IN Navy chief sends a warning to Industry

[gf0012-aust]

25/04/2004 at 15:16:59


Date line: NEW DELHI
India's naval chief Madhavendra Singh said Sunday the navy was mulling plans to buy warships from abroad due to a potential shortfall by domestic manufacturers in the next two years.

"If domestic shipyards are not able to give us new ships, we may certainly have to think of getting ships from abroad," Singh told a press conference in the southern port of Cochin, as quoted by the Press Trust of India news agency.

Singh said India's navy would "certainly shrink in another two to three years" if ageing ships were not replaced quickly.

"We do believe we need a navy of around 200 ships. At the moment we have 147... the fleet strength will go down to 127 soon if ships are decommissioned as per their original life span," he said.

Singh added that even while inducting 12 Dornier aircraft for short-range patrolling activities the Indian navy was "still on the look out for good long-range" surveillance aircraft.

This month Russia handed over to India the Tabar frigate, the third ship Moscow has built for New Delhi's navy under a one billion-dollar contract signed in 1997. Moscow handed over the two other ships under the contact in

In January, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov announced in New Delhi that Moscow -- after about a decade of negotiations -- would sell to India the 44,570-tonne Admiral Gorshkov aircraft carrier along with 28 MiG-29K maritime fighter jets for some 1.5 billion dollars.

French defence group Thales and naval shipbuilder Direction des Constructions Navales (DCN) have also completed negotiations with New Delhi on the building of six Scorpene submarines in India but are awaiting final approval for the two billion-euro (2.37 billion-dollar) deal.

Until now Indian submarines have been made with help from Russia and Germany.

India announced a 250-billion-rupee (5.5-billion-dollar) fund to speed up arms procurements in an interim budget ahead of general elections which are being conducted through May 10.

© 2004 AFP

(OSINT advice, unsure of link as none provided)

 

[Roger Smith]

It seems India is going to be a Naval power in the Asian region.

 

[adsH]

It seems India is going to be a Naval power in the Asian region.

yEah it seams like that but they would need a couple of decades to become a powerful effective blue water navy. buying assets is a small part towards becoming a naval power you need surveillance, Integration, networks and above all stratgic planners, training and extreme discipline (which indian Navy has) but its a long process and will take some time. Team work !! and above all state of the art Extreame research like the British and The US navy we have research devisions that can't be rivaled by any one in the world (partly because we recruit and train our scientist and engineers to there max) all the above is important to becomeing and staying a powerfull navy this is what i think!!

 

[Soldier]

It seems India is going to be a Naval power in the Asian region.

yEah it seams like that but they would need a couple of decades to become a powerful effective blue water navy. buying assets is a small part towards becoming a naval power you need surveillance, Integration, networks and above all stratgic planners, training and extreme discipline (which indian Navy has) but its a long process and will take some time. Team work !! and above all state of the art Extreame research like the British and The US navy we have research devisions that can't be rivaled by any one in the world (partly because we recruit and train our scientist and engineers to there max) all the above is important to becomeing and staying a powerfull navy this is what i think!!

CAN'T BE RIVALED?
Everything can be rivaled. The process may take time but there is nothing which can not be bettered. Technology never stays the same ADSH. The return of the cream Indians which were abroad may do wonders back in India. The only thing is that our stupid politician knows how to use them and how to reward them.

 

[gf0012-aust]

I don't see China as having a lot of projection potential anyway. India has considerable advantage in that she engages in dissimilar combat training with Russia, recently the US, UK and France. China has had 1 week trawling around with a French bridal party (eg ships doing goodwill visits)

India also has the advantage of a strong officer cadre that has been tested. China doesn't. Their last little venture against Vietnam a few years ago was an embarassing defeat couched in the terms of a situational and strategic withdrawal after making a political point. The reality was that the Viets bloodied their nose and surprised them. Must have been like Deja Vu as the last time they tried to belt the Viets a few hundred years ago they were belted as well.

Having new vessels, new toys and new weapons means absolutely nothing until doctrine is tested in "real time"

I'd be betting that The Spratleys are Chinas little version of Spain in 1936 - testing time before the main event against Taiwan.

 

[mysterious]

Your example of the Vietnamese bloodying Chinese nose(s) doesnt make much of a point gf, cuz the way I see it, if the Viets could bloody American nose(s), Chinese werent half as advanced as the US back then.

