PN sources say that the scorpene deal signed by the IN prohibits sale of scorpene to the PN!
Ouch.
Jliu
well, what do you think? do you think the deal will eventually go through? I still hope that Pakistan gets the Marlin, though.
You can easily talk with the french to secretly integrate deadly weapons like cruise missiles or transfer critical technology, but with the germans, I'm sure you'd get a "threat of arms race in the sub-continent (although this only applies to Pakistan and never India)" or "cruise missiles falling into the hands of terrorists".
The French have never missed an opportunity to make a quick buck but even then they won't spin out on a tangent and transfer cruise missile related components or top of the line technology for obvious political reasons.
Even if pakistan doesn't get the U214, I still think it'll be better to get the Marlin or even the Song class submarines. I remember hearing from a senior who used to work for lockheed, that the french were secretly transfering technology to china. I trust his info, he even said he had a chinese friend involved in the project who could confirm that.
The entire sensor, propulsion fit and acoustic dampeners found on the
Agosta90B via Pakistan (ever wondered why the PN made a unique order for a nine bladed propeller?) until the Indians and Japanese started applying no small amount of pressure-not that the French would have transferred anything beyond that point. You simply don't give your best gear away for any price even if you are out to make a quick buck like the French. As for the same nine bladed Song, I don't exactly see why the PN would procure a boat whose performance is similar to that of the 90B which played a large part in its development. The PLAN utilises an evolutionary approach to SSK design so the current Yuan class can best be represented as a marriage of a 636 Kilo and the Agosta90B-somewhat inferior to the 90Bs in both the critical areas of noise management and with an appalling sensor fit which is puzzling given the available commercial gear.
Besides, we can still cooperate with Turkey even if we do get a different sub. the turks are going for a more "indigenous" drive in naval technology, although I think they may be overdoing and underestimating it a bit. AFAIK, the turks plan to use only the hull design for the U214 with germans working in turkey, which means that we could possibly get a lot of help on our own designs for the future. a three-way technology outlet, turkey-china-france.
Domestic Assembly is a step up from Kit Assembly although I don't see the joy that seems to stem from the Turks selecting the U214. The Turks are full of bluster (some say crap) when they talk about exporting or cooperation with third parties on a U214 derivative simply because it is not the buyer who decides which of the 14,000 subcomponents and 28 critical systems of a conventional AIP submarine may be exported to a third party-it is the vendor and the vendor as you all know is HDW and the German government. Frankly with DCNS it would have been so much easier as the French would easily have found a way for either the Scorpene or Marlin design to "migrate" to Pakistan if Turkey did the selling.
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