Indian Navy Developments & Discussions

[shade2]

Perhaps with friendly Pentagon walas we can juke any embargoes of spare parts with the current fleet of Free & Democratic IAF Transport aircraft, ASW Aircraft used by Navy and engines used by all three forces since these aren't directly involved in hooman raites violations of Pakis or Cheenis in the future.

As for the question of bombs, torpedoes and missiles, those are consumables, once sent to us, they can't stop us from using them right?
Right?

 

[shade2]

Turns out we wanted the Predators after all, per this chronology provided by Couptaji's website

India-US deal for Sea & Sky Guardians, negotiated since 2015, comes to fruition. How India got there

On Monday, India signed a contract for procurement of 31 MQ-9B Remotely Piloted Aircraft with US & American firm General Atomics after nearly decade of negotiations full of twists & turns.

theprint.in

India had requested the US for 31 MQ-9B Sky Guardian aircraft, 161 Embedded Global Positioning and Inertial Navigation systems, 170 AGM-114R Hellfire missiles, 16 M36E9 Hellfire Captive Air Training Missiles (CATM), 310 GBU-39B/B Laser Small Diameter Bombs (LSDB), and 8 GBU-39B/B LSDB Guided Test Vehicles (GTVs) with live fuzes besides other items for the HALE drones besides logistics support.

The Indian Navy will get 15 MQ9B drones in maritime and anti-submarine warfare kits, while the Army and the IAF will get 8 each of its land version.

 

[Ayan Barat]

So I've been doing some reading on the paths to be taken by future of larger warship development l, in light of the fact that noone's sure.

Personally it's feeling like Aircraft Carrier will not retain their sole dominance for long in this drone & missile swarm era against battle-cruiser, as fighter jets themselves are becoming mere range extension taxis for stand-off weapons!
Cruiser projects like CG-21 & CG(X) of US Navy failing spectacularly, with even Zumwalt class destroyer/cruiser concept practically discarded & there being no replacement of the Ticonderoga class in sight. The 122 VLS ships were repeatedly proposed for mothballing to cut costs (we could vie for getting some, no AAD vessel in our near future will match their anti-swarm capabilities).

"Aircraft Cruiser" concepts like UXV are being re-evaluated.

Op-Ed: Is it Time for the U.S. Navy to Build the Drone Carrier Warship? - Naval News

As the Pentagon and Congress grapple on determining what to build to meet the “500-ship U.S. Navy goal,” a couple of years-old ideas and artist renderings may lead to a more flexible future for the U.S. Navy’s global operations. BAE Systems' UXV and Naval Group’s “Ocean Avenger” are Potential...

www.navalnews.com

They now think they could start building a new cruiser-sized ship in the 2030s based on, guess what, hull of the amphibious ships.


Soviets once made a half-assed attempt towards helicopter cruisers, but now I'm thinking that maybe had merit. A large warships of 15k-25k tonnes range in very limited numbers like Zumwalt, that double as long-range missile ships as well a drone motherships.
View attachment 10977
A single such ship operating fixed-wing drone with EW mimicking fighter jets, stealthy ones doing CAP with IRST & IR-guide BVRs, rotary ones for anti-sub work etc... plus BMD & LR-AAD missiles, some AShBM, Aero-ballistic glide vehicles, ASM both stealthy & supersonic would take out the whole PN alone.

Opinions? @Blood+ @Binayak95

So apparently I found your dream ship

CGH-67 concept from late 80s

A fast, lightweight catamaran design with twin 127mm guns, torpedoe tubes, whopping 128 VLS cells and flight deck capable of simultaneous operation of three full sized helicopters; all topped up with Aegis Combat System.

 

[Blademaster]

Like I said, de link the State Dept from Pentagon.

The state dept is classist, uses left wokism as a cover to control the narrative and is more or less hostile to an assertive India.

And secondly, we did kill the fucker XD

Sorry you can’t delist state from defense. Doesn’t work that way. After all US doesn’t see us that way either.

And no we didn’t kill that fucker. Why? Because GoI says so. Unless GoI says something otherwise on its own, we had nothing to do with it and that’s the message that should be repeated over and over. Plausible deniability.

 

[Binayak95]

So apparently I found your dream ship

CGH-67 concept from late 80s
View attachment 12445
A fast, lightweight catamaran design with twin 127mm guns, torpedoe tubes, whopping 128 VLS cells and flight deck capable of simultaneous operation of three full sized helicopters; all topped up with Aegis Combat System.

Oh look its the Kuznetsov as she originally was.

Such a dumb idea.

