-seat versions of the MiG-35 latest by mid-October and be made available for a week-long phase of flight evaluations within India later this year, followed by a second round of evaluations (involving test-firings of precision-guided munitions) in Russia within the first quarter of next year. And as for systems commonality, especially pertaining to the AESA radar, it became evident last August that it will be the Zhuk-AE from Phazotron JSC that will go on board the MiG-35, while the FGFA will be equipped with a variant of the MIRES Sh-121 AESA-based multi-mode radar, which is now being developed by Tikhomirov NIIP. The Zhuk-AE AESA which has repeatedly been shown on board the MiG-29M2 No154 M-MRCA (built in 1990) since 2007 is now officially described as being a functional technology demonstrator containing 600 transmit/receive modules, while the definitive series-production variant of the Zhuk-AE will have 1,000 T/R modules. And the MiG-29M2 No154, which has deceptively been painted as the MiG-35 and been used in the past for giving joyrides to some India-based broadcast media journalists and a few IAF pilots, is now being described by RAC-MiG as just a ‘proof-of-concept’ demonstrator!

It has now emerged that RAC-MiG had built two prototypes of the shipborne MiG-29 as part of the contract to supply 12 MiG-29Ks and four MiG-29KUBs to the Indian Navy. These two prototypes—a tandem-seat MiG-29KUB No947 and a single-seat MiG-29K No941—made their maiden flights in January and June 2007, respectively. (By the way, these two prototypes were the first brand-new MiG-29s to be built by RAC-MiG after a gap of 15 years!) Following the conclusion of the flight certification and weapons qualification phases, the single-seat MiG-29K No941 was and is still being subjected to a modification programme aimed at deriving the definitive single-seat MiG-35. This perhaps explains why RAC-MiG has publicly displayed (during MAKS 2007 and MAKS 2009) the MiG-29KUB No947, but has never even revealed the existence of the Indian Navy-specific MiG-29K No941 to date. It is now believed that the Russian Air Force, as part of a Kremlin-initiated bailout package for debt-ridden RAC-MiG, will place an order for 24 MiG-35s by 2012, while the Russian Navy will procure 24 MiG-29K/KUBs in 2012 to replace the existing Su-33 shipborne combat aircraft.

According to RAC-MiG, the definitive MiG-35 will have larger wings to accommodate 10 underwing weapon stations, plus a belly-mounted station to house the Novator-built 3M-14AE Kalibr-A subsonic 290km-range air-to-ground land attack cruise missile. To make the MiG-35 a truly network-centric platform RAC-MiG has already initiated industrial participation negotiations with Israel’s SIBAT, plus avionics OEMs from Italy (Finmeccanica/Elettronica) and France (SAGEM for the Sigma-95 RLG-INS, which is also on board the Su-30MKI).—Prasun K. Sengupta

First Impressions

2009-10-29T16:53:00.001-07:00

Here’s what we know so far by visually observing the crash of the Ecuadorian Air Force-owned Dhruv ALH at Quito on October 27: of the three Dhruv ALHs flying over an air base during celebrations to mark the 89th anniversary of the air force, one of them apparently swung 90 degrees and started losing altitude. As the video clip of the incident shows, the two-man aircrew who are in all probability highly experienced aviators, instinctively resorted to the autorotation technique (the only available option) to regain control and to their credit it must be said that they did succeed in slowing the rate of descent, although within the available 8 seconds, they could not stabilise the helicopter, which in turn led to a half-controlled descent and touchdown, with the stricken Dhruv ALH coming to rest on its portside, with the two-man aircrew managing to leave the helicopter by themselves after the crash before being taken to Quito's Military Hospital. The video clipping also showed the Dhruv ALH’s main rotor blades and tail rotor blades functioning, but not enough to indicate if the tail-rotor hub and tail-rotor shaft were in a fully functional state. Based purely on the available video clipping, it would seem that:

• The ill-fated Dhruv PROBABLY suffered from a sudden loss of power in either one of its twin Ardiden-1H (Shakti) engines, jointly built by HAL and Turbomeca. But catastrophic failure of both engines or failure of both the LH and RH sides of the main gearbox (MGB) can be ruled out. It is also PROBABLE that either one of the two fuel supply tanks (which supply fuel independently to the two engines) was starved of fuel-flow from the the Dhruv ALH’s three main fuel tanks, which house the pumps required for ensuring the fuel-flow to the fuel supply tanks.

• The above two probabilities PROBABLY contributed to the sudden reduction of supply of power to the tail-rotor gearbox via the tail-rotor drive shaft, resulting in the helicopter veering off to the left while losing altitude at the same time.

The only saving grace then, and the only available option for the aircrew then was to resort to the autorotation technique, which they did and that is probably the only reason they were fortunate enough to survive to fly again in future. Full marks to them!—Prasun K. Sengupta

I am enclosing below all the FAR Part 29standards that the Dhruv ALH complies with. FAR Part 29: Airworthiness Standards: Transport Category Rotorcraft

Federal Aviation Regulations Subpart A - General

o Sec. 29.1 - Applicability.

o Sec. 29.2 - Special retroactive requirements.Subpart B - Flight

o Sec. 29.21 - Proof of compliance.

o Sec. 29.25 - Weight limits.

o Sec. 29.27 - Center of gravity limits.

o Sec. 29.29 - Empty weight and corresponding center of gravity.

o Sec. 29.31 - Removable ballast.

o Sec. 29.33 - Main rotor speed and pitch limits.

o Sec. 29.45 - General.

o Sec. 29.49 - Performance at minimum operating speed.

o Sec. 29.51 - Takeoff data: general.

o Sec. 29.53 - Takeoff: Category A.

o Sec. 29.55 - Takeoff decision point (TDP): Category A.

o Sec. 29.59 - Takeoff path: Category A.

o Sec. 29.60 - Elevated heliport takeoff path: Category A.

o Sec. 29.61 - Takeoff distance: Category A.

o Sec. 29.62 - Rejected takeoff: Category A.

o Sec. 29.63 - Takeoff: Category B.

o Sec. 29.64 - Climb: General.

o Sec. 29.65 - Climb: All engines operating.

o Sec. 29.67 - Climb: One engine inoperative (OEI).

o Sec. 29.71 - Helicopter angle of glide: Category B.

o Sec. 29.75 - Landing: General.

o Sec. 29.77 - Landing Decision Point (LDP): Category A.

o Sec. 29.79 - Landing: Category A.

o Sec. 29.81 - Landing distance: Category A.

o Sec. 29.83 - Landing: Category B.

o Sec. 29.85 - Balked landing: Category A.

o Sec. 29.87 - Height-velocity envelope.

o Sec. 29.141 - General.

o Sec. 29.143 - Controllability and maneuverability.

o Sec. 29.151 - Flight controls.

o Sec. 29.161 - Trim control.

o Sec. 29.171 - Stability: general.

o Sec. 29.173 - Static longitudinal stability.

o Sec. 29.175 - Demonstration of static longitudinal stability.

o Sec. 29.177 - Static directional stability.

o Sec. 29.181 - Dynamic stability: Category A rotorcraft.

o Sec. 29.231 - General. o Sec. 29.235 - Taxiing condition.

o Sec. 29.239 - Spray characteristics.

o Sec. 29.241 - Ground resonance.

o Sec. 29.251 - Vibration.Subpart C - Strength Requirements

o Sec. 29.301 - Loads.

o Sec. 29.303 - Factor of safety.

o Sec. 29.305 - Strength and deformation.

o Sec. 29.307 - Proof of structure.

o Sec. 29.309 - Design limitations.

o Sec. 29.321 - General.

o Sec. 29.337 - Limit maneuvering load factor.

o Sec. 29.339 - Resultant limit maneuvering loads.

o Sec. 29.341 - Gust loads.

o Sec. 29.351 - Yawing conditions.

o Sec. 29.361 - Engine torque.

o Sec. 29.391 - General.

o Sec. 29.395 - Control system.

o Sec. 29.397 - Limit pilot forces and torques.

o Sec. 29.399 - Dual control system.

o Sec. 29.411 - Ground clearance: tail rotor guard.

o Sec. 29.427 - Unsymmetrical loads.

o Sec. 29.471 - General.

o Sec. 29.473 - Ground loading conditions and assumptions.

o Sec. 29.475 - Tires and shock absorbers.

o Sec. 29.477 - Landing gear arrangement.

o Sec. 29.479 - Level landing conditions.

o Sec. 29.481 - Tail-down landing conditions.

o Sec. 29.483 - One-wheel landing conditions.

o Sec. 29.485 - Lateral drift landing conditions.

o Sec. 29.493 - Braked roll conditions.

o Sec. 29.497 - Ground loading conditions: landing gear with tail wheels.

o Sec. 29.501 - Ground loading conditions: landing gear with skids.

o Sec. 29.505 - Ski landing conditions.

o Sec. 29.511 - Ground load: unsymmetrical loads on multiple-wheel units.

o Sec. 29.519 - Hull type rotorcraft: Water-based and amphibian.

o Sec. 29.521 - Float landing conditions.

o Sec. 29.547 - Main and tail rotor structure.

o Sec. 29.549 - Fuselage and rotor pylon structures.

o Sec. 29.551 - Auxiliary lifting surfaces.

o Sec. 29.561 - General.

o Sec. 29.562 - Emergency landing dynamic conditions.

o Sec. 29.563 - Structural ditching provisions.

o Sec. 29.571 - Fatigue evaluation of structure.Subpart D - Design and Construction

o Sec. 29.601 - Design.

o Sec. 29.602 - Critical parts.

o Sec. 29.603 - Materials.

o Sec. 29.605 - Fabrication methods.

o Sec. 29.607 - Fasteners.

o Sec. 29.609 - Protection of structure.

o Sec. 29.610 - Lightning and static electricity protection.

o Sec. 29.611 - Inspection provisions.

o Sec. 29.613 - Material strength properties and design values.

o Sec. 29.619 - Special factors.

o Sec. 29.621 - Casting factors.

o Sec. 29.623 - Bearing factors.

o Sec. 29.625 - Fitting factors.

o Sec. 29.629 - Flutter and divergence.

o Sec. 29.631 - Bird strike.

o Sec. 29.653 - Pressure venting and drainage of rotor blades.

o Sec. 29.659 - Mass balance.

o Sec. 29.661 - Rotor blade clearance.

o Sec. 29.663 - Ground resonance prevention means.

o Sec. 29.671 - General.

o Sec. 29.672 - Stability augmentation, automatic, and power-operated systems.

o Sec. 29.673 - Primary flight controls.

o Sec. 29.674 - Interconnected controls.

o Sec. 29.675 - Stops.

o Sec. 29.679 - Control system locks.

o Sec. 29.681 - Limit load static tests.

o Sec. 29.683 - Operation tests.

o Sec. 29.685 - Control system details.

o Sec. 29.687 - Spring devices.

o Sec. 29.691 - Autorotation control mechanism.

o Sec. 29.695 - Power boost and power-operated control system.

o Sec. 29.723 - Shock absorption tests.

o Sec. 29.725 - Limit drop test.

o Sec. 29.727 - Reserve energy absorption drop test.

o Sec. 29.729 - Retracting mechanism.

o Sec. 29.731 - Wheels.

o Sec. 29.733 - Tires.

o Sec. 29.735 - Brakes.

o Sec. 29.737 - Skis.

o Sec. 29.751 - Main float buoyancy.

o Sec. 29.753 - Main float design.

o Sec. 29.755 - Hull buoyancy.

o Sec. 29.757 - Hull and auxiliary float strength.

o Sec. 29.771 - Pilot compartment.

o Sec. 29.773 - Pilot compartment view.

o Sec. 29.775 - Windshields and windows.

o Sec. 29.777 - Cockpit controls.

o Sec. 29.779 - Motion and effect of cockpit controls.

o Sec. 29.783 - Doors.

o Sec. 29.785 - Seats, berths, litters, safety belts, and harnesses.

o Sec. 29.787 - Cargo and baggage compartments.

o Sec. 29.801 - Ditching.

o Sec. 29.803 - Emergency evacuation.

o Sec. 29.805 - Flight crew emergency exits.

o Sec. 29.807 - Passenger emergency exits.

o Sec. 29.809 - Emergency exit arrangement.

o Sec. 29.811 - Emergency exit marking.

o Sec. 29.812 - Emergency lighting.

o Sec. 29.813 - Emergency exit access.

o Sec. 29.815 - Main aisle width.

o Sec. 29.831 - Ventilation.

o Sec. 29.833 - Heaters.

o Sec. 29.851 - Fire extinguishers.

o Sec. 29.853 - Compartment interiors.

o Sec. 29.855 - Cargo and baggage compartments.

o Sec. 29.859 - Combustion heater fire protection.

o Sec. 29.861 - Fire protection of structure, controls, and other parts.

o Sec. 29.863 - Flammable fluid fire protection.

o Sec. 29.865 - External loads.

o Sec. 29.871 - Leveling marks.

o Sec. 29.873 - Ballast provisions.Subpart E - Powerplant

o Sec. 29.901 - Installation.

o Sec. 29.903 - Engines.

o Sec. 29.907 - Engine vibration.

o Sec. 29.908 - Cooling fans.

o Sec. 29.917 - Design.

o Sec. 29.921 - Rotor brake.

o Sec. 29.923 - Rotor drive system and control mechanism tests.

o Sec. 29.927 - Additional tests.

o Sec. 29.931 - Shafting critical speed.

o Sec. 29.935 - Shafting joints.

o Sec. 29.939 - Turbine engine operating characteristics.

o Sec. 29.951 - General.

o Sec. 29.952 - Fuel system crash resistance.

o Sec. 29.953 - Fuel system independence.

o Sec. 29.954 - Fuel system lightning protection.

o Sec. 29.955 - Fuel flow.

o Sec. 29.957 - Flow between interconnected tanks.

o Sec. 29.959 - Unusable fuel supply.

o Sec. 29.961 - Fuel system hot weather operation.

o Sec. 29.963 - Fuel tanks: general.

o Sec. 29.965 - Fuel tank tests.

o Sec. 29.967 - Fuel tank installation.

o Sec. 29.969 - Fuel tank expansion space.

o Sec. 29.971 - Fuel tank sump.

o Sec. 29.973 - Fuel tank filler connection.

o Sec. 29.975 - Fuel tank vents and carburetor vapor vents.

o Sec. 29.977 - Fuel tank outlet.

o Sec. 29.979 - Pressure refueling and fueling provisions below fuel level.

o Sec. 29.991 - Fuel pumps.

o Sec. 29.993 - Fuel system lines and fittings.

o Sec. 29.995 - Fuel valves.

o Sec. 29.997 - Fuel strainer or filter.

o Sec. 29.999 - Fuel system drains.

o Sec. 29.1001 - Fuel jettisoning.

o Sec. 29.1011 - Engines: general.

o Sec. 29.1013 - Oil tanks.

o Sec. 29.1015 - Oil tank tests.

o Sec. 29.1017 - Oil lines and fittings.

o Sec. 29.1019 - Oil strainer or filter.

o Sec. 29.1021 - Oil system drains.

o Sec. 29.1023 - Oil radiators.

o Sec. 29.1025 - Oil valves.

o Sec. 29.1027 - Transmission and gearboxes: general.

o Sec. 29.1041 - General.

o Sec. 29.1043 - Cooling tests.

o Sec. 29.1045 - Climb cooling test procedures.

o Sec. 29.1047 - Takeoff cooling test procedures.

o Sec. 29.1049 - Hovering cooling test procedures.

o Sec. 29.1091 - Air induction.

o Sec. 29.1093 - Induction system icing protection.

o Sec. 29.1101 - Carburetor air preheater design.

o Sec. 29.1103 - Induction systems ducts and air duct systems.

o Sec. 29.1105 - Induction system screens.

o Sec. 29.1107 - Inter-coolers and after-coolers.

o Sec. 29.1109 - Carburetor air cooling.

o Sec. 29.1121 - General.

o Sec. 29.1123 - Exhaust piping.

o Sec. 29.1125 - Exhaust heat exchangers.

o Sec. 29.1141 - Powerplant controls: general.

o Sec. 29.1142 - Auxiliary power unit controls.

o Sec. 29.1143 - Engine controls.

o Sec. 29.1145 - Ignition switches.

o Sec. 29.1147 - Mixture controls.

o Sec. 29.1151 - Rotor brake controls.

o Sec. 29.1157 - Carburetor air temperature controls.

o Sec. 29.1159 - Supercharger controls.

o Sec. 29.1163 - Powerplant accessories.

o Sec. 29.1165 - Engine ignition systems.

o Sec. 29.1181 - Designated fire zones: regions included.

o Sec. 29.1183 - Lines, fittings, and components.

o Sec. 29.1185 - Flammable fluids.

o Sec. 29.1187 - Drainage and ventilation of fire zones.

o Sec. 29.1189 - Shutoff means.

o Sec. 29.1191 - Firewalls.

o Sec. 29.1193 - Cowling and engine compartment covering.

o Sec. 29.1194 - Other surfaces.

o Sec. 29.1195 - Fire extinguishing systems.

o Sec. 29.1197 - Fire extinguishing agents.

o Sec. 29.1199 - Extinguishing agent containers.

o Sec. 29.1201 - Fire extinguishing system materials.

o Sec. 29.1203 - Fire detector systems.Subpart F - Equipment

o Sec. 29.1301 - Function and installation.

o Sec. 29.1303 - Flight and navigation instruments.

o Sec. 29.1305 - Powerplant instruments.

o Sec. 29.1307 - Miscellaneous equipment.

o Sec. 29.1309 - Equipment, systems, and installations.

o Sec. 29.1321 - Arrangement and visibility.

o Sec. 29.1322 - Warning, caution, and advisory lights.

o Sec. 29.1323 - Airspeed indicating system.

o Sec. 29.1325 - Static pressure and pressure altimeter systems.

o Sec. 29.1327 - Magnetic direction indicator.

o Sec. 29.1329 - Automatic pilot system.

o Sec. 29.1331 - Instruments using a power supply.

o Sec. 29.1333 - Instrument systems.

o Sec. 29.1335 - Flight director systems.

o Sec. 29.1337 - Powerplant instruments.

o Sec. 29.1351 - General.

o Sec. 29.1353 - Electrical equipment and installations.

o Sec. 29.1355 - Distribution system.

o Sec. 29.1357 - Circuit protective devices.

o Sec. 29.1359 - Electrical system fire and smoke protection.

o Sec. 29.1363 - Electrical system tests.

o Sec. 29.1381 - Instrument lights.

o Sec. 29.1383 - Landing lights.

o Sec. 29.1385 - Position light system installation.

o Sec. 29.1387 - Position light system dihedral angles.

o Sec. 29.1389 - Position light distribution and intensities.

o Sec. 29.1391 - Minimum intensities in the horizontal plane of forward and rear position lights.

o Sec. 29.1393 - Minimum intensities in any vertical plane of forward and rear position lights.

o Sec. 29.1395 - Maximum intensities in overlapping beams of forward and rear position lights.

o Sec. 29.1397 - Color specifications.

o Sec. 29.1399 - Riding light.

o Sec. 29.1401 - Anticollision light system.

o Sec. 29.1411 - General.

o Sec. 29.1413 - Safety belts: passenger warning device.

o Sec. 29.1415 - Ditching equipment.

o Sec. 29.1419 - Ice protection.

o Sec. 29.1431 - Electronic equipment.

o Sec. 29.1433 - Vacuum systems.

o Sec. 29.1435 - Hydraulic systems.

o Sec. 29.1439 - Protective breathing equipment.

o Sec. 29.1457 - Cockpit voice recorders.

o Sec. 29.1459 - Flight recorders.

o Sec. 29.1461 - Equipment containing high energy rotors.Subpart G-Operating Limitations and Information

o Sec. 29.1501 - General.

o Sec. 29.1503 - Airspeed limitations: general.

o Sec. 29.1505 - Never-exceed speed.

o Sec. 29.1509 - Rotor speed.

o Sec. 29.1517 - Limiting height-speed envelope.

o Sec. 29.1519 - Weight and center of gravity.

o Sec. 29.1521 - Powerplant limitations.

o Sec. 29.1522 - Auxiliary power unit limitations.

o Sec. 29.1523 - Minimum flight crew.

o Sec. 29.1525 - Kinds of operations.

o Sec. 29.1527 - Maximum operating altitude.

o Sec. 29.1529 - Instructions for Continued Airworthiness.

o Sec. 29.1541 - General.

o Sec. 29.1543 - Instrument markings: general.

o Sec. 29.1545 - Airspeed indicator.

o Sec. 29.1547 - Magnetic direction indicator.

o Sec. 29.1549 - Powerplant instruments.

o Sec. 29.1551 - Oil quantity indicator.

o Sec. 29.1553 - Fuel quantity indicator. o Sec. 29.1555 - Control markings.

o Sec. 29.1557 - Miscellaneous markings and placards.

o Sec. 29.1559 - Limitations placard.

o Sec. 29.1561 - Safety equipment.

o Sec. 29.1565 - Tail rotor.

o Sec. 29.1581 - General.

o Sec. 29.1583 - Operating limitations.

o Sec. 29.1585 - Operating procedures. o Sec. 29.1587 - Performance information.

o Sec. 29.1589 - Loading information.Appendices• Appendix A to Part 29 - Instructions for Continued Airworthiness • Appendix B to Part 29 - Airworthiness Criteria for Helicopter Instrument Flight • Appendix C to Part 29 - Icing Certification • Appendix D to Part 29 - Criteria for Demonstration of Emergency Evacuation Procedures Under §29.803

The military variants of the Dhruv ALH adhere to the following FAR/MILSPEC standards:

US Army Aeronautical Design Standard-33E (ADS-33E)Flaw-Tolerant Rotor System: FAR/JAR 29.571,

AM 29-28Crashworthy Fuel System: FAR/JAR 29.952,

AM 29-35Flaw-Tolerant Drive Train with Over Torque Certification: FAR/JAR 29.952, AM 29-28

Turbine Burst Protection: FAR/JAR 29.901, AM 29-36

Composite Spar Main & Tail Rotor Blades with Lightning Strike Protection: FAR/JAR 1309(h), AM 29-40

Engine Compartment Fire Protection: FAR/JAR 29.1193

Redundant Hydraulics & Flaw Tolerant Flight Controls: FAR/JAR 29.571, AM 29-28

Aircraft-Wide Bird Strike Protection: FAR/JAR 29.631, AM 29-40

Crashworthiness Standard: FAR/JAR 29.561, AM 29-38

Crashworthy Seats Conforming to MIL-STD-1472B

Cockpit Instrumentation Lighting Conforming to MIL-STD-85762A

Avionics Databus: MIL-STD-1553B or ARINC-429

Autopilot Accuracy: MIL-F-9490D

Embedded MIL-STD-188-141B ALE Link Protection

Embedded MIL-STD-188-110B data modem

Russian Approaches To Combat Helicopter Survivability

2009-10-26T11:35:00.000-07:00

The BMD Challenge

2009-10-22T16:31:00.000-07:00

While India has taken some significant steps toward the development of a homegrown ballistic missile defence (BMD) system since 1998, these nevertheless constitute only the ‘crawl’ phase of the R & D effort, with the ‘walk’ and ‘run’ phases yet to kick in. Several challenges are yet to be overcome, including the development of high-velocity interceptor missiles, a ground-based battlespace management system (BMS), and a three-tier network comprising BMD deployment packages for point defence, for area defence and for theatre defence. The best indications of the shape of things to come are the existing BMD systems already operational in Israel and in the US, and are explained in some detail in the above slides.—Prasun K. Sengupta

The Dragon’s REMCF Explained

2009-10-20T17:22:00.000-07:00

In developing a comprehensive appreciation of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) already formidable presence in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and the neighbouring western province of Xinjiang, one needs to take note of the fact that Xinjiang, with its domestic oil fields in the Tarin Basin and its role as a hub for oil and gas pipelines arriving from Pakistan and Central Asia, has now become China’s main source of non-seaborne hydrocarbons-based products. The TAR, on the other hand, possesses large amounts of zircon, chromium, rutile, magnesium and titanium that are needed by China’s heavy industries. Large amounts of cobalt and copper also lie astride the now operational 1,118km-long Qinghai-Tibet Railway. Consequently, the immensely strategic value of these regions and their resources has resulted in the increased deployment of the PLA’s rapid reaction forces (RRF, or kuaisu fanyin budui), and also better known as ‘Resolving Emergency Mobile Combat Forces, or REMCF) to these regions in order to prepare for any contingencies that might threaten its interests. To support the rapid deployment of its REMCFs in TAR and Xinjiang, the PLA in 2007 completed the construction of two major heli-bases and a massive ELINT/SIGINT station in Aksai Chin to conduct early-warning and border surveillance missions that could, potentially, substantially threaten Indian Army positions in Sub-sector North and Sub-sector West and the Saltoro Range. The two new heli-bases are the biggest in the world at 16,000 feet and could accommodate 300 medium-lift air-mobility helicopters, light armed aeroscouts and attack helicopters at a time. Simultaneously, the PLA Air Force (PLAAF) last made operational an air base near Xining in Western China. Last but not the least, the Golmund-Lhasa-Qinghai-Tibet Railway (QTR) network has now tripled the PLA’s offensive power against India, with reinforcements reaching from the Beijing and Shanghai military regions in 18 hours instead of the earlier 80 hours. Besides, the rail networks also now enable the REMCF formations from Gansu and Shaanxi provinces to be deployed by rail in less than 12 hours to carry out limited but intensive offensive campaigns against deployed Indian forces in Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.

