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

Orbital Sciences Corporation Antares launcher Source- The National Interest Author- Paul R. Pillar Private enterprise that is engaged in transportation to space and the upper atmosphere had two catastrophic failures within the last week: the explosion seconds after liftoff of an Antares rocket launched by Orbital Sciences Corporation under a NASA contract to ferry supplies to the international space station; and the crash, killing one of the test pilots, of a rocket plane that Virgin Galactic hopes to use to give passengers rides through the mesosphere. Accidents can happen to anyone, but the incidents point to some issues regarding the relative roles and performance of the public and private sectors and how those roles are commonly viewed. Two issues in particular. One concerns how a well-founded appreciation for the working of free markets has too often been translated into a crude and unfounded, and ideologically driven, belief that the private sector is inherentl

INS Chakra ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons/ Author- Indian Navy Source- The National Interest Author- Iskander Rehman The United States’ strategic reorientation towards the Indo-Pacific has been accompanied by a heightened interest in matters maritime. In contrast to the primary theaters of the Cold War, the region’s strategic and economic geography is strongly defined by its wide oceans, narrow choke points and contested waterways. As a result, the naval profiles of Asia’s two great rising powers, India and China, have attracted a hitherto unprecedented level of attention. Meanwhile, the very nature of maritime competition appears to be undergoing a radical transformation. The proliferation of precision-guided weaponry has resulted in the erection of increasingly formidable land-based reconnaissance-strike complexes, structured around dense constellations of anti-access and area denial (A2/AD) complexes. The growing ability of coastal states to both locate and pro

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Image source- Internet Source- The Telegraph Author- Julian Ryall North Korea has launched a domestically built submarine that is designed to fire ballistic missiles, raising new concerns about the growing threat posed by Pyongyang's missile and nuclear programmes. Military sources in South Korea say the vessel is based on a Golf II-class Soviet submarine that the North acquired in 1993, ostensibly for scrapping. The 3,500-ton Golf II was equipped with submarine-launched ballistic missiles that could carry a 2,600 lb warhead more than 880 miles. And although the Soviet-era vessel is obsolete and the Russian Navy insisted it could never return to service, North Korea is believed to have spent the last 20 years examining and replicating its missile launch system, which included the launch tubes and stabilisation equipment, according to analysts at the US-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University. The institute recently identified a new test stand at

Image credits- Wikimedia Commons/ Author- United States Army Source- The National Interest Author- Micheal Peck Which Asian armies are the best in the region? Even if you get past the nationalist chest thumping, it's difficult to choose. What does having the "best" army mean for a hegemonic regional power like China, versus an island-nation like Japan, versus warring states on the mainland like the two Koreas? Does “best” mean the army that is most proficient or lavishly equipped? Or is it the one that most fits the needs of its country? But that's what makes Asia so fascinating. It has a variety of capable armies, but capable in different ways. Here are the top five in East and Southwest Asia: China: Some say the Chinese military is a paper tiger, rendered toothless by corruption and sloth. But even a tiger made of paper can crush you if it weighs 800 pounds. With an estimated active-duty ground force of 1.6 million and 9,000 tanks, the P

Indian Navy Fleet ( Image credits- Indian Navy)  Source/ Copy Right- The Hindu Author- Y. Mallikarjun India is looking to export indigenously developed hull-mounted sonars and negotiations are at an advanced stage with the navies of three to four friendly nations. SONAR (an acronym for Sound Navigation and Ranging) is used to detect underwater targets. Like radar, used to detect long-range aerial and other targets, sonars have applications in underwater surveillance, communication and marine navigation. Three units of these sonars have been exported to Myanmar. Officials from Bharat Electronics Limited and the Naval Physical and Oceanographic Laboratory visited the neighbouring country and installed them a fortnight ago. BEL produced the sonars while the Kochi-based NPOL, a naval lab of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), designed and developed them. BEL had signed the Rs.150-crore contract for the three sonars with Myanmar in January 2013. D

Image credits- Flickr/ Narendra Modi  Source- The Diplomat Author- Jordan Olmstead The seven-decade rivalry between India and Pakistan is often portrayed as intractable – with good reason. The countries were birthed out of a bloody partition that encouraged each to define itself in opposition to the other, and they have fought four wars since. Even during peacetime, tensions are high. This year, though, encouraging overtures by newly elected prime ministers Nawaz Sharif and Narendra Modi led some observers to cautiously hope that the two countries would step up cooperation on trade, energy, humanitarian, and environmental issues. Unfortunately, other actors, most notably the Pakistani defense establishment and its terrorist proxies, are derailing the process. There are two reasons. First, they see further cooperation and integration between India and Pakistan as putting off negotiations to settle the Kashmir issue. Second, from a broader perspective, closer relati

Vietnamese scud ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons/ Author- Hohum) Source- The Business Standard Author- Jeremy Bender Vietnam is becoming a proxy against China in any future possible confrontation in the South China Sea or South Asia as a whole. On Oct. 28 India announced that it would sell naval vessels to Vietnam in exchange for an energy-exploration deal. These vessels would arrive at a time of rising tension between Vietnam and China over contested island chains in the South China Sea. Massive protests broke out across Vietnam in May and over the summer, as citizens torched Chinese businesses after China moved an oil rig into disputed territory west of the Paracel Islands in the South China Sea. Both Vietnam and China lay claim to the islands, and the nations have frequently clashed over them. India's decision to back Vietnam comes during the country's own border disputes with China. China and India fought a border war in 1962 that has led to the fr

Image credits- Flickr/ MEA Official Source- First Post Author- Rajeev Srinivasan Events in the recent past have made it clear that the Narendra Modi government is serious about India’s military and geopolitical ambitions. It is a truism that a blue-water navy that can project power over long distances is a necessity for any major power, especially one with global ambitions. Equally, it is clear that any power worth its salt has to deter other powers from doing things that would hurt its geopolitically. In this context, Vietnam becomes significant for India for several reasons. It is clear that India’s most important enemy is China, which has embarked on a ‘string-of-pearls’ strategy to surround and contain India in a “South-Asia” ghetto of sorts (incidentally, the Chinese have been the most enthusiastic propagators of that meaningless term in an attempt to dilute India’s fairly good and historical brand, while they aggressively push the ‘Greater China’ brand, notably

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