India - Partnership with China only out of necessity

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India - Partnership with China only out of necessity


Not quite together, not quite against?


Recently, the Indian military-industrial complex has begun to develop its own high technologies in the field of naval defense. If earlier India bought a significant part of military ships and submarines from the USSR and Russia, as well as from the USA and a number of other countries of the "collective West", now, in addition to joint developments with more technologically advanced naval powers, projects have appeared that can be considered its own.



So far they become “our own” mainly only under license, but there are also examples of their own implementation. For example, there is a project of two sea vessels that has no analogues in the world drones- reconnaissance aircraft: surface aircraft with the ability to land on water and launch from water, as well as UAVs launched from submarines.

It would seem that one can rejoice at the technological successes of a traditionally friendly country. But everything would be fine, only all these engineering innovations are directed against a colleague in BRICS and SCO – China. This raises a logical question: how strong are the bonds of partnership?

The Indian Navy command not only does not hide the fact that all innovations in its weapons are aimed against the Chinese fleet, but every time they are discussed, they even emphasize this. India's second enemy, Pakistan, is already fading into the background. And China is causing concern in India precisely by building up its military power at sea and high-tech developments in this area.


India is far behind China in this regard. Only if China, although it has claims to a number of Indian border territories, is increasing its military presence at sea specifically - as a counterweight to pro-American Taiwan, and not to India, then for India the main target for the development of naval technologies is China.

The fleet is not of the future, but of the present


Late last year, the Indian Navy simultaneously launched the submarine INS Vagsheer, the destroyer Surat and the frigate Nilgiri, all built at the state-owned Magazon shipyard in Mumbai. At the ceremony, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said the importance of the Atlantic Ocean had shifted to the Indian Ocean, which was becoming the centre of international rivalry.


India is currently building 60 large warships at a total cost of about 1,5 trillion rupees. This investment is expected to generate economic output of about three trillion rupees and a six-fold increase in employment. Each ship creates up to 14 direct and indirect jobs.

The Nilgiri frigate is an upgraded version of the Project 17 Shivalik class vessel. It outperforms its predecessor with improved stealth capabilities and indigenously manufactured weapons and enemy detection equipment.

The ship measures 149 meters in length and 17,8 meters in width, its displacement reaches 6670 tons, and the number of crew is 226 people. The frigate is equipped with an integrated CODOG gas-diesel power plant with two LM2500 turbines and a pair of MAN 12V28/33D STC diesels, which allows it to reach speeds of up to 28 knots and cover a distance of 5500 nautical miles at a speed of 16 knots.

The ship's arsenal includes 127-mm artillery Oto Melara installations, anti-aircraftmissile the Barak-8 complex, eight supersonic anti-ship missiles BrahMos (PJ-10), two torpedo tubes with three 324 mm caliber tubes, two AK-630 anti-aircraft artillery installations with a caliber of 30 mm, as well as two systems for launching RBU-6000 rocket bombs.


The dimensions of the destroyer Surat reach 163,9 meters in length and 17,7 meters in width, and its displacement is 7400 tons. The destroyer is equipped with a COGAG power unit with four DT-59 gas turbine engines, providing a speed of over 30 knots. Its autonomy reaches 4500 nautical miles at a speed of 18 knots.

The ship's armament includes 76 mm Super Rapid Oto Melara artillery mounts, four AK-630M 30 mm anti-aircraft automatic cannons, launchers with sixteen Brahmos anti-ship cruise missiles developed by the Russian-Indian company Brahmos Aerospace, as well as thirty-two Barak-8 / Barak-ER anti-aircraft guided missiles, RBU-6000 Smerch-2 bomb launchers, four torpedo tubes from Larsen & Toubro (L&T) with 533 mm torpedoes. There is space on board for basing two Sea King or Sea Hawk helicopters.

INS Vagsheer, the sixth of the French-built Kalvari (Scorpene) class of conventional diesel-electric submarines (SES) to be built under licence, is designed to replace India's ageing fleet of submarines and address serious shortcomings in the existing ones. India currently has a total of 16 submarines.


Its dimensions are 67,6 metres long and 6,2 metres wide, with a displacement of between 1615 tonnes surfaced and 1775 tonnes submerged. Four MTU 12V 396 SE84 diesel engines provide a speed of up to 20 knots submerged and 11 knots on the surface. Armament includes six 533 mm torpedo tubes, capable of launching both torpedoes and SM-39 Exocet Block 2 cruise missiles.

