Manoj Ambat's Blog dealing with Defence, Foreign Affairs, Strategic Affairs and Politics

Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / Indian navy) Source- Russia & India Report Russian ships will arrive at Visakhapatnam port on the southeast coast of India in the state of Andhra Pradesh on December 6 to take part in the Indra joint naval maneuvers, a source close to the Indian Ministry of Defense told TASS on Tuesday. "The exercise will be held from December 7 to 12 this year; the welcoming ceremony for the detachment of the Russian Navy ships is planned for December 6," he said. According to him, taking part in the drills from the Russian side will be a missile cruiser, a destroyer, a large sea tanker, a tugboat and two naval helicopters, and from the Indian side - a multipurpose frigate, a destroyer, an anti-submarine plane, a Coast Guard plane, two training planes and a helicopter. "The maneuvers will focus on drilling antisubmarine defense of ships, gun practice on surface and air targets. Also, it is planned to conduct anti-terrorist ope

Image credits- Wikimedia Commons Source- The Diplomat Author- Kabir Taneja Over the past six months, Russia has made its presence felt in the global realpolitik scene with gusto. With the Kremlin militarily intervening in Syria, reportedly bombing ISIS and in effect protecting Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Damascus, while juggling a yet unresolved Ukraine crisis and dealing with Western sanctions… Moscow has its hands full. Most aspects of India-Russia bilateral ties are quite institutionalized, and work in an automated manner irrespective of who is in power in New Delhi or Moscow. Russia could perhaps be seen as India’s only definitive “strategic” partner in its truest form, and this unique relationship has developed over decades. However, over the past year the Moscow-Delhi dynamic seems to have lost some of its previous momentum. This may now be about to change, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi preparing to make his first visit to Moscow early next month. Ru

BMP3 of The Russian Army ( Image source- Wikimedia Commons / Author- Vovan) Source- Russia & India Report / Itar Tass Russia and India are considering co-development of a new generation infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) at an Indian enterprise, Albert Bakov, first vice president and co-owner of the Tractor Plants Concern, told TASS on Wednesday. "There are plans of joint production of a new combat vehicle implying development and manufacture at their plant of a Russo-Indian infantry fighting vehicle. This is quite realistic, but no final decision on this has been made so far," Bakov said. "Our countries already have experience of joint work, for instance, the fifth generation fighter project," Bakov added. He said that there are a few more options of cooperating with India. "The Indians would like to launch the production of some vehicles in their country. At issue is the modernization of equipment in service with their armed forces as w

Sukhoi SU-35 ( Image source- Wikimedia Commons / Author- Aleksandr Medvedev) Source- The National Interest Author- Dave Majumdar Russia seems to be eager to antagonize both friend and foe alike these days. In a move that seems to be completely inexplicable, Russia is apparently negotiating to sell Pakistan advanced Sukhoi Su-35 Flanker-E fighters along with Mi-35 Hind-E attack helicopters. Perhaps more amazingly, the Russians don’t seem to grasp that their Indian allies are likely to react extremely negatively at the prospect of such a deal. “I do not think that the contracts under discussion will cause jealousy on the part of any of the two sides,” Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov told state-owned Russian media outlet Sputnik on Sept. 9. Despite the fact that the two South Asian nations share linguistic, cultural, geographic and economic links—and are part of the same civilization—they have fought three full-scale wars over the past several deca

INS Tarkash (F-50) ( Source- Flickr/ Credits- Noah Snowdon) Source- Russia & India Report Author- Petr Topychkanov If we compare the three areas where there is military-technical cooperation between Russia and India; for the Army, the Air Force, and Naval requirements; the Navy’s is distinguished from the first two by its strategic character. It is quite clear that the cooperation began to take on this character during the Cold War years. As early as the 1970s, India initiated a project to build strategic nuclear submarines. It was divided into three parts: reactor development, body design, and building nuclear warheads to place on submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM) fitted on nuclear submarines. Russia offers India a super submarine The official launch of the Indian project to build nuclear submarines, also known as Advanced Technology Vessels (ATVs), however, happened only in 2009, when the dry dock in which the submarine had been built was fi

