Bharat Rakshak

>> While it has been toying with the idea of buying a couple of DSRVs for sometime now

I have heard this for a decade now - at various points US, Canda, norway, UK have been mentioned as vendors. is DSRV covered under some MTCR treaty that its so difficult to purchase off the shelf?

A picture of the Brazilian corvette Barroso which is an improved version of the Inhauma class corvette cruising along with INS Deepak and INS Delhi from the recently concluded IBSAMAR III naval exercise that involved India, Brazil and South Africa.

Clicky

for a economy whose GDP is $ is higher than India, all one can say is Brazil is punching well below its weight.
our CG has better ships than this harbour tug

They don't have the security threats like we do

Brazil operates a CATOBAR carrier.

And yet, when I am using google uncle to help me out with the Brazilian Navy, I type 'Brazilian' and before I can type Navy, all sorts of haraam links come up. Why is that, hain ji?

as the saying goes "even if you are on top, better compete with yourself. or someone else will"

I myself would not entirely agree. Check out this page on the Brazilian Navy's website regards its fleet inventory:

Clicky

Singhaji why does Brazil need such a heavy military, their neighbours are all impoverished except Venezuela. With Columbia what Brazil needs is a more counter insurgency force on the lines of RR to fight the cartel or NSAs(of course this breed only exists on one place on earth but still)

So i guess they can do with what they have as they dont have any ambitions/needs for power projection

*sigh* the australia of the western hemisphere. minerals and food products by the megaton, low pop, zero threats, khan chacha on standby if anything bad happens.

Exactly. Besides that, we have a maritime environment, like the tonnage passing through SLOCs, type of cargo like o&g, issues of piracy, choke points, disputes etc that demand a large navy.

But is the size of the navy really up to the task of meeting the Indian requirements.

Keep in mind brazil has a running program for nuclear SSBN/SSN as well as for an 'indigenous' 4+ gen fighter aircraft
As for missile tech they are almost up there in the top tier in some areas.

To be fair Singha is correct their fleet is bit underwhelming bunch of Type 22s and light frigate from 2 decades ago. Brazil and Argentina had big naval ambitions in late 70s but economic woes and shifting priorities changed all that but Brazil has greatly increased spending in past few years not to the level of IN however.

The type-22 and Niteroi frigates are very poorly armed. Why are they still stuck with MM-38 exocet? For the size of Brazillian coastline 14 frigate/corvette is too small. Since DCNS is helping with new subs they may go with FREMM or Gowind class for future.

so, practice and procedure needs more streamlines.. INS Viraat ops should take serious note on such vulnerabilities and address the corrections.

A similar accident happened with a IN frigate a few years ago and sunk the frigate. Luckily no one was hurt (the frigate had family members of IN personnel on board at that time).

These accidents happen because the Indian Navy has to share ports with commercial shipping. Essentially, it's because the government failed to fund proper naval bases for the IN. A country like India needs at the very least 5 Karwar size naval bases (when fully developed) and a dozen smaller bases.

The IN will get new frigates and destroyers in the coming years, I wouldn't want a USD 1bn IN destroyer to get sunk because of an accident like this. The IN needs to move away from overcrowded commercial ports to proper naval bases. But I don't think they'll get the land or funds for the construction of such bases.

Agree that IN should not share ports withh commercial. We have one such base in Karwar intended for sole IN use. Build for decongesting Mumbai. Even now hardly any capital ships use it as Home port.

In this instance Viraat was in Cochin for repairs which can be handled only by Cochin Shipyard. Also Naval ships would have to visit the other ports periodically. It would not be feasible for having secluded Naval bases in every nook and corner of the company.

In the present scenario it was a lapse on the traffic control. We would need to have stricter traffic controls in the port, channel and sea lane much like air traffic control.