 

[SwordOfDarkness]

G

So apparently I found your dream ship

CGH-67 concept from late 80s
View attachment 12445
A fast, lightweight catamaran design with twin 127mm guns, torpedoe tubes, whopping 128 VLS cells and flight deck capable of simultaneous operation of three full sized helicopters; all topped up with Aegis Combat System.

Generally when trying to do everything at once, product turns out to be medioce at everything with heavy dowsides.

 

[Ayan Barat]

Oh look its the Kuznetsov as she originally was.

Such a dumb idea.

Original Kuznetsov?
Ayye...isn't Kuznetsov this smoke screen ship which protects the remaining Russian fleet?

I'm pretty sure you're talking about "original" Kiev Class, which was later converted to Vikramaditya.

CGH-67 was supposed to be a tiny 16,000t ship which would be nowhere near Kiev Class. The whole idea was to have a heavily (Ticonderoga level) armed, fast, catamaran type ship with improved aviation capabilities. Hanger for 3x helicopters, deck to operate 3x more and capable of operation helicopters as big as Chinooks.

Was the idea dumb?
I mean there might be some reason why we don't have anything other than these concept drawing.

But Laughing Bulldog's idea, something tailored for 2024 was not that bad.
Similar ship, but lighter given the improvement in material and technology. Hanger capable of 10 or so aircrafts. 5 or 6 F-35 type fixed wing fighters, just enough to provide CAP to this one ship or do an Anti-CBG strike. 2-3 Helicopters. And a ton a UAVs for different role ranging from Anti-Piracy operations to ASuW to naval strike.

"The most capable ship for a navy that doesn't want to have 10 Carrier Strike Groups and is absolutely not interested in delivering democracy to some remote corner of the world"

 

[Ayan Barat]

G

Generally when trying to do everything at once, product turns out to be medioce at everything with heavy dowsides.

Yup; yesterday only I was talking about the whole XM-29 program.

But here it idea is not to do everything at once. You're trying to do most of the things of a dedicated Carrier Battle Group but not the most important; have an "expeditionary" air-force of some 100 aircraft, which can take on a whole country's conventional air-force.

Compared to a CBG, the aviation capabilities here is hardly a fraction.

 

[Binayak95]

Original Kuznetsov?
Ayye...isn't Kuznetsov this smoke screen ship which protects the remaining Russian fleet?
View attachment 12465
I'm pretty sure you're talking about "original" Kiev Class, which was later converted to Vikramaditya.
View attachment 12466
CGH-67 was supposed to be a tiny 16,000t ship which would be nowhere near Kiev Class. The whole idea was to have a heavily (Ticonderoga level) armed, fast, catamaran type ship with improved aviation capabilities. Hanger for 3x helicopters, deck to operate 3x more and capable of operation helicopters as big as Chinooks.

Was the idea dumb?
I mean there might be some reason why we don't have anything other than these concept drawing.

But Laughing Bulldog's idea, something tailored for 2024 was not that bad.
Similar ship, but lighter given the improvement in material and technology. Hanger capable of 10 or so aircrafts. 5 or 6 F-35 type fixed wing fighters, just enough to provide CAP to this one ship or do an Anti-CBG strike. 2-3 Helicopters. And a ton a UAVs for different role ranging from Anti-Piracy operations to ASuW to naval strike.

"The most capable ship for a navy that doesn't want to have 10 Carrier Strike Groups and is absolutely not interested in delivering democracy to some remote corner of the world"

Yeah my bad, i meant the Kievs, the Baku as she was then.

Why i say dumb is because VTOL imposes lots of restrictions operationally on the aircraft. You are sacrificing range and payload for that ability.

Catapults are the best - but expensive. STOBAR is I feel the most I am willing to compromise in terms of usable payload and range

 

[Bleh]

Generally when trying to do everything at once, product turns out to be medioce at everything with heavy dowsides.

Isn't that basically all Indian warships other than anti-submarine ships?

Original Kuznetsov?
Ayye...isn't Kuznetsov this smoke screen ship which protects the remaining Russian fleet?
View attachment 12465
I'm pretty sure you're talking about "original" Kiev Class, which was later converted to Vikramaditya.
View attachment 12466
CGH-67 was supposed to be a tiny 16,000t ship which would be nowhere near Kiev Class. The whole idea was to have a heavily (Ticonderoga level) armed, fast, catamaran type ship with improved aviation capabilities. Hanger for 3x helicopters, deck to operate 3x more and capable of operation helicopters as big as Chinooks.

Was the idea dumb?
I mean there might be some reason why we don't have anything other than these concept drawing.