 

[gf0012-aust]

Your example of the Vietnamese bloodying Chinese nose(s) doesnt make much of a point gf, cuz the way I see it, if the Viets could bloody American nose(s), Chinese werent half as advanced as the US back then.

20 years ago?? Are you stuck in a temporal flux? China went into Vietnam in the late 70's overconfident of their ability - militarily they were far more stronger than the Viets and they were fighting them on their terms.

You need to study the Vietnam War before making such comments. The US lost due to rules of engagement - not due to tactical inefficiency - they won every battle they went in to.

I can give you a history lesson if you like rather than have you misunderstand the complexity of why vietnam was lost. Military prowesss had nothing to do with it.

 

[mysterious]

You misunderstood me I think. I said, if the Americans couldn't defeat the Vietnamese (due to whatever reasons), how can you expect China to defeat them (you yourself acknowledge that American advanced tech. didnt help them so if China wasnt anywhere even halfway as advanced than the US, how could they beat the Viets?)?? If the US with all its experience and advancement couldnt do much harm to Vietz, I'm not surprised about the Chinese not being able to do so either. On the battlefield, a loss is a loss, a defeat is a defeat, etc. Reasons and excuses come afterwards. :smokingc:

 

[gf0012-aust]

You misunderstood me I think. I said, if the Americans couldn't defeat the Vietnamese (due to whatever reasons), how can you expect China to defeat them (you yourself acknowledge that American advanced tech. didnt help them so if China wasnt anywhere even halfway as advanced than the US, how could they beat the Viets?)?? If the US with all its experience and advancement couldnt do much harm to Vietz, I'm not surprised about the Chinese not being able to do so either. On the battlefield, a loss is a loss, a defeat is a defeat, etc. Reasons and excuses come afterwards. :smokingc:

Not at all, your inference was that the US lost the war even though they were technologically superior, hence China would lose if it was less sophisticated in capability.

That conveniently ignores the fact that China deliberately waged war on Vietnam using Korean War tactics as it believed that it could defeat the Vietnamese without a technological advantage - it was more of an issue that they saw the Viets as inferior, not only tactically, but racially - you need to look at the history of both countries before proceeding further. There is a continuing simmering disagreement with both countries - and no doubt this will happen again - especially if China makes an arbitrary seizure of The Spratleys.

A loss is a loss, but drawing an association or disassociation due to technology differences belies the actual logic for Chinas invasion.

They clearly thought that they could not lose due to not having the same political impediments that fractured a cohesive american response. To quote an oft used expression "they thought it was a walk in the park"

The Chinese lost due to arrogance and over confidence. The US lost due to a lack of political will and intent. - They never lost any force on force contacts, and in real terms had absolutely crippled the NV militarily in Tet of 1968.

 

[mysterious]

Perhaps. My knowledge is not as much as yours gf but you say the US never lost force on force contacts, then can you explain why thousands of US soldiers got killed at the hands of Viets and the average age of a US soldier in Vietnam was just 17 yrs and why the soldiers were scared shitless before setting their foot on Vietnamese soil?? :help

 

[gf0012-aust]

Perhaps. My knowledge is not as much as yours gf but you say the US never lost force on force contacts, then can you explain why thousands of US soldiers got killed at the hands of Viets and the average age of a US soldier in Vietnam was just 17 yrs and why the soldiers were scared shitless before setting their foot on Vietnamese soil?? :help

The issues you talk about aren't connected to the final outcome of battle. The NVA was never ever able to field an army of strength after Tet in 1968, the US absolutely decimated them.

The only major battle that the NVA and Viet Minh won was against the French. That is the lesson of Vietnam, is that the army can absolutely, tactically win the war, but if it does not have supporting political will and intent, if the rules of engagement work against the military - then with the best capability in the world you stand the risk of losing.

It was the singular most important lesson that Schwarzkopff walked away with as a junior officer in Vietnam, it was also why he was so committed to winning without political interference.

 

[mysterious]

So you're trying to imply that the Vietnamese were no good in battle and weren't effective against US troops?

 

[gf0012-aust]

So you're trying to imply that the Vietnamese were no good in battle and weren't effective against US troops?

Not at all, individually some were extremely competent. Giap is considered to be one of the most successful generals of the 20th Century - irrespective of that, the NV and VM didn't win any battles when the US entered the war.

The war was won at a political level. Look at any military historian, military analyst be they american, russian, chinese, french etc... Any war college will show that the vietnam war was lost politically - not militarily.

The urban myth about the nth vietnamese winning battles is an absolute nonsense - and it helped shape the way that some countries deal with warfighting now.

