Why does not India possess an indigenous arms industry?

[Chinese-Dragon]

So maybe Tiananmen square incident is an blessing in disguise for the Chinese defense industry? Though huge blow for democracy any time soon.

The SANCTIONS themselves were a blessing in disguise for us.

The incident itself was not.

 

[S-DUCT]

By his tone I guess he means the dude's got lambos and chicks and all the good stuff usually reserved to people not working for the government.

Anyways, India is pretty developed I doubt it would take India as long as China, if for the simple reason China started when China had nothing, India, if starts now, won't be starting from scratch. Also the west may help, though I'm not sure about the best stuff.

But the main reason I see it, btw even if an indigenous industry does exist there are still ways of doing kick backs, India still has access to western stuff even Apache helicopters and F-35s if India wants it. China has no access to these things now or from the looks of it ever.

So maybe Tiananmen square incident is an blessing in disguise for the Chinese defense industry? Though huge blow for democracy any time soon.

Infact China got lots of help during 1980 era from USA(J-10 project),though USA withdrew after Tiananmen square incident.China hired many soviet union scientists after soviet union collapase and its results visible now,Apart of turbofans engines you guys have successufully indenized your defence industry.

IMO,Tiananmen square incident is not a blessing to your defence industry.If this event was not happened then, china would had access to leading west defence industry and had a successfull chinese turbofan engines in your arsenal.

ON topic:Import weapons is a good choice their is no other option.We have gained lot of knowledge through offsets by defence imports.
1)MEMs based sensors, actuators, RF devices, Focal Plane arrays.
2)Nano Technology based sensors & displays.
3)Miniature SAR & ISAR technologies.
4)Fiber Lasers Technology.
5)EM Rail Gun technology.
6)Shared and Conformal Apertures.
7)high efficiency flexible Solar Cells technology.
8)Super Cavitations technology.
9)Molecularly Imprinted Polymers.
10)Technologies for Hypersonic flights (Propulsion, Aerodynamics and Structures).
11)Low Observable technologies.
12)Technologies for generating High Power Lasers.
13)High Strength, High Modulus, Carbon Fibers, Mesophase pitch-based fiber, Carbon Fiber Production Facility.
14)Pulse Power network technologies.
15)THZ technologies.

 

[帅的一匹]

Wish China could envolve into a democratic country in a peaceful way.

 

[Not Sure]

Simple answer... you can not make multi- millions of $s in kickback if you have your own defence industry!

These people are everywhere, in all the nations. In India they hold greater sway and secrecy against the indigenous firms and thus, are more successful.

But there is another important angle to it. Quite like Saudi Arabia (Like all others, but had to point at KSA since it is the prime example), Indian government has often felt forced to engage in such transactions with powerful countries to ensure better relationship.

Such purchases and outgoing of the Forex is less of a choice and more of an imposition on the nation, and we have to engage in it to keep the sovereignty intact.

For example, had the MRCA contract been floated in the early '90's, we would have been forced to buy Mikoyans, or face a steep deterioration in relationship with Russia. No wonder we still keep paying them inflated amounts for the Subs we purchase. But now, with a powerful economy and a higher position in the global arena, India is showing it would rather go for its choices than be subjected to forced purchases.

It is more like paying a legalized "Hafta" to the powerful ones to keep them from siding with opposing forces, and all the poor/weak countries are forced to pay that - be it in the form of weapons purchases, or in the form of any other 'benefits'.

India has come a long way, and is gradually becoming more and more independent with respect to its position in, and relationship with, the rest of the world.

So, as India becomes more and more financially independent and powerful, we are bound to see an escalation in the number of indigenous firms offering quality weapons to the armed forces - within, as well as outside the country.

 

[Dandpatta]

Wanglaokan / Chinese Dragon - others may sneer at Chinese technology compared to the western technology. But bear in mind, not too many decades back, Soviet technology was also sneered at by most NATO members with a total discounting of quality .

I don't know the mean average of posters on PDF but I would say , having grown up in an era that had a cold war, soviet bloc and western bloc, East is Evil, West is cool, Bears are bad, Eagles are best... I can tell you of countless times when Russian military equipment was snubbed or looked down by most western countries.

