It's highly likely, training is a major factor. For instance, most state police forces don't even know how to hold a weapon...let alone firing it in an active-shooter situation. During 26/11, Marcos reached the spot but couldn't encounter the terrorists except for evacuating a few hostages in empty floors where there was no hostile presence. Even the NSG took 3 days to eliminate em. During the Pathankot attack, despite Garuds presence in the IAF base, NSG had to be flown in from Manesar and it literally took us 4 days to eliminate 6 attackers followed by a 5 day clean up op. Our strategy has always been to wear down the enemy and make em run outta ammunition prior to an all-out assault. On that note, even Pakistanis have eliminated way quicker during such attacks like the Peshawar school massacre where SSG eliminated all 6 attackers within a day
IAF has also claimed to have shot down higher number of aircrafts during simulation and joint exercises with the west but that's simply not true and is for domestic consumption while our audience go gaga over it. If you see videos of our joint exercises, even our SF rappelling down from the choppers is sloppier than some regular western units
In regards to the emergency landing of AH-64, it's more likely to be training over a malfunction since Apaches have a pretty good reliability record and these are spanking new. Coupled with shoddy maintenance, I wouldn't be surprised if we see crashes of western equipment
After 26/11
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Hopefully IAF and IA resolve there differences and all the Helicopter fleet of IAF gets absorbed into Army Aviation.
Maybe 40-50 Dhruv and 40-50 LUH for SAR/Medical Evacuation/VIP Transport/Utility roles. But that's it. Rest Mi17 fleet, Attack Helicopters and Chinooks should be transferred to Army.
Maybe 40-50 Dhruv and 40-50 LUH for SAR/Medical Evacuation/VIP Transport/Utility roles. But that's it. Rest Mi17 fleet, Attack Helicopters and Chinooks should be transferred to Army.
Army has asked for one more LUH high altitude trial, which will be carried out this year. IAF already cleared LUH certification.
Price negotiation has been concluded for LCH. The initial order of 15 helicopters will be concluded by the year-end.
Price negotiation has been concluded for LCH. The initial order of 15 helicopters will be concluded by the year-end.
4 years to conclude price negotiations with a DPSU wherein the IOC was obtained in 2017 itself & the DAC cleared the acquisition in 2016!! It's a miracle considering we signed the contract for the Apaches & received deliveries faster. I think MoD is improving otherwise this contract could easily have been signed 4 years later.
True. And by then the forces would have rejected the equipment asking for upgrades as the tech would have been of age.
The typical story of India.
Stall successful projects - allow tech to become dated - force Armed Forces to reject due to dating of tech and issuance of fresh SQR - blame forces for changing SQR 'midway' post facto - emergency - procure at 3x 4x costs - get cuts for purchases - make DPSUs lead integrators for foreign purchase - blame forces for delays when tech was locally available - rinse and repeat.
That Aviator Anil Chopra guy is serial liar, for few RT and likes he claim any thing, was caught few days back sharing old pics of coffins when 20 soldiers died, have done it regularly in past too.
Both IAF and IA stalled the order citing full testing of the helicopters. The govt had cleared and HAL had already built the production facilities and even started production in 2017. The forces didn't want the IOC configuration which happened in 2017 and waited for HAL to complete flight testing to FOC standards.
So this is completely on the forces. It's unfortunate that the forces stalled the production of the 15 LRIPs. These could have gone on to improve the production standards of the aircraft and also some changes could have been incorporated based on pilot input. Now these will have to be carried out on the FOC models instead.
I suspect the IA and IAF deliberately stalled the LCH in order to remove any potential hurdles for the Apache. I find it interesting that LCH accomplished its enire gamut of FOC testing (Feb 28) a week after the govt cleared the army's Apache deal (Feb 20).
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