The PLA began raising its first REMCF formations in the late 1980s. A 100,000-man fully mechanised REMCF specialising in combined-arms land campaigns was established in 1992 and placed under the direct control of the Central Military Commission (CMC). This mission-oriented REMCF was given the tasks of border defence, dealing with internal armed conflict, maintaining public order, and conducting disaster relief missions. For creating this REMCF, each PLA Group Army Corps of every Military Region (MR) selected an Infantry Division to be the designated REMCF for dealing with emergency situations in every Military Region (MR). This was followed by a second tri-service 300,000-strong REMCF formation (also under the CMC’s command) in 1998, made up of the PLA Army’s 91 Division and 121 Division, the PLA Navy’s 5th Amphibious Landing Detachment, and the PLA Air Force’s (PLAAF) 15th Airborne Division. The 15th Airborne Division comprises three airborne brigades. The 43rd Brigade, stationed in Kaifeng, Henan Province, is attached to the Jinan MR. The 44th Brigade, stationed in Yinshan, Hubei Province, is attached to the Lanzhou MR. The 45th Brigade, stationed in Huangpi, Hubei Province, is also attached to the Lanzhou MR. The Division also includes elements of the PLAAF’s 13th Transport Division. The Division too is directly under the CMC’s control (and not under the PLA’s General Staff Department). Strategically, the airborne troops are considered to be a reserve force, yet in tactical terms they are deployed as an advance force. It can also be reconstituted as an air-mobile RRF.

The PLA Army has also since established a Regiment-level Army Special Force (ASF) in every MR as an RRF unit, directly under the MR HQ’s command. The principal officers of the ASF, including the commander, political commissar, and chief of staff, are full Colonels. Officers above the Platoon-level are University graduates and receive further education in the Army Command Academy. In every Group Army, a Battalion-level special reconnaissance task force has been set up under the Group Army HQ’s command. Officers and men of this ASF are selected from reconnaissance and technical units of every Group Army. The wash-out rate is about 50% after receiving further tests and training. In addition, every MR has established special training facilities for their ASF/RRF units. These facilities impart training on ‘five defences’, including means to defend against nuclear/biological/chemical attacks, electronic countermeasures, and employment of precision-guided weapon systems. The timeframe of each exercise for such RRF/ASF elements is three days and troops are given a two-day food ration. The exercise missions include occupying and defending strategic key points, sabotaging airfields, anti-air attack, anti-reconnaissance, and survival course training. Combined-arms tri-services RRF and REMCF exercises (conceptualised and directed by the PLA’s first combined-arms tactical training centre in the Nanjing MR) were first carried out in 1995 and 1996 in the Gobi desert, the Tibetan and Xinjiang highlands, and in the southwestern tropical forests to enhance the RRF’s and REMCF’s adaptive survival capabilities.

The ASF/RRF units currently deployed throughout the TAR specialise in the conduct of reconnaissance combat operations (RBD), which involves the extensive use of signals intelligence, helicopters (air-mobility, armed aeroscout and attack) and high-mobility reconnaissance teams to provide actionable intelligence for light mechanised infantry formations which are then able to serve as blocking forces to ambush and halt retreating hostile ground-based interdiction forces, as well as provide fire coordination for long-range field artillery and tactical air support. The operational environment in the TAR and Xinjiang regions—comprising the world’s largest mountain ranges and high desert plateaus—has required that lighter forces be deployed, since the terrain and the long borders are generally unsuited for operations to be undertaken by large heavily armoured formations. Consequently, the PLA Army has equipped its Brigade-sized REMCFs in Tibet and the 6th Independent Division in Xinjiang—the first fully mechanised infantry Division to be deployed at this height—with wheeled armured fighting vehicles and all-terrain logistics vehicles. These include the NORINCO-built WMZ-550 four-wheeled, WMZ-551B (Type 92A) six-wheeled and WMZ-525 eight-wheeled family of armoured personnel carriers (APC), armoured infantry fighting vehicles (AIFV) and tank destroyers, and the WMZ-551A (Type 92) and WMZ-501 Type 86 infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) and PLZ-95 combined gun/missile air defence system mounted on a tracked hull. These vehicles are organised along the lines of a cavalry battalion. In both regions, the AIFVs are equipped with one-man high elevation turrets that are mounted with 25mm and 30mm automatic cannons. Such turrets allow the AIFVs to engage targets located high in the mountains. In addition, the ability of the 25mm/30mm cannons to penetrate light armour gives it a measure of security if it were to face light tanks.

The structure of the 6th Independent Division follows the standard PLA triangular organisation, comprising three mechanised infantry or armoured Platoons to a Company, three Companies to a Battalion, three Battalions to a Brigade and three Brigades to a Division. The Division comprises three mechanised infantry Brigades, one MBT Brigade (equipped with Type 96G MBTs), one field artillery Brigade (equipped with SH-1 155mm/52-calibre motorised self-propelled guns, WS-2 and AR-2 MBRLs), one air defence Brigade (equipped with the PLZ-95, Yitian SHORADS and KS-1A M-SAMs), one helicopter wing, and a logistics Brigade. The Division HQ comprises a combat engineer Battalion, an electronic warfare Battalion, a chemical defence Battalion, the Company-size Division HQ Staff, an integral air defence unit and a quick-reaction force Company. There are a total of 351 Type 86 AIFVs in this Division, which are supported by an Artillery Brigade of 72 155mm/52-calibre PLZ-05 guns and a MBT Battalion of 99 Type 96Gs. Type 89 tracked armoured command vehicles are liberally provided throughout the Division down to the company-level to provide command-and-control capabilities. The Type 86 AIFV sports a one-man universal turret containing a 30mm chain gun. The turret also has greater depression and elevation to enable individual windows and mountainsides to be engaged. The Battalion’s support Company includes one mortar Company (armed with 10 W-99 82mm mortars mounted on 4 x 4 vehicles), an automatic grenade launcher (AGL) Platoon with two vehicles each equipped with two 35mm AGLs, one anti-tank Platoon of two vehicles sharing three anti-tank guided-missile systems (the HJ-9A mounted on ZFB-05 APCs). There are 18 ZFB-05s in each Brigade providing 72 anti-tank guided missile launchers in the Division. There is also an air defence Platoon of three PLZ-95s with four FN-6 VSHORADS missiles per vehicle for a total of twelve. The Division has 27 motorised air defence vehicles and has 108 VSHORADS launchers that come under the operational control of the air defence Brigade, which comprises one Battalion of 24 towed 57mm anti-aircraft guns and one Battalion of 18 towed twin 3omm ‘Giant Bow’ anti-aircraft guns. An air defence Platoon of six PLZ-95s and one Yitian launcher are attached to the field artillery Brigade. A new addition to the 6th Division is a helicopter wing with one squadron of six Harbin Z-9G attack helicopters and one transport squadron of six Mi-17V-5 air-mobility helicopters.

Operational logistics are provided assets that are attached to the REMCFs as required. The all-terrain vehicles and weapons (built by NORINCO, Yongkang ADBTEV Vehicle Co Ltd in Zhejiang, Chongqing Yonghui Technology Development Co Ltd, Chongqing Jinguan High-Technology Group, and Shaanxi Baoji Special Vehicles Manufacturing Co Ltd) are much lighter than those in other PLA Army mechanised units, reducing their logistical footprint and providing tactical mobility, allowing for more roads and bridges to be used during operations. In addition, a wide range of wheeled light specialist vehicles have been inducted into service. These vehicles can be armed with weapons that include the NDM-86 7.62mm sniper rifle, PF-98A 120mm LAW, PF-89A 80mm LAW, QJG-02 12.7mm HMG, Type 82 106mm RCL, Type 88 5.8mm sniper rifle, Type 89 12.7mm sniper rifle, and the Type 91 35mm grenade launcher.

For ultra-low-level air defence of installations like heli-bases, air bases and logistics bases, state-owned China North Industries Corp (NORINCO) has begun delivering two new systems to the PLA Army: the LD-2000 close-in weapon system (CIWS); and the Yitian VSHORADS. The LD-2000 is mounted on a locally developed cross-country 8 x 8 truck. To provide a more stable firing platform, four stabilisers are lowered to the ground. Mounted at the rear is the remote-controlled turret armed with a 30mm seven-barrel cannon. Two ammunition boxes each hold 500 rounds of ready-to-use ammunition. One magazine holds armour-piercing discarding-sabot and the other high-explosive rounds. The 30mm cannon has a cyclic rate of fire of 4,000 rounds/minute out to 3km, but airborne targets will be engaged between 1km and 1.5km. The power-operated mount is unmanned and laid onto the target by a gunner who is seated in a fully enclosed module to the rear of the cab. Mounted on the top of the 30mm gun mount is a wide-band tracking radar and an optronic fire-control system, which also incorporates a laser rangefinder. Target information comes from a wheeled command/control vehicle fitted with a CPMIEC-built TD-2000B surveillance radar, which controls between three and six LD 2000 firing units. Another version of the LD-2000 comes equipped with the gun plus six TY-90 VSHORADS missiles.

The Yitian VSHORADS is mounted on NORINCO’s WZ-551 series 6 x 6 APC. A turret, armed with four TY-90s located either side of the sensor package, is mounted on the upper part of the WZ-551’s chassis. The sensor package comprises an optronic system, above which is mounted a new 3-D radar that can be folded down into a horizontal position while travelling. The 3-D radar has a detection range of 18km and a tracking range of 10km. Targets can be tracked either in the optronic mode or in the radar mode, with the latter being especially useful when there is a threat of electronic countermeasures. Yitian also features an automatic target tracking and engagement capability and can engage targets with a maximum velocity of up to 400 metres/second, with a claimed reaction time of six to eight seconds. The TY-90 solid-propellant missile has a maximum effective range between 300 metres and 6km, with altitude coverage from 15 metres up to 4km. The fire-and-forget missile is transported and launched from a box-type container and has four fins at the rear and four control surfaces at the front. Once the missiles have been fired, new missiles are reloaded using a support vehicle. The WZ-551 chassis includes a nuclear/biological/chemical warfare protection system, and a central tyre pressure regulation system that allows the driver to adjust the tyre pressure to suite the terrain being crossed. A 12.7mm machine gun is mounted at the front right side of the vehicle for local defence, with a bank of three electrically operated smoke grenade launchers mounted either side of the turret. Optional equipment includes an identification friend-or-foe capability.

For airborne EW operations in support of limited war campaigns conducted by REMCFs, the PLAAF has deployed the Y-8XZ platform since April 2007. The aircraft features large fairings forward of the main landing gear compartments, as well as two large plate antennae on each side of the rear fuselage. Other features include twin-blade antennae on both sides of the vertical tailfin, a wire antenna underneath the rear fuselage, and a SATCOMS antenna on top of the real fuselage. The Y-8XZ can also be pressed into service for conducting psychological operations and has on board high-power broadcast equipment

The PLA’s Army Aviation Unit (AAU), raised in April 1986, is tasked with deploying armed aeroscout (Z-11), air-mobility (Mi-17V-5) and attack helicopters (ZW-9G) to support ground operations. The AAU is directly under General Staff Department (GSD) command, and has been seen in several combined exercises in Northern China (Huabei), TAR and Xinjiang performing reconnaissance, anti-armour attack, special forces insertion, electronic countermeasures operations, and command post relocation. For reconnaissance operations by night, the AAU has in its inventory several Z-9G helicopters equipped with imaging infra-red LORROS sensors using secure data links to provide near-real time fire-support observation and coordination in high-altitude terrain. To enter service in the near future will be the Zhisheng ZW-10A twin-engined light attack helicopter. It may be recalled that Pratt & Whitney Canada had sent 10 PT6C-67Cs engines to China in 2001 and 2002 under a Canadian government export license for use in the 6-tonne AMHU medium-lift helicopter that is currently under development by China National South Aviation Industry Ltd, Changhe Aircraft Industries Group (CAIG) and China Helicopter Research and Development Institute (CHRDI), both based in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Province. It has now been confirmed that these engines have mysteriously ended up in the ZW-10A, whose maiden flight took place on April 29, 2003. China, however, claims that the two helicopters are being developed on a ‘common platform’ that share common rotors and transmissions. The tandem-seat ZW-10A is fitted with a fly-by-wire flight control system, twin glass cockpits, nose-mounted optronic turret, and a chin-mounted 20mm cannon. The electronic warfare suite, developed by CETC International, includes a radar warning receiver (RWR), laser warning receiver, infra-red jammer and chaff/flare dispensers. Twin stub wings provide four stores stations for external ordnance like the HJ-10A laser-guided missile and TY-90 laser-guided air combat missile.--Prasun K. Sengupta

IPMS For New Indian Warships

2009-10-18T14:35:00.000-07:00

The above four slides explain what exactly is the Integrated Platform Management System (IPMS), which L-3 MAPPS is supplying for the Indian Navy's three Project 17 FFGs, three Project 15A DDGs and four projected Project 15B DDGs. The Bangalore-based subsidiary of L-3 MAPPS was set up in early 2002 to specifically undertake systems integration-related applications software development for interfacing the IPMS with the Ukraine-based Zorya/Mashproekt M36E gas turbine-based propulsion plants of the Project 15A and Project 15B DDGs. All 10 warships will also have on board the EMDINA combat management system (CMS) originally co-designed by the Indian Navy's Weapons and Electronic Systems Engineering Establishment (WESEE) and TATA Power as part of project MEDINA for further details, proceed to: http://trishulgroup.blogspot.com/2009/03/cms-radars-vls-modules-of-project-11356.html).

The EMDINA CMS is a follow-on to the EMCCA Computer Aided Action Information System (CAAIS), also co-developed by WESEE and TATA Power, under Project MECCA and is presently on board the three Project 16 FFGs, three Project 16A FFGs and three Project 15 DDGs.--Prasun K. Sengupta

F-16 Block 50/52 Explained

2009-10-16T17:04:00.000-07:00

China Ups The Ante

2009-10-13T16:05:00.000-07:00

While the October 1 parade for celebrating 60th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) saw the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) 2nd Artillery Corps publicly showcasing for the first time its 2,500-km range DF-21C road-mobile ‘cannistered’ medium-range ballistic missile and the road-mobile ChangJiang-10Zai (Long Sword) 2,200km-range land-attack cruise missile (LACM), what was not revealed was how exactly would these missiles be guided to their intended targets. For strategic targetting of both land-based and sea-based targets, the 2nd Artillery Corps has been, since the late 1990s, deployed a mix of overhead recce satellites equipped with both optronic sensors as well as synthetic aperture radars (SAR). Belonging to the ‘Yaogan’ or ‘JianBing’ family, the constellation presently comprises the Yaogan-1 Yaogan-3 and Yaogan-5 satellites equipped with SAR antennae (supplied off-the-shelf by Russia’s NPO Mashinostroneyie), and the Yaogan-2, Yoagan-4 and Yaogan-6 satellites equipped with optronic sensors. All these satellites were designed by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp’s (CASC) No5 Research Institute and No8 Research Institute, with final fabrication and systems integration taking place at the CASC’s Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology.

To date, the 2nd Artillery Corps has already implemented the launch-control protocols and ultra-secure SATCOMS-based communications networks required for employing both the land-launched and air-launched variants of the CJ-10A cruise missile against both land-based and seaborne targets. Development of the CJ-10A and its launch platforms (including the Hong 6K bomber) was led by the Hubei-based 9th Academy of the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp (CASIC), which is also known as the Sanjiang Aerospace Group, or 066 Base. Series-production is now underway at the Beijing-based 3rd Academy, also belonging to CASIC. The navigational and fire-control components of the CJ-10 are produced at the Shanghai-based Xinxin Factory, which was set up in the late 1990s with the help of military-technical assistance from Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan. The CJ-10’s maiden test-flight took place on August 10, 2004. It is widely believed that the CJ-10 is an exact clone of the Korshun LACM (developed in Ukraine) and weighs 1,090kg, has a wingspan of 3.1 metres and diameter of 0.514 metres, and a length of 6.3 metres, 0.26 metres longer than the Kh-55. This slight difference in length comes from placing the Korshun’s R95-300 turbofan within the rear of the missile’s fuselage, with an air intake underneath. The Kh-55’s engine, in contrast, pops out of the rear section after launch, and hangs beneath the missile’s fuselage during cruise flight. By making the Korshun (and the CJ-10) more streamlined, like the Tomahawk cruise missile, Ukrainian designers succeeded in reducing the missile’s overall radar cross-section by eliminating the unwanted right angles of the exposed engine, which reflect telltale radar energy.

Another new-generation nuclear-armed missile deployed since 2007 by the 2nd Artillery Corps is the Dong Feng 21C (NATO reporting name: CSS-5 Mod-3) MBRM, which has a range of 1,700km when carrying a 2,000kg payload. The fully cannistered ballistic missile is carried on a 10 x 10 wheeled WS-2500 transporter-erector-launcher vehicle, which has a maximum load capacity of 28 tonnes. According to the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the DF-21C can be armed with fuel air explosive-based (FAE) and electromagnetic pulse-based (EMP) warheads, which could typically be employed against high-value strategic land-based targets, or against aircraft carrier-led battle groups. When used as part of a coordinated strike package, both the CJ-10 and DF-21C could significantly up the ante (as force multipliers with strategic reach) against any adversary, while keeping the threshold of hostilities limited to the conventional level. In India’s case, the widespread deployment of these two missile systems by the PLA in either the Tibet Autonomous Region or the Chengdu Military Region could in one stroke neutralise the operational advantages of offensive airpower projection now enjoyed by the Indian Air Force (IAF) in northeastern and northern India, unless India begins a large-scale deployment of theatre-based ballistic missile/cruise missile defence networks that are backed up by a robust constellation of overhead recce satellites for strategic reconnaissance-cum-targetting purposes.

To this end, India’s satellite-based overhead reconnaissance and related strategic targetting capabilities were significantly boosted when the state-owned Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched India’s second dedicated, military-specific, operational recce satellite—RISAT-2—on board the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C12) from the Sriharikota-based Satish Dhawan Space Centre on April 20 this year. The RISAT-2 was bought off-the-shelf from Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) for India’s Dehra Dun-based National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) as part of the fast-tracking of procurements of critical hardware required for strategic deterrence, along with related ground receiving stations and imagery interpretation systems. It is virtually identical to the 300kg TecSAR/Polaris synthetic aperture radar-equipped satellite that was launched by ISRO’s subsidiary Antrix Corp for Israel on board the PSLV-C10 rocket launcher on January 21, 2008. Following RISAT-2 by the year’s end will be the ISRO-built RISAT-1, 1,780kg overhead recce satellite equipped with a C-band active phased-array synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and developed at a cost of Rs4 billion (see: http://directory.eoportal.org/get_announce.php?an_id=12429).

India’s first dedicated operational military reconnaissance satellite was CARTOSAT-2A (see http://directory.eoportal.org/get_announce.php?an_id=10000443), which was launched on board the PSLV-C9 on April 28, 2008. This was preceded on January 21 by the launching of the TecSAR/Polaris at a cost of Rs550 million. Weighing 300kg, both the TecSAR/Polaris and RISAT-2 can take pictures of the earth through cloud and rain, 24 hours of the day utilising electronic beam-steering techniques. The IAI-produced satellite features mesh antennae panels which, once opened, provide high-fidelity reflections of the Earth’s surface. Aside from IAI-subsidiary ELTA Systems, producers of the 100kg SAR payload, program subcontractors include Tadiran Spectralink and RAFAEL Advanced Defense Systems, producers of hydrazine thrusters and other propulsion components. TecSAR was placed into its intended orbit with a perigee (nearest point to earth) of 450km and apogee (farthest point to earth) of 580km with an orbital inclination of 41 degrees with respect to the equator. As the Polaris’ manufacturer—the MBT Space Division of Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI)--wanted a ‘core-alone’ configuration of the PSLV-C10 to put Polaris in orbit, the four-stage rocket launcher did away with the six strap-on booster motors, and weighed only 230 tonnes at liftoff. The Antrix Corp subsidiary of ISRO is now hopeful that it will also bag the follow-on contracts from Israel to launch another two recce satellites of the Polaris family in future.

By February 3 last year, initial streams of TecSAR/Polaris-generated SAR imagery had reached Israel’s highly-secure ground station on the Tel Aviv-based campus of IAI. Once initial imagery was analysed and the satellite’s various operational modes were determined to meet user requirements, the TecSAR/Polaris was certified as operational. Until then, IAI and Israeli Military Intelligence (AMAN) technicians proceeded through an extensive intialisation and calibration testing regime that began about an hour after launch, with first receipt of the satellite’s signals. TecSAR/Polaris and RISAT-2 promise a qualitative upgrade in strategic intelligence not only because of the all-weather, photographic quality imagery they generate, but by their ability to linger longer over targeted areas of interest. Both satellites feature a unique combination of in-orbit agility and electronically-steered beams that allow operators to capture more images over a wider area in each rotational pass. Agility is provided by high-powered, yet low-weight reaction wheels that allow the satellite to alter its orbiting attitude as it travels some 7.5 kilometres per second. In parallel, electronic switching of the radar beam allows operators to back-scan critical target areas and utilise multiple modes of image collection, thereby maximising every second of the typical 8.5-minute overpass of a given area. Both satellites can operate in any inclination and at a wide range of altitudes. The payload is designed to collect imagery in three distinct operating modes: Spot mode for collecting a large number of high-resolution images per orbit; strip mode for capturing many hundreds of medium-resolution imaging swaths; and beam-scanning mosaic mode for very wide coverage at lower, yet ‘extremely valuable’ resolution. The satellites are also inherently capable of detecting and tracking moving targets. During a single pass, due to extraordinary flexibility of the beam and the agility of the satellite itself, the TecSAR/Polaris or RISAT-2 can capture widely spread targets at the same time. The estimated footprint, or area of image collection, is more than 500 square kilometres. If a normal satellite provides a 25km footprint, one can multiply by 20 or even 30 to get the coverage provided by these two satellites in mosaic mode. By activating the reaction wheels, they make a back-scan that allows them to linger more time in a certain area. Their added value thus lies in this unique combination of electronic switching of the beam and the mechanical agility of the satellites that allows one to achieve a phenomenal capability for high-resolution imaging over very large areas. But beyond expected imaging improvements, TecSAR/Polaris and RISAT-2 will provide significantly enhanced revisit time for monitoring ballistic missile launching sites, seaport activities, weapons production facilities, troop movements and other militarily-significant changes. Both these satellites can circle the Earth every 90 minutes.

Almost as anxious as its Israeli counterpart for the TechSAR/Polaris’ success is Northrop Grumman Corp, which hopes to parlay the lightweight, high-resolution SAR-equipped satellite into a new, US niche market for operationally responsive space systems. An exclusive teaming agreement with IAI now allows Northrop Grumman to co-produce slightly-modified TecSAR clones--dubbed Trinidad--to be held in storage for launch by US users at a mere 30-day notice. When the two companies announced their agreement in April 2007, they stressed that implementation of the prospective launch-on-demand initiative was contingent upon the successful launch and operational performance of the Israeli spacecraft. Each Trinidad satellite could be manufactured in about 28 months at a very small fraction of the cost of other US SAR-equipped satellites. Within two years, this satellite will be ready for launch by a very low cost launcher like the Minotaur four-stage Space Launch Vehicle of the Orbital Sciences Corp. The commercial partners still need to wait for IAI to complete all testing, certification and other activities demanded by its Israeli government customer. But following full validation and initial operation of TecSAR/Polaris’ multi-mode, X-band radar-imaging collection capabilities, Northrop Grumman has received the data it needs to convince potential US users of the benefits to be had from the system. According to Northrop Grumman, preliminary plans call for the US firm to invest in a mobile ground station modified to capture, receive, store and process TecSAR/Polaris imagery provided by the IAI ground station. The plan is to actually demonstrate the satellite’s capabilities to prospective customers.

