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

Kudamkulam Atomic Power Station ( Credits- Wikimedia Commons / Petr Pavlicek/IAEA) Source- Russia & India Report Author- Ria Novosti The Kudankulam nuclear power plant’s second unit is likely to be launched in June, the website of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) has stated. The launch of the second unit of KNPP that is under construction in India, with Russian collaboration, is due in June this year. This is the beginning of a controlled nuclear chain reaction in the VVER-1000 second unit reactor and its transfer to the minimally controlled power unit level (CPU). This power level is sufficient to monitor a self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction. The transfer of the new power unit to the CPU is one of the most important steps in preparation for the unit’s operation. In accordance with the intergovernmental agreement of 1988 and the supplement thereto of 1998, Russia is building the Kudankulam NPP in India. The first unit with a 1000 MW power

Credits-  http://www.losbarcosdeeugenio.com/credit_en.html Source- Russia & India Report Author- Alexander Yemelyanenkov , RIR Another diesel-electric submarine owned by the Indian Navy, the Sindhukesari, will be in the Zvezdochka ship repair centre for repairs in Russia later this summer. It is being awaited at the Severodvinsk centre, where five similar Russian- built submarines of the Indian Navy were earlier sent to undergo repairs and modernization. The India Embassy in Moscow sent a delegation headed by the naval attaché Commodore Tarun Sobti recently for an inspection visit to Severodvinsk, RIR has learnt. The authorized Indian representatives have checked the enterprise’s industrial and consumer sites for readiness to receive the Sindhukesari diesel-electric submarine for repair. During the visit, Sobti examined the ship lifting facilities and main production plants, which will be involved in the repair of the Indian submarine, Eugene Gladyshev, offici

S-400 Triumf ( Credits- Wikimedia Commons / Соколрус) Source- Russia & India Report Author- RT.COM Russia and India are yet to sign a contract for the supply of advanced S-400 air defence systems, a senior Russian official said in response to an Indian claim, which said the deal was already signed. “The contract has not been signed yet,” the head of Russian state-owned technology giant Rostec Sergey Chemezov said. Earlier Rao Inderjit Singh, Minister of State for Defence Production of India, said the deal was already signed. Singh is attending an international security forum in Moscow. Russia's Defence Ministry has not yet commented on the reports. The S-400 is the latest and most advanced of the long-range surface-to-air missiles produced by Russia. The Russian military is the only operator of the system, but China and India are expected to be the first foreign nations to receive it. Media reports in 2015 said that India wants to buy five S-40

SU-35 ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / Author- Aleksandr Markin) Source- Russia & India Report Authors- Nikolay Litovkin , Nadezhda Ustinova , RIR Asian countries, particularly China and India, are Russia’s top partners in the sphere of defence cooperation, officials have repeatedly stated. At the moment, there are contracts in place with a number of countries in the region for the supply of military fighter aircraft, air defence systems, submarines, and other weapons. The Asian continent is the global leader in terms of growth in defence spending today, and a huge market for arms exports has opened up in these countries. “Interest in Asian countries can be explained by the fact that their armed forces are familiar with our weapons, and the Syrian campaign has shown their effectiveness in actual combat. This applies primarily to aircraft, submarines armed with cruise missiles and air defence systems,” said Igor Korotchenko, chief editor of the magazine Nat

Russian Special forces ( Source- Wikimedia Commons / Author-   http://eng.mil.ru/en/index.htm ) Source- Russia & India Report Author- Nikolay Litovkin , RIR How much is Russia spending on defence? The Stockholm International Peace research Institute (SIPRI) said Russia has increased its defence spending by 7.5 percent in 2015, with the Defence Ministry’s budget reaching $66.4 billion, How does this compare with other countries?   According to SIPRI, the world’s biggest military spender, the USA, spent $596 billion on its defence in 2015. Next was China, with $215 billion; and Saudi Arabia, with $87 billion. India spent $51 billion on defence in 2015. What share of GDP does it constitute? Percentage-wise, Russia is among the leaders in terms of the share of GDP spent on defence. The USA’s defence spending makes up 3.3 percent of the country’s GDP. China spends around 1.9 percent, whereas Russia’s amounts to 5.4 percent of GDP. The Russian figure is the wo

IRNSS Coverage area ( Source- Wikimedia Commons / Author- Brilliant Wiki-II) Source- Russia & India Re port Author- Sputnik The decision of China and India to work together on a joint system of satellites would allow the members of BRICS to be more independent and implement more complex engineering projects in space without having to depend on US technology, Russian military expert Vasiliy Kashin told Sputnik in an interview. A few days ago during his visit to India, Wu Yanhua, Deputy Administrator for the Chinese National Space Agency (CNSA), said Chinese and Indian space scientists would begin cooperation in the field of aerospace. This announcement also comes amidst the plan of all BRICS members to have their own satellite system to avoid becoming dependent from US technology and equipment in space. "Any form of technological dependence from the United States is a serious risk, both political and commercial. BRICS nations should use each other'

