navtrek
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Feb 4, 2009
- Messages
- 3,169
- Reaction score
- 3
- Country
- Location
Singapore, Feb. 6: From the café called The Jewel Box on Mount Faber here, the strait that separates this city-state from Indonesia is a vision of maritime congestion.
The fleet of large tankers, freighters, huge containerised cargo vessels, motorised dinghies, crane-bearing barges, flatbed floaters and hovercraft is just one of the signs that this little country is an Asia-Pacific hub.
But they do not tell the story that the island is also an exporter of arms and ammunition, big and small, carbines and cannons. Indeed its ambition is so big that it will be taking on one of the biggest names in the business, Bofors (now BAe Land Systems), near the heights of Kargil this month.
There was a gun emplacement here, on this little bukit Malay for hill when Singapore, like Calcutta, was colonised by the British after being established as a trading post.
Today, a shell fired from here by one of the big guns that Singapore is right now freight-forwarding to India can whistle over the amusement centre at Sentosa, fly over the maritime traffic in the Singapore Straits and explode on one of the Indonesian islands that dot the horizon, sparking a crisis in the Asia-Pacific.
It is a better idea to send the big guns elsewhere, where armies are more used to them, like in Kargil.
The Charlie-130 aircraft that is carrying the iFH 2000 towed howitzer made by Singapore Technologies (ST), a government-held firm, will face-off with the Bae Land Systems (formerly Bofors) FH77B05, the big brother of the Bofors FH77B02 that were the last artillery guns the Indian army bought more than 22 years back.
The Bofors guns firing in Kargil is one of the most enduring images of the 1999 war.
But at Boon Lay Way, in the corporate headquarters of ST Kinetics, the managers are worried about what fate awaits their iFH2000 when it lands in India.
Last June, they paid a quarter-of-a-million dollars to fly their Pegasus ultra-light howitzer to Mumbai for summer trials in the Pokharan desert.
The day the Antonov with the Pegasus landed in Mumbai, the defence ministry named ST Kinetics in a blacklist of seven companies with which all business was frozen.
A month ago, in May, the director-general of the Ordnance Factories Board, Sudipto Ghosh, was arrested in Calcutta. Preliminary investigations by the CBI found that Ghosh had personal bank accounts in Singapore.
Indias battle of the big guns is not only a contest between field howitzers of the 155mm/52cal category. It has now also turned into a contest of reputations between the erstwhile Bofors, whose name had become synonymous with defence scandal, and ST Kinetics, that is now a history-sheeter in the defence ministrys perception.
I must stress that we do not have a contract in India, in fact we are nowhere near a contract, said Patrick Choy, STs chief marketing officer, when asked about the Ghosh connection that the CBI had drawn. Singapore Technologies has tied up with Punj Lloyd.
We have met Ghosh in the past. We have also met the CBI in November and offered to open our books. We have written to the Indian defence ministry, the retired brigadier-general told journalists during a media visit to STs facilities.
In December, the government lifted the ban on trials because the Indian Armys artillery modernisation is now so delayed that commanders admit there is a quiet desperation building up. But the defence ministry has said no contract may be signed.
Like ST Kinetics, Bae Land Systems has also shipped its FH 77B05 to India from Karlskoga in Sweden.
It is with our partners, the Mahindras, said Guy Douglas. And we can tell you that the 05 is being sold in its self-propelled version called the Archer to Sweden and Norway and it is an upgraded version of the FH 77B02 that proved itself with the Indian army in Kargil. (The B02 is a lighter 39 calibre and the BO5, like the iFH 2000 is a 52cal).
But the record of the defence ministry under A.K. Antony, whose image matters more than that of Bofors or STKs, indicates that it will not sign contracts in a rush.
Despite the armys urgency, the defence establishment under a Congress-led government will have to contort itself into impossibilities to sign a deal again with Bofors even in its new avatar.
Likewise, with Antony himself having taken the lead in scrapping business deals with blacklisted companies, STK will need to keep worrying about the quarter-million dollars it is spending yet again to enter into an artillery contest in India.
Patrick Choy of ST said his company was successful in a Latin American country through a three-point formula: We found the right man at the right place, we had the right weapon to sell and we could assure long-term support.
Asked why the same formula would not work in India, he reflected before he replied. As a trend, except for India and China, the world sees a decline in military acquisitions. Expenses are more on operations, he explained.
Also, we are looking at India as a long-term engagement, as a base from where we can export. India is a market that we still dont understand very well so we are taking our time and we have decided to take some risks.
If it sounds like the money is piffling, think again. The Indian Armys order of 400 towed 155mm/52 cal field howitzers will top Rs 70,000 crore. An additional 1,180 of the guns will have to be made in India after technology transfer.
That is not all. Singapores military is so small and its investment in weapons and ammunition so huge that it needs India to keep the factories running. In contrast, Indias military is so huge and its indigenous defence production so poor that New Delhi will have to keep looking at foreign vendors for imports, even from spatially challenged but powerful countries like Israel and Singapore.
The Bofors FH77B05 and the iFH 2000 face-off near Kargil for the high-altitude winter trials from February 27. The summer trials will be held in the Rajasthan desert, probably in June.