India’s CARTOSAT-2A, which has a spatial resolution of 0.7 metres, will be followed in future by the 2B, 2C and 2D, with these having high-resolution cameras capable of supplying imagery with 0.5-metre spatial resolution. India currently has in orbit four dual-purpose satellites that can be used for military overhead reconnaissance. CARTOSAT-1 (see http://directory.eoportal.org/get_announce.php?an_id=7389) or IRS P5 (Indian Remote Sensing Satellite) was launched on May 5, 2005 into a 618km-high polar sun synchronous orbit by the PSLV-C6 rocket. It carries two panchromatic (PAN) cameras with 2.5-metre resolution that take black-and-white stereoscopic pictures of the earth in the visible region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The swath covered by these PAN cameras is 30km, and they are mounted in such a way that near-simultaneous imaging of the same area from two different angles is possible. This facilitates the generation of accurate three-dimensional maps. The cameras operate in the 500-750nm wavelength and are tilted +26 degrees and -5 degrees along the track. CARTOSAT-1, weighing 1,560kg, also carries a solid-state recorder with a capacity of 120 Giga Bits to store the images taken by its cameras. The stored images can be transmitted when the satellite comes within the visibility zone of an Earth-based ground station. The 680kg CARTOSAT-2 (see http://directory.eoportal.org/get_announce.php?an_id=13733), designed for supplying scene-specific spot imagery, was launched into the intended 639km polar orbit by the PSLV-C7 rocket on January 10m 2007. CARTOSAT-2 has a single PAN camera capable of providing scene-specific spot imageries for cartographic applications. The camera is designed to provide imageries with 1-metre spatial resolution and a swath of 10km. The satellite can steer along and across its track up to 45 degrees. It has been placed in a sun-synchronous polar orbit at an altitude of 630km and has a revisit period of four days, but this can be improved to one day with suitable orbit manoeuvres. Several new technologies like two-mirror-on-axis single camera, carbon fabric reinforced plastic-based electro-optic structure, large size mirrors, JPEG-like data compression, solid-state recorder, high-torque reaction wheels and high-performance star sensors are employed on board CARTOSAT-2. The satellite has a revisit interval of four days.

The third overhead recce satellite currently in orbit is the Technology Experiment Satellite or TES (see http://directory.eoportal.org/get_announce.php?an_id=15557), which weighs 1,108kg and was successfully placed in 568km sun synchronous orbit on October 22, 2001 using the PSLV-C3 rocket. The technologies demonstrated thus far on board TES are attitude and orbit control systems, high-torque reaction wheels, new reaction control systems with optimised thrusters and a single propellant tank, lightweight spacecraft structure, solid-state recorder, X-band active phased-array antenna, improved satellite positioning system, miniaturised power system, and two-mirror-on-axis camera optics. The TES has a PAN camera capable of producing images of 1-metre resolution. In attention to these and the CARTOSAT-2 family of satellites, India will later this year launch the RISAT-1, which will carry a C-band (5.35 GHz) SAR with a spatial resolution of 3 metres to 50 metres and a swath of 10km to 240km. The Earth-facing side of the AESA-SAR antenna is a broadband dual polarised microstrip radiating aperture. The antenna will comprise three deployable panels, each of 2-metre x 2-metre size. Each of the panels is sub-divided into four tiles of size 1-metre x 1-metre, each consisting of 24 x 24 radiating elements. In each tile, all the 24 x 24 radiating elements are grouped into 24 groups, with each group comprising 24 elements spread along azimuth directions, which are fed by two stripline distribution networks feeding for V and H polarisation. Each of these groups of 24 radiating elements is catered to by two separate T/R modules feeding two separate distribution networks for V and H operation with the same radiating patches. Present plans call for deploying up to seven RISAT-type recce satellites by 2015.

Another reconnaissance satellite that was launched on September 23 this year by ISRO was OCEANSAT-2 (see http://directory.eoportal.org/get_announce.php?an_id=14267), which would study the oceans and the wind surface of oceans. It is more powerful than the OCEANSAT-1 (launched in May 1999), which was nearing the end of its life cycle. The OCEANSAT-2, placed into a near-polar sun synchronous orbit of 720km, carries an ocean-colour monitor and a Ku-band pencil beam scatterometer, which is an active microwave radar and operates at 13.515GHz providing a good resolution cell-size swathe of 50km x 50km. It also carries a radio occulation sounder for atmospheric studies. The ocean colour monitor payload is an eight-band multi-spectral camera operating in the visible-near infra-red spectral range. This camera provides an instantaneous geometric field-of-view of 360 metres covering a swath of 1,420km. The back-scattered beams from the ocean surface are measured to derive the wind vector. OCEANSAT-2 will be used for sea state forecasting, coastal zone studies, and also provide inputs for weather forecasting and climatic studies of consequence to the movements of both naval surface combatants and submarines. Its orbital path, combined with the wide swathe of both payloads, will provide an observational repetity of two days. For providing the high-accuracy navigation inputs for precision-guided munitions as well as for long-range navigation over land, sea and air, ISRO last year initiated the Indian Regional Navigational Satellite System (IRNSS) project, which calls for the deployment of a constellation of seven low-cost, GPS satellites in geo-stationary orbit over the next five years. Its footprint will be regional, and will include the Indian subcontinent, the Tibetan plateau, Central Asia and Southeast Asia.—Prasun K. Sengupta

Ottavio Quattrocchi’s Lasting Gift To India

2009-10-06T10:13:00.005-07:00

With the executive branch of the Govt of India now seemingly determined to permanently and legally bury the Bofors scandal and accord Mr Ottavio Quattrocchi the privilege of having the last laugh, I’ve endeavoured to draft out a chronological timeline that illustrates the sheer havoc caused by this scandal to the Indian Army’s Field Artillery Rationalisation Plan. The timeline runs from 1982 to 2005.

From 1982 the Government of India (GoI) is on the lookout out for a towed 155mm/39-calibre howitzer along with a family of artillery rounds, charges, fuzes and gun-towing trucks. The requirement is for 1,840 howitzers, of which 410 are to be imported off-the-shelf and the rest to be built in-country with progressive local content. The howitzers are required to re-equip 92 of the Indian Army’s Medium Artillery Regiments. The competition is shortlisted in December 1982 to SOFMA/GIAT Industries of France offering the TR-155, Bofors AB of Sweden with its FH-77B, UK-based International Military Services with its FH-70B, and Austria’s Voest Alpine (later NORICUM) with its GHN-45.

Between October 1982 and February 1986, the Indian Army does no fewer than seven evaluations of the relative merits of the towed howitzers offered by the bidders. In the first six, the TR-155 is clearly preferred to the FH-77B.

Between May and July 1984, the Price Negotiations Committee (PNC) set up for the towed howitzer acquisition by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) is officially informed by the four contenders about their agents in India. Following a discussion of this matter in the PNC, its Chairman, Defence Secretary S K Bhatnagar, meets representatives of the four contenders on May 3, 1985 and informs them that “the present GoI does not approve of the appointment of Indian agents acting for foreign suppliers; that in case they had made provision for any commissions for their Indian agents, they should make a suitable reduction in their offers; and that they would be disqualified if it came to the notice of the GoI that they had appointed Indian agents”.

In November 1985, the GoI’s choice, based on advice from Army HQ and a recommendation by the PNC, shortlists the TR-155 and FH-77B.

From January 1986, bids from both the shortlised contenders are received. On March 11, Bofors AB submits its best and final offer. On March 12 the PNC decides to issue a Letter of Intent to Bofors AB for the purchase of FH-77Bs. The matter goes through five tiers of official approval and three Union Cabinet Ministers on a single day, before it is approved by Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in his additional capacity as Minister for Defence on March 14, 1986. The contract, dated March 24, 1986 and valid for a 14-year period, is entered into between the GoI and Bofors AB and is valued at SEK8.41 billion or Rs14,377.2 million (US$1.3 billion). The amount reportedly includes $50 million in secret payoffs made by Bofors AB to three or more recipient arrangements and these payments, far from representing any ‘winding-up costs’, are percentage payments tied to specified supplies against the total order and to realisation of the payments by the GoI.

In early 1987, Army HQ formally asks the MoD’s approval to issue a Request for Proposals (RFP) for procuring acoustic-based and radar-based artillery locating systems.

In April 1987, following media disclosures in Sweden about the illegal payoffs, the GoI in 1989 indefinitely suspends all commercial contacts with Bofors AB. Consequently, the licenced-production of 1,430 FH-77Bs to be undertaken by India’s state-owned Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) is shelved. All 410 FH-77Bs and 527,000 rounds of seven types of 155mm ammunition are delivered by Bofors AB by January 1990.

In June 1989, the MoD sanctions the OFB’s Badmal Factory to produce a range of 155mm ammunition, with the planned date of completion being June 1993 in two phases. The Factory concludes a contract with US-based Day & Zimmerman in May 1994 for the design, supply and commissioning of a 155mm ammunition filling plant with a capacity of 50,000 rounds per annum on single shift at a cost of Rs293.6 million, including a foreign exchange content of $6.88 million. The planned date of completion of the project is December 1996. The machinery is received in six consignments from October 1995 to June 1997 as against the contracted date of May 1996. The plant is commissioned in May 1998 to produce only three types of 155mm rounds.

In 1991, Army HQ finalises its GSQR for a tactical UAV, and the DRDO’s Bangalore-based Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) commences work on developing the Nishant tactical UAV. The project is due for completion by 1995 but is delayed till 2002.

Out of seven types of indigenous 155mm ammunition required to be delivered during 1991-1993, OFB develops only four types of rounds between 1992 and 1998. Against the Army’s requirement of 585,000 rounds, Army HQ places orders for only 237,000 rounds of seven types.

Between 1993 and 1994, the MoD purchases 480 (24 Regiments) M-46 130mm towed howitzers worth Rs100,000 each, of which 100 howitzers come from the Czech Republic, and 380 from Russia.

In 1994, Army HQ proposes the off-the-shelf procurement of nine Regiments of 152mm 2S19 MSTA tracked SPHs from Russia and later modifying them in-country to accept 155mm/52-cal barrels made by either Bofors AB or Soltam.

By 1995, Army HQ reformulates its Field Artillery Rationalisation Plan (FARP), under which it plans to replace its 14 different medium artillery howitzers (towed and self-propelled) with 155mm/52-cal towed, motorised and tracked howitzers for the majority of its Artillery Regiments by 2025. Army HQ also says that over the 9th (1997-2002), 10th (2002-2007), 11th (2007-2012) and 12th (2012-2017) Five Year Plans, it seeks 400 additional tracked and motorised SPHs. Also, two Regiments of the DRDO-developed 214mm Pinaka MBRLs (comprising 36 launchers) worth Rs11 billion are to be acquired by the end of the 10th Plan in 2007 out of the total plan for six Pinaka MBRL Regiments.

In April 1995, the MoD decides to begin importing 155mm ammunition from South Africa as the OFB supplies only 49,257 complete rounds against the Army’s demand of 136,000 rounds as of March 1995.

By October 1995, 20 pre-production Prithvi SS-150 surface-to-surface missiles are delivered to the Army to form the 333 Missile Group. The Group with 16 liquid-fuelled, single-stage SS-150 road-mobile missile launchers (and a total of 60 missiles, including reserve rounds) has two Sub-Groups, each of which are further sub-divided into two Troops with two launchers each. The Group is based at Panchmarhi in Madhya Pradesh State.

In 1996, Army HQ decides to accept 12 Searcher Mk1 UAVs (originally destined for Singapore) from Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI) for delivery in 1998.

In the summer of 1996, Vickers Shipbuilding & Engineering Ltd (now owned by BAE Systems) demonstrates on a no-cost-no-commitment basis its 155mm/52-cal tracked self-propelled howitzer (SPH), comprising the AS-90 turret mated with the hull of a T-72M1 main battle tank (MBT). During firepower trials in the plains, the SPH fires a family of 155mm rounds out to 41.6km. The mobility trials in the desert, however, show the SPH to be underpowered. GIAT Industries, with its GCT turret mounted on a T-72M1 hull, and Denel/LIW with a similarly mounted T-6 turret—therefore decide not to demonstrate such hybrid, tracked SPHs in India.

In mid-1996, Russia’s Rosoboronexport State Corp and Ekaterinberg-based Uraltransmash propose to co-develop with the DRDO and OFB a hybrid 2S19M1/MSTA-S tracked SPH that combines the hull of the T-90S MBT with a turret containing a 155mm/52-cal barrel that is jointly developed by Bofors AB and Volgograd-based Barrikady State Production Association. The MoD and Army HQ ignore this offer.

In 1997, the United Front-led GoI under Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda and later Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral formalises a declaration inked earlier in the year with South African President Nelson Mandela under which the centrepiece of the bilateral relationship is the concept of a long-term strategic partnership, especially for co-developing a family of 155mm/52-calibre towed autonomous howitzers, plus tracked and motorised SPHs.

In March 1997, the MoD inks a contract with South Africa’s Denel Group for importing 80,000 HEER 155mm rounds and 20,000 fuzes at a cost of Rs1.88 billion with free transfer of technology to produce them in-country due to the OFB’s delayed indigenous development of HEER rounds by five years, non-development of 155mm illuminating rounds, and to offset the existing deficiency of 86,955 rounds.

On May 1, 1997 Army HQ starts work on raising the Army’s 40 Artillery Division (now part of the Ambala-based 1 Strike Corps). The Division is to have two Gun Brigades (with six Medium Regiments of which one will have 155mm tracked SPHs, two with motorised 155mm SPHs and three with 155mm towed howitzers) and one Regiment of 122mm BM-21 Grad MBRLs; and one Composite Brigade comprising one Prithvi SS-150 Missile Group, one Regiment of Pinaka MBRL with 18 launchers, one Regiment of 12 Smerch-M MBRLs, and one RSTA Group comprising six Searcher II/Heron II UAVs, two TPQ-37 Firefinder counterbattery radars and four medium-range, BEL-built Stentor battlefield surveillance radars.

In May 1997, the MoD authorises OFB to build two new, dedicated facilities for producing a family of 155mm ammunition and their related charges and fuzes in cooperation with the Denel Group.

During firepower trials conducted at the Pokhran Field Range in 1997-1998, one 130mm M-46S towed howitzer upgraded by Israel’s Soltam Systems (but utilising the carriage and recoil system of the original gun) to the 155mm/45-cal standard is test-fired using extended-range base-bleed ammunition out to a range of 39km.

In early 1998, engineering development work begins on the Bhim tracked SPH, comprising Denel/LIW’s T-6 turret housing a 155mm/52-cal barrel and the hull of the Arjun Mk1 MBT.

In early 1998, Rosoboronexport offers the 9K58 Smerch-M (Tornado) 300mm MBRL to the Army.

In early 1999 Russia’s Tula-based KBP Instrument Design Bureau offers the Krasnopol-M KM-2 laser-guided 155mm projectile, along with related 1D-22 laser target designators and 1A-35I/K shot synchronisation systems. While it is tested to perfection in February 1999 at the Pokhran Field Range, firepower tests at altitudes of 3,700 metres in the Karbuthan Field Range in Kargil fail, after which KBP asks for more time to make modifications to the round and its range table. During the third trial, after modifications, there are two correct hits and two misses and the conclusion is that the Krasnopol-M is still not fit for mountain warfare. Later, it is tested again in the Mahe Field Range in Ladakh after which it is realised that it works in high altitudes with a height differential between targets and gun positions. Approval for acquiring 1,000 Krasnopol-M rounds worth Rs1.51 billion is given by the NDA-led GoI’s Cabinet Committee on National Security (CCNS) in April 1999.

In May 1999, against an urgent requirement, a conditional contract is signed with KBP for the supply of 1,000 Krasnopol-Ms and 10 laser designators worth $34.75 million.

In late May 1999, Army HQ leases one IAI-built Searcher II UAV system comprising one ground control station and four UAV vehicles from Israel’s Ministry of Defence for a one-year period for Rs300 million.

In June 1999 during the Kargil conflict with Pakistan, Lt Gen Shamsher S Mehta, Deputy Chief of Army Staff (Planning and Systems), proposes the leasing of 40 Denel/LIW-made G-6 motorised 155mm/45-cal SPHs with the eventual aim of acquiring them in large numbers once the border conflict ended. The proposal, which moves rapidly upwards within the MoD for approval, stresses the ‘commonality’ factor between the G-6 and the tracked Bhim SPH. The Army’s proposal is ultimately rejected by the MoD’s Finance Department as being impractical and too costly.

On June 17, 1999 Army HQ says that it requires 155mm red phosphorous ammunition to gain the advantage of incendiary effects in addition to laying smokescreens during Operation Vijay. A contract is concluded on August 20, 1999 with the Denel Group for 9,000 rounds worth $12.69 million (Rs551 million). A technical delegation visits South Africa in June/July 1999 and clears Denel as a single vendor. The contract stipulates the delivery of 1,000 rounds within four months after the export license is obtained, and the balance between six and nine months. The first lot of 1,200 rounds is received at the Pulgaon-based Central Ammunition Depot only in June 2000, and QC inspections are not completed until October 2000. The delay is caused primarily due to problems in getting ships through the Ministry of Surface Transport for transporting the consignments.

In July 1999, the MoD lifts its self-imposed ban on commercial deals with Bofors AB.

In August 1999 and January 2000, respectively, the MoD signs contracts for importing 9,000 rounds of smoke and 7,300 rounds of 155mm illuminating ammunition from the Denel Group at a total cost of Rs1.07 billion for Operation Vijay.

In August and December 1999, the MoD inks two contracts with Rosoboronexport for various types of ammunition worth $92.62 million (Rs4.02 billion), including 45,000 rounds of 130mm VOF/RVC rounds (worth $6 million) of which only 30,000 rounds are serviceable up to April 2003.

In August 1999, the MoD inks a contract worth SEK186 million (Rs976.5 million) with Bofors AB for procuring urgently needed spares (489 items) for the FH-77Bs Of this, SEK143 million (Rs750.8 million) is to be adjusted towards the recovery of exuded HE-107 rounds supplied earlier by Bofors AB. The spares are delivered between March and November 2000. A follow-on but bigger spares package worth $23.26 million is ordered later to make the 100 FH-77Bs (cannibalised earlier) operational. Bofors AB also offers to upgrade the FH-77Bs to the FH-77BO5L52 standard by introducing a 52-cal barrel, along with TCM and BONUS sensor-fused guided-rounds.

In October 1999, the MoD inks a contract with state-owned Electronics Corporation of India Ltd (ECIL) for 67,000 M-8513 fuzes for 155mm rounds and 400 fuze setters at a total cost of Rs815.9 million. The fuzes are to be imported/assembled from components supplied by a South African firm. As per the contract, deliveries are to begin in October 1999. After failing to adhere to the delivery schedule, the South African firm makes a request in November 1999 for supplying M-8513 fuzes of 1989 to 1992 vintage being held by the South African Army, as against the 1994 vintage indicated in the firm’s technical offer. The MoD’s approval is communicated, after which the firm then supplies 15,000 fuzes of 1989-1990 vintage in December 1999 and 95% of the contracted amount for these fuzes (Rs172.7 million) is paid.

By late 1999, the sole prototype of the Bhim tracked SPH is ready for user’s mobility/firepower trials. Over the next four months it is tested in the plains and deserts and achieves a sustained rate of fire of 116 rounds in 60 minutes, firing ERFB-BB rounds out to 42.1km, and VLAP rounds out to 52.5km when using the M64 Bi-Modular Charge System (BMCS). The T-6 turret also houses a ring-laser gyro-based modular azimuth position system (comprising a vehicle motion sensor, dynamic reference unit, and a control display unit) that provides land navigation/direction cues for an autonomous navigation and gun-laying system. A prominent cover is fitted over the recoil/recuperator assembly and an automatic travelling lock for the 52-cal barrel is carried at the front of the glacis plate. The Army projects a requirement for 520 tracked SPHs valued at $972 million, or $2.4 million per T-6 turret. State-owned Bharat Earth Movers Ltd (BEML) is designated as lead contractor for the Bhim’s in-country production.

In 2000, Army HQ orders 32 Searcher II UAVs from IAI, of which 16 systems are delivered by 2001.

In January 2000, the MoD inks a $11.98 million (Rs524.7 million) contract with the Denel Group for 7,300 rounds of 155mm illuminating rounds (with 24km-range), based on a June 1999 requirement. Deliveries begin in May 2000. As against the rate of $1,440 per round, inclusive of transfers of manufacturing technologies, that was contracted for in 1997 with Denel, the MoD contracts a rate of $1,641 this time, a cost escalation of 14%.

In March 2000 the final contract is inked between the GoI and KBP to buy the Krasnopol-M after the MoD is apprised of the conditions attached to the round’s usage and the Defence Minister’s waiver is taken for departing from the GSQR procurement procedures. Deliveries begin in early April 2000.

In 2000, the DRDO begins developing a new 122mm rocket to replace those of Russian origin for the Army’s existing BM-21 Grad MBRLs. The new rocket will use a case-bonded composite propellant and a low-calibre thrust chamber, offering an enhanced range of 35km compared to the BM-21’s current 20.4km range.

In March 2000, Soltam Systems wins a contract worth $47,524,137 for upgrading 180 M-46s to 155mm/45-cal M-46S standard. A follow-on deal will provide kits to OFB further retrofit another 250 M-46s. A total of 400 M-46s for 20 Regiments are earmarked for upgrade.

In 2001, Army HQ orders six Heron II UAV systems from IAI.

In January 2001, Army HQ issues a RFP for procuring an initial 15 acoustic weapon locating (AWL) systems worth Rs1.5 billion ($33.33 million). The total requirement is for 70 systems to detect mortar, tube artillery and MBT fire. BAE Systems’ Hostile Artillery Locating (HALO) system and SEL-THALES’ SMAD system are offered.

On November 29, 2001 the MoD says that the OFB’s Jabalpur-based Gun Carriage Factory has started receiving 180 M-46S howitzer upgrade kits from Soltam. The project is temporarily suspended by the MoD in mid-2002 because of quality problems.

In early 2002, Russia’s Tula-based Splav State Research and Production Association brings an improved Smerch-M MBRL to India for field trials. The Smerch-M can fire the 9M528 projectile, which uses a high-energy composite propellant to give an increased range of 90km, and a new warhead that scatters 25 anti-tank mines. It can also be fitted with a warhead containing five Bazalt MOTIV-3F anti-armour sub-munitions, each of which has dual-colour infra-red sensors for terminal guidance, and kinetic-energy fragmentation warheads that can penetrate 70mm of armour at an angle of 30°.

On February 18, 2002 Army HQ issues RFPs to five foreign manufacturers of 155mm/52-cal motorised SPHs and invites them to subject their SPHs to firepower/mobility field trials in India starting April 2002. The RFP states that the requirement is for 300 such SPHs, comprising the off-the-shelf purchase of 180 units and the supply of 120 units in knocked-down condition for equipping 40 Regiments. The RFP recipients include SWS Defence (formerly Bofors AB) with its FH-77BD, Denel/LIW with its G-6 and the T-5 Mk2000 Condor, GIAT Industries with its CAESAR, Karmetal of Slovakia with its Zuzana, and Soltam Systems with its ATMOS. Both SWS Defence and GIAT decline to take part in these competitive trials as they suspect the MoD and Army HQ to have already decided to award the contract to Denel/LIW. Consequently, only the ATMOS and G-6 arrive in India for the trials on a no-cost-no-commitment basis.

In February 2002, the MoD signs two contracts with South Africa’s Denel Group under which the OFB will set up its 40th ordnance production facility in Nalanda to undertake the licenced-production of 155mm BMCS developed by Denel’s Somchem subsidiary; and modify its facility in Bolangir with the help of Denel’s Naschem subsidiary to undertake the licenced-production of the M2000 Assegai (Spearhead) family of 155mm ammunition. The family includes the M2000 high-explosive, M2000 low-fragmentation, M2000 practice, M2001 cluster (containing 42 bomblets), M2002 smoke, M2003 illuminating, M2004 smoke red phosphorous and the M2005 VLAP (Velocity-Enhanced Artillery Projectile). All of these can be fitted with a base-bleed unit. The MoD also signs a contract to buy 200,000 BMCS modules off-the-shelf in April 2002, with deliveries ending by December 2006. Denel’s main competitor for these two contracts is SWS Defence.

Also in February 2002, Army HQ issues an RFP plus invitations for in-country firepower/mobility trials for towed autonomous 155mm/52-cal howitzers. The projected requirement for such howitzers is for 1,580 units (for 20 Regiments) of which about 400 (five Regiments) worth $663 million will be procured off-the-shelf. The three competitors are: the SWS Defence’s FH-77BO5L52; Denel/LIW’s G-5 Mk2000; and Soltam’s ATHOS 2052. Again, GIAT with its TR-G2 howitzer declines to take part. None of the contenders met the Army’s GSQR in the two rounds of field trials, conducted in 2002 and 2003. The Army’s Director-General of Artillery produces a non-committal evaluation of the three contenders, and does not rank the howitzers by order of merit. The MoD requests the contenders to retrofit the howitzers with driver’s night vision navigation devices for a third round of field trials to be held in early June 2004.

In May and November 2002, the MoD signs Letters of Agreement (LoA) to acquire 12 THALES Raytheon Corp-built AN/TPQ-37(V)3 Firefinder counterbattery radars along with 26 AN/VRC-90E SINCGAR radios and related training, spares and logistics packages all worth $142.4 million (Rs9.5 billion) through the US Foreign Military Sales (FMS) process. Delivery of the radars will be completed by September 2006.

In June 2002, Army HQ raises 41 Artillery Division, now attached to the XXI Strike Corps of the Army’s Southern Command.

In April 2003 the MoD approves induction of the Pinaka Mk1 MBRL with a 37.5km range and directs the DRDO’s Armaments Research & Development Establishment to continue efforts to improve the rocket’s range to 40km by using enhanced solid propellants.

In July 2003, successful user trials of a modified M-46S are conducted. Following this, work begins on upgrading 180 M-46s, but is subsequently capped at only 40 units.