INS Sindhukirti S-61 on trial at HSL ( Image credits- Hindustan Shipyards Ltd, Government of India) Source- Russia & India Report Author- Tass Russia’s defence shipyard, the Zvezdochka Ship Repair Centre (Severodvinsk), has repaired, refitted and modernized the ‘INS Sindhukirti’, the Indian Navy’s diesel-electric submarine, at the Vishakhapatnam shipyard, a press release stated. The exercise, which took 10 years to complete, was the first time that such a feat has been accomplished successfully. The shipyard’s press release noted that the repairs to the ‘Sindhukirti’ were the first experience of a capital overhaul and modernization of a Russian-built submarine in an Indian shipyard. The works lasted almost 10 years. In the end, the ship was re-equipped with a Club-S modern missile system, becoming a full-fledged multi-purpose submarine, able to strike surface targets from the water. The Indian submarine has also been provided with the latest motion control sys

INS Vikramaditya ( R-33) (Image credits- Indian Navy) Source- Russia & India Report Author- Konstantin Zavrazhin , RIR The Russian Morinformsystem-Agat company has held talks with several Indian instrument-making and defence companies on new projects to jointly develop information systems for the Indian Navy, a company press release said. “Talks were held with the GRSE Shipyard, Goa Shipyard, and Hindustan Shipyard on the possibilities for cooperation in the construction of new ships of Indian design, and integration of the concern’s information systems in these projects. Cooperation in development of joint-projects for manufacturing information systems for the Indian Navy were discussed with the instrument-manufacturing companies Bharat Electronics Limited and Mahindra & Mahindra, as well as defence companies Reliance Defence and the SUN Group,” RIA Novosti quoted the company’s press release as saying. Among areas of cooperation between Morinformsystem-Ag

Sukhoi T-50 ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / Alex Beltyukov) Source- Russia & India Report / Sputnik A supersonic BrahMos cruise missile may be installed on a Fifth-Generation Fighter Aircraft (FGFA) jointly developed by Russia and India, head of the Russian-Indian BrahMos Aerospace enterprise, Sudhir Mishra, said Monday. The FGFA has stealth capabilities and is based on the Russian T-50 prototype jet. The FGFA project came about following the signing of a Russian-Indian cooperation agreement on October 18, 2007. "We are presenting BrahMos to many Indian public and private defense companies, from some of them we get a technical job. We presented it also to developers of the FGFA — they asked to adjust the size of the missile, so it can be placed on board the aircraft. Such work is ongoing," Mishra told RIA Novosti during the exhibition Defexpo India 2016. He also said that four nations are negotiating the purchase of the supersonic BrahMos cruise

INS Chakra ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / Indian Navy) Source- Russia & India Report Author-  Ivan Safronov , Kommersant Russian Defence Minister Sergey Shoigu and Manohar Parrikar, India’s Defence Minister discussed the lease of a second nuclear submarine to India. While discussing military-technical cooperation between the two countries during a telephone conversation on March 23, the two ministers agreed to work out details for the transfer, on a leasing agreement, of a second nuclear-powered submarine (NPS) to the Indian Navy. According to Kommersant, the situation is being complicated by different approaches to this issue. In New Delhi they want to rent the latest multi-purpose project 885 Yasen-class submarine, but the Russian Navy has its own plans for this sub. A compromise being considered is the transfer of a project 971 submarine. Kommersant learned about the phone conversation between the two ministers from an official Defence Ministry press

Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / Author- A Savin Source- Russia & India Report Author- Alexey Lossan , RIR The state-owned ‘Rosneft,’ Russia's largest oil company, has decided to sell nearly half of the largest oil deposit in Eastern Siberia to Indian investors. The company has ceded 49.9% of "Vankorneft" shares to a consortium of Indian public sector oil majors. Of these, the Oil and Natural Gas Commission (ONGC) will get 26% of the shares, while 23.9% will go to Oil India Limited (OIL), Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Bharat Petroleum (BPL). ‘Vankorneft’ owns a deposit with 500 million tons of oil and condensate reserves and 182 billion cubic meters of gas, reports the Rosneft press service. All the necessary documents for the sale of deposits will be signed "in the shortest time possible,” the company press release said. Earlier, Chinese players were considered as potential investors. "India is a partner which is easier to negotia

Sukhoi SU-30 MKI ( Source- Wikimedia Commons / Chanakya  The Great) Source- Russia & India Report Author- Rakesh Krishnan Simha How many fighter squadrons does the Indian Air Force need to fight a war, and more importantly, win it? A senior IAF commander says the current fleet strength of 33 squadrons – approximately 600 aircraft – is not enough to fight a two-front war. The “sanctioned strength” is quoted at 42 squadrons and anything below this will impact national security. Where did this number come from? In the 1950s, the defence brass had recommended 64 fighter squadrons for the IAF. That was revised to 42 in the 1960s. There is nothing magical about this number and only those who fail to recognise that the nature of air combat has changed will cling to it. Back in the 1960s; when the supersonic era was in its infancy; jet fighters were smaller, accident prone, required longer maintenance hours and had low endurance. For instance, it was said about the MiG

Image credits- Indian Navy Source- Russia & India Report Author- Dmitry Sikorsky, Rueconomics.RU India will, over the next decade, face the task of building a modern naval industrial complex, able to implement all the technologies already available to Delhi. Pyotr Topychkanov, Senior Researcher at the Security Centre of the Institute of World Economy and International Relations RAS, believes modernization of the Indian military-industrial complex, in order to develop the country’s naval forces, is long overdue. “The Indian naval doctrine and plans for the development of its Navy are greatly outpacing the current development of the country’s defence establishment. As a result, India is forced to depend on suppliers of foreign technologies and on the direct supply of naval armaments,” said Topychkanov. Modernization of this sector should not only focus on improving the quality and increasing the capacity of the country’s military-industrial complex, but also