But Laughing Bulldog's idea, something tailored for 2024 was not that bad.
Similar ship, but lighter given the improvement in material and technology. Hanger capable of 10 or so aircrafts. 5 or 6 F-35 type fixed wing fighters, just enough to provide CAP to this one ship or do an Anti-CBG strike. 2-3 Helicopters. And a ton a UAVs for different role ranging from Anti-Piracy operations to ASuW to naval strike.

"The most capable ship for a navy that doesn't want to have 10 Carrier Strike Groups and is absolutely not interested in delivering democracy to some remote corner of the world"

Kiev was an Aircraft Carrier with missile strike capability for some reason.


Here's our girl, the original Moskva Class.

She was not a good ship, with a lot of seafairing issues due to the immature experimental design. My original thought was aligned on the concept of a cruiser for tomorrow where missile swarm capability & counter-ability are necessary. She'd need atleast 4 helos to leave the anti-sub work to, not for performing as a Light Helicopter Dock.

That where drones came in... as decoys, EW or scouting platforms, extending to long-range suicide drones or BVRAAM carrying-launching platforms. A big ship could accommodate such.

 

[125mm_Smoothbore]

Isn't that basically all Indian warships other than anti-submarine ships?



Kiev was an Aircraft Carrier with missile strike capability for some reason.


Here's our girl, the original Moskva Class.

She was not a good ship, with a lot of seafairing issues due to the immature experimental design. My original thought was aligned on the concept of a cruiser for tomorrow where missile swarm capability & counter-ability are necessary. She'd need atleast 4 helos to leave the anti-sub work to, not for performing as a Light Helicopter Dock.

That where drones came in... as decoys, EW or scouting platforms, extending to long-range suicide drones or BVRAAM carrying-launching platforms. A big ship could accommodate such.

No

Regarding kiev class i feel they are a very good concept but they wouldnt have that big an effect in a real naval combat situation

 

[Ayan Barat]

Why i say dumb is because VTOL imposes lots of restrictions operationally on the aircraft. You are sacrificing range and payload for that ability.

Again, the whole prerequisite of this is that you're completely forgoing the long range expeditionary air-force capabilities and focusing on 10 or 15 "self sufficient ships" instead of 4 CBGs if you're tight on budget.

VTOLs have lower MTOW, they suffer from shorter range...you're right on all the points. But..
• four F-35Bs with 8x Meteor and 32x CUDA (all internally for least RCS) can provide a considerable CAP capability

• four F-35Bs with 16x LRASM is a significant AShM force


Again we're not talking about a CBG; the aforementioned capabilities would be laughable for a CBG. It's just a single, slightly bigger than carrier ship here. For that, these are huge.

Kiev was an Aircraft Carrier with missile strike capability for some reason.

And that some reason is primarily the Soviet naval doctrine of revolving everything around the core capability to extremely potent AShM missiles (1,000kg carrier disabling warhead, that too at high supersonic) and secondly not making an "aircraft carrier" but rather a "heavy aviation cruiser" to mess with the Turks.

Soviets never tried matching USA in similar capabilities which we now see PLA trying to do at a surprising pace. The Soviet plan was always to "counter" USA
• You have a formidable Air Force so we'd have the best SAM coverage
• Low RCS planes? Here comes long wavelength radar
• You've best C4ISR capabilities so here's the most comprehensive EW system
• and in this context, focusing on AShMs to counter CBGs

Isn't that basically all Indian warships other than anti-submarine ships

Ummn...pretty much yes.

Like I said earlier, the Soviet doctrine of AShMs. We also follow that as it's one of the best strategy to counter not just numerically superior but even technologically superior naval adversary.
As @SwordOfDarkness said that when one tries to adress multiple things at once the end result often turns out mediocre. It's absolutely true but the problem is, in terms of modular VLS it's not.

The armaments in Russian doctrine (and in turn ours) is fixed from the shipyard. So on hand we've perhaps the best ship based AShM capability in the region but on the other
• we still don't have long range land attack capability (even if Nirbhay gets inducted today, it would take considerable time to modify ships for hot-launching it)
• fleet wide BMD is non-existent (just validation test from one platform)
• still a very long way to multi-tier SAMs (Kusha would be made, tested, type certified for marinized use, retrofitted to ships if possible)
• the potential of ASROC is wasted by RBUs

Sorry for long ahh post

 

[Binayak95]

Again, the whole prerequisite of this is that you're completely forgoing the long range expeditionary air-force capabilities and focusing on 10 or 15 "self sufficient ships" instead of 4 CBGs if you're tight on budget.