On July 10, 2003 the US Army delivers two AN/TPQ-37(V)3 Firefinders on a two-year lease for training purposes. Initial operator and crew training for 16 Indian Army personnel had begun in April 2003 in California.

In August 2003, the Army’s Electrical and Mechanical Engineering (EME) unit at Mhow, near Indore in Madhya Pradesh, conducts the first round of competitive field evaluations of AWL systems offered by BAE Systems and SEL-THALES. The latter is teamed up with state-owned ECIL. It joined the competition in 2002 as did Tilaker Cannon of Australia, which later withdrew its bid during the early stages of the trials.

In September 2003, the PNC is constituted for the Bhim tracked SPH project. The PNC is seeking a 15% reduction in Denel/LIW’s asking price of Rs130 million ($2.9 million) for each T-6 turret. Orders are planned to be placed for 124 Bhims for equipping nine Regiments.

In October 2003 the GoI’s CCNS clears the acquisition of two Regiments of the Pinaka MBRL (36 launchers) worth Rs11 billion plus 5,000 rockets worth Rs5 billion; two Regiments of the Smerch MBRL (24 launchers) worth Rs22 billion; along with three Regiments of the Bhim tracked SPH (54 units); nine Regiments of G-6 motorised SPHs, and nine Heron II and Searcher II UAVs.

By November 2003, Army HQ rejects the procurement of the Iskander-E—a solid-fueled, land-launched single-stage ballistic missile with a range of 280km and capable of carrying a payload of up to 480kg.

In December 2003, the MoD creates a PNC for finalising a contract for procuring 180 G-6 motorised SPHs for Rs31 billion.

On January 23, 2004 the Prithvi SS-350—a solid-fuelled, two-stage variant—is flight-tested by the DRDO. It uses a high-energy solid propellant (HTPB/AP/Al) that allows greater range (350km to 600km) and payload (500kg to 1,000kg) capability.

In February 2004, IAI begins work on developing for India the first two solid-fuel LORA missiles with a range of up to 300km. Specifications for the missiles were submitted by Indian Army officials in November 2003. Army HQ says it needs 36 LORA missiles worth $800 million and the India-specific ones, whose R & D work is being fully funded by India, will be a 300km-range version. The Army plans to conduct up to 10 test-firings of the missiles before placing a bulk order with IAI.

In March 2004, Army HQ conducts the third round of evaluations and trials for the competing HALO and SMAD AWL systems.

In September 2004 Army HQ awards a contract to BEL to build a DRDO-developed Artillery Combat & Control System (ACCS), dubbed Shakti. Developed by the DRDO’s Centre for Artificial Intelligence & Robotics (CAIR), the Shakti ACCS comprises artillery computer centres, Battery computers, remote access terminals and gun display units. Deliveries will begin in late 2005. The Army aims to spend about $300 million by 2015 to fully deploy the ACCS in all its Artillery Regiments.

In December 2004, Israel Military Industries (IMI) inks a $40 million contract with the MoD for upgrading the existing Russia-made BM-21 Grad MBRL rockets and improving their precision and range. The contract could expand to as much as $1 billion over a period of five years.

On December 22, 2004 the first production version of the land-based BrahMos supersonic, multi-role cruise missile is successfully test-fired from the Pokhran Firing Range. Each BrahMos Regiment comprises three Batteries each with four Mobile Autonomous Launchers (each with three vertically-launched missiles), three Mobile Command Posts, one Fixed Command Centre, nine missile replenishment vehicles, and three maintenance support vehicles. The Regiment can fire 36 BrahMos missiles against different targets within seconds over a frontage of 600km.

In January 2005 El-Op of Israel’s Portable Lightweight Laser Designator (PLLD) and EADS/CILAS’ DHY-307 PLLD begin undergoing competitive field trials at Pokhran in Rajasthan. Six of El-Op’s PLLDs have been in service with the Indian Air Force since 2001. The Army wants 90 PLLDs worth $266 million (Rs1.2 billion) before considering the purchase of IAI’s LAHAT laser-homing anti-tank missile for the infantry. The Army will also use the PLLDs in conjunction with its Krasnopol-Ms.

By January 2005, the 444 Missile Group and 555 Missile Group equipped with conventional warhead-carrying Prithvi SS-150 missiles are operational.

In February 2005, the PNC concludes negotiations with Rosoboronexport for the Smerch-M MBRL.

In February 2005, Army HQ places orders for four Nishant UAV systems from the DRDO’s ADE for delivery by 2007, with another eight systems to be procured between 2007 and 2012. Each system comprises a mobile hydro-pneumatic launcher mounted on a BEML-built Tatra 8 x 8, six 350kg UAVs each with an El-Op FLIR turret, a three-man Ground Control Station, and an antenna tracking system.

In April 2005, the MoD’s PNCs suspend work on the project to acquire 180 G-6 wheeled SPHs and 54 Bhim tracked SPHs following publication by the South African newspaper Cape Argus of a report claiming that the Denel/Mechem, after winning a contract to supply 100 NTW-20 anti-material rifles and related ammunition to the Army, paid 12.75% of the contract value ($393,720) as commissions on December 8, 2002 to Isle of Man-based Varas Associates, which had reportedly influenced the MoD’s decision to choose Denel/Mechem as the preferred supplier of the rifles. The MoD had concluded an initial contract in July 1999 with Denel/Mechem for 100 NTW-20s and 100,000 rounds of (14.5mm and 20mm) ammunition at a cost of $5.4 million (Rs232.2 million). Another 200 NTW-20s and 150,000 rounds of ammunition arrived in March 2002. In September 2003, a third contract was signed for 400 more NTW-20s. The Army requires a total of 1,200 NTW-20s

Consequently, the MoD instructs Army HQ to revise its two GSQRs and issue fresh Requests for Information (RFI), which is done.
END

Bottoms-Up, Not Top-Down

2009-10-02T17:23:00.003-07:00

The above five photos graphically illustrate both the missed opportunities as well as the challenges now confronting Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) to deliver the new-generation HTT-40 advanced turboprop trainer to the Indian Air Force (IAF). The first photo is that of the long-forgotten HTT-35 advanced turboprop trainer, in particular its full-scale mock-up, which was designed and fabricated in-house by HAL in the late 1980s and rolled out in the early 1990s—all in all a four-year effort. The objective at that time was to team up with a global avionics supplier (most probably THALES) and co-design the semi-glass tandem cockpits and offer the aircraft for evaluation by the IAF by 1998. However, after 1994 the HTT-35 disappeared, literally! One can only speculate on what exactly happened to this full-scale mock-up, or on why did the MoD or IAF HQ develop a coordinated ‘memory loss’ on the need to series-produce the HTT-35. For it was realised as far back as 1998 that the induction of fourth-generation combat aircraft such as the Su-30MKI and the likely induction of additional medium multi-role combat aircraft (M-MRCA) and the fifth-generation fighter aircraft (FGFA) would force the IAF sooner than later into undertaking a critical revision of its flying training practices that included primary flying training, intermediate flying training, and lead-in fighter training (LIFT).

Each of these three stages requires a dedicated flying training aircraft, starting with benign turboprop trainers, followed by intermediate jet trainers (IJT), and culminating in LIFT aircraft, following which those destined to fly combat aircraft are assigned to a dedicated Operational Conversion Unit (OCU) to convert to a particular aircraft type by either training on tactical simulators for some 40 hours, or directly proceeding to gain flight experience for some 200 hours on the single/twin-seat operational combat aircraft. As a rule, therefore, air forces worldwide upgrade their fleets of flying training aircraft by first procuring advanced turboprop trainers, followed by intermediate or advanced jet trainers, and lastly, LIFT aircraft. For the IAF, however, this is not the way flying training is being or has been conducted for a number of reasons. Firstly, Air HQ has yet to induct a suitable turboprop trainer to replace its existing fleet of piston-engined HPT-32 Deepak primary trainers of 1980s vintage. Although HAL had in the mid-1990s done considerable R & D work on the HTT-35 tandem-seat turboprop training aircraft, such efforts, for mysterious reasons, could not culminate in the HTT-35 being put to series-production. Secondly, HAL has for the past two years been unable to accelerate R & D work on the indigenous tandem-seat HJT-36 IJT, work on which began in July 1999, but the first prototype aircraft was able to take to the air only on March 7, 2003. To make matters worse, it was only on March 9, 2006 that the Cabinet Committee on National Security approved the acquisition of the first 12 production-standard IJTs at a cost of Rs4,868.2 million, which means initial deliveries will only get underway by late 2009. Meanwhile, deliveries of all BAE Systems Hawk Mk132s will be concluded before even the first 12 HJT-36s start rolling out. This, consequently, will result in the IAF’s Training Command revising its LIFT syllabus first and the intermediate flying training curriculum later—a top-down approach—instead of undertaking a bottoms-up approach. What is likely to complicate matters even further is the IAF’s inability, till this day, to procure both cockpit procedure trainers and tactical flying training simulators for frontline combat aircraft like the upgraded MiG-21 Bison and the upgraded MiG-27Ms. It is another story that existing simulators for the HAL-built Jaguar IS/IM and Dassault Mirage 2000H/TH are in dire need of upgrades and refurbishment.

Given the accelerated induction of Su-30MKIs and the impending induction of new-generation M-MRCAs and FGFAs, it is therefore highly likely that the MoD will soon issue global RFPs for up to 60 new-generation turboprop training aircraft and the follow-on tranche of 57 LIFT aircraft. Simply put, LIFT encompasses the entire process of preparing aircrew to both fly and undertake flight/weapon systems management found on board fourth- and fifth-generation combat aircraft in the most effective way. The idea here is to utilise LIFT aircraft and its related tactical full-motion simulators in a way that replicates the flight control and management characteristics of those frontline combat aircraft that have cost-prohibitive direct operating costs per flight hour. Typically, a LIFT aircraft therefore is employed for imparting flying training in the following phases: transition, all-weather formation flying, combat manoeuvring, low-level navigation, ground attack orientation, cockpit systems management, mission planning, weapons delivery, and multi-mode radar operations. Though the Hawk Mk132 is often touted as having ‘morphed’ into a LIFT aircraft, it cannot yet be classified as a LIFT platform for the following reasons:

• A LIFT aircraft, in order to replicate the flight control characteristics of aircraft like the Su-30MKI, FGFA or MiG-29K, will be required to have a digital, quadruplex fly-by-wire (FBW) flight control system. The Hawk Mk132 does not have FBW flight controls.

• The LIFT aircraft must be supersonic and have a thrust-to-weight ratio between 0.7 and 1.0, against 0.45 for the Hawk Mk132, which is subsonic in flight.

• High angle-of-attack capability while maintaining full control, and possessing a multi-mode pulse-Doppler fire-control radar is a must for any LIFT aircraft. The Hawk Mk132 is found lacking in both these areas.

It is purely for these reasons that aircraft manufacturers like Aermacchi of Italy, Russia’s United Aircraft Corp and the joint venture of Lockheed Martin and Korea Aerospace Industries have developed new-generation supersonic LIFT aircraft like the M-346, Yak-130 and T-50 Golden Eagle. Aircraft like these have been optimised for imparting basic combat training, weapons employment training, and enhancing the aircrew’s on-board avionics-related systems handling/management skills. The secondary role of such LIFT aircraft in wartime could be both defensive counter-air as well as tactical interdiction missions. Given such realities, the options ahead for the IAF are three-fold:

• Revive the HTT-35 along with HAL (as the HTT-40) and equip the aircraft’s cockpits with AMLCD-based electronic flight instrumentation systems (see Photo 2 above) designed to enhance the trainee pilot’s aircraft handling and systems management skills.

• Accelerate the certification process of the single-engined HJT-36 IJT and upgrade its cockpits by installing AMLCD-based avionics and electronic flight instrumentation/management systems, all integrated by MIL-STD-1553B digital data bus.

In addition, a LIFT-specific mission planning system should be developed as an integral part of the LIFT curriculum. Such a system, replicating those of frontline combat aircraft, should enable rapid mission planning on the ground, with aircraft loading via a manportable data loader. The mission data loader should be fully compatible with all frontline operational ground-based training systems, and should also act as the data storage medium for mission recording automatically from power-on to shutdown. To enable full mission playback after flight, the system should record all display input data, with provision for event markers where required.—Prasun K. Sengupta

Double-Edged Dissuasive Airpower Deterrence

2009-09-26T15:38:00.000-07:00

Of all the operational commands of the Indian Air Force (IAF), it is the Western Air Command (WAC) that will have to operate as a double-edged sword in the event of a future round of hostilities along India’s high-altitude northern frontiers. Consequently, it is within the WAC that one is now witnessing a multi-phase operational-level transformation taking place, a process that began way back in mid-1999. It was during Operation Safed Sagar (from May 15 till July 12, 1999) that the WAC was first exposed to a high-altitude theatre of war, involving both fixed-wing combat aircraft and helicopters. At that time, close to 150 combat aircraft were deployed at the IAF;s air bases at Adampur (46 Mirage 2000Hs, MiG-29B-12s and Jaguar IS), Awantipura (28 MiG-21bis, MiG-29B-12s and Jaguar IS), Pathankot (30 MiG-21bis and MiG-23MFs), Srinagar (34 MiG-21bis, MiG-23BNs and MiG-27Ms), and Udhampur (12 MiG-21bis). Together, these aircraft collectively flew 550 strike missions, 150 tactical recce and COMINT missions, and 500 defensive counter-air and offensive escort-cum-sweep missions. The overwhelming majority of the strike missions were during daytime, with the Mirage 2000Hs (equipped with RAFAEL Litening-2 laser designator pods and Griffin laser-guided bombs) scoring high marks during the limited aerial bombing campaign. Needless to say, this was the first time in the history of military aviation that such aerial campaigns were carried out in a sustained manner over high-altitude battlefields.

Encouraged by such ‘baptism by fire’, the WAC by early 2002 had firmed up plans for phase 2 of its transformation process along the northern front and in mid-2003 a solitary Su-30MKI Mk2 did a trial-landing at the IAF’s Leh (located at 10,680 feet ASL and having a 9,000 feet-long runway) and Srinagar air bases. This was preceded by the Su-30MKI pilots during a few route-check flights and runway overshoots with MiG-29B-12s to familiarise themselves with the overall sortie pattern, weather conditions and the operating terrain. It was only after this that the four Su-30MKI Mk3s from the Barielly-based No24 Squadron along with 12 pilots landed at Leh on September 16 last year (in two phases of four each and led by flight commander Wing Commander K Sundaramani) for a 10 day-long deployment that also saw the Su-30MKIs each logging up to four training sorties per day and also doing overshoots of the runways at Srinagar and Thoise air base (located 10,066 feet ASL and hosting a 10,000 feet-long runway). Thoise is the acronym for Transit Halt of Indian Soldiers Enroute.

Prior to this historic deployment, was another pathbreaking achievement on May 31 last year when after a 44-year break, an IAF An-32B tactical transport aircraft landed on the 2.3km-long sandy airstrip (now being lengthened to 3km) at the 12,037 feet-high advanced landing ground (ALG) in Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO) in the sub-sector north (SSN) area of Ladakh at 6.17am. This was followed by another An-32B landing at the refurbished ALG at Fukche (at 14,200 feet ASL) on September 24 last year, with the latest ALG being brought to life being Nyoma, south of Chushul, at 13,400 feet ASL on September 18 this year. All these ALGs facing the Line of Actual Control (LAC) will eventually have a 3km runway length and will be used for aerial logistics support (rendered by An-32Bs) for the more than 50 border observation posts (BOP) manned by the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), the Vikas Battalion and the Ladakh Scouts (that’s right, because as per the Patrolling Limit Policy, or PLP, formulated by the Govt of India in 1975 and unchanged since then, only these agencies, and not the Indian Army, are responsible for border patrolling, with the Army patrols venturing to no more than 5km away from the LAC in eastern Ladakh!). Thus, with the An-32Bs (and in future the six Lockheed Martin-supplied C-130J-30 Stretched Hercules) being committed to providing all-year round air maintenance (since vehicular traffic is unavailable during winter from October to May), the IAF’s Mi-17s are now free to provide tactical air transportation of troops, provide perishable supplies for troops deployed along the Saltoro Ridge (via 10 dropping zones), as well as deal with time-urgent MEDEVAC sortie requirements. It was, in fact, the lack of such helicopter support (due to the acute shortage of available Mi-17s) that the Indian Army had great difficulty in redeploying its fully high-altitude acclimatised 114 Brigade (deployed along the LAC) for undertaking offensive operations during Operation Vijay in mid-1999.

To appreciate the critical role played by such enhanced aerial logistics capabilities, one has to understand the operational-level posture of the Indian Army’s Leh-based III Infantry Division, which has committed forces against Pakistan for the Siachen area of operations, and the SSN against China, stretching from DBO to Demchok—a frontage of 1,150km. Supplementing the Divisions three Brigades (with the 102 Brigade being deployed solely for Siachen and the remainng two Brigades being earmarked for support and back-up) are five Battalions of the ITBP, Vikas Battalion and Ladakh Scouts that are thinly spread. As a consequence, there are no Army reserve forces available at SSN and what further complicates matters is that SSN as a whole has not road connectivity. Therefore, the deployed troops undertake foot patrols in batches of 15 or 20 and have often come across intruding patrols of China’s People’s Armed Police (PAP), with each such patrol comprising up top 400 personnel riding on all-terrain wheeled vehicles. And when a faceoff ensues, the Indian Army along with the ITBP and Ladakh Scouts are strictly forbidden to enter into any verbal or armed altercations, and instead seek a flag meeting of the respective sector commanders. And when this happens, no cohesive, coordinated or united response is forthcoming from the Indian side, since the Indian Army reports to the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and the ITBP reports to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs. Such administrative mis-matches notwithstanding, the Indian Army and the IAF have devised several innovative measures for the flexible switching or redeployments of combat assets throughout the northern theatre of operations. For the IAF, the two principal all-the-year-round logistics nodes are the air bases at Leh and Thoise, located north and on either side of the 18,380 feet-high Khardung La pass (under the command of the Udhampur-based AOC Jammu & Kashmir HQ). While Leh will become the principal air base for any offensive air campaign launched by the IAF against China, Thoise (known till 1990 as SUI Generis-19 and operating under the Leh-based 21 Wing of the IAF) is today an independent air base with its integral No19 Forward Base Support Unit (FBSU) and hosts centrally-heated hangars for accommodating Mi-17s.

With India’s MoD now seemingly going on a belated overdrive for developing the military infrastructure along India’s 4,057km disputed frontier with China, the next five years will likely witness a five-fold increase in the demand for new-generation night landing aids and man-portable SATCOM-based communications systems, with the bulk of such hardware being acquired by the IAF, and the rest by the Indian Army. In the eastern sector, those ALGs earmarked for upgradation in Arunachal Pradesh include Tuting (Upper Siang district), Mechuka (West Siang), Vijaynagar (Changlang) and Passigat (East Siang district). Going hand in hand with such ALG reactivations is the construction of some 50 new helipads in Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim and Uttarkhand, and a massive upgrade of the IAF’s air bases at Leh, Thoise, Tezpur, Hashimara and Panagarh, all of which will house detachments of the Su-30MKI air dominance fighter. Topping it all up are up to six new ALGs to be specifically built for supporting the Army routine tactical aerial surveillance along the Sino-Indian border with the help of medium-altitude long-endurance (MALE) unmanned aerial vehicles.

Each and every one of these ALGs, air bases and helipads will be equipped with several types of hardware that are currently in widespread use in active combat zones throughout Iraq and Afghanistan. These include a wide range of remote-controlled night landing aids and portable lighting systems for fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters on both land and at sea. For instance, a Tactical Approach Lighting System (TALS), currently deployed by ISAF forces in Afghanistan, is a field deployable, manportable, solid-state, battery-powered lighting system that will provide both infra-red and visible light sources. Light Units can be fully configured and operated via a UHF radio Remote Control Unit up to a typical range of 5km, or configured and operated manually. Illumination is provided over a hemispherical area by LED light sources. In infra-red mode the Light Units are NVG-compatible. The primary purpose of the TALS is to indicate landing and drop zones, forward arming and refuelling points, and can also be used for both covert and overt infiltration/exfiltration operations. Such systems are fully NATO-codified. A system consists of the following and is contained and transported in a backpack: one Remote Control Unit, six Light Units, six Ground Spikes (for deploying Light Units), one Universal input Battery Charger, and one Backpack which houses all the system units. The system provides sufficient Lights for a minimum operating strip (MOS) for fixed-wing aircraft or marking out a ‘T’ formation, typically used for helicopters. If a larger or more complex layout is required then any number of packs can be combined, and may be remote-controlled by single or multiple controllers either from on the ground or from in the air. Another mission-critical item that has already started flowing into the IAF is Signature Industries’ software-defined SARBE G2R and SARBE 6-406G personal locator beacons, which are also currently operational with the air forces of the UK and Singapore. When used in combat search-and-rescue mode, these beacons emit a short, randomised burst data transmission, along with the ability to stop and restart data transmissions on demand. This ensures extremely low probability of interception/detection by hostile passive surveillance systems.

Also underway today as part of the on-going transformation process is the long-overdue beefing up of the airspace surveillance network throughout Jammu & Kashmir. As stated by the WAC’s AOC-in-C Air Marshal N A K Browne on September 24, two distinct types of low-level lightweight radars (LLLWR) are being deployed along the 667km-long LAC with China, these being an initial two of three Rohini S-band 3-D radars built by Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL), which will be replaced between next year and 2012 by two out of the 19 ordered THALESRaytheon Systems-built Ground Master 400 S-band LLLWRs (to be sited at Leh and Nyoma). The Ground Master 400 is easily air-transportable by the C-130J-30, making it ideal for deployments at short notice for filling up essential gaps in airspace surveillance. To be acquired in future for siting at DBO, Thoise and Partapur are three modified EL/M-2083 aerostat-mounted L-band radars, which will also be air-transportable by both C-130J-30s and IL-76MDs. Thus, if all goes as per plans, by the end of the 11th Defence Plan (2007-2012) the IAF will have in place a robust and layered airspace surveillance network backed up by an in-depth deployment infrastructure (such as centrally heated hardened aircraft shelters) at air bases in Leh and Thoise for the Su-30MKI. For ground-based base air defence, the IAF has already decided to deploy up to a Battery each of the SpyDer-S E-SHORADS at these two air bases.—Prasun K. Sengupta

Debunking A Myth

2009-09-08T15:36:00.000-07:00

India-based intellectuals, be they civilians dabbling in strategic affairs or even serving or retired armed services chiefs, have repeatedly demonstrated a remarkable consistency in making ludicrous and largely discredited claims about Pakistan’s military-industrial capabilities that seemingly tend to give the Pakistan Armed Forces a debilitating force projection superiority over their Indian counterparts. The latest such accusation to have surfaced concerns the alleged efforts by the Pakistan Navy to modify its ship-launched Boeing-built RGM-84A and submarine-launched UGM-84A Harpoon anti-ship cruise missiles (of 1984 vintage) into ship-launched 50nm-range dual-role anti-ship strike and land attack precision-guided missiles. True or false? Can such modifications be done covertly without any involvement by the guided-missile’s OEM?

The best and most convincing answer comes from none other than the OEM itself—Boeing Integrated Defense Systems, which had by the mid-1990s successfully modified the Harpoon into precision-guided land attack missile called SLAM-ER (standoff land attack missile-extended range), and had also developed the related Harpoon Shipboard Command Launch Control System and the AWW-14 data-link pod (this being for the air-launched variant of the SLAM-ER). The above slides clearly demonstrate what exactly were the modifications carried out by Boeing IDS on the basic Harpoon, and how this missile has since evolved into the SLAM-ER (which is now being offered to the Indian Air Force along with both the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and F-16IN Super Viper medium multi-role combat aircraft). Taking the cue from the SLAM-ER, both MBDA and Israel Military Industries (IMI) have adopted the same optronics-based precision-guidance approach for their SCALP and Delilah air-/ship-/submarine-launched standoff land attack missiles (as has the Pakistan Air Force with the Ra’ad air-launched land attack cruise missile).

Consequently, it emerges from the above that for any Pakistani military-industrial entity to modify the Harpoon into a LACM, it would not only have to radically redesign the missile’s nose section, but will also have to develop a passive optronic sensor and integrate it with the missile’s inertial navigation system, develop a new Shipboard Command Launch Control System, and develop the airborne data-link pod so that the LACM can be provided with over-the-horizon targetting (OTHT) cues at its terminal cruise phase. Which means, while the LACM will have to be launched from a warship lurking dangerously close to a hostile coastline, a defenceless manned airborne platform (either fixed-wing or rotary-winged) too will have to be in the warship’s immediate vicinity for providing OTHT cues.