Image credits- Kremlin Official image gallery Source- The Diplomat Author- Jayant Singh As strategic relations go, few countries can match the enduring partnership that India and Russia have shared since the 1960s. For close to half a century Russia has been New Delhi’s foremost military supplier. In fact, defense trade became the raison d’être for strategic relations between the two nations – particularly in the post-Cold War era. Yet Russia’s share of military sales to India is now in steady decline. In consonance with India’s enhanced geopolitical status and strategic rapprochement with the U.S., New Delhi has found new partners in the West. And what was once the defining aspect of the bilateral relationship with Russia is threatening to become a heavy burden for both partners. This shift has been a decade in the making and can be traced back to the 123 Agreement that India signed with the U.S. The pursuit of a “strategic partnership” with India is perhaps the most

Image credits- Wikimedia Commons/ Vlsergey Source- The National interest Author- Zachary Keck Russia may help India build nuclear submarines and stealth warships, according to Indian media reports. Last week India’s Economic Times reported that the Indian conglomerate Reliance Infrastructure—which owns stakes in numerous Indian defense companies—is seeking Russian assistance for programs to locally produce nuclear submarines and other stealth warships. According to the report, top Reliance executives were in Moscow last week to meet with Russian defense officials about finding a partner for a joint venture between a Russian defense company and Pipavav Defence & Offshore Engineering, India’s largest defense shipyard, which Reliance has an 18 percent stake in. Specifically, Reliance is looking for a Russian partner with the “requisite technology expertise for manufacturing warships in India.” As the Economic Times points out, the meetings come on the heels o

SU T-50 ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons/ Author- Alex Beltukov) Source- The Diplomat Author- Franz-Stefan Gady India and Russia agreed in early 2007 to jointly develop a fifth generation fighter program. Ever since then, the Sukhol/HAL Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft (FGFA) or as it is called in India, the Perspective Multi-role Fighter (PMF) project, has been plagued by delays, costs overrun, and unsteady technology  In 2014, a prototype of the plane even caught fire during a demonstration flight for technical evaluation, causing heated arguments between India and Russia. “What added to the controversy … was Russia’s refusal to share any details of this failure, to the extent that a technical evaluation team of the Indian Air Force that reportedly was present at the site was refused access to inspect the damaged platform,” Monika Chansoria, senior fellow at the Centre for Land Warfare Studies think tank in New Delhi, was quoted as saying in a Defense News articl

Image credits- Flickr/ Scroll Editorial  © Source- The Russia & India Report Author- Boris Volkhonsky In all likelihood, it will only be possible to accurately evaluate the results of the meeting between Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Narendra Modi only after some time, when the plans that have been announced start being implemented. But it is already possible to say that the summit’s results really do open up fundamentally new perspectives for cooperation. And it is not just about 20 documents that were signed. This is perhaps for the first time in recent years that the documents encompassed such a wide range of issues that they should eliminate some of the imbalances that have characterised our cooperation in the recent past. India, Russia sign 16 agreements at bilateral summit It is no secret that bilateral relations between Russia and India, as in the past between the Soviet Union and India, have always been characterised by the highest degree of unders

Image credits- Wikipedia Commons/ Igor Dvurekov Source- The Russia & India Report Author-  Petr Topychkanov The visit to Pakistan by a large delegation from the Russian Ministry of Defence, led by Sergey Shoygu last month once again showed a particular weakness in Russia-India relations, and in particular, government and public relations. There are at least two reasons that should make the Russian authorities pay careful attention to government and public relations. The first reason is the complicated relationship between India and Pakistan. In the context of this relationship any news about the development of Russian-Pakistan relations can be negatively interpreted in India. The second reason is the existence in political, business and media circles of Indian groups largely focused on countries other than Russia. For this group the above mentioned weakness in Russia-India relations is a gift which they will use to criticise Russia and promote the interests of oth