As a war it was lost by a failure to comprehend the power and seduction of instantaneous viewing, the failure of the political process to comprehend how that warfighting needed to be absolutely supported at the political level - otherwise it was "lost"

The north vietnamese were far from being lousy soldiers - but tactically they never won anything.

It's a matter of understanding the paradigm shift that occurred in the 60's-70's. To try and compartmentalise the "loss" of the vietnam war to warfighting only is specious and ignores the reality of the sea change that was happening.

 

[mysterious]

Ahan, I'll take your word for this issue then. :smokingc:

 

[ipfreak]

Your example of the Vietnamese bloodying Chinese nose(s) doesnt make much of a point gf, cuz the way I see it, if the Viets could bloody American nose(s), Chinese werent half as advanced as the US back then.

20 years ago?? Are you stuck in a temporal flux? China went into Vietnam in the late 70's overconfident of their ability - militarily they were far more stronger than the Viets and they were fighting them on their terms.

You need to study the Vietnam War before making such comments. The US lost due to rules of engagement - not due to tactical inefficiency - they won every battle they went in to.

I can give you a history lesson if you like rather than have you misunderstand the complexity of why vietnam was lost. Military prowesss had nothing to do with it.

i happen to disagree on that. vietname war can't be won!!! without chinese and soviets behind them, vietcons would be long gone. vietnamese got all of its infatary weapons, military logistics, even uniforms, food from china. they got heavy weaponary such as mig-19, mig-21, SA-2, SA-3 from soviets. unless US attack chinese (soviet would be too far) directly, then it would be another korean war alike. nobody wanted that.

the war in 1979 didn't go well, chinese did get noses blooded. from some pictures and stories told by those soldiers fought there, vietnamese were well trained, well armed (better than chinese army). china came right out off its demastic chaos back then. its military was no in shape to fight any war. i guess they were over-confident ..

then came with another hard fought boader conflit along the boarder line between china and vietname in 1980s. it lasted 10 years. this time chinese were better prepared and vietnamese got beat up pretty bad. interesting part of that conflict was its rule of engagement. no airforce involved (avoid to scale up the conflict into a larger war?). both sides fought battles along the boader, never really got into another side...

 

[ipfreak]

So you're trying to imply that the Vietnamese were no good in battle and weren't effective against US troops?

Not at all, individually some were extremely competent. Giap is considered to be one of the most successful generals of the 20th Century - irrespective of that, the NV and VM didn't win any battles when the US entered the war.

The war was won at a political level. Look at any military historian, military analyst be they american, russian, chinese, french etc... Any war college will show that the vietnam war was lost politically - not militarily.

The urban myth about the nth vietnamese winning battles is an absolute nonsense - and it helped shape the way that some countries deal with warfighting now.

As a war it was lost by a failure to comprehend the power and seduction of instantaneous viewing, the failure of the political process to comprehend how that warfighting needed to be absolutely supported at the political level - otherwise it was "lost"

The north vietnamese were far from being lousy soldiers - but tactically they never won anything.

It's a matter of understanding the paradigm shift that occurred in the 60's-70's. To try and compartmentalise the "loss" of the vietnam war to warfighting only is specious and ignores the reality of the sea change that was happening.

of couse, vietnam war was a part of cold war era. americans got into vietnam because of cold war; sovites got involved it because of cold war. chinese became a part of it because of geopolitics. the tacit agreement between china and Us back then was us would not cross over 17th line (like korea 38th line), then chinese would be off vietnam war. the only winner was vietnamese who unified the country on their own term.

 

[gf0012-aust]

then came with another hard fought boader conflit along the boarder line between china and vietname in 1980s. it lasted 10 years. this time chinese were better prepared and vietnamese got beat up pretty bad.

nope, the vietnamese smacked the chinese about in that little fracas as well. the chinese were encouraged to undertake what's euphemistically called a "strategic withdrawal"

eg, pull out before we incur politically unacceptable larger losses. the chinese have been held to account both times by a much smaller and committed adversary.

China started to undertake it's own change in military affairs immediately after the first gulf war - in fact there were some documents running around the net at one stage about how they compared the US strategy in Kuwait and GW2 compared to their stuff ups against the Viets.

As has been said in various ways:

very poor leadership
1950's and a 1962 sino-indian battle strategy which was 30 years out of date
poor eqiuipment
over confidence
lack of cohesive tactical strategy
a failure to comprehend the value of combined arms (which gets back to their maoist/stalinist battle strategies)
assuming that sheer mass would overwhelm a smaller enemy

if you look at any chinese battle doctrine after 1991, they always refer to the US as an example of how to wage war, Kuwait and Iraq style operations are embedded into their future planning.

