rohitvats wrote:There we go again. I thought we had buried this argument. Where's Shankar?
You allude this statement as if Russia is one monolith production firm which does all the resource planning and produces all the harware. It's the invidual factories which do all the work, right. The inability of the shipyard building Vick to deliver on time is unrelated to Sukhoi prouction schedule. Unless you assume that a finite resource is being rationed between different groups. Russia owes up for the delays as it is with Russia and the factory/shipyard in question that we have signed deal with. So the argument is irrelevant.
Right, so tell that to the gentleman making the comment that it is russia as a whole that is to blame and not just the individual shipyard.
There we go again on the cost issue. So basically what you are saying is since the price quoted was dirt cheap in the first place, India should not mind the extra cost, actually ransom amount and pay up.
What i'm saying is that if people look at the overall picture and compare it to the other choices, its not half bad. And russia is not some demon out to eat our babies. lets realize that so long as indigenous products are ignored, and a desire to max out every penny until it screams remains in the Indian psyche, there is simply no match to russia as a supplier. If you want contractual obligations to be written in stone and followed, be ready to fork over some big time dinero. And even then delays and booboos are very possible (look at the M2k-5 deliveries to greece). S**t tends to happen.
And again it was the IN fault.
My point in highlighting the IN's role in the whole fiasco was to provide a more balanced perspective. Considering the overall picture, I personally feel it is immature at best to be blaming any party in this mess. The Russians agree on an absurdly cheap deal (even though it is amply clear to every joe that its not possible), India is very happy; now that the deal is not so absurdly cheap (but still very cost effective), no need to get the knickers in a bunch. such crap will stop only when India achieves complete self sufficiency in this dept. And that won't happen until phoren loving services and bribe loving babus and politicians get their asses whupped.
The russkies are angels with white wings.
never said so, only that they are the only ones willing to haggle with penny wise Indians. They may be no angels, but I doubt they are demons.
And we went for the Vick only because it was available at the erthswhile price. I'm not sure what IN's decision would have been if the price was what we will have to pay.
Be as it may, the future is always unpredictable and I'm sure the IN knows this. Surely, when even internet forum bosses knew that the Gorky would take a lot more than 4 years in 2004, wouldn't the IN experts on the ground know better?
As for the SU-30MKI part, my freind you make it sound as if a big favor has been done to us. Well, the russkies would have sold to anyone with money. and they are doign it. So what's the big deal. As for the price part, thats more a funstion of economics than realpolitiks.
The favors (if any) my friend are mutual. just as russia needed India's help, so did india need russkie help. Remember GOI couldn't afford M2k-5s (which was IAF's original choice). As for "russkies having sold to anyone", they obviously sold india gold std eqpmt (esp in terms of the flankers) while China (despite having tons more $$$) didn't get it. Let us not be forgetting such "little" "favors" as you call them.
Ah!!! the ultimate gem. It's orgasmic in its arguments actually. Teh zist of the argument is, "India better stick to Russian shpere of influence or else they'll squeeze our balls".Some extraordinary example of "freindship" we have here
Right old chap, never did i mention anything about friendship in my post. But the fact remains that the roosies offer a golden goose, India turns it down in favor of promised "land of milk and honey" and you expect them to feel swell about it eh? Please look at how India's other traditional ally, france is taking this type of behavior. If you hadn't heard, they've lodged complaints because of political armtwisting by the U.S. They've almost given up on the MRCA (which btw started out as being their deal) as well. As far as friendship goes (since you brought it up), I'd say that the Russkies have earned a wide berth from peacenik Indians after the amount of help rendered in terms of nuke subs, cryo engines, boycotting TSP etc etc.
Regards,
Cm.
. Rest assured by the time it actually comes the price would have shot upto a minimum of $ 5-6 billion. The gorky for under $ 2 bil is still decent.