Austin wrote:From what I know the TOT for gun has been given by the Russian and yes initially the Russian were reluctant on Gun TOT but that has been settled , they have not provided composite armour technology and DRDO has developed equivalent technology for armour and they would be using that hence forth for T-90 production , that is the latest information I have on T-90 TOT goes , its not about the payment or any thing like that it about both party agreement on what can be transferred and what cannot be. Russians were acting funny but MOD prevailed as far as Gun Barallel technology goes.
Austin, thats exactly the problem - how do you know it has been settled? From the press reports saying, it has been settled because the Russians have agreed to give it to us etc. Right? An Indian MOD official went to Moscow and this was raised and then they said this. But was it? That statement has as much veracity, as the statements made in good faith from the Indian side that the Russians would transfer us TOT for the T-90, which never happened!! Instead, now you have the HVF person openly stating they have been looking at Indian gun barrels instead!
You seem to have a lot of faith in the Indian MOD and it prevailing. With some 70% of IA equipment of Indian origin - thanks to the phenomenal short term idiocy of taking everything at friendship prices and neglecting own industry (which the Russians were VERY happy with, per several accounts of people from that period), India's negotiating power is weak!
What I can make out from Ajai many write up is he is a man of strong opinion and he sticks his neck out and he him self agrees to that that his opinion on T-90,JSF and many other would remain the same , nothing bad in that some people are driven by their own strong conviction.
Well MOD does not respond to many queries from jurnos nothing abnormal about it , its a pain to get written response from MOD , hence Jurnos prefer their own sources which have their own pitfalls.
The point is his opinions do have a basis in fact. And nowhere has he said that he will stick to his opinion if he was proven wrong with facts and evidence. That he is willing to critique the T-90, despite being a strong supporter of the T-72 just shows the same. What you are not apparently willing to concede, is the fact that the T-90 deal, all said and done, is something Russia has taken us to the cleaners over. Their actions were unethical and unprofessional.
Ajai can make that out from the evidence, so can we, and its high time India said "enough" - as versus just going on and on taking whatever cr*ap Russia dishes out. The Navy Chief also lost his cool - on Gorshkov.
This sort of behaviour from Russia is just going on without end. How many excuses can we in India make for their behaviour.
I am happy the SA-6 regiments in CADA will be replaced by the Akash, and hopefully other non Russian SAMs, while the Spyders replace the OSA-AKMs. The less the proportion of Russian gear in our Army, the better. That will allow us to treat these people as just vendors or partners but not force us to treat them as "the vendors" or "the partners", who cannot be refused.
Tell me, if Russia regards as more than a customer, why the RD-33s for the JF-17? Is this how a partner behaves? Almost the entire Chinese SAM network is Russian both import, and technology transfer.
For one successful Brahmos and one successful MKI, we have had armtwisting over Talwars (which we didnt back down on), the inexcusable refusal to share design data on MiGs (for which our pilots lose their lives and they blame us for the bad press), the Gorshkov, the T-90s, the Smerch, the Krasnapol...
Any and every attempt to reason with these chaps, and they try to armtwist us over something else. Just inexcusable. Its not as if we have not given enough to Russia in return. We paid huge amounts to compensate for our outstanding loans and buy everything in hard currency now.
All we ask in return is they stick to their agreements and give us what we paid for. If they were to do that, then India would gladly continue to work with Russia.