VTOLs have lower MTOW, they suffer from shorter range...you're right on all the points. But..
• four F-35Bs with 8x Meteor and 32x CUDA (all internally for least RCS) can provide a considerable CAP capability
View attachment 12604
• four F-35Bs with 16x LRASM is a significant AShM force
View attachment 12605

Again we're not talking about a CBG; the aforementioned capabilities would be laughable for a CBG. It's just a single, slightly bigger than carrier ship here. For that, these are huge.

And that some reason is primarily the Soviet naval doctrine of revolving everything around the core capability to extremely potent AShM missiles (1,000kg carrier disabling warhead, that too at high supersonic) and secondly not making an "aircraft carrier" but rather a "heavy aviation cruiser" to mess with the Turks.

Soviets never tried matching USA in similar capabilities which we now see PLA trying to do at a surprising pace. The Soviet plan was always to "counter" USA
• You have a formidable Air Force so we'd have the best SAM coverage
• Low RCS planes? Here comes long wavelength radar
• You've best C4ISR capabilities so here's the most comprehensive EW system
• and in this context, focusing on AShMs to counter CBGs

Ummn...pretty much yes.

Like I said earlier, the Soviet doctrine of AShMs. We also follow that as it's one of the best strategy to counter not just numerically superior but even technologically superior naval adversary.
As @SwordOfDarkness said that when one tries to adress multiple things at once the end result often turns out mediocre. It's absolutely true but the problem is, in terms of modular VLS it's not.

The armaments in Russian doctrine (and in turn ours) is fixed from the shipyard. So on hand we've perhaps the best ship based AShM capability in the region but on the other
• we still don't have long range land attack capability (even if Nirbhay gets inducted today, it would take considerable time to modify ships for hot-launching it)
• fleet wide BMD is non-existent (just validation test from one platform)
• still a very long way to multi-tier SAMs (Kusha would be made, tested, type certified for marinized use, retrofitted to ships if possible)
• the potential of ASROC is wasted by RBUs

Sorry for long ahh post

the entire thought behind flexible deployment of multiship distributed F35B squadron hinges on us having F35Bs.

or even harrier IIs.

woh hojayega toh bhai hogaya sab.

 

[VictorDelta4]

Jeet&Jeet of all names!!

 

[SKC]

View attachment 12658
View attachment 12659

Jeet&Jeet of all names!!

Bigger point is that we were importing these glass windows till now! This is a fairly simply product which could be indigenize quickly.
Don't know how many such trivial parts and components are still being imported.​

 

[Ayan Barat]

Bigger point is that we were importing these glass windows till now! This is a fairly simply product which could be indigenize quickly.
Don't know how many such trivial parts and components are still being imported.​

Certainly this could have been the most obvious reason, but there can also be an underlying cause that we don't know for sure.

Sometimes the prices charged by local OEMs are absolutely bonkers compared to foreign ones. And in niché products you don't even have the hope of economies of scale working in long term as the order quantity is never that big.

The classic example would be OFB's prices for civilian firearms.

 

[ezsasa]

Bigger point is that we were importing these glass windows till now! This is a fairly simply product which could be indigenize quickly.
Don't know how many such trivial parts and components are still being imported.​

good thing is that MDL started this process for this particular component before the first positive indigenisation list came out i.e 2020.

https://www.mazagondock.in/images/pdf/List of Item Indigenised.pdf

and full tracker.

https://srijandefence.gov.in/ProductList

 

[SKC]

good thing is that MDL started this process for this particular component before the first positive indigenisation list came out i.e 2020.

https://www.mazagondock.in/images/pdf/List of Item Indigenised.pdf

and full tracker.

https://srijandefence.gov.in/ProductList

Unless we force our Industry to indigenize, everyone is happy importing most of the stuff!

 

[Corvus Splendens]

The classic example would be OFB's prices for civilian firearms.

That has less to do with overcharging citizens for profit, and more to do it with making it a nightmare for civilians to own even crap firearms for self defense. GoI since independence never wanted civvies to own automatic firearms. This policy has remained constant over the decades and is unlikely to change. The handful of legitimate private sellers are charging a fortune for crude 1911s. From getting a license to actually buying something good, the whole process is carefully curated to discourage civilians from trying. And bless you if you get the privilege to buy more ammo within a reasonable timeframe. Local police station will have you writing a thesis.

 

[samsaptaka]

Only exception to this rule seems to be those M777 Howitzers in service with the Army

That too is Jizya(ducks for cover) ..despite having Kalyani's ULH and other plethora of offerings...

Our order of 31 MQ-9 Reaper makes us the 2nd largest operator of MQ-9 after USA. Similarly, we are 2nd largest operator of C-17 Globemaster.

Are you sure we operate them ? Last I gathered it is directly flown from US of A and we only give the coords etc...