Given such daunting R & D challenges, wouldn’t it be much easier for Pakistan to acquire and deploy ground-/air-/ship-launched LACMs like the Babur and Ra’ad, both of which not only have much longer engagement envelopes, but also heavier warheads for guaranteeing assured target destruction? And if at all it is so easy to modify or even reverse-engineer anti-ship cruise missiles of 1980s vintage, then can someone explain why the DRDO’s labs (like the DRDL, GTRE, IRDE and DARE) have still been unable to reverse-engineer the decommissioned BAE Systems-built Sea Eagle anti-ship cruise missiles (whose performance parameters closely resembled those of the Harpoon A) that have now been decommissioned and are available for total strip-down and cloning? Why has the DRDO been unable to re-engineer the Sea Eagle into an unmanned high-speed target drone capable of subjecting the Indian Navy's Barak-1 and Kashtan-M close-in anti-missile defence systems to some pretty realistic threat simulation environments of the kind expected to be faced in wartime? Why does this operational requirement (for the drones) remain unfulfilled till this day? India’s civilian and military decision-makers—it thus seems—can bark galore but cannot bite.—Prasun K. Sengupta

Selected Literature On Russia's PESA & AESA Radars

2009-09-03T14:45:00.000-07:00

While Russian radar developers and manufacturers have failed to keep up with their Western counterparts in terms of introducing new-generation multi-mode AESA radars for both manned combat aircraft and airborne early warning & control platforms, there is still room for optimism if immediate steps are taken to redress the existing shortcomings. One interesting innovation the V Tikhmirov Scientific-Research Institute of Instrument Design has come up with concerns the ‘smart skin’ concept under which an AESA array’s L-band and S-band transmit/receive modules can be placed anywhere on board an AEW & C platform to generate the relevant radiation field required for achieving 360-degree hemispheric coverage of airspace. For countries like India such a technological breakthrough holds enormous promise, as this will now enable one to do away with conventional AESA antenna designs (like the one selected for the DRDO's to-be-developed AEW & C platform) that impose avoidable aerodynamics and structural penalties. To this end, it will be worthwhile to examine the prospect of modifying new-generation platforms like the IL-214 multi-role transport aircraft (MRTA)--being co-developed by India and Russia and to be co-produced in both countries as well--into an AEW & C plaform that would incorporate the 'smart skin' concept by acommodating conformally-mounted dual-band AESA T/R modules.--Prasun K. Sengupta

T-90S MBT's Combat Effectiveness Flowcharts

2009-08-25T16:56:00.000-07:00

The above flowcharts have been officially produced by Rosoboronexport State Corp and Nizhiny Tagil-based Uralvagonzavod JSC and clearly state the obvious. By the way, despite three days of persistent queries sent to the Ministry of Defence's Public Relations Branch, not a single soul has been able to explain exactly why the T-90S MBTs taking part in this year's Republic Day Parade were labelled as 'Bheeshma', while those T-90S MBTs rolled out on August 24 have been labelled as 'Bhishma'. Your guess is as good as mine. In addition, no answers are forthcoming as yet on what exactly is the 'indigenous' content of the HVF-built 'Bhishma', given the fact that both the ERA package and the composite armour panels along with the 12.7mm HMG are being imported off-the-shelf from Uralvagonzavod JSC, while the powerpacks and tracks are being jointly sourced from Russia and Kazakhstan. There also exists another such set of flowcharts comparing the parameters of the OPLOT-M, T-90S and the Arjun Mk1 and needless to say, the conclusions regarding the T-90S are extremely distressing--Prasun K. Sengupta

BEL-Made Hardware For Upgrading MBTs & ICVs

2009-08-09T15:53:00.000-07:00

What's Wrong With The T-90S MBT's Fire-Control System?

2009-08-06T01:03:00.000-07:00

All the answers lie within the above-posted diagrams. Anyone care to figure them out?

China-Made Radars Being Delivered To Pakistan

2009-08-02T15:26:00.000-07:00

Schematics of ATV, Scorpene SSK & Project 28 Corvette

2009-08-01T13:31:00.000-07:00

ATV Schematics

2009-07-28T22:30:00.001-07:00

Pakistan's Home-Grown Solutions: Part-3

2009-07-28T05:25:00.000-07:00

Pakistan's Home-Grown Solutions: Part-2

2009-07-27T15:09:00.000-07:00

Pakistan's Home-Grown Solutions: Part-1

2009-07-24T23:03:00.000-07:00

The Truth About Krasnopol-M Firing Trials In India

2009-07-19T12:28:00.000-07:00

R-77 BVRAAM Handling/Storage Procedures

2009-07-16T12:23:00.000-07:00

V-22 Osprey For IAF & Indian Navy?

2009-07-15T10:07:00.000-07:00

Notwithstanding the efforts of the Indian Air Force (IAF) to acquire fixed-wing and rotary-winged transportation aircraft for medium- and heavy-lift operations, the Indian Navy is determined to acquire its own seaborne integral air transportation assets for the Indian Army's projected combat aviation brigade, and its 91 Infantry Brigade, which is now being reconfigured as an amphibious brigade. For enabling both these brigades to undertake all-weather expeditionary campaigns via vertical envelopment (as part of joint services power projection operations) the Indian Navy has reportedly begun seriously evaluating the performance of the Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey ‘tilt-rotor’ aircraft, so called because it takes off with its twin wingtip-mounted rotors set vertically like a helicopter and glides in the air with them thrust forward as on a fixed-wing aircraft. The shift requires only a pull of the lever by the pilot. The Navy is apparently convinced that in terms of weight, cargo, distance or speed (it can travel twice as fast and three times farther than any existing medium-lift utility helicopter) the once derided Osprey has finally emerged as the vital game-changing force multiplier when employed for effecting maritime/amphibious manoeuvres from the sea, as well as for high-altitude, all-weather air assault, aerial logistics and casualty evacuation over mountainous terrain of the type prevalent along India’s northern and northeastern borders (this also explains the IAF's new-found interest in the Osprey). Being able to cruise at altitudes of 25,000 feet allows the Osprey you to clear obstacles that today’s helicopters like the CH-47F Chinook or AW-101 or Mi-26T cannot even negotiate. Though such helicopters can airlift things, and probably more than the Osprey can, they still cannot arrive at their landing/drop zones from altitude. Nor can they do the transit times and ranges. Furthermore, while existing medium-/heavy-lift helicopters typically require between 24 and 40 man-hours of maintenance for every hour in the air, the Osprey requires only about 9.5 man-hours of maintenance for every hour of flight, and consequently its direct operating costs too are drastically reduced.

The V-22 is best employed as a vertical takeoff-cum-landing platform capable of rapidly deploying air assault and special operations forces to any theatre of operation over both land and sea. This will facilitate the timely build-up of combat forces while minimising the demands of sealift and airlift assets for expeditionary force projection campaigns. While the US Marine Corps is using its MV-22Bs to perform combat assault and combat support missions, the US Air Force’s Special Operations Command’s CV-22s have been configured for terrain-following, low-level, high-speed flight in a variety of special operations missions. The US Navy’s MV-22s will perform combat support missions. Boeing Rotorcraft Systems is responsible for the fuselage and all subsystems, digital avionics, and fly-by-wire flight-control systems. Boeing’s industrial partner Bell Helicopter Textron is responsible for the wing, transmissions, empennage, rotor systems and engine installation. The Osprey is presently being series-produced in three customer-specific versions--50 CV-22s are in delivery to the US Air Force, 360 MV-22Bs to the US Marine Corps and 48 V-22s to the US Navy. Although the Osprey’s per unit cost is estimated at US$100 million, no less than 15 countries (India included) are seriously considering its acquisition in the near future. The Indian Navy is believed to require about 40 Ospreys over a 10-year period (including about six platforms configured for AEW & C operations). Each such tilt-rotor aircraft can carry 24 fully-equipped combat troops, or up to 20,000 pounds of internal cargo or 15,000 pounds of external cargo, at twice the speed of a helicopter. The Osprey also features cross-coupled transmissions so that either engine can power the rotors if one engine fails. The rotors can fold and the wing rotates so the aircraft can be stored on board an aircraft carrier or LPD/LHD. It also has a fixed aerial refuelling boom for being refuelled in mid-air by aircraft like the Lockheed Martin-built C-130J-30 Super Hercules, six of which are on order for the IAF. The Osprey comes powered by twin Rolls-Royce AE1107C turboshaft engines each rated at 6,150shp, has a service ceiling of 25,000 feet (7,620 metres), and has an unrefuelled mission radius with 24 troops of 390nm (722km).--Prasun K. Sengupta

Beidou Satellite Navigation System

2009-07-15T04:56:00.000-07:00

SSGN Design For Indian Navy

2009-07-11T11:39:00.000-07:00

Airborne Multi-Mode Radar Data

2009-07-08T03:10:00.001-07:00

PAF F-16s Being Upgraded

2009-07-07T14:48:00.000-07:00

Turkish Aerospace Industries, Inc (TAI), which is Turkey’s centre of aerospace, has acquired an international success by signing a contract regarding the modernisation of PAF F-16s. Under the programme, the financial dimension of which is around US$75 million, a total of 42 F-16A/Bs will be upgraded at TAI’s facilities in 46 months starting from October 2010. A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), regarding the start of proposal process of PAF F-16 Modernisation Programme, was signed between TAI and PAF during the IDEAS Defence Exhibition in September 2006 in Karachi, Pakistan. Being invited to the international bid for the PAF's F-16 Modernisation Programme, TAI, among other European competitors, was announced as the main contractor of the programme following the final evaluation by Pakistani authorities in July 2008. Following the negotiations, which started in 2009 between TAI and Pakistan authorities, and the mutual agreement, the contract was signed between TAI and Pakistan's Ministry of Defence Production on June 29, 2009 at a ceremony held in Rawalpindi. In 2006, as a result of another bidding process, TAI, which had signed an agreement with the Royal Jordanian Air Force (RJAF) for the modernisation of RJAF F-16A/Bs, has since successfully completed the programme with the delivery of the last aircraft in April 2009.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Will Goliath Prevail Over David?

2009-07-05T13:06:00.000-07:00

When all six participating M-MRCA manufacturers submitted their compliant technical and financial bids to the Ministry of Defence (MoD) in late April last year, everyone assumed that only these six would be eligible for bidding for the contract to supply close to 180 fourth-generation M-MRCAs to the Indian Air Force (IAF). What went totally unnoticed and was left unreported by India’s mainstream media was that a seventh independent bidder too had presented its detailed bid—this being SIBAT—the Foreign Defense Assistance and Defense Export Department of the Israel Ministry of Defence, and Israel’s counterpart of Russia’s Rosoboronexport State Corp, France’s Office Francais d’Exportation de Materiel Aeronautique (OFEMA), the United Kingdom’s Defence Export Services Organisation (DESO), and Pakistan’s Defence Export Promotion Organisation (DEPO). The consolidated bid from SIBAT had adopted a consortium approach just like what the other M-MRCA bidders had done. The prime contractor as per SIBAT’s submissions was Israel Aerospace Industries and included RAFAEL Advanced Defence Systems, Elbit Systems and RADA Electronics. On the other hand, the Boeing Integrated Defense Systems-led consortium included GE Aero Engines, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman; the Lockheed Martin-led consortium included Northrop Grumman and GE Aero Engines; the Eurofighter GmbH-led consortium included BAE Systems, EADS Military Aircraft and EADS Defence Electronics, Eurojet, DIEHL-BGT Defence, MBDA and Selex-Galileo; the Dassault Aviation-led consortium included the THALES Group, Snecma Moteurs, SAGEM and MBDA; while the Anglo-Swedish Gripen International-led consortium included GE Aero Engines, BAE Systems, and Saab AB, but was supplemented by the independent submission from SIBAT.

From the above-mentioned listing of the various consortiums it emerges that while the ones led by Boeing Integrated Defense Systems, Lockheed Martin, Dassault Aviation and Eurofighter GmbH had each presented a single, unified compliant bid, the submission by Gripen International, which was literally the most comprehensive and bulky of all the M-MRCA submissions, was in essence an intelligent packaging of two submissions—from Gripen International and SIBAT—all aimed at promoting a single product, the JAS-39 Gripen IN. In marketing terms, therefore, the combined Gripen International/SIBAT submission easily presented itself as the most formidable proposal since it offered, both financially and quantitatively, both direct and indirect offsets offers by aerospace OEMs that are extremely well-established in India and each of them have had a rich legacy of market predominance for the past two decades, these being BAE Systems, GE Aero Engines, Israel Aerospace Industries, RAFAEL Advanced Defence Systems and Elbit Systems.

While conventional wisdom would dictate that it was SIBAT that conceived of and articulated such a superlative marketing strategy, it was actually BAE Systems that came up with this ingenious packaging once it had become evident by mid-2007 that Lockheed Martin, wanting to have and eat the whole cake, flatly refused all overtures by SIBAT to be a significant industrial stakeholder in the F-16IN—the airframe with which Israel Aerospace Industries, RAFAEL Advanced Defence Systems and Elbit Systems were extremely familiar and had maximum hands-on experience. Soon after this initial disappointment, BAE Systems orchestrated the joint venture tie-ups between the Israeli OEMs and Gripen International, knowing fully well that in the ultimate analysis, it will be the direct and indirect military-industrial offsets and related ToT packages that will dictate the final choice of the M-MRCA. In addition, BAE Systems had correctly anticipated that the bulk of the realistically deliverable military-industrial offsets and related ToT packages would be offered not by Gripen International or GE Aero Engines, but by the Israeli OEMs that are already deeply involved in several on-going projects with guaranteed financial dividends, such as the Tejas LCA Mk2’s development phase, the An-32-100 upgrade project, the projected upgrades for the Jaguar IS and Su-30MKI, and the substantial projected participation in the tandem-seat Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft (FGFA) and Multi-Role Transport (MRT) projects.

Obviously highly enthused by what Gripen International had offered, the IAF’s Project Evaluation Team had by late last year adopted the JAS-39 Gripen IN’s offer as the ultimate yardstick and had begun drafting detailed supplementary queries for the other M-MRCA bidders of the kind that were not considered financially viable by them. Consequently, by last February an informal ‘cartel’ had reportedly emerged betweeen the US-based OEMs and their European counterparts that have since jointly demanded a ‘level playing field’ against the Gripen International/SIBAT joint venture. The Obama Administration has already communicated its extreme displeasure to Israel by giving it two stark choices: preserve, and not expand Israel’s predominance within India so that US-based OEMs could gain a firm foothold within India, or face the prospect of losing big-time. In other words, SIBAT is free to enhance its profile within India through participation in the Tejas LCA Mk2, FGFA and MRT projects and follow-on sales of AEW & C systems as long as it withdraws its supplementary bid for customising the JAS-39 into the Gripen IN. That SIBAT has since chosen the only available path is, however, not the end of the story and the coming weeks will most likely see the emergence of a compromise formula being worked out between 10 Downing Street and 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue under which the following options will be examined:

· The revised offer of the F-16IN with US-origin mission sensors and Israel-origin weapon systems, and consequently the formation of a formal US-Israel ‘cartel’ to counter Eurofighter GmBH and Dassault Aviation.

· The option of creating a joint venture between US and Israeli OEMs for bidding for the IAF’s projected upgrade of 120 Jaguar IS interdictors, this being done to compensate SIBAT for withdrawing from the Gripen IN offer.

· Agreeing to a win-win option under which Gripen International and the two US-based M-MRCA OEMs would not present competing bids in countries that are expected to procure new-generation combat aircraft, albeit in far smaller numbers than what the IAF will be procuring, with these countries including Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Croatia, Denmark, Greece, Malaysia, The Netherlands, Romania, Slovakia and Switzerland.—Prasun K. Sengupta

20 Principal Issues Defining The IAF’s Techno-Economic Matrix For Selecting The M-MRCA

1) Which is the most technologically advanced and readily available M-MRCA in the world as of today?
2) While the IAF procure a single-engined M-MRCA or a twin-engined M-MRCA?
3) Will the majority of the M-MRCAs be single-seaters or tandem-seaters?
4) Will the choice of the M-MRCA be predicated by any political compulsions or weightage?
5) Which of the M-MRCA OEMs will guarantee total operational dominance and operational sovereignty for the IAF?
6) Which of the M-MRCA OEMs have offered guaranteed unrivalled access to source codes for software-defined mission sensors?
7) Which of the M-MRCA contenders has substantially lower real life-cycle costs than its nearest competitor?
8) Is it a big deal for the IAF to select as its M-MRCA an aircraft-type that has not yet been introduced in South Asia?
9) Which is the only M-MRCA option that will fundamentally shift India’s defence-industrial technology prowess to one that is able to realise its ambition of being an independent global player?
10) Which M-MRCA will be the perfect match with the IAF’s Su-30MKI and a true force multiplier while using the IAF-specific operational data link?
11) Is the IAF giving any serious credence to parameters such as proven superiority in combat missions?
12) How important are capabilities like super cruise and supermanoeuvrability? Will they offer any kind of “game-changing tactical advantages in offensive and defensive spectrum, and also contribute to “lowered IR signature, rapid theatre presence, evolutionary sensor/weapon kinematics and denial of enemy reaction time”?
13) Which M-MRCA OEMs are offering customer-specific mission avionics suites and weapons packages to the IAF?
14) Which of the M-MRCA contenders has the operational range, payload and built-in net-centric warfare (NCW) capability to meet all the roles as defined by the IAF, both national and regional expeditionary?
15) Which of the M-MRCA OEMs has offered a level of ToT that will enable India to manage all aspects of the M-MRCA’s life-cycle?
16) Is it true that in combination with the milutary-industrial cooperation programmes offered, such offers will make India by 2020 completely independent of the need to purchase combat aircraft from other countries and make it an exporter of combat aircraft?
17) Which of the M-MRCA proposals promise to deliver industrial offsets equal to the contract value?
18) How many M-MRCA OEMs have proposed ToT programmes that will guarantee full involvement in future capability development and maximise Indian industrial autonomy through the transfer of unique and highly advanced and multi-tier MRO-related competencies?
19) Will the ToT packages include: design, development and integration of avionics, software, armaments packages and mission sensor systems on the M-MRCA; and guaranteed incorporation of pre-planned product improvements and related key high-tech competencies for example in areas of sensor fusion, low-observability (LO) and stealth?
20) What are the linkages, if any, between the M-MRCA programme and the Tejas Mk 2 LCA’s R & D phase?

India-Specific Assorted News Briefs From Paris Air Show 2009

2009-06-14T13:27:00.001-07:00

Indian company Samtel (hall 4, E16) has launched a full-colour cathode ray tube display at Le Bourget. The CRT is designed for Airbus aircraft and is integrated into a 6 x 6in (150 x 150mm) Thales display unit. Samtel has signed a contract with Thales to develop the CRT through its AS9100-certificated production facilities in India. The unit has been specified under strict supervision by Thales to match stringent air transport specifications and quality requirements. (Why is this being done in India when the world over everyone else is going for AMLCDs is anyone's guess!--Prasun)

Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) has signed a contract to supply a HAROP Loitering Munition (LM) system to a foreign customer, believed to be India. The contract is estimated to be worth over $100 million. Itzhak Nissan, President and CEO of IAI said: "HAROP is an extremely impressive system, and everyone at IAI is proud of this accomplishment. This is a state-of-the-art loitering munition system, which features accurate detection capabilities and minimizes collateral damage to the surrounding area." Separately, the German Armed Forces and the German Ministry of Defense (MOD) have approved an operational requirement utilizing IAI's HAROP system. The project will be implemented in cooperation with Rheinmetall Defense as the prime contractor. The German MOD has already invested funds for the adaptation of HAROP to its specific requirements. Part of the adaptation was successfully performed by a joint IAI/Rheinmetall Defense team, and a follow on contract is planned for this year. This activity is a reflection of the successful cooperation between IAI and Rheinmetall Defense, which has also included projects involving Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). HAROP is a long endurance LM which can be launched from a variety of platforms, and is equipped with tactical UAV capabilities: high performance FLIR/ color CCD EO seeker with 3600 hemispherical coverage. It searches, detects, attacks and hits high value re-locateable, time critical, land or sea-based, moving targets with pinpoint accuracy at long ranges. A HAROP unit is comprised of LM launchers and a Mission Control Shelter (MCS) that enables missile control with a Man in the Loop operation, engagement or abort attack capability in real time, avoiding collateral damage. The HAROP can be applied to a variety of battle scenarios, including low and high intensity conflicts, urban warfare and counter terror operations. HAROP LMs are launched from transportable launchers and navigate towards the target area, where they loiter and search for targets. Once a target, static or moving, is detected, it is attacked and destroyed by the HAROP LM. The attack can be performed from any direction and at any attack angle, from flat to vertical which is highly essential in urban areas. The operator monitors the attack until the target is hit. Another HAROP LM can observe and send real time video of Battle Damage Assessment (BDA) to the operator. The operator can command to abort the attack in order to avoid collateral damage, returning the LM to loitering mode, and restart the attack later.

Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) has been awarded multiple orders of 34 units by India of its advanced Multi-Mission Radar (MMR) type EL/M 2084. ELTA Systems Ltd., a group and wholly owned subsidiary of IAI, is the prime contractor and developer of the EL/M 2084. ELTA's MMR addresses an emerging requirement to include all land-based radar functions in one operational unit. MMR combines a Weapon Locator Radar and an Air Defense Radar. The radar detects Surface-to-Surface medium- and short-range missiles, rockets and mortars, calculates the anticipated impact and launching points, and provides target data to air defense weapons systems. MMR is based on Active Electronically Steering Array (AESA) architecture and provides outstanding performance that was combat proven in the recent fighting in the Gaza Strip. The radar is mobile and scalable in order to meet different performance requirements. Scaling is performed by means of an antenna of varying physical size and the amount of transmit-receive (TR) module content. The current orders include 3 different versions of the radar.

Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) has recently signed a contract worth tens of millions of dollars to provide India with GRIFFIN 3, the Next Generation Laser Guided Bomb (NGLGB) Kit. The GRIFFIN 3 Kit is an advanced guidance kit which is attached to a general purpose or penetration aerial bomb. Itzhak Nissan, President and CEO of IAI, said: "The GRIFFIN 3 is a product which stands out in its exceptional accuracy and ability to ensure maximum penetration of a general or penetration aerial bomb". The GRIFFIN System provides much better hit accuracy than previous generation kits, even in high wind conditions or when aiming for a moving target. Another important feature of the GRIFFIN 3 is its trajectory shaping capability, which, when used with a penetration warhead, is integral to achieving maximum penetration. The GRIFFIN 3 has an optional GPS guidance feature to enable dual guidance capability, and is one of a wide range of IAI's laser guided munitions. Others include LAHAT, a lightweight missile for helicopters, armored vehicles, and tanks; Nimrod, a longer range laser guided missile; and Fire Ball, a laser guided rocket kit.

Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) has recently signed a contract with India to develop and supply the land-based Barak 8 Air and Missile Defense (AMD) System. The Barak 8 AMD, an advanced all-weather, day/night system capable of multiple simultaneous engagements in complex scenarios, provides a 360-degree defense against a wide variety of airborne platforms and munitions from short and medium ranges. The land-based system is based on the Naval Barak 8 AMD system that has been sold to the Israeli Navy and to foreign customers. Itzhak Nissan, IAI's President and CEO said: "We are very proud of the Barak 8 AMD system. IAI employed its technological and experiential knowledge-based on both the Naval Barak 8 AMD system, and on its four decades of work in the aerospace field to reach this significant accomplishment. The system is composed of a combination of IAI-manufactured products, creating a powerful system which can be a cornerstone to any defense plan." The Barak 8 AMD system includes a unique battle management, command, control, communication and intelligence center (BMC4I); an interceptor; and a Land-Based Multi-Function Surveillance, Track & Guidance Radar (LB-MF-STAR). The BMC4I, produced by the MBT Division of IAI's Missiles, Systems, and Space Group, offers both stand alone operation for a single fire unit, and joint task force coordination (JTC). The JTC mode allows for the synergy of all available resources, giving the user maximum operational flexibility. The Barak 8 interceptor, developed in collaboration with RAFAEL Advanced Defense Systems Ltd., can intercept at short and medium ranges. It is dual pulsed and has an advanced seeker, providing all-weather, day/night engagements in complex saturation scenarios. The interceptor is vertically launched from a mobile ground launcher.

The 196kg EL/M 20600 RTP recently ordered for the IAF’s upgraded Jaguar IS is a unique Radar Targeting Pod integrating High Performance Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) imaging, Ground Moving Target Indication (GMTI) and Precision Target Tracking.The RTP is a complete All-Weather, Autonomous Real Time System. It provides high quality radar images of ground targets and terrain from Stand-Off ranges, even through clouds, rain, fog, battlefield smoke and man-made camouflage. The RTP incorporates ELTA’s multi-year vast experience in the development and manufacturing of a varietyof radars including Airborne Fire Control, SAR, GMTI and Multi-Mission Suites. The RTP enables:
Long Range, Wide Area Surveillance & Reconnaissance
Detection, Classification, Precision Tracking and Targeting of Ground Targets
Optimized Time Sensitive Targets (TST) engagement
Network Centric Warfare (NCW) support: Target data sharing and “Kill Sequence” execution
Short Sensor-to-Shooter loop
Accurate Geo-location data for targets
Support of a wide variety of Air-to-Ground weapons
Installation on board Trainers, Helicopters andvarious A/C
The RTP supports fighter Air-To-Surface missions:
Real-Time Tactical/Armed Reconnaissance
Precision Strike of Stationary & Moving Ground Targets
Bomb Damage Assessment (BDA)

The EL/K-1891 on board the IAF’s PHALCON AEW & C platform is a full duplex X or Ku Band microwave Satellite Communication (SATCOM) network ideally suited for uninterrupted wideband over-the-horizon (OTH) communication. Each subscriber port of the SATCOM network can be either static or mobile (ground-based mobile, airborne or shipborne) and must be within the satellite's footprint area with its antenna tracking the satellite. Communications between any two subscribers is bidirectional and routed via standard links of a commercial geostationary satellite. The digital data rate on the carrier link can be as high as 128 kbps and can include voice, data and compressed JPEG video. The SATCOM network is employed for military, paramilitary and commercial applications.

