Paksanity
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then good for you. for that you need to increase your defense budget. even US chose to continue to use M4 for their infantry soldiers because of the high cost of the H&K. if pakistan can afford that weapon with just 8 billion $ defense budget then it will be a miracle
One can not disagree with you entirely. Truth is no country has unlimited defence budget and new procurements have to be carefully managed to make the best of allocated funds. Replacing main assault rifle of an army of the size of Pakistan involves massive amount of money hence calls for cost mitigation measures. My guess is Pakistan will put in place range of measures to get best weapon with least possible expenditure. Few of them could be
1. Span replacement program over many years, something like 15 years or even more. Allocating a portion of defence budget each year. G-3 isn't that bad and can soldier on with some units for another decade or two till finally relegated to reserve units.
2. Local assembly is almost certain given the number of units needed which could end up well over a million copies. Number of units along with prolonged production will bring the cost down. As production run continues, more and more components will be locally manufactured and hence will keep bringing cost down.
3. Arms companies deal differently with large government contracts compared to individual sales at local gun store. These are huge contracts and can turn around fortune of any company. Competition thus ensues bringing costs down with some deal sweeteners thrown in. If government negotiators are sincere and competent, they can pull off a great deal. Most often than not corruption sends the price through the roof. I sure hope our negotiators do well here.
4. There can always be a possibility of support through soft loans given the size of deal so can't rule that out either. HK made some good business with G-3 from us and Pak made units were of good quality so they don't have to worry about their reputation.
In nutshell, we hope to get a good deal and we are not in hurry. G-3 has got us covered for the time being and while it is an old design it works well. What is the final outcome of all this, well.....your guess is as good as mine.