So to China's credit, Tiananmen or no Tiananmen, sanctions or no sanctions, what really made you guys GO FOR reverse engineering - OR - making any technological breakthroughs was the onus and importance on self reliance. And the fact which no Chinese can deny that from top to bottom, the politburo has instilled a larger sense of nationalism and pride in the Chinese people especially after the takeover of Hong Kong from the Brits.

India is improving in indegenous production.. baby steps for now but slowly, it is learning to walk. Many examples have been cited by my Indian brothers in previous post. The most improving aspect in Indian R&D psyche TODAY is that failure in any project is taken as a learning lesson .

Now.. if only Indian defence labs & R&D institutions had engineers getting better pay, there would be a huge lure of talent. THAT !! IS not going to happen in the foreseeable future.

 

[shuttler]

I read articles about the turnonver rate of the indian drdo is 60% and 40% of india's univeristies are understaffed.

The progress of india's indigenous arms development programs is hampered by many other factors than just bribery and kickbacks despite the west has been providing ample assistance to it.

 

[danger007]

a good thread after long time... no one is trolling....

@topic: we are slow, will catch up gradually ..... today's failure tomorrow success.... hope our dirty politicians change their attitude....

 

[Screambowl]

to be honest
sarkar ki aukaad nahi hai top class engineers and scientists ka kharcha pani uthaney ki. This is one reason why there no major defence industry in the country. Or else Tejas would have been done by now.

 

[Matrixx]

Things in India is always go slow...but steady and certain.....

Our current need will be fulfill by buying weapons....but we are working towards development of indigenous weapons

I sure things will start turn around in next 10 years...

BTW I like most of Chinese fellows valuable input here....Thanks

 

[Dandpatta]

The Chinese posters understand what it takes to go it alone - having their nation face embargoes . Perhaps they empathize (hopefully) with what India is going through in IGD (short for Indegenous Developments)

By the way - just for laughs - not to demean the efforts of our brethren in defence labs

What do you call an Indian indigenous effort? Answer - Indi-genius

Ok.. back to serious discussions

Things in India is always go slow...but steady and certain.....

Our current need will be fulfill by buying weapons....but we are working towards development of indigenous weapons

I sure things will start turn around in next 10 years...

BTW I like most of Chinese fellows valuable input here....Thanks

 

[Speeder 2]

Indigenous arms industry = indigenous high tech industry + indigenous manufacturing.

India has indigenous manufacturing to produce plastic slippers and some 4th hand copies of Chinese cell phones. That’s about it.

To develop high tech, though, one needs 4 things only, of which India has none of them:

i. Baseline population IQ: it’s important coz it decides what IQ will be for the top 1% (given say 4sd above the mean and the same variance), many of whom will become the tech creators of indigenous defence sector. Therefore, high IQ countries such as China and the Europe/former USA consistently has the top 1% with significant higher IQ that India’s top 1% - fact!

ii. Big Money investment. India has (relatively) no money, both absolute amount and per cap amount, thus has much lower investment level. On the contrary, for instance, China’s R&D total amount has been amongst the top tier in the world for many years, with large annual growth rate still.

iii. Education, both general and higher education of the population. Since India’s education level is, optimistically speaking, below average on world standard ( e.g. the last spot amongst 73 participating countries in PISA 2009), how India supposes to make above average technologies, let alone top level?

iv. Traits of people (which also decides the National characteristics) : disciplined, hard-working, persistent, and ambitious people (e.g. East Asians, protestant Europeans) are the best for manufacturing and creating technologies. Indians have one of the highest ambitions which is good, however, they are one of the worst on discipline, hardwork and persistency – creating the classic textbook joke of what are “Day Dreamers”, the internet example of that is “loud mouth cheat-thumping Indians who want to go to Mars yet don’t have basic technologies to produce a simple standard bullet or a qualified rifle”.

Sorry to break it for you, no Modi, Judi or Kidi will make it work without above 4.

 

[born]

TROLL ALERT

 

[ExtraOdinary]

We do have an indigenous defence industry but it's a slow lumbering elephant. Too much bureaucratic red tape. I believe encouraging private enterprises could be a solution. For example, imagine the LCA contract outsourced to Indian versions of Lockheed, Fairchild republic or Boeing (I know presently there are none) and the best design wins. Also private sector is more efficient and gives emphasis on accountability, they dont tolerate any delay in the deadlines

 

[shuttler]

Why India is poor at making its own weapons - Hindustan Times

March 28, 2012

No government agency talks more about indigenisation and self-reliance than the ministry of defence and has a worse record to show for it. India earned a top ranking in the latest international arms transfer report of the Swedish think tank, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, as the world's largest arms importer.