A-50E/KJ-2000 AEW & CS Of China Detailed

2009-06-06T15:44:00.000-07:00

What It Takes

2009-06-03T13:00:00.000-07:00

The above feature-length article, derived from the IAF's FLIGHT SAFETY magazine dated September 2008, highlights some of the critical issues that are related to the deployment of Su-30MKIs to new air bases.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Stop The Abuse

2009-05-27T14:46:00.001-07:00

Within 72 hours of the fatal crash of an IAF Su-30MKI on April 30, it was theoretically deduced by experimental test pilots attached to Russia’s Sukhoi OKB that only a catastrophic failure of the aircraft’s digital redundant fly-by-wire flight control system (FBW-FCS) would have caused loss of flight control and the consequent crash. But what could not be explained until recently was under exactly what circumstances would a redundant FBW-FCS—designed to be a fail-safe system—not deliver as advertised. And the answer could not have come from Sukhoi OKB simply because it, in case of the Su-30MKI, was responsible for only prescribing the flight control envelopes of the aircraft for both conventional flight profiles as well as for those involving supermanoeuvrability. What the OKB could not monitor or enforce was the operational flight regime of the Su-30MKI. And if initial findings of the IAF-instituted Board of Inquiry (BoI) are to be believed, the crashed Su-30MKI’s loss of flight control can now be pinned down, with a high degree of probability, to the FBW-FCS (see the block diagram above) suffering catastrophic failure as a result of non-prescribed usage of the aircraft’s FBW-FCS regime, which in turn had probably caused loss of the aircraft’s directional control (attached above is a brief explanation of the Su-30MKI’s FBW-FCS as appearing in the aircraft’s technical manual).

What now remains to be seen is whether the BoI will clearly disclose why exactly IAF HQ had not taken any disciplinary steps to curb at a much earlier stage the non-prescribed usage of the aircraft’s FBW-FCS-based flight regime during operational flying training at the squadron-level, and why exactly such uncompromising instructions were not made mandatory during the operational flight conversion phase. It also remains to be seen if IAF HQ will at last officially acknowledge the fact that had it procured Su-30MKI tactical flight simulators six years ago, it would have been better positioned to enforce operational flight discipline among those air warriors who were destined for the Su-30MKI squadrons. Therefore, the only consolation for those interested in the IAF’s well-being for now is that the Su-30MKI remains a reliable and formidable air dominance platform, but at the same time its end-user now needs more than ever to enforce a mandatory regime of operational flying discipline by whatever means possible, and acknowledging that even fail-safe solutions have a certain threshold of tolerance when it comes to sustaining abusive usage.—Prasun K. Sengupta

Club Family Of Multi-Role Cruise Missiles

2009-05-08T15:24:00.000-07:00

HUMS For Su-30MKI

2009-05-02T10:38:00.000-07:00

The Indian Air Force (IAF) adopted a multi-pronged approach to customise the Su-30MKI to the IAF’s qualitative requirements and enhance its operational reliability and serviceability, especially once it became clear that Russia was perfectly willing to incorporate systems and sub-systems of non-Russia origin. One of the main areas of thrust was predictive maintenance through HUMS.

For acquiring this capability, the IAF joined forces with South Africa’s Aerospace Monitoring And Systems (Pty) Ltd (AMS), a high-technology electronics engineering company that designs, develops, manufactures and supports specialised proprietary Aircraft Monitoring and Data Recording Systems. AMS has serviced this specific niche of the global aerospace and defence market since 1984. Predictive maintenance means the on- and off-board processing of aircraft sub-systems data, resulting in an accurate, conclusive indication of the health and usage status of various airborne systems. The heart of any health-and-usage monitoring system (HUMS) is a Data Acquisition Unit (DAU), capable of handling hundreds of input signals, supported by powerful processing hardware and software. The HUMS not only has the capability to monitor almost every aircraft system and sub-system, including the avionics sub-systems, it can also act as an engineering data recorder. For the Su-30MKI, AMS was contracted for providing total HUMS solutions, starting with the definition of the IAF’s qualitative requirements, followed by the provision (development and implementation), integration and support phases. AMS’ total HUMS package, as installed on the Su-30MKI, includes the following:

• The Crash Survivable Memory Unit (CSMU), whose prime mission is to save aircraft data and cockpit voice information in a crash-protected, non-volatile memory for post-incident/accident investigations. The CSMU receives aircraft flight data from a DAU on an ARINC 717 Harvard Bi-phase communications channel, and stores the data in a crash-protected memory module in the CSMU. The CSMU also records two channels of cockpit voice information, and stores the information is the crash-protected memory module in the CSMU.

• The DAU, whose prime mission is to acquire, process and store aircraft flight data and cockpit voice data, and forward the aircraft data to the CSMU on an ARINC 717 FDR channel. Recorded aircraft flight data and cockpit voice data is stored in non-volatile flash disk memory in the DAU for post-flight analysis of Su-30MKI component health and usage, and debriefing.

• The airborne Flight Data Recorder (FDR) system, which consists of a DAU, CSMU, and a Maintenance Panel Unit (MPU). The FDR ground support system consists of a Flightline System (FLS) and a CSMU Control Unit (CCU). The prime mission of the FDR system is to record and process aircraft data and cockpit voice information. A recorded sub-set of flight and voice data is stored in crash protected memory for post incident/accident investigations. Recorded flight data in the DAU is used for post flight analysis of aircraft component health and usage. The prime mission of the FLS is to download data from the on-board DAU and retrieve modify the DAU configuration data. The FLS is a ruggedised notebook computer that can be transported to the flight line and operated under harsh exposed conditions. All inputs in the field are via a touch-sensitive screen using graphic-based MMI screens. The FLS can download selected flight and voice data from the DAU. The FLS also has an external keyboard and mouse that allow easier use under office conditions using a special interface loom.

Fatigue in metallic structures is associated with cyclic loading, and can occur at low stress levels which would not otherwise cause failure when applied as a single event. Repeated loading causes cumulative damage. A structure will absorb cumulative damage from fluctuating loads, which eventually leads to the formation of small, detectable cracks. This is termed the life-to-crack initiation of the aircraft and in certain circumstances the airframe life is considered to have been expended when these first cracks start to appear. Nevertheless, aircraft can be operated past this time, into the so-called crack-growth phase, albeit with different maintenance and inspection intervals and procedures. With modern fracture mechanics techniques, it is possible to predict and predict/correct crack growth in almost any geometrical configuration. This in turn allows one to extend the life of an airframe beyond the threshold of crack initiation. This approach, along with damage tolerant repair procedures, can safely extend the life of an airframe beyond its previously-anticipated phasing out date. Finally, the cracks start to grow rapidly, leading to fracture. Tolerance to cyclic loading varies widely for different materials, with certain fracture-tough steels exhibiting excellent fatigue properties. However, the choice of material is often dictated more by the weight for static strength.

Even with the ever-increasing employment of composite materials, aircraft structures are still predominantly made up of aluminium and titanium alloys, and this brings up the issue of structural fatigue caused by fluctuating loads. For fracture-tough steel structures, designing for low mean- and fluctuating stress levels can give a near-infinite life. Unlike these steels, high-strength aluminium alloy structures cannot be designed for infinite life without considerable costs in structure weight. Any fluctuating stress imposes cumulative damage, which will eventually lead to fracture and failure. Weight efficient aircraft structures therefore have a finite life. The basic aims for the Su-30MKI’s aircraft fatigue monitoring and management system are generally:

• Verification of the structural integrity and longevity of new aircraft.

• Life monitoring, maintenance, and safe life extension of aging aircraft.

Interest in the monitoring and managing of aircraft structural fatigue has greatly increased globally over the last two decades. Fleet operators who are considering the implementation of a HUMS programme should take cognisance of why this is so. Notwithstanding finite structural life, the much higher rate of advance in avionics technology, relative to aerodynamic, airframe and engine technologies, has meant that aircraft “obsolescence” is now determined more by the avionics fit than the performance and efficiency of the airframe/engine combination. This is particularly the case for military aircraft. Because of rapid ageing of avionics technology, avionics upgrades to in-service aircraft have become the norm. These can take the form of frequent small upgrades, or major refits once or twice during its service life. A new engine and airframe can account for 40-50% of the total cost of a new combat aircraft, while adding little of consequence to its operational capabilities. Increasingly, cost-conscious air forces and other fleet operators are opting to retain existing airframes and engines and to spend their money on capability-enhancing equipment. An extreme example is the B-52H aircraft, which entered service in the late 1950s and is currently expected to remain in service up to the year 2040, a life of 80 years!

In light of the above it is clear that the airframe is the limiting factor in aircraft longevity, and this in turn determines the economic viability, or otherwise, of any upgrade programmes that might be envisaged. The remaining airframe life is a decisive factor in aircraft upgrade decisions. Therefore there is an increasing demand for accurate tracking of life consumption. Many operators acquire used rather than new aircraft as a matter of policy, and the availability of accurate remaining life estimates can greatly increase the resale value of an aircraft fleet. As part of the initial design process, an aircraft manufacturer will assume a flight loading spectrum to which the aircraft will be subjected to during service, and design for a specified life on the basis of that spectrum. However, changing roles and missions may, to a greater or lesser degree, invalidate the initial assumptions. In the case of military (and particularly combat) aircraft it is quite possible that the roles they are eventually called upon to fulfil, and missions they are then required to carry out, will be very different to those originally envisaged. Initial estimates of fatigue life are then invalid, and a great deal of uncertainty is introduced into fleet management. The objective of fatigue monitoring in HUMS is to reduce these uncertainties. There are cases where the initial life estimates have been extended by 50% as a result of more accurate measurement and monitoring programs implemented in service.

In Output-Based Contracting (OBC) an aircraft supplier is no longer paid for a once-off delivery of systems, but instead is contracted to provide a service, for example flying hours. There is currently a marked trend towards this type of contracting, which brings greater contract risk while at the same time also holding out the prospect of higher financial returns. Minimising risks, while increasing operating efficiencies and maximising the life of the aircraft, poses great challenges. The aircraft provider can meet these challenges by including fatigue monitoring as part of general health- and usage monitoring. Fatigue monitoring can protect the service provider from the consequences of unduly severe usage, by providing a record of such usage and the impact thereof on the structural life of the aircraft. Output-based contracting exposes the aircraft service provider to higher levels of risk. One major risk is that the client’s usage of the aircraft will not correspond to that assumed by the contractor at the time of initial costing. For example, it is quite possible that different missions with more demanding mission profiles could be imposed during the life of the aircraft. Furthermore, flight limitations may be exceeded more frequently during an given mission. These eventualities would impact negatively on the cost of providing the service contracted for. Monitoring will provide clear indications as to whether the aircraft is being operated within its contractual limitations and provide recourse to the supplier.

The aircraft operator/end-user can use health-and-usage monitoring to minimise contractual risk. But after this, aircraft maintenance operations can be managed so as to improve profitability. If costs are estimated conservatively at the time of bidding, and if realised costs can be minimised during the service period by intelligent management, the higher reward commensurate with higher risk will be obtained. A more accurate knowledge of the probable condition of the aircraft can allow on-condition maintenance, as opposed to unnecessarily frequent and therefore more expensive scheduled teardowns and inspections. OBC requires that a given number of flying hours are to be provided per month. Aircraft availability is therefore a major factor. Anticipation of problems via fatigue monitoring (and general systems condition monitoring) allows early corrective action to be taken, with beneficial effects on availability. Less aircraft are then required to fulfil the contractual obligations.

Initially at the OEM the focus is on methods for fatigue and fracture mechanics technology in the design of durable, damage-tolerant aircraft structures. Aircraft manufacturers generate and maintain Fatigue and Stress Corrosion Manuals. Once the aircraft has been in service for some time, the operator will focus on the extended safe use of aging aircraft: The applicable technologies have to do with the basic fatigue and fracture behaviour of structural metallic materials. For the Su-30MKI, methods have been developed by the IAF for the following:

• Fatigue loading spectra;

• Fatigue analysis methods;

• Material fatigue behaviour;

• Fracture mechanics;

• Damage tolerance analysis and testing of redundant metallic aircraft structures;

• Fatigue crack growth analysis;

• Crack growth, residual strength analyses, and aircraft structural integrity programmes;

• Ageing aircraft issues.—Prasun K. Sengupta

G-550 CAEW & C Profiled

2009-04-25T21:46:00.000-07:00

With a longer endurance of nine hours and capable of flying at a higher operating altitude of 41,000 feet, this new platform also has a longer detection range of more than 200 nautical miles. By enhancing the Republic of Singapore Air Force's (RSAF) all-round radar coverage, the introduction of the four G-550 CAEW & C platforms (the RSAF is the second customer of the G-550 CAEW & C after the IDF Air Force) will strengthen the RSAF's situational awareness and give it greater response time to deal with any aerial threat more effectively. The delivery of all four platforms is expected to be completed over the next two years, and will be stationed at the RSAF’s Tengah Air Base under the command of 111 Squadron, while operating with the Air Defence and Operations Command during mission execution. The Indian Navy too is soon expected to order an initial two of four such platforms under a fast-track procurement procedure--Prasun K. Sengupta

Can They Or Can’t They?

2009-03-27T15:08:00.000-07:00

Is there any existing shipyard in India that can undertake modular warship-building? For that you ought to look for some visual signs of it, instead of asking any of the existing shipbuilders, be it Goa Shipyard Ltd (GSL), Kolkata-based Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers Ltd (GRSE), the Mumbai-based Mazagon Docks Ltd (MDL), or Cochin Shipyard Ltd (CSL). Because one will only get a warped answer that skirts the entire issue of modular shipbuilding and tries to oversimplify the industrial challenges. Before we go any further, let us examine in simple terms what modular warship-building is all about. Simply put, it was pioneered by Germany’s Blohm + Voss and ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems (now grouped as the German Naval Group, or GNG), with the scope of work to be performed consisting of integrated modular designs (using TRIBON CAD/CAM software) for both onboard and off board systems that are designed specifically for the varied deployment of standardised modules (weapons, electronics and the ship’s technical equipment) which, in addition, are connected with the power supply, the air-conditioning and ventilation system and the data network for example, via standardised interfaces. All the components needed to run a specific system are accommodated in a single module. Depending upon the particular task they are required to perform, a distinction is made between weapons, electronics and the ship’s technical modules. Containers, pallets and mast modules are installed during the construction phase. Such modularity allows a wide range of choice in the selection of the on-board systems, whether it be with regard to the integration of customer-supplied systems or the use of products that the customer already has in service from various manufacturers. By simultaneously building the warship’s platform at a shipyard and the modules at the suppliers’ premises, a significant savings in both time and cost can be achieved. The modular construction principle also reduces the costs of maintaining and modernising the vessels during both periodic refits and service life-extension programmes (SLEP). Following the example and standards set by the GNG, other European shipyards like The Netherlands’ Schelde Naval Shipbuilding, the UK’s BAE Systems and Italy’s Fincantieri have actively embraced such shipbuilding practices and processes.

This now leads us to the question at hand: can shipyards like GSL, CSL, MDL and GRSE presently undertake modular warship-building? The answer is a clear no, as they are not only not equipped with the required industrial infrastructure, but they do not have any standardised roadmap or time-bound infrastructure development implementation plan. A cursory look around any of these shipyards will reveal that none of them even have syncrolifts, which must be accompanied by related shiplift piers, and dry berth. For modular shipbuilding the syncrolift (for transferring the various modules into the final enclosed assembly hall), dry berths and assembly halls must all be connected by a modern, land-level ship-transfer system. The only such syncrolift that exists within India is the one at INS Kadamba (Project Seabird) in Karwar, having been ordered on May 20, 2002 at a cost of US$32 million and delivered by Rolls-Royce Marine Systems in late 2004. Configured as a 10,000-ton shiplifter, it is a large marine elevator used for lifting warships out of, or lowering ships into, the water. To dock a warship, the platform and cradle are lowered into the water, and the vessel is then moved into place over the platform. When in position, the syncrolift raises the platform, removing the vessel from the water. Work on the vessel can then be done in situ, or the vessel transferred offshore, leaving the syncrolift available to dock other vessels. On completion, the process is reversed. The hoists, platform and associated ship-transfer system were all made in India and the project was managed by Syncrolift Inc, the world leader in shiplift systems with 224 installations in 67 countries.

Making matters worse is the disparate state of military-industrial cooperation between the Indian shipyards and their foreign counterparts. For instance, GSL has a longstanding agreement with Schelde Naval Shipbuilding, The Netherlands’ Maritime Research Institute (MARIN) and Haskoning Nederland BV, and Germany’s Raytheon Anschutz GmbH. MDL, on the other hand, openly declares its preference for ARMARIS of France, while CSL is now in bed with Fincantieri, with GRSE preferring to team up with the GNG. These varying and competing industrial tie-ups are now indulging in intense lobbying within the MoD for securing the contract for supplying the Indian Navy with seven Project 17A guided-missile frigates (FFG), seven Project 15B guided-missile destroyers (DDG) and up to three amphibious assault vessels. While the Navy’s Directorate of Naval Design (DND) has clearly indicated its preference for adopting the GNG’s proven and globally popular MEKO concept of modular design/construction, BAE Systems, ARMARIS, Schelde Naval Shipbuilding and Fincantieri haven’t yet lost hope and are exerting intense pressure on the MoD to at least share the cake (comprising the projected FFG, DDG and LPH projects) as a compromise. The latest entrant into the fray is South Korea’s Hanjin Heavy Industries & Construction, which is offering the Dokdo-class LPH and KDX-3 DDG.

As far as selecting the design of the Project 17A FFG goes, ARMARIS’ Fremm FFG, the GNG’s F-125 FFG and Navantia’s F-310 FFG are likely to be shortlisted. The foreign shipyard whose FFG design wins the tender will be required to build two FFGs at its own yard, using craftsmen from the selected lead Indian shipyard. For the Project 17A FFG, the Navy is seeking revolutionary solutions aimed at seamlessly operating under various scenarios under a global deployment spectrum. For instance, the Navy wants the vessel’s dwell-time in the area of operations of up to one year, without having to return to its homeport for scheduled maintenance during this phase. This concept of operations is thus aimed at doubling the warship’s time-on-station between major overhauls by maintaining the warship’s uninterrupted operational availability, and drastically cutting down (by several weeks) on long-transit times. In addition, a high degree of on-board automation will be specified to enable the warship to be manned by a crew complement of less than 100, with the crew complement on deployment being swapped at-sea according to a four-monthly cycle. An identical concept will be specified for the three planned seven Project 15B DDGs.

On the Indian Navy’s plans to acquire up to three LPH-based multi-role support ships (MRSS), a total of eight companies from The Netherlands (Schelde Shipbuilding with its Enforcer LPD), France (Armaris’ Mistral LHD), the UK (BAE Systems Marine’s Ocean-class LHD), Germany (ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems’ MHD-150), Italy (Finantieri’s 20,000-tonne LHD), the US (Raytheon’s San Antonio-class LPD-17), Spain (Navantia’s 21,500-tonne Strategic Projection Ship, two of which were ordered by Australia on October 9, 2007) and South Korea (Hanjin Heavy Industries & Construction’s 14,500-tonne assault landing ship, three of which have been ordered for the ROK Navy) have begun lining up for marketing their respective solutions. It is believed that the Indian Navy originally desired a LPD design capable of undertaking sea logistics and humanitarian relief operations. Now, however, the Navy has projected a requirement for helicopter carriers (LHD) that will also host rear flooding decks to accommodate armoured wheeled/tracked amphibious assault vehicles and LCAC-type assault hovercraft. This means the MRSS will in essence be a LHD that will also be capable of supporting ‘over-the-horizon assaults’ by heliborne and LCAC-borne infantry forces. That being the case, the Navy’s to-be-selected MRSS will have to host on board at least six medium-lift utility helicopters.—Prasun K. Sengupta

The New Untouchables

2009-03-19T13:23:00.000-07:00

In every endeavour you require the services of middlemen, a much maligned term that sounds more respectable when referred to as ‘facilitators’. While people of diverse faiths require the services of both ordained priests and self-styled godmen/Sadhvis to operationalise the two-way communications links between the Almighty and us mortal human beings, so too are such ‘facilitators’ required for expediting the decision-making processes associated with the procurement of major weapon systems for India’s armed forces. By the mid-1990s, in the aftermath of the scandals associated with Sweden’s Bofors AB and Germany’s HDW, the closely-knit community of such facilitators—having both business and political backgrounds—closed ranks in India and resolved to devise a fool-proof method of conducting their businesses based on a win-win doctrine. It was quite an ingenious and totally legal way of doing business. How? Kindly allow me to elaborate. The two key essential elements of this business plan are: an India-based citizen who must have access to business venture capital; and an NRI or PIO whose business interests are located abroad, and whose business activities are registered in an offshore tax-free haven. The next step is to register a shelf company in this tax haven and develop a business plan in areas where the Govt of India allows either 100% foreign ownership or majority shareholding by foreign corporate entities. Once ready, this business plan is then peddled in search of venture capital and bridging loans. Concurrently, the owners of this business plan—the facilitators—establish political linkages with those in power within the executive branch of the Govt of India—to gain insights into the short-term, medium-term and long-term weapons procurement programmes of the Indian Army, Indian Navy, Indian Air Force, the Indian Coast Guard Service, the central paramilitary forces, and the central intelligence agencies. Once the key programmes are identified the search then begins for suitable OEMs that are ‘preferred’ by both the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), keeping in mind the supreme national interests of India. Interestingly, by this stage, the decision-makers within the Govt of India have already decided who the preferred OEM will be, with the yet-to-be-conducted competitive tendering process just being an eyewash and an exercise in futility. I say this because under the existing decision-making process for military procurements, the end-user is only mandated to indulge in evaluating the competitive bids and has no final say in zeroeing in on one specific OEM/supplier. That is a political decision to be made by the Cabinet Committee on National Security after factoring in various variables such as the financial offer, state of bilateral trade/international relations between India and the country hosting the respective bidders, etc.

After having received the key selection criteria inputs from the MoD and MEA, the concerned facilitator, armed with his/her business plan, initiates contact with the already preferred OEM and takes the OEM into confidence, and consequently, the OEM conducts an independent audit of the business plan (which may include the setting up in India of a private airline, or business air charter service, or a telecommunications-related business franchise) and agrees to provide the necessary venture capital for setting up such business activities within India in lieu of being awarded the procurement contract from the MoD. The venture capital is then transferred by the OEM (usually through one of its business subsidiaries) to the offshore shelf company registered by the facilitator’s NRI/PIO business partner who in turn acts as the foreign institutional investor making a perfectly legal and no-nonsense investment in a newly registered business entity within India. The facilitator in turn appoints his/her proxies to the Board of Directors of the business entity to run the show, with the plan being to turn the private limited company into a publicly-listed company within 24 months of its launch, thereby getting access to additional venture capital through the capital markets both within India and abroad, something I like to refer to as OPM, or other people’s money.

By the time contract signature takes place between the preferred OEM and the MoD, the OEM has seen to the following: that the FDI has been pumped into India for a perfectly legitimate business venture; that the business venture has a clearly defined business roadmap under which it will undergo public listing within a pre-defined timeframe, and the resultant OPM will be used—perfectly legally—for making financial donations or extending aerial logistics support to the concerned political parties whenever required; that the venture capital extended by the OEM to the facilitator will be returned in successive tranches (via the OPM) back to the OEM or one of the OEM’s designated business subsidiaries. So what you have in the end is no legal wrongdoing, no financial impropriety, no stashing away of slush funds, and a totally transparent business plan whose execution is flawless and beyond any suspicion. If questioned, the OEM on its part is also able to prove beyond reasonable doubt that its adherence to the mandatory ‘Integrity Clause’ contained within the military procurement contract is total without any breach, that no financial remuneration was paid to anyone either within India or abroad for facilitating the military procurement’s contract signature, and there was no ‘hidden’ inflation of the contract value.