Most naval bases adjoin commercial harbours, there are many reasons for the same.
The basic facilities for maintanence of hull ,machinery ,aux machinery on commercial and naval vessels
could be handled by the same infra structure, ensuring fuller use of the same. Also would u prefer being posted to a big city or a small naval town? most people would prefer the former.

^^
All we need is better port traffic management plus such collision are actually not so rare even in the so called advanced western countries...

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/15/us/na ... coast.html

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-navy-s ... 42532.html

USS Porter suffered following severe damage on the starboard side.. on 12th August, 2012 after colliding with a Japanese Oil Tanker in the strait of Hormuz.



What is most incredible is that repair was done in flat 2 months and the ship joined the fleet back on 12th of October, 2012.

Guys there is this Indian defense magazine which is free online. There was a link posted on BR sometime back. I forget the name. Its not force or Indiastrategic. It had a whole cover article dedicated to the IN a couple of months back. Anyone can think of any names?

Geopolitics?

Thats the one. Thanks a lot

Good Page on LHD Program.

Multi-Role Support Vessel

As part of naval week celebrations, they are allowing access to INS Tabar and INS Betwa from the Tiger gate. I took the tour yesterday and for a BRFite it was a 'Jannat'. I also saw other Talwar class Frigates, Delhi class destroyers, Kilos, HDWs, Fleet replenishment ship, ASWs and loads of missiles boats berthed in vicinity. I really had a good field day!

Today is the last day and timings are from 10 to 5. No cameras allowed

Regards,
Khambat

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Ocea ... nce_System

Cheen has apparently launched a triplet of satellites into orbit for radiolocation of emissions from naval ships.
this might feed into their ASBM plans. while US has the means and the teeth to use shipboard TBMD weapons or lasers to knock out low flying satellites,
the implications for India are more severe in that a DF21c ASBM launched from Yunnan(!) with zero warning could presumably even target our ships in
the bay of bengal if space based cueing and tracking were available(!)

http://minnickarticles.blogspot.in/2010 ... alter.html

On March 5, China launched the Yaogan-IX Naval Ocean Surveillance Satellite (NOSS), a “system intimately related to China’s ASBM program,” Easton said. “Unlike many space­based military satellites, Naval Ocean Surveillance Satellites are of a tactical and not strategic nature. They live and breathe to hunt and kill enemy ships.” Launched from the Jiuquan Space Center in Gansu province, the system — like earlier versions of the U.S. White Cloud NOSS —
consists of three small satellites that orbit in close formation.



A “first-generation” Chinese surveillance satellite, the Yaogan-IX carries millimeter­wave radar to help stay in good orbital formation, infrared sensors to spot ships, and antennae to pick up electronic emissions.



It “has serious implications for U.S. aircraft carriers due to its potential ability to find and track them, and its potential ability to cue land-based anti-ship ballistic missile [ASBM] systems as well as their associated sensors,” Easton said.


China launched two other reconnaissance satellites in this series in December: the Yaogan-VII electro-optical satellite Dec. 9 and the Yaogan-VIII synthetic aperture radar satellite five days later. All will work together to help Chinese ASBMs find their targets.



“The advent of the first Chinese NOSS is a watershed in terms of actual, precise, real-time targeting capability” because it will provide location data that is precise enough to guide an anti-ship ballistic missile, Easton said.



Once this technology matures, he said, the U.S. Navy will “face the unsavory choice of either risking the loss of its carriers to a Chinese first strike or having to take out the space-based eyes of China’s ASBMs with anti-satellite weapons and risk further escalation.” Erickson said a Chinese ASBM would affect U.S. strategy in the region, for even the “likelihood of a capability may have a large deterrent effect.”

Easton said regional air forces also should be concerned by China’s evolving NOSS capability, “for once mature, it could also be used to target mobile air-defense systems with pinpoint accuracy from great distances.” He said the ASBM could affect arms control, the militarization of space and many other issues.