The Telegraph - Calcutta (Kolkata) | Frontpage | Guns loaded for battle of reputations
The fleet of large tankers, freighters, huge containerised cargo vessels, motorised dinghies, crane-bearing barges, flatbed floaters and hovercraft is just one of the signs that this little country is an Asia-Pacific hub.
But they do not tell the story that the island is also an exporter of arms and ammunition, big and small, carbines and cannons. Indeed its ambition is so big that it will be taking on one of the biggest names in the business, Bofors (now BAe Land Systems), near the heights of Kargil this month.
There was a gun emplacement here, on this little bukit Malay for hill when Singapore, like Calcutta, was colonised by the British after being established as a trading post.
Today, a shell fired from here by one of the big guns that Singapore is right now freight-forwarding to India can whistle over the amusement centre at Sentosa, fly over the maritime traffic in the Singapore Straits and explode on one of the Indonesian islands that dot the horizon, sparking a crisis in the Asia-Pacific.
It is a better idea to send the big guns elsewhere, where armies are more used to them, like in Kargil.
The Charlie-130 aircraft that is carrying the iFH 2000 towed howitzer made by Singapore Technologies (ST), a government-held firm, will face-off with the Bae Land Systems (formerly Bofors) FH77B05, the big brother of the Bofors FH77B02 that were the last artillery guns the Indian army bought more than 22 years back.
The Bofors guns firing in Kargil is one of the most enduring images of the 1999 war.
But at Boon Lay Way, in the corporate headquarters of ST Kinetics, the managers are worried about what fate awaits their iFH2000 when it lands in India.
Last June, they paid a quarter-of-a-million dollars to fly their Pegasus ultra-light howitzer to Mumbai for summer trials in the Pokharan desert.
The day the Antonov with the Pegasus landed in Mumbai, the defence ministry named ST Kinetics in a blacklist of seven companies with which all business was frozen.
A month ago, in May, the director-general of the Ordnance Factories Board, Sudipto Ghosh, was arrested in Calcutta. Preliminary investigations by the CBI found that Ghosh had personal bank accounts in Singapore.
Indias battle of the big guns is not only a contest between field howitzers of the 155mm/52cal category. It has now also turned into a contest of reputations between the erstwhile Bofors, whose name had become synonymous with defence scandal, and ST Kinetics, that is now a history-sheeter in the defence ministrys perception.
I must stress that we do not have a contract in India, in fact we are nowhere near a contract, said Patrick Choy, STs chief marketing officer, when asked about the Ghosh connection that the CBI had drawn. Singapore Technologies has tied up with Punj Lloyd.
We have met Ghosh in the past. We have also met the CBI in November and offered to open our books. We have written to the Indian defence ministry, the retired brigadier-general told journalists during a media visit to STs facilities.
In December, the government lifted the ban on trials because the Indian Armys artillery modernisation is now so delayed that commanders admit there is a quiet desperation building up. But the defence ministry has said no contract may be signed.
Like ST Kinetics, Bae Land Systems has also shipped its FH 77B05 to India from Karlskoga in Sweden.
It is with our partners, the Mahindras, said Guy Douglas. And we can tell you that the 05 is being sold in its self-propelled version called the Archer to Sweden and Norway and it is an upgraded version of the FH 77B02 that proved itself with the Indian army in Kargil. (The B02 is a lighter 39 calibre and the BO5, like the iFH 2000 is a 52cal).
But the record of the defence ministry under A.K. Antony, whose image matters more than that of Bofors or STKs, indicates that it will not sign contracts in a rush.
Despite the armys urgency, the defence establishment under a Congress-led government will have to contort itself into impossibilities to sign a deal again with Bofors even in its new avatar.
Likewise, with Antony himself having taken the lead in scrapping business deals with blacklisted companies, STK will need to keep worrying about the quarter-million dollars it is spending yet again to enter into an artillery contest in India.
Patrick Choy of ST said his company was successful in a Latin American country through a three-point formula: We found the right man at the right place, we had the right weapon to sell and we could assure long-term support.
Asked why the same formula would not work in India, he reflected before he replied. As a trend, except for India and China, the world sees a decline in military acquisitions. Expenses are more on operations, he explained.
Also, we are looking at India as a long-term engagement, as a base from where we can export. India is a market that we still dont understand very well so we are taking our time and we have decided to take some risks.
If it sounds like the money is piffling, think again. The Indian Armys order of 400 towed 155mm/52 cal field howitzers will top Rs 70,000 crore. An additional 1,180 of the guns will have to be made in India after technology transfer.
That is not all. Singapores military is so small and its investment in weapons and ammunition so huge that it needs India to keep the factories running. In contrast, Indias military is so huge and its indigenous defence production so poor that New Delhi will have to keep looking at foreign vendors for imports, even from spatially challenged but powerful countries like Israel and Singapore.
The Bofors FH77B05 and the iFH 2000 face-off near Kargil for the high-altitude winter trials from February 27. The summer trials will be held in the Rajasthan desert, probably in June.
The Telegraph - Calcutta (Kolkata) | Frontpage | Guns loaded for battle of reputations