But let it be known that to date, following exhaustive internal enquiries and investigations conducted by Indian authorities, no shred of evidence has emerged to directly and conclusively imply that the business methodology I have outlined above was employed by any party in securing the Scorpene SSK procurement contract. Consequently, during a recent meeting held at the MoD between the Central Vigilance Commission, Central Bureau of Investigation, the Indian Navy HQ, and the Indian Chapter of Transparency International (headed by former Chief of the Naval Staff, Admiral (Ret’d) R H Tahiliani), everyone concluded that it was impossible for anyone concerned to prove beyond reasonable doubt any allegations of corruption involving the on-going procurement of the six Scorpene SSKs. Consequently, life goes on as usual….Prasun K. Sengupta

ADDENDUM 1

Murky Deals

For a country with the world’s third-largest standing Army, seventh-largest Navy and the fourth-largest Air Force it should not come as a surprise when, from time to time, there are cases of financial misappropriations or alleged kickbacks associated with military procurements undertaken to sustain the armed forces’ force modernisation efforts. But what is undeniably surprising is that almost all the procurement scandals that have come to light thus far since the early 1980s have involved Western companies such as Sweden’s Bofors Defence, Germany HDW and recently South Africa’s Denel Group. Despite the fact that more than 70% of the armed forces’ operational weapon systems have since the early 1980s been imported from the former Soviet Union (USSR) and its successor state, the Russian Federation (in total, from 1960 till 2000, the USSR and Russia supplied India with almost $35 billion worth of military hardware), there has never been even a single recorded or revealed case of questionable purchases of weapons by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) from either the USSR, or Russia, or other former East Bloc countries like Poland, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine or Belarus. That is until now.

The first ever revelation about alleged kickbacks received by senior MoD officials, including a Defence Minister himself, as a quid pro quo for purchasing weapons from the erstwhile USSR appears in the book titled ‘The Mitrokhin Archive, Volume II: The KGB and the World’, published by Penguin/Allen Lane. The book opened a Pandora’s box not only about the nature of bilateral relations between India and the erstwhile USSR between the 1950s through to the late 1980s, but also throw some light on how military-industrial cooperation between the two countries and India’s defence procurement practices throughout the 1970s and 1980s, both marked by a remarkable degree of opacity during this period, climbed to dizzying heights. The book, jointly written by Vasili Mitrokhin, a former senior archivist of the USSR’s civilian intelligence agency, the KGB, and Cambridge University Professor and intelligence historian Christopher Andrew, is a sequel to the whistle-blowing Volume I that was published in 1999 (detailing the KGB’s operations conducted in the West between 1917 and 1991) and has since been appreciated worldwide for the authoritativeness, quality, minutae and detail of the information copied over a 12-year period from thousands of top-secret KGB files by Mitrokhin, who defected to the UK after the USSR collapsed in 1992. Volume II deals with the KGB’s attempts to ‘communise’, ‘Sovietise’, make friends and influence people in the developing world, and two of its chapters reveal how in the 1970s India was one of the countries most successfully penetrated by the KGB, how and why India became a model of KGB infiltration of a Third World government, and why the KGB ‘residency’ in Delhi was one of the largest in the world outside the Soviet bloc, and was awarded the rare honour by the Centre (KGB HQ in Moscow) of being promoted to a ‘main residency’. The most significant revelation, as far as military hardware procurements from the erstwhile USSR go, is that India’s Defence Minister V K Krishna Menon in the mid-1960s was successfully persuaded to buy MiG-21PF (Type 74) interceptors instead of the English Electric Lightning for the Indian Air Force (IAF), and in return his general election campaigns in 1962 and 1967 were KGB-funded.

Yet, despite such authoritativeness, caution would be well-advised here. For while it is generally appreciated that the Soviets were extremely active in trying to influence Indian ‘intellectual opinion’ between the 1950s and 1980s, Volume II reveals only a part of the whole story. And this is because the KGB constituted only a part of the gigantic Soviet information-gathering apparatus that in a country like India also had several personnel and ‘indigenous high-value assets’ working in parallel for/in the payroll of other Soviet agencies such as the GRU (military intelligence), accredited Soviet mass media agencies such as Izvestia, ITAR-TASS, Novosti and Pravda, and most importantly, the Delhi-based Trade Representative’s Office that reported to the USSR’s Ministry of Foreign Economic Relations, which in turn was the sole Soviet government organ responsible for marketing and supplying weapons of Soviet origin to 76 countries, including India. To gain a comprehensive appreciation of the former USSR’s ‘intellectual penetration’ of India and its consequences as far as Indian military hardware procurements go, it is best to start with trying to find out where India found itself in the Soviet scheme of things. The USSR began engaging India seriously soon after the Sino-Soviet split in the early 1960s and took India seriously since the late 1960s because it had global interests, notably a definite military threat from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and a desire to reduce the US influence in the subcontinent. This was the only basis for the India-USSR relationship, which acquired a strategic dimension in August 1971 when both countries inked the India-Soviet Treaty of Peace, Friendship, and Cooperation and consequently both countries got what each wanted—the USSR achieved strategic encirclement of the PRC while India got:
· A credible but limited duration nuclear umbrella to discourage and even neutralise any Chinese military adventurism targeted against India in the event of a future round of India-Pakistan military hostilities.
· The much-needed diplomatic support from the East Bloc at the UN Security Council as well as the crucial military hardware-cum-war wastage reserves required to successfully undertake the 14-day ‘Lightning Campaign’ that resulted in the dismemberment of Pakistan and the birth of Bangladesh in December 1971.

Between 1972 and 1975 there were no major procurements of USSR-built military hardware by India, and the Soviets were quite happy to keep India engaged (and simultaneously keep the PRC strategically encircled and contained) by offering sops like the bilateral rupee-rouble trading system (despite this, non-military trade was never a high point of India-USSR relations), supporting India’s indigenous space technology development projects, and continuing the off-the-shelf supply of weapons like MiG-21M/bis combat aircraft and Mi-8T utility helicopters. These geo-strategic imperatives, however, began undergoing a sea-change when the Indian National Congress led by the then Prime Minister Mrs Indira Gandhi lost the 1976 general elections to the Janata Party. At around the same time, the Indian Army, Navy and Air Force were gearing up to undertake a gigantic, 10-year-long phased force modernisation effort that called for the procurement of big-ticket items like deep penetration strike aircraft (DPSA) and medium multi-role combat aircraft (M-MRCA); principal surface combatants like guided-missile frigates (FFG), guided-missile destroyers (DDG) and both single- and double-hulled diesel-electric submarines (SSK); main battle tanks (MBT) and infantry combat vehicles (ICV); mobile air defence artillery systems, 155mm/39-calibre towed field howitzers; attack and utility helicopters, plus tactical and strategic transport aircraft.

For obvious reasons, alarm bells must have started ringing in the Kremlin in 1978 when the Janata Party government led by the KGB’s bete noire (Prime Minister Morarji Desai) signed a contract with British Aerospace (now BAE Systems) for the purchase of 120 SEPECAT Jaguar IS/IM DPSAs. Next on the list were MBTs for which the Army had shortlisted contenders from France, Germany, and the UK; ICVs for which Army HQ wanted to evaluate French and German offers; the M-MRCA for which Dassault’s Mirage 2000 was the preferred choice, and single-hulled SSKs for which Kockums of Sweden and HDW of Germany were the preferred suppliers. What made matters far more complicated for the Kremlin was India’s attempt to normalise relations with the PRC in the post-Mao Tse-Tung era, while for Delhi the USSR’s inability to prevent Beijing from ‘teaching a lesson’ to Hanoi (by being unable to avert the Sino-Vietnam War of February-March 1979) revealed the true limits of Soviet politico-military power projection. And what was also not known then to India as well as the West was the USSR’s plan to undertake the invasion of Afghanistan in the fall of 1979 despite the steadily deteriorating economic situation of the Warsaw pact member-states. By 1980 the Warsaw Pact countries were collectively importing 110 million tonnes of crude oil to satisfy internal requirements even though the USSR was by then the world’s largest producer of crude oil and the second largest gold producer. What made matters far worse for Moscow were efforts made by the West led by Reagan Administration to irreversibly cripple the Soviet economy into a state of perpetual decline by forcing the USSR to increasingly to borrow from the West.

For the Kremlin, therefore, it must have come as enormous relief to see Mrs Gandhi being elected as Prime Minister for a third term. And this is where the mystery deepens and the ground gets murkier. For, despite the known limitations and decline of Moscow’s economic/military prowess, the MoD, without any fanfare, in May 1980, inked a $1.6 billion weapons procurement agreement with the USSR (at concessionary terms of 2.5% interest rate) and also followed Moscow in establishing diplomatic relations with the Vietnam-installed Cambodian government of Heng Samrin. This was followed by another gigantic contract signed in 1981 for procuring weapons worth $2.5 billion, followed by yet another contract in 1984 worth almost $3 billion, despite the latter two deals proving to be a heavy burden for the Indian economy, and becoming the main reason why India applied for a $5.65 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund (when the USSR collapsed, New Delhi’s debt to Moscow was estimated at $16 billion, including interest, thanks to the rupee-rouble trading practice). As a consequence of all this, at least three major Indian force modernisation plans mutated to the following:
· Instead of the IAF acquiring a single M-MRCA, the requirement was broken down to an astonishing five aircraft types—49 Mirage 2000H/TH M-MRCAs were ordered in 1984, while 90 MiG-23BNs and 50 MiG-27Ms were imported off-the-shelf between 1981 and 1986 (and another 165 produced in-country between 1983 and 1997) to serve as tactical air support aircraft, and 40 MiG-23MFs and 50 MiG-29B-12s were procured in 1983 and 1986 directly from the USSR as dedicated air superiority combat aircraft. The clinching argument in favour of these procurements was then spelt out by the Soviets to a gullible MoD as: quantity has a quality of its own!
· Against all logic the Navy’s SSK procurements were broken up among two parties, with the single-hulled SSKs procured being the four Class/Type 209 from HDW, along with their advanced, prohibitively expensive licenced-fabrication facilities since 1982, while at the same time eight double-hulled Type 877EKM Kilo-class SSKs were procured off-the-shelf from the USSR. This led to avoidable and wasteful expenditures incurred for creating from scratch two parallel types of on-shore infrastructure for SSK training and maintenance.
· The Indian Army, which wanted to acquire a MBT incorporating hit-survivability design features (something that the home-grown Arjun Mk1’s design strongly signifies), from late-1982 became surprisingly reconciled to acquiring some 1,900 T-72M/M1s that incorporated hit-avoidance features. This despite the fact that by late 1980 when the Army conducted field trials of the T-72M it found out to its utter horror that basically, with the exception of the T-55, the overall Soviet approach to MBT design in the post-World War II era was found to be flawed on two major counts: namely, the gamble on not being hit rather than on surviving hits, and the refusal to perceive survivability of the tank crew as a quite distinct issue from survivability of the vehicle, with the former having priority over the latter. The combination of these two shortcomings produced design solutions such as the T-72M’s carousel autoloader and ammunition reserve being accommodated on the turret floor. This indeed allowed for a very compact configuration and ensured that the ammunition is less likely to take a direct hit—but it also entailed a very high risk of ignition or sympathetic detonation should the fighting compartment be penetrated, in which case there went the MBT and the crew with it. In fact, in mid-1982 in Lebanon the 105mm APFSDS rounds fired by Israeli Merkava Mk1 MBTs with 105mm rifled-bore guns routinely pierced the Syrian T-72M’s front glacis, went straight through the MBT and exited through the engine compartment, leaving a turretless hulk behind. The Indian Army got a first-hand demonstration of the T-72M’s acute vulnerability in October 1987 when LTTE guerrillas exploded improvised explosive devices underneath two T-72Ms deployed with 65 Armoured Regiment for Operation Pawan during the battle for Jaffna, which resulted in armour penetration and the ensuing catastrophic detonation of the MBT’s ammunition reserve (this being stored in a carousel autoloader on the turret’s floor), resulting in the turrets being blown off. Subsequent events in 1991 during Operation Desert Storm would convincingly highlight the T-72M’s totally flawed design features.

The rest, as they say, is history. The collapse of the Soviet Union reduced India’s military preparedness to a parlous state throughout the 1990s, thanks to the one-sided weapons procurement policies initiated in the early 1980s. The limited war in Kargil in 1999 and Operation Parakram in 2002 further highlighted the inadequacy of the country’s war-waging capabilities and block technological obsolescence of the armed forces. India today is totally dependent on Israel and France for ‘surgically upgrading’ the performance of almost all its weapons of Soviet origin. And Russia till today is unable to ensure the guaranteed supply of critical military spares because it no longer controls the various military-industrial facilities now spread out throughout Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia and the Central Asia Republics. The present UPA government led by the Congress (I), the very party that inked some of the highly questionable arms deals with the erstwhile USSR more than two decades ago, is eminently qualified to explain exactly what ‘enlightened national interests’ prompted the MoD to embark upon such a one-sided and disastrous defence procurement policy, even if it is for posterity. And the most qualified official to do so is none other than the present Minister for External Affairs, who was the Union Finance Minister during the 1980s.--Prasun K. Sengupta

ADDENDUM 2

Who Is The Real Enemy Of India?

Surprising as it may seem, the greatest threat to India’s national security interests has always been and continues to be the Government of India’s executive branch. The total lack of strategic visioning, consistently developing cold feet when it comes to enacting the much needed administrative and procedural reforms within the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and its Department of Defence Production & Supplies (DDPS), and politicising the procurement of weapon systems from abroad starting with the Bofors FH-77B towed howitzers have all had the most frustrating and terrible impacts on the force modernisation efforts of the country’s three armed services since 1988. Add to this the kind of vindictive politics now being practiced and one has the most poisonous cocktail ever concocted to make the armed forces the real and only losers. The most glaring example of such shameful and possibly treasonous conduct was evident in April 2004 when the then newly-elected UPA coalition government abruptly shelved the well-conceived Rs250 billion (US$5.3 billion) Defence Modernisation Fund (DMF) that was created by the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA coalition government earlier in February 2004 for fast-tracking the long-overdue acquisition of critical military hardware. The fund was meant to be ‘non-lapsable’, meaning the MoD would not have to surrender its capital account funds if they were not used within the fiscal year they were allocated for. It was thus meant to reverse the trend of the past years, when the MoD returned on average more than $3.8 billion per annum to the national exchequer. However, the then Defence Minister (and presently the Minister for external Affairs) Pranab Mukherjee said on June 19, 2005 that such a concept was neither constitutionally nor legally valid, although he was subsequently contradicted by Prime Minister D Manmohan Singh, who said in April 2005 that he was not averse to the DMF being resurrected. When coupled with the ruling UPA government’s decision to examine all arms deals inked during the NDA government’s tenure for any traces of financial kickbacks, the lack of a consolidated DMF has had a paralytic impact on, among other things, the Army’s ambitious plans to re-equip its aviation, infantry, armoured, air defence artillery and field artillery formations, the Navy’s plans for acquiring deep-submergence rescue vessels, a fleet of intelligence-gathering vessels, and a DRDO-owned but Navy-operated fleet of telemetry tracking vessels. The following are but a few of the projects that have been put on hold since 2005, pending the outcome of CVC/CBI-led investigations into allegations of financial impropriety, reported manipulation of qualitative requirements (QR) to suit a particular vendor, to outright misrepresentation of the recorded conclusions of competitive field evaluations.

1) Recall the much hyped-about procurement of deep-submergence rescue vessels for the Indian Navy? Well, nothing has been inked so far as the CVC in 2007 put on hold the contract signature. The Indian Navy had selected the Remora 2000 remotely operated rescue vehicle (RORV) for its submarines by mid-2005, along with its launch-and-recovery system (LARS) and a fully integrated self-contained emergency life support system (ELSS) package, all to be supplied by Canada’s Ocean Works International of North Vancouver. The yet-to-be-signed contract, however, ran into rough weather two years ago amidst allegations of irregularities (i.e. kickbacks) during the contractual negotiations phase. The 20.6-tonne Remora 2000 RORV has a depth rating to 610 metres, can accommodate 18 men, can dry-transfer personnel under pressures up to 6 atmospheres into surface decompression facilities, and is designed for operations in Sea State 5 and transport in Sea State 6. The related surface decompression facility can treat more than 100 personnel. The entire Remora 2000 system can be air-transported for rapid deployment. Similar systems built by the same company are currently operational with the navies of Australia, Russia and Singapore.

2) What is known so far about the so-called ‘leaks’ (first revealed in May 2005) is that Navy officers posted in the Operations Directorate of Naval Headquarters were found trading off classified information of a commercial nature. What has not been revealed until now is that after the procurement costs of INS Vikramaditya, it is the cost of procuring a fleet of four 8,000-tonne intelligence-gathering vessels, and a DRDO-owned but Navy-operated fleet of three 15,000-tonne telemetry tracking vessels (each equipped with three monopulse radars capable of tracking the flight of multiple independent re-entry warheads) that constitutes the second biggest contract (in financial terms) to be awarded by the MoD for the Navy. But what makes the procurement of these types of vessels so lucrative is the sheer number of vendors involved—not just for supplying the vessels off-the-shelf—but for equipping them with more than 600 different systems and components, each of which are to be procured after intense competitive bidding under individual, supplemental multi-million dollar contracts. In essence, this is the dream contract that every ‘facilitator’ cherishes, and could potentially create more than 600 Indian multi-millionaires. Consequently, so great was the demand for access to the combined Navy/DRDO-drafted QRs for each of the 600+ systems that thumb-drives had to be employed for copying the QR files for onward dispatch to potential local and foreign vendors! Of the two types of naval vessels sought, the telemetry tracking vessels are of a strategic nature and there’s a pressing need for them simply because without them there’s no other credible way of tracking and validating the MIRV’s re-entry flightpath. Yes, you guessed right: thus far all test-firings of ballistic missiles carried out by the DRDO out of the ITR have involved only single re-entry warheads and until such time as India acquires such telemetry tracking vessels, the DRDO will be unable to test-fire MIRV-equipped ballistic missiles. Bu then again, the wait is likely to be a long one, as the procurement of such vessels is now on hold due to the on-going CVC/CBI investigations.

3) Another procurement that has been put on hold, again for reasons of alleged financial impropriety, is that concerning Swedish Space Corporation’s (SSC) supply of mission sensor suites for an initial three Dornier Do-228-211s of the Indian Coast Guard Service. SSC had won the competitive bidding process in mid-2007 for supplying the maritime surveillance system, each of which comprises an Ericsson-built SLAR (typically covering 18,000 km² per hour for oil spills and small objects on the water surface and 48,000 km² per hour for large vessels), and Argon ST (formerly Daedalus) 1221 IR/UV linescanner (operating in the 8.5-12.5µm region and in the 0.32-0.38 µm region and providing high-resolution imagery of oil spills and other features on the sea surface).

4) This may sound extremely depressing, but there’s a reason why the upgraded M-46S 155mm/45-calibre towed howitzers have gone missing from the Republic Day and Army Day parades since 2007. One may recall that in 1990, the Indian Army firmed up its plans for upgrading the 130mm M-46s and year later the MoD approved the plan, and SOLTAM Systems of Israel was selected as the prime contractor among five bidders. In-country field trials of the upgraded prototypes were carried out in 1993, but the MoD took another five years to sanction the funds. On paper, 430 upgraded M-46S 155mm/45-cal towed howitzers (for 20 Regiments) were to be supplied (since 2002) by the state-owned Ordnance Factories Board (OFB) under licence from Israel’s SOLTAM Systems, making the M-46S the Army’s tube artillery system with the longest reach, being able to fire ERFB-BB rounds out to 38.5km and VLAP rounds out to 42km when using bi-modular charges. The bad news is that the upgrade programme has been terminated after only 40 howitzers were modified, this being due to a fatal barrel explosion taking place two years ago. Army HQ has since then asked the MoD to terminate this project for good and efforts are now on to initiate legal proceedings against SOLTAM and seek liquidated damages.

5) Remember the big splash made in April 2007 when the MoD reportedly leaked news about the Eurocopter-built AS.350B3 Fennec winning the competitive bid for supplying the Army’s new-generation single-engined light observation-cum-utility helicopter? Well, the news is that this result was already known two years ago, when Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) and Eurocopter had inked a Global Industrial Cooperation Partnership Agreement in February 2005 to jointly produce Ecureuil and Fennec helicopters for the world market. Yet, Eurocopter’s rival, Bell Helicopters Textron, prudently decided to give the MoD the benefit of the doubt and took part in the in-country flight evaluations throughout 2006. But it got the shock of its life when in May 2007 the MoD invited Eurocopter for final contractual negotiations. And this happened even after the Fennec convincingly failed to perform as advertised during the ‘cold soak’ tests in January 2007 at Leh air base during which both competing helicopters’ engines had to be switched off overnight and re-started at high-altitude the following day. Apparently, the Bell 407 had no problem activating its engine with the help of the internally-mounted battery-operated starter-generator. But the AS.550B3 Fennec could not follow suit and it had to remain grounded for 48 hours, awaiting the arrival of an external ground power unit (GPU) from NOIDA. Consequently, fed up with the charade of flight-tests, Bell Helicopters has since decided for good measure not to take part in the subsequent round of competitive flight trials. Reportedly, Bell Helicopters now believes that HAL and Eurocopter are now hand-in-league to divide the MoD’s now inflated order for LOH/LUH helicopters (for all three armed services)—have the cake and eat it as well. Nothing else can explain how HAL can state that it will require a ridiculous timeframe of six years to develop a single-engined 3-tonne variant of the twin-engined 5.5-tonne Dhruv ALH! Thus, the stage is now set for other competitors like OBORONPROM (proposing the Kamov Ka-226) and AgustaWestland (offering the A-119LUH) to smell a rat and refuse to take part in the forthcoming competitive bidding process.--Prasun K. Sengupta

IDAS For Indian T-90 MBTs Selected

2009-03-10T05:19:00.000-07:00

Sweden’s flagship company Saab Group, which also owns Gripen International and late last January opened its representative office in New Delhi, recently won two significant contract awards from the Ministry of Defence, one worth US$24 million for supplying the CIDAS integrated all-digital defensive aids suite for the 16 armed Dhruv ALH helicopters now being built by HAL for the Indian Air Force (IAF), and the other for supplying the LEDS-150 active protection system (APS) for the Indian Army’s T-90S+ and T-90M main battle tanks (MBT). Presently, the DRDO’s Bangalore-based Defence Avionics Research Establishment (DARE) and SaabTech are co-developing the MILDS AN/AAR-60 missile approach warning system (MAWS), which forms only one component of the CIDAS defensive aids suite. The MAWS is of South African origin and was further co-developed by EADS ewation (Germany) and Grintek Ewation (South Africa) after decided to merge by 2001. This was followed by SaabTech taking a stake in Avitronics (part of Grintek). SaabTech now owns both the South African companies (Grintek and Avitronics) as well as the EADS-Grintek joint venture. Therefore, in conclusion, the prime contractor for supplying the CIDAS defensive aids suite is SaabTech. The CIDAS will also find its way on board the HAL-developed Light Combat Helicopter, whose first prototype will be rolled out this March. In addition, the CIDAS will also most likely be on board the to-be-upgraded Ka-28PL, Ka-31 and Sea King Mk42B helicopters of the Indian Navy, and also on the 60 armed Dhruv ALHs that the Indian Army will be procuring for its projected Combat Aviation Brigade, which will also be employed for vertical envelopment operations in support of expeditionary amphibious warfare campaigns. A version of CIDAS also exists for combat aircraft and will in all probability be selected for installation on board the Su-30MKI in the near future, since the Su-30MKIs lack on-board missile approach warning systems and laser warning systems. Another aircraft to be equipped with CIDAS will be the Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft (FGFA) now being co-developed by HAL and Russia’s United Aircraft Corp.

The contract for supplying the LEDS-150 APS suite for installation on board 987 T-90 MBTs has been won against stiff competition, and follows the Army HQ’s issuance of RFPs on April 24 last year. A total of six companies (Israel Military Industries, RAFAEL, BAE Systems, Raytheon, Rosoboronexport, Saab, and Germany’s IBD Deisenroth Engineering) were invited for submitting bids for supplying 1,657 APS suites worth $270 million. APS suites offered were Russia’s Kolomna-based KBM Engineering Design Bureau’s Arena-E, Israel Military Industries’ Iron Fist, RAFAEL Advanced Defence Systems’ Trophy, Raytheon’s Quick Kill, Saab’s LEDS-150 and Deisenroth Engineering’s AMAP-ADS. Eventually, the LEDS-150 was selected and its procurement contract was inked last month. The Land Electronic Defence System (LEDS) combines active signature management, soft-kill and hard-kill mechanisms to provide full spectrum active protection to armoured vehicles. Full hemispherical coverage is provided to detect incoming threats and alert the crew. When installed in full configuration, the LEDS-150 offers MBT-comparable protection to light and medium combat vehicles against engagement by weapons like RPG-7s, anti-tank guided-missiles, KE ammunition, mortars and field artillery shells. The LEDS-150 typically comprises laser warning sensors, ADC-150 active defence controller AD, a number of munition confirmation and tracking sensors, and high-speed directed launchers, which allow the combination of soft- and hard-kill countermeasure deployment capability to the platform, optional displays, and interconnecting harnesses. The hard kill feature of the LEDS-150 is characterised by its capability to physically destroy the efficiency of the terminal ballistic capability of attacking munitions without residual penetration of the protected vehicle. The hard kill system detects and tracks a single or simultaneous threats and calculates if the attacking munition will hit the platform or not. The system determines the best inertial intercept position and provides the slew and firing commands to the launchers. The Mongoose-1 countermeasure missile is launched at a predetermined time to intercept and neutralise the detected munition off-board at a distance of between 5 metres and 15 metres from the vehicle to minimise the collateral damage to own forces.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Too Many Secrets....