“The ultimate conclusion one begins to come to is that U.S. carriers will very soon no longer be the uncontested juggernaut of the world’s seas,” he said

I suspect much of the Thaad & SM2-IV work against "rogue iranian & north korean IRBMs" is actually testing ways and means both to tackle a tier of ASBMs and ASAT concepts to knock lots of satellites out. while India is sometimes careless and kanjoos, Khan didnt get to the top without being paranoid and willing to spend what it takes to be the big dog.

I think some of the Irs satellites have ocean reconnaissance capability.

Another aircraft carrier - this time the 25-year old Spanish carrier - available.

http://www.larazon.es/noticia/9378-el-p ... -en-ferrol

Doubt we'd do anything about it though even though the domestic shipyards are going to screw up the IAC delivery even further.

Anther person who wants to buy everything available, before you lament why we are not buying, please make the case why we should buy it, how many aircraft, awacs can take off it etc. and why should the navy consider it. Regarding IAC-1, first time we are taking a project of this nature and there will be bound to be delays, but the knowledge gained is vital for us in the long run.

It is too small for the Indian navy to operate, in the absence of a genuine VTOL.

After the Vik fiasco, doubt that the IN would ever look at "cheap" 2nd hand carriers ever again!

^^^

Vik is not the first time in the history of the world where out fitting an old ship has been as expensive as makeing a new ship. With the only a moderate increase in capabilities.

The IJN tried with the 4 Kongo class ships pre WW2, the Italians have dabbled in such action as well. But the results have never been worthwhile.

In just had the misfortune of learning this at its own expense.

even for baby carriers the principe de asturais is bottom of barrel stuff.
good for gunboat diplomacy against mauritania or ivory coast perhaps but little else.

1. If I had said buy the Kitty Hawk + Enterprise + British Carriers + whatever you could make that assertion. How about a Plan B for a hypothetical scenario where we got screwed on both the Vik and IAC-1...oh wait, how about learning from how not having a Plan B allowed the Russkies to screw us over on the Gorky.

2. Availability for today's tasking is as important a criterion as all the fancy Dan capability that a new build would have for future wars (See Robert Gates chopping of heads in the USAF a while back). We can have a boys with toys attitude and turn up our noses at the bottom of the barrel stuff -totally ignoring that the Viraat is a busted boiler away (See Nimitz) from us having no tangible sea control capability. Even the mighty Yanks had no ego problems with buying decommed Harriers from the Brits when the F-35 procurement sh$$ hit the fan.

3. The golden era of big defence spending by India in the last decade is over for at least the next 4-5 years. Watch where critical economic indicators like the current account deficit, IIP, and fiscal deficit are headed if you think that is just random scare-mongering. If opportunistic, cut-price deals are available with financially beleaguered countries like Spain, or the UK, take it.

...and gunboat diplomacy against Maldives, or Somali pirates is pretty much what the tasking is going to be for now. The Chinese are still not ready with the Liaoning for us to sink with the shiny new toys we ordered.

Really?

http://www.military-today.com/navy/principe_de_asturias.htm

The standard aircraft complement is 24, although this can be increased to 37 in times of crisis with the aid of flight-deck parking. The standard aircraft mix is six to 12 AV-8Bs, two SH-60Bs, two to four AB 212 ASW helicopters, and six to 10 SH-3H Sea King helicopters.

RajitO we are moving away from the sea Harriers, 6-12 we can manage with the Viraat, we hardly need this Spanish AC. better to chug along with Viraat until Gorky arrives and later IAC-1. The customisation required, i dont think there is case for this 25 year old Spanish which again need to go for long refit and aircraft customisation for Indian requirements. Better to let this go

Yes, really, the reason being that the F 35, is not yet available in VTOL version to India, the Harrier is nearly at the end of its service life. Virat will serve on till 2018. As a helo carrier. in addition to that, keeping in view, that fact the Vik will enter service by 2014 at the latest and the IAC by 2017, it makes no sense to buy a ship of such a limited utility.
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