 

[ipfreak]

nope, the vietnamese smacked the chinese about in that little fracas as well. the chinese were encouraged to undertake what's euphemistically called a "strategic withdrawal"

eg, pull out before we incur politically unacceptable larger losses. the chinese have been held to account both times by a much smaller and committed adversary.

well, if you story was true, then why chinese still hold those strategic hights alone the boarder?

i visited china two years ago and met a guy who used to fight there (in 1986?). he told me that vietnamese tried to recapture those hights quite a few times and all failed. chinese used vitenamese as real war game practices. troops from different military regions were well trained in the hinterland of china and took turn to fight there (called "real war exercises"). all of leaders above platoons were graduates from military schools. fighting soldiers served ther for aound 6 month, then new troops from different military regions replace them.

i don't think both sides view each other as blood foes as you think. both sides are the same race, almost idetical culture (souther china). remember, before the french time, vietnamese uses the same chinese characters as their writen language. even a lot of vietnamese speak the same dialect as thsoe southen chinese. one problem for chinese soldiers in that war was that it was almost impossible to tell who was vietnamese agents and who was a local chinese. that guy told me, he stationed in a fox hole around 20 meters away from a vietnamese outpost. thet sometimes yelled at each other, or made fun of each other since both sides spoke the same dialect. no body shot at each other unless other side across the "line". one of vietnamese soldiers did came across the "line" and asked for cigarattes when the chinese new year coming (both sides have the same lunar new year tradition); then the chinese soldiers just gave him a coupel of packs cigarette and even a couple of cans of ham (he said they were sick and tired of eating ham since they wanted fresh cooked food). that guy fought therre for almost 8 months and lost a toe on his right feet.

of couse pla would look up to US military as its bar for modernization. who else would be? we have the best trained and bets equiped military in the world.

 

[gf0012-aust]

well, all I can do is accept what you say is true, I'm not going to challenge it as obviously I have a different view of the overall outcome.

But China and Vietnam (in it's pre vietnam named days) have had a very long and fractious history. IIRC the prev major conflict was 700 years ago.

Old habits die hard sometimes. When you talk about dialect similarities, then you start to explain some of the "deconflicted" contacts you talk about. It's a very good example of why the Chinese bought northern troops into Tianeman Sq rather than use locals - they knew that the Mongolian troops hated the central chinese, and of ordered to shoot would have been less likely to refuse.

As a theory, I'd argue that if the troops on the border were northerners, then the "amiable" side of contact would not have happened.

IN WW1 Australians, New Zealanders held a truce with the enemy so that they could exchange christmas greetings, cigarettes and drinks, then they went back to shooting each other the next day.

War can be strange like that. It doesn't reflect the entire situation though.

 

[ipfreak]

well, all I can do is accept what you say is true, I'm not going to challenge it as obviously I have a different view of the overall outcome.

well, i guess that you wish that chinese had been beaten up by vietnamese. nothing wrong with that, given the odds between indians and chinese ..

But China and Vietnam (in it's pre vietnam named days) have had a very long and fractious history. IIRC the prev major conflict was 700 years ago.

true. some vietnamese think that they are more authentic "chinese" than those chinese in china. supprised, well i did. but when you look at history, look at the roots of vietnamese. there is sone kidna truth in it. just like american indians could say they are more authetic american than i am ...

Old habits die hard sometimes. When you talk about dialect similarities, then you start to explain some of the "deconflicted" contacts you talk about. It's a very good example of why the Chinese bought northern troops into Tianeman Sq rather than use locals - they knew that the Mongolian troops hated the central chinese, and of ordered to shoot would have been less likely to refuse.

can't comment on that since i don't know the details of that.

As a theory, I'd argue that if the troops on the border were northerners, then the "amiable" side of contact would not have happened.

well. the talk between me and that guy interlaced in english and chinese. but i am sure he spoke chinese with strong southen accent. but as i stated before, those battles were a part of "live war game exercises" for PLA. troops were selected from different military regions. i read some chiese web sites this morning and i think he told me the truth

IN WW1 Australians, New Zealanders held a truce with the enemy so that they could exchange christmas greetings, cigarettes and drinks, then they went back to shooting each other the next day.

i think it happened between brits and germans during wwi.