2009-03-08T13:20:00.000-07:00

The past week was by all accounts a momentous one, as no less a person than former Pakistani President and former Chief of the Army Staff, Gen (Ret'd) Pervez Musharraf, assertively disclosed what has been a 'no-go' area for India's mainstream media and the otherwise hyper-ventilating broadcast media thus far: that India's Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) has, since 2002, waged a highly successful covert war against Pakistan by actively rendering all kinds of financial assistance to Balochistan-based separatists. But mind you, such covert warfare has not been waged by the Research & Analysis Wing (RAW), but by the tri-services DIA and Afghanistan's Riyast-i-Amniyat-i-Milli, and in addition to his routine assignment as India's Defence Adviser at the Embassy in Kabul, Brigadier Ravi Datt Mehta was officially dolling out huge financial assistance--as ordered by the DIA--to the Baloch separatists as and when required. For the past one year such activities being undertaken by the DIA wer, in fact, openly discussed by both serving and retired senior military officials at both the Armed Forces Gymkhana and the United Services Institution within the National Capital Region. It, therefore, did not come as a great surprise to South Block when Brig Mehta was specifically targetted for assassination by the Pakistan Army's Peshawar-based 324 Military Intelligence Battalion . This in many ways is reminiscent of the era ranging from the mid-1980s and early 1990s during which RAW had succeeded in gaining the trust of what would later morph into the Northern Alliance. In fact, by 1986, despite India's official recognition of the then Soviet-backed Afghan regime led by Dr Najibullah, India had begun extending medical assistance to the guerrilla forces led by the legendary leader Ahmad Shah Massoud and as a consequence of this, one wing of the All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) was completely cordoned off by South Block and it was there that all those Mujahideen wounded in battle while fighting the Soviets under Massoud's leadership received the urgent medical attention that they deserved. So impressed was the Northern Alliance by India's humanitarian assistance that this relationship, at first opportunity, got elevated to a higher level when, in the early 1990s after the breakup of the USSR, the Northern Alliance succeeded in securing Tajikistan's approval for an Indian Army-run field hospital to be established at Farkhor.

Last week also saw BrahMos Aerospace successfully test-firing the Block 2 version of the BrahMos supersonic multi-role cruise missile's land attack variant. But here again, India's mainstream media failed to illustrate what has thus far been a severe shortcoming for both BrahMos Aerospace and the Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO): there are NO available firing ranges in India that can host test-firings of surface-to-surface or air-to-surface battlefield support missiles (like the BrahMos or Prithvi SS-150/SS-250) out to their maximum range envelopes! The firing range at Pokhran where such missiles are routinely test-fired, measures at most 58km and that too after two villages have been temporarily evacuated, even though the DRDO has been pleading with the MoD since the late 1990s for making available a firing range that can support missile firings out to 100km over land.

Yet another revelation for me last week was an update on the launch status of the nuclear-powered Advanced Technology Vehicle (ATV): the new Project Director has, rightly, adopted a cautious attitude towards advancing the launch-date of the hull by conducting a thorough and controlled 'flushing' of the ATV's complex network of steam piping associated with the vessel's BHEL-built heat exchanger, which had previously proved to be quite problematic. In addition, the new-design vertical silo for housing a yet-to-be-available 8,500km-range submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) is now being removed from the ATV's hull as the priority is to--as part of the ATV's multi-phase sea trials schedule--firstly, establish the ATV's hull integrity under operational conditions, and secondly, to establish the functional maturity of the ATV's nuclear propulsion system. Only after these two milestones have been achieved that the weaponisation phase will be put to effect. The Govt of India's Cabinet Committee on National Security last January decided to accord only 'conditional & on principal' approval for constructing two ATV-derived vessels: one being the SSBN and the other being the escorting SSN.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Coming up soon: how the Indian Navy recently saved the Scorpene SSK project from being scuttled by the already-concluded investigations into allegations of corruptions, and how exactly the 'agents' involved with the deal and their principals succeeded in legally covering up their tracks and skirting around the 'Integrity Clause' that was integral to the procurement contract.

Batch 3 Of Project 1135.6 FFGs To Be Ordered

2009-03-05T09:07:00.000-08:00

Contractual negotiations for ordering a third batch of three Project 1135.6 guided-missile frigates (FFG) are expected to be wrapped between India's Ministry of Defence and Rosoboronexport State Corp, with contract signature taking place before the year's end. Each of these three FFGs will have a stretched hull with broadened beamwidth to house the vertically-launched Shtil-1 M-SAM and the eight-cell UVLM for the BrahMos vertically-launched supersonic multi-role cruise missile. The on-board mission sensor suite's components are currently being finalised, but the suite will include some 20 systems of non-Russia origin, including the hull-mounted panoramic sonar and the towed-array sonar, the marine navigational radar, and the Link-2 fleetwide communications system.--Prasun K. Sengupta

CMS, Radars & VLS Modules Of Project 1135.6 FFG & Project 17 FFG

2009-03-04T11:28:00.000-08:00

The top two diagrams illustrate the EMDINA combat management system (CMS) originally co-designed by the Indian Navy's Weapons and Electronic Systems Engineering Establishment (WESEE) and TATA Power as part of project MEDINA. This centralised CMS architecture has been adopted for the Navy's three Project 17 guided-missile frigates (FFG), three Project 15A guided-missile destroyers (DDG), and the four Project 28 ASW guided-missile corvettes. The following two diagrams illustrate the EMCCA Computer Aided Action Information System (CAAIS), also co-developed by WESEE and TATA Power, under Project MECCA and is presently on board the three Project 16 FFGs, three Project 16A FFGs and three Project 15 DDGs. The Fregat-M2EM radar can be found on board all six Project 1135.6 FFGs and the three Project 17 FFGs, while the Fregat MAE-4K radar has been developed by FSUE Salyut for installation on board the aft mast of the Project 1135.6 FFG and Project 17 FFG. However, these have not yet been installed, and the Indian Navy will likely select a L-band radar of either Indian or Israeli origin. The SGPFS vertical launch system for the Club-M is the bottom-most illustration. This VLS is on board both the first three Project 1135.6 FFGs and Project 17 FFGs. For the follow-on three Project 1135.6 FFGs now being built by Russia's Kaliningrad-based Yantar Shipyard the UVLM system will be installed. The UVLM module is built by Larsen & Toubro for the BrahMos supersonic MRCM and it is this module that will also be on board the three upgraded Kashin 2-class DDGs and three Project 15A DDGs.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Project Samyukta Detailed

2009-02-27T07:55:00.000-08:00

Project Samyukta, a joint software/integration-intensive R & D programme of the DRDO, the TATA Group and the Indian Army’s Corps of Signals, reached fruition last April and was recently showcased by Bharat Electronics Ltd during Aero India 2009. The project, launched in May 1994, had called for the development and deployment of an integrated EW system covering the 1.5MHz–40GHz bandwidth. The system comprises both communications (com) and non-communications (non-com) segments and encompasses 145 wheeled vehicles for housing sensors for electronic surveillance, interception, monitoring, analysis and jamming of all communications and radar signals. The core system was successfully demonstrated to the Indian Army by late 2002 by the DRDO’s Defence Electronics Research Laboratory. The Army subsequently placed an order with state-owned Bharat Electronics Ltd for the production of three communications control centre (CC) blocks at a total cost of Rs4.25 billion. Two CC blocks with 46 vehicles were delivered in January 2004 to the Army after successful demonstration and user trials in early 2003. Demonstrations of the non-com core system, comprising a CC, electronic support measures sub-suite, and electronic countermeasures-low and high-frequency entities were successfully conducted in 2005, following which Army HQ ordered the first two non-com CC blocks at a cost of Rs5 billion. Work is now underway on a sub-project of Samyukta, called ‘Samrat’, under which the design and development of indigenous communications EW receivers for search, monitoring, direction-finding (single and multi-channel), analysis and decoding in the HF/VHF and UHF frequency ranges along with associated systems control/applications software development is now being undertaken. Thus far, technologies have been developed for compact low-noise, high-dynamic range HF (0.5-30MHz) and V/UHF (20-3,000MHz) search-cum-monitoring receivers for COMINT suites, as well as for new-generation narrow- band signals classifier, and the demodulator and decoder sub-system.

The com segment’s COMINT/ELINT sensors include those for detecting emissions from pulsed airborne synthetic aperture radars (SAR), from the active radars of air-to-surface precision guided-munitions and from radar altimeters, from airborne early warning & control radars, and from terrain-following radars while they are still 150km away. The three types of active jammers employed include those for wide-band jamming of hostile field artillery radio proximity fuzes over an area of 600,000 square metres, and for simultaneous jamming up to eight hostile X-band airborne radars in azimuth and elevation. SAR radars operating up to 80km away can be jammed, while the X-band monopulse pulse-Doppler airborne radars of combat aircraft can be jammed out to a distance of 50km. The efficient emitting power of the jammer is not less than 580kW. The jammers can be deployed in two patterns: 16 as a battalion, and 6 as a company.

Frequency detection sensitivity is 110-123dB/W, while the frequency measurement accuracy is 1MHz. Bearing accuracy is automatically achieved between 1-3 degrees. The measurement accuracy of temporal pulse parameters 0.05 milli-second at a pulsed length of 0-2-70 milli-seconds. The measurement accuracy of the pulsed repetition period is 0.05 milli-second for a minimal pulse duration of 1 milli-second. Measurement accuracy of the pulse string-repetition period is 0.1 second. The system’s internal database contains frequency libraries of up to 2,000 types of radars. Another type of jammer operates in the 13,333-17,554MHz frequency bandwidthand can process incoming signals like simple-pulse, quasi-continuous wave (CW) and CW, pulsed chirp-modulated, and phase code-shift keyed with pseudo-random frequency-tuning signals. The input sensitivity of a receiver fitted with frequency determination and reproduction sensors is minus 90, while the radiated power is 600 Watt. The frequency-accurate interference signals reproduction is +/-0.5MHz. Spectrum-matching of the reproduced interference signal is fully automated. Jamming signals emitted include MP-1, MP-2, MP-1 + noise, MP-2 + noise, quasi-CW noise, spot jamming in frequency and range deception signals. The system can also jam GPS signals out to a distance of 70km, and multi-frequency autodyne radio proximity fuzes.

The non-com component’s COMINT/ELINT suites can operate autonomously and are also available in man-portable versions with GIS and digital moving map overlays. They can undertake panoramic frequency-band surveillance and produce time-and-frequency analysis in three formats: gain-frequency panorama, time-and-frequency panorama, and frequency-intensity panorama. Frequencies are monitored in the 30-18,000MHz bandwidth, and the direction-finding error is not more than 3 degrees. The suites are thus optimised for providing search, intercept, analysis and monitoring capabilities of hostile communications emissions.--Prasun K. Sengupta

OSAMC For Aircraft Upgrades

2009-02-21T12:45:00.000-08:00

The OSAMC, originally developed by DARE and also known earlier as the core avionics computer, is presently on board the Su-30MKI and upgraded MiG-27Ms and upgraded Jaguar IMs, and will also be an integral part of the DARIN-3 avionics upgrade package for the yet-to-be-upgraded and re-engined Jaguar IS. The IAF's upgraded MiG-29s and Mirage 2000s too will have OSAMC on-board. The OSAMC is also being globally marketed by a joint India-US joint venture.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Honeywell's Re-Engining Offer For IAF Jaguars

2009-02-14T02:42:00.000-08:00

The above-posted brochure is self-explanatory, except for the fact that this re-engining is only one component of the upgrade package for the Jaguar IS/IM, which is being proposed by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL), and which will include the third-generation DARIN-3 navigation-system system and an integrated defensive aids suite, both of which have been designed and integrated by the DRDO's Defence Avionics Research Establishment (DARE), using several avionics LRUs originally developed for the Tejas LCA. The cockpit, shown at the Aero India 2009 expo, will now feature the same HUD as that on the Tejas LCA, along with three large MFD-55 AMLCDs supplied by THALES-Samtel Display Systems, and HOTAS controls, all utilising a MIL-STD-1553B digital databus. It remains to be seen if these upgraded Jaguars (about 120 in all will be upgraded and will be in service till 2022) will also be equipped with the fly-by-wire flight control system, which was tested out by BAE Systems way back in the mid-1980s on the Jaguar. By the way, these upgraded Jaguars are also due to be fitted with multi-mode monopulse radars for which the EL/M-2052, Captor-E and Seaspray 5000e are being proposed.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Super Hornet Flight Evaluation Schedule

2009-02-06T08:48:00.000-08:00

For the uninitiated, the above tableaux give a detailed explanation of the forthcoming flight evaluation process and schedules for the F/A-18F Super Hornet Block 2 that is likely to be conducted by the Indian Air Force (IAF) sometime this August over a two-week period. Close to 30 sorties lasting 45 flight-hours are expected to be flown, with half the sorties expected to be devoted to the evaluation of the Raytheon-built APG-79 AESA radar. Of all the six contenders for the IAF's M-MRCA requirement, the Super Hornet, the Rafale F-3 and the MiG-35 are expected to be subjected to the most stringent flight evaluations as only these three contenders are being offered with AESA radars. Of these three, only two--the Super Hornet (with the APG-79) and the Rafale F-3 (with the THALES-built RBE-2)--are in operational service. The JAS-39IN Gripen NG on offer to the IAF is also expected to be fitted with the ELTA Systems-built EL/M-2052 AESA radar by the time the IAF evaluation team proceeds to Sweden. The Block 70 F-16IN Super Viper from Lockheed Martin is being proposed with the Northrop Grumman-built APG-80 AESA radar that is also on board the F-16C/D Block 60 of the UAE Air Force, but in the absence of any such in-house available aircraft for the IAF's flight evaluations, Lockheed Martin will reconfigure one of its F-16 Block 60 flight simulators into the Block 70 configuration for the IAF flight evaluation team, a process similar to what Boeing IDS had done for the P-8I LRMR/ASW platform's evaluation process.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Eitam CAEWS At Aero India 2009

2009-02-05T15:08:00.000-08:00

Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) is sending its Gulfstream G-550-based conformal airborne early warning and control (CAEW) system to the Aero India 2009 expo in Bengaluru. Developed by IAI's ELTA Systems subsidiary, the CAEWS has to date been ordered by Israel and Singapore, with the first Israeli platform being delivered in February 2008 and the second following in May 2008. Singapore has ordered four such platforms that will be delivered through to 2010. The CAEWS is equipped with the ELTA-built EL/W-2085 system, uses AESA antennae at the nose and tail, with large slab-sided arrays on the fuselage sides. Together, these give 360° airspace coverage without the complication and drag of a rotodome above the fuselage. Each CAEWS carries six operators, and also has ESM antennae under the tail and wingtips, and above the nose, with a SATCOM array atop the vertical tail. Radar, ESM and COMINT data is collected and fused to give a fully correlated and synthetic air situation picture. The aircraft’s structural, aerodynamic and power modifications, including two additional generators and a low-drag liquid cooling system, are all installed on the aircraft by Gulfstream Aerospace prior to delivery to ELTA, and the mission sensors/management suite is then installed in country by IAI’s Bedek Aviation Group. The CAEWS offers an unrefuelled mission endurance of 9 hours when operating at an altitude of 41,000 feet (12,500 metres) and 185km (100nm) from its home base.—Prasun K. Sengupta

Spotlight On The Mi-46 Heavylift Helicopter

2009-01-30T14:04:00.000-08:00

In the competitive bidding process now underway for supplying up to 24 new-generation heavylift helicopters, Russia's Oboronprom JSC has offered the Mi-46 heavylift helicopter. Incidentally, the heavylift helicopter requirement has been broken down into two components, under which any bidder can offer to supply six heavylift helicopters to replace the existing six Mi-26Ts, plus another 16 heavy utility helicopters (for high-altitude aerial logistics) and another four of the same model that will be configured for high-altitude combat search-and-rescue. Boeing IDS is therefore offering the CH-47F Chinook and its HH-47 CSAR version, while AgustaWestland is offering the AW-101 (12 of which will shortly be ordered by the IAF for VIP transportation), and Sikorsky has just come in with the CH-53K. Although, Boeing IDS, Sikorsky and AgustaWestland have pitched their products to meet all three vertical airlift requirements, it is likely that in the end the competing bidders for the heavylift requirement will be restricted to the Mi-46 and CH-53K, while the battle to supply heavylift utility and high-altitude CSAR helicopters will be limited to the CH-47F/HH-47, and AW-101.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Dhruv ALH's Defensive Aids Suite

2009-01-29T21:58:00.000-08:00

The CIDAS defensive aids suite has already selected by the Indian Air Force (IAF) for installation on board its 16 armed Dhruv ALH helicopters on order from HAL, and will also find its way on board the Light Combat Helicopter, whose first prototype will be rolled out this March. In addition, the CIDAS will also most likely be on board the to-be-upgraded Ka-28PL, Ka-31 and Sea King Mk42B helicopters and the initial 16 yet-to-be-selected shipborne ASW/ASV helicopters of the Indian Navy, and also on the 60 armed Dhruv ALHs that the Indian Army will be procuring for its projected Combat Aviation Brigade, which will also be employed for vertical envelopment operations in support of expeditionary amphibious warfare campaigns. A version of CIDAS also exists for combat aircraft and will in all probability be selected for installation on board the Su-30MKI in the near future, since the Su-30MKIs lack on-board missile approach warning systems and laser warning systems. The RMAF Su-30MKMs are already equipped with CIDAS.—Prasun K. Sengupta

India’s ‘Born Again’ T-90M MBT

2009-01-28T10:40:00.000-08:00

By the year’s end, if all goes as per plan, the Indian Army will begin receiving its first T-90M main battle tank (MBT) in completely knocked-down condition from Russia’s Nizhny Tagil-based Uralvagonzavod JSC. It may be recalled that in February 2001, India bought its first batch of 310 T-90S MBTs worth US$795 million, of which 120 were delivered off-the-shelf, 90 in semi-knocked down kits (for licenced-assembly by the Ministry of Defence-owned Heavy Vehicles Factory, or HVF, in Avadi), and 100 in completely-knocked down kits. This was followed by a follow-on contract, worth $800 million, being inked on October 26, 2006, for another 330 T-90M MBTs that were to be built with locally-sourced raw materials. The third contract, worth $1.23 billion, was inked in December 2007 for 347 upgraded T-90Ms, the bulk of which will be licence-assembled by HVF. The T-90M’s final round of user-trials were successfully concluded last year and it has now been cleared for series-production.

The T-90M is a radically upgraded variant of the existing T-90S ‘Bhishma’ MBT, and is 1.5 times more capable than the T-90S. The T-90M features the ‘Kaktus’ embedded explosive reactive armour (ERA) package on its frontal hull and turret-top (the T-90S has ‘Kontakt-5’ ERA), is fitted with an enhanced environmental control system supplied by Israel’s Kinetics Ltd for providing cooled air to the fighting compartment, has additional internal volume for housing the cryogenic cooling systems for new-generation thermal imagers like the THALES-built Catherine-FC thermal imager (operating in the 8-12 micron bandwidth and housed within the Peleng-built 1G-46 gunner’s sight) and the commander’s panoramic sight (which houses the Matis-STD thermal imager that operates in the 3-5 micron bandwidth and which has also been selected for the Arjun Mk1 MBT’s panoramic sight), is fitted with an automatic gearbox, has an electro-hydraulic turret-drive-cum stabilisation system, and most importantly, has a 52-cal 2A46M-5 Rapira smoothbore main gun barrel that also comes fitted with a muzzle reference system. The T-90M’s powerplant will be the Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant-built 1,000hp V-92S2 diesel engine, while a 1kW AB-1-P28 auxiliary power unit will provide back-up electric power when the engine is idling. The gunner’s sight-cum-laser rangefinder will be the 1A43 system, which will also house the Peleng-built 1G46 day sight and the ESSA module containing the Catherine-FC thermal imager and the 9S517 missile guidance module for the Refleks anti-armour/anti-helicopter round. The digital hunter-killer fire-control system will use the 1V528-1 ballistics computer and the DVE-BS meteorological sensor. Bharat Electronics Ltd will supply the T-90M’s digitised battlespace management system and radio communications suite (licence-built models originally designed by Elbit Systems and Tadiran), while Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd will provide the fibre-optic gyro-based autonomous land navigation system.

In future, the HVF is expected to retrofit all 987 T-90 MBTs with active protection systems (APS) for which Army HQ on April 24 last year issued requests for proposals to six companies (Israel Military Industries, RAFAEL, BAE Systems, Raytheon, Rosoboronexport, Saab, and Germany’s IBD Deisenroth Engineering) for procuring 1,657 active protection systems (APS) worth $270 million. Those taking part in the Indian bid were Russia’s Kolomna-based KBM Engineering Design Bureau with its Arena-E APS on offer, IMI of Israel with its Iron Fist suite on offer, RAFAEL’s Trophy APS, Raytheon’s Quick Kill APS, Saab’s LEDS-150 and Deisenroth Engineering’s AMAP-ADS. Eventually, the LEDS-150 was selected and its procurement contract was inked on January 27, 2009. The Land Electronic Defence System (LEDS) combines active signature management, soft-kill and hard-kill mechanisms to provide full spectrum active protection to armoured vehicles. Full hemispherical coverage is provided to detect incoming threats and alert the crew. When installed in full configuration, the LEDS-150 offers MBT-comparable protection to light and medium combat vehicles against engagement by weapons like RPG-7s, anti-tank guided-missiles, KE ammunition, mortars and artillery shells. The LEDS-150 is an active defence system and typically comprises laser warning sensors, ADC-150 active defence controller AD, a number of munition confirmation and tracking sensors, and high-speed directed launchers, which allow the combination of soft- and hard-kill countermeasure deployment capability to the platform, optional displays, and interconnecting harnesses. The hard kill feature of the LEDS-150 product is characterised by its capability to physically destroy the efficiency of the terminal ballistic capability of attacking munitions without residual penetration of the protected vehicle. The hard kill system detects and tracks a single or simultaneous threats and calculates if the attacking munition will hit the platform or not. The system determines the best inertial intercept position and provides the slew and firing commands to the launchers. The Mongoose-1 countermeasure missile is launched at a predetermined time to intercept and neutralise the detected munition off-board at a distance of between 5 metres and 15 metres from the vehicle to minimise the collateral damage to own forces.

Interestingly, the hulls and welded steel turrets of the 330 T-90Ms, along with their Rapira gun barrels, will be fabricated by HVF with locally-sourced raw materials, while an improved version of the indigenous ‘Kanchan’ modular ceramics-based composite laminate armour package will be used for substituting the Russian package, whose technology-transfer has been denied by Russia. The same also goes for the Kaktus ERA tiles and RPZ-86M anti-radar paint coating, which will be totally imported from Russia.

Presently, as things stand, Indian Army HQ is adhering to a modified MBT force structure, whose original version, as proposed in 2006, had called for a fleet of 3,780 MBTs, comprising 1,302 T-90s 2,356 T-72s and 124 Arjun Mk1s. The modified structure now calls for 2,473 higher-end MBTs, including 1,409 T-90s, 248 Arjuns, and 692 T-72M1 Combat Improved Ajeyas. The Army’s gameplan is to have 21 regiments of T-90s and 34 regiments of upgraded T-72M1s and six regiments of Arjuns by 2020.--Prasun K. Sengupta

Has India Acquired ATGMs from China’s NORINCO?

2009-01-19T14:07:00.000-08:00

That could well be the case, if one goes by what was shown at a recently-held 'Know Your Army' exhibition held under the auspices of the Army's Jalandhar-based Cantonment. The top photo, which can be viewed in its original form at http://flickr.com/photos/gopal1035/3197220130/, clearly shows the NORINCO-built HongJian-8L (HJ-8L) anti-tank guided-missile (ATGM), which is also in service with the Pakistan Army as the Baktar Shikan. For comparison purposes, the third photo is the original version (from NORINCO's brochure on the HJ-8L) of the one displayed by the Indian Army poster. NORINCO’s HongJian-8L is a semi-active wire-guided ATGM with a 3.2km-range. The missile (second photo), equipped with a tandem warhead, weighs 11.2kg, while the tripod launcher, incorporating a day sight, laser rangefinder and IR goniometer, weighs 22.5kg. So, what rational explanations can be offered for such a poster being displayed by the Indian Army? Has the Army indeed acquired the HJ-8L? Consequently, was this acquisition 'inadvertently' leaked by the displayed poster? Or is it just a case of an atrocious and unforgivable error by the organisers of the exhibition (aka the Indian Army!) who 'assumed' that the HJ-8L illustration could have easily been used to show non-discerning citizens of India what an ATGM looks like, as opposed to what's really operational with the Indian Army? You be the judge. As the saying goes, the devil always lies in the detail.--Prasun K. Sengupta

BrahMos MRCM Schematics

2009-01-12T08:38:00.000-08:00