Yes,the babus in MOD must be scratching their heads right now.What lack of foresight.WE were offered Backfires by Brezhnev!
Incidentally,in the Ru weapons td.,there's news of new advanced MBU rounds been developed for anti-sub/decoy/anti-torpedo purposes.These can in the future replace exg. round that we have on our ships which have ASW MBU systems.The rounds can descend to 1000m deeper than any sub can dive.
Nirbhay,as reported failures due to recycled material used for the wings! I did comment about the poor quality of the missile when first revealed,esp. when compared with BMos. BMos is a separate corp. entity,JV with Russia,while Nirbhay is a DRDO project.Therein lies the difference.
Laugh at the Kuz,its tugs,etc.but it did the biz in Syria,something that the entire might of the US couldn't do at all!The Russians ,using tough,reliable,easy to operate eqpt. from Sov. days including Bears,Backfires,Blackjacks,Kilos,SU_25s,etc.,used old and new weaponry like Kalibir missiles,to turn the tide Assad's way,plus shrug off the attempts of the so-called "Syrian rebels",Western/Arab mercenaries to poach on Syrian interests.
Reg. 29K problems,an excpt. from a report .I've said before since Russia is acquiring a few doz. of them for the RuN,we should (if the problems are not rectified) return them to be rep[laced by new perfected ones. There must be guarantees in the contract for any such defects. Whatever aircraft the IN acquire,should be used both aboard our carriers as well as from naval air stations in the A&N theatre for example. Russia,China have considerable numbers of frontline strike aircraft which operate from land bases as well as LRMP types.
"The engine-design defects should be rectified with the utmost urgency at the Russians' cost," Prakash said. "Any respectable company, conscious of its reputation, would attend to this. But the oligarchs who control the Russian military-industrial complex are too brazen, for two reasons: (a) they know that India has not choice and (b) they are confident that Indian politicians will never turn the screw on them."
However, retired Indian Navy commodore and independent defense analyst, Sujeet Samaddar, gave no credence to the CAG report.
"I firmly believe auditors have no experience or professional ability to comment on technical matters of a modern state — just putting numbers and percentages."
A Ministry of Defence official would not comment in detail on the CAG report, but said: "MiG-29K will remain the primary combat fighter for the Indian Navy."