It is a position, says retired Vice-Admiral Premvir Das, India will hold for years to come because its armed forces need to buy $ 40 - 50 billion in capital equipment.

There are two broad reasons why India fails so miserably to become more self-reliant in arms production.

One is a superstructure of inefficiency that is held in place by corruption and inertia. The Tatra truck deal has long been a byword in arms procurement incompetence. Over 25 years, the Indian army bought 7000 trucks from the Czech Republic at roughly double the cost they are sold in their home country. The indigenisation rate was so poor the trucks do not have right-hand drive to this day. General VK Singh's claim he was offered Rs. 140 million to keep India buying Tatras would explain why this absurd state of affairs existed for as long as it did.

India has a reputation in the international arms industry for importing substandard equipment at inflated prices. As the SIPRI report points out, measured over a five-year period, Russia has remained India’s largest weapons supplier. But Russia’s comparative advantage in military sales is partly an ability to give huge kickbacks. The Russian Accounting Chamber, its CAG equivalent, in 2001 noted that the umbrella arms exporting firm, Rosoboroneksport, kept such convoluted finances it could not understand them. Trade experts privately say Indian middlemen in Moscow sales get 10 to 15% of the contract and 5%, curiously, has to be paid to the Russian government.

The second reason is the nexus between the mandarins of the defence ministry and the state-owned arms companies that keeps private Indian firms at arm’s length. As defence ministry officials privately admit, institutions like the Defence Research and Development Organisation and Hindustan Aeronautics prefer to import foreign-made weapons rather than allow the Tatas and Mahindras to get a real share of the contracts. Their fear: the competence of the private sector will marginalise them.

Even the official defence indigenisation figure of 30% being Made in India is a myth says retired Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal of the Combat Land Warfare School. “Ten to 12 percentage points of that is screwdriver usage – importing kits, assembling them and giving the smallest value addition.”

 

[shuttler]

Why Has India Become the World's Top Arms Buyer? - NYTimes.com

March 21, 2012

India has replaced China as the world’s largest arms buyer, accounting for 10 percent of all arms purchases during the past five years, a Swedish research group said.

India purchased some $12.7 billion in arms, 80 percent of that from Russia, during 2007-2011, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). China’s arms purchases during that time were $6.3 billion, 78 percent of which came from Russia.

India has tried, but failed, to create a sizable domestic manufacturing industry for weapons or even basic military goods, while China has increased production of defense supplies. About 75 percent of India’s weapons purchases came from imports during 2007-11, said Laxman Kumar Behra of the Institute of Defense Studies and Analysis, a government-funded research organization.

Some analysts in India attribute the failure to create a domestic defense industry to government involvement. “India’s public sector is very inefficient and the private sector is by and large kept out of arms production,” Mr. Behra said.

“We lack long-term vision,” and a culture of research and development, Mr. Behra said. “The government keeps on forming one committee after the other but there is hardly any implementation” of the committee’s recommendations, he said.

In a recent article in The Economic Times, Uday Bhaskar, a retired commodore and leading strategic analyst, also criticized India’s weapons procurement policy.

“More than 60 years after becoming a republic and 50 years after the debacle with China, the opaque Indian defense production establishment does not produce high quality clothing and personal inventory items like boots, let alone a suitable rifle for a one million army, or tanks and aircraft.”

Russia, the world’s No. 2 weapons supplier in recent years after the United States, sold $7.8 billion in defense supplies in 2011, and $40.8 billion from 2005 to 2011. India bought about one-third of the supplies.

India’s dependence on Russia is a holdover from the Cold War era, when the two were close allies.

South Korea was the second-largest arms importer from 2007 to 2011, with $7 billion in purchases. Pakistan and China followed, each accounting for about 5 percent of the world’s total arms import during the five-year period, SIPRI said.

India’s import of major weapons increased by 38 percent from the 2002-2006 period to the 2007-2011 period. India’s main acquisitions over the past five years were 120 Sukhoi and 16 MiG-29 jet fighter aircraft from Russia and 20 Anglo-French Jaguar fighters.

India recently finalized a deal for 126 multi-role fighter aircraft with French defense contractor Rafael, in a deal worth $10 billion.