Even before that, in 2022, India commissioned its first indigenously built aircraft carrier, the Vikrant, whose name means “mighty” or “courageous” in Sanskrit. It is the second Indian aircraft carrier, providing a modern, yet 100% indigenous alternative to the outdated and worn-out Soviet aircraft carrier Vikramaditya, which India acquired from Russia in 2004.

Not only on water and under water


In September 2023, Sagar Defence Engineering Private Limited and Liquid Robotics, a subsidiary of the Boeing multinational corporation, announced a partnership to jointly develop and manufacture scalable unmanned surface vehicle systems. There is already a pilot project.

The second similar project is 100% Indian, Sagar Defence Engineering Pvt Ltd, a Pune-based defence start-up, is implementing it under the auspices of India's Defence Research and Development Organisation. This is an innovation not even by Indian standards, where such devices have not been produced before, but such drones are also rare around the world.

Specifically, these are underwater-launched UAVs. They will be launched from a submarine. The OOIR announced a tender for such a project, and Sagar Defence, which had previously developed a naval spotter drone that is already in service with the Indian Navy, was selected from 14 candidate companies. The drone being developed will be designed to conduct surveillance unnoticed, which will give submarines the ability to track potential threats without revealing their presence.

These drones, compared to the few similar ones in other countries, will have a greater flight range. In the future, it will be possible to install weapons on them.

On October 16 last year, the Indian Navy inducted a new SSBN into its naval forces, the fourth SSBN in the series and featuring over 70% indigenous components. It is armed with an all-nuclear arsenal of K-4 ballistic missiles with a range of up to 3500 kilometers. This SSBN is a significant upgrade over the INS Arihant model in its series, which is armed with K-15 nuclear missiles with a range of 750 kilometers.

The Arihant and Arighaat submarines have an approximate displacement of 6000 tons, while the S4* SSBN reaches about 7000 tons. They also differ in length: the first two are 111 meters, while the S4* is 130 meters. All three types have the same width of 11 meters and a draft of 15 meters.

Their propulsion system is powered by a CLWR-B1 high-pressure water reactor, producing 83 megawatts of power per shaft, allowing them to reach speeds of 12 to 15 knots on the surface and 24 knots when submerged. They are capable of unlimited cruising, requiring only occasional resupply, and can dive to depths of up to 450 meters underwater.

Such tendencies of the Indian arms race at sea, directed exclusively against China, raise the question of the existence of real threats to the integrity of BRICS. It is clear that BRICS is an economic union, not a military one, but in the event of serious military actions between two of its individual members, their foreign economic relations will be in great question.
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  1. +9
    31 January 2025 07: 12
    Does India have a socio-economic basis for naval parity with China?
    1. India is a 3rd world country, this country has the most poor people in the world - 229 million people. In one generation, the Chinese communists, with the help of Lenin's NEP, brought the country out of poverty, fully providing for its citizens.
    2. In India, 22% of the population is illiterate - 287 million Indians cannot write or read. In China, literacy is universal.
    3. There is no point in comparing incomes at all. China is a socialist country with all the social concerns for its citizens. The Republic of India is a country of the wildest feudal capitalism and the most powerful corruption. The early medieval caste system alone is worth something.
    The results are not surprising: China considers BRICS its organization for promoting its economic interests.
    Well done, communists.
    1. +5
      31 January 2025 07: 55
      I completely agree with you. The Chinese, unlike us, have found a version of correct socialism.
      1. +6
        31 January 2025 09: 55
        found a version of correct socialism.
        But the Chinese communists themselves say that they are currently laying the foundation for building socialism. And this is probably true.
        1. man
          +1
          2 February 2025 18: 51
          Quote: kor1vet1974
          found a version of correct socialism.
          But the Chinese communists themselves say that they are currently laying the foundation for building socialism. And this is probably true.

          Because they prefer action to chatter... unlike us...
    2. +5
      2 February 2025 22: 28
      Dear Comrade, your comments are not only in bad taste, especially costly for someone from India where the majority are friendly towards Russia, but also lack any understanding of history and geopolitics. Let's tell you why:
      1. "Third world, second world, first world" is a classification invented by Mao and do not necessarily reflect how the people of the world want to identify themselves. He placed USSR in the second world and his own country in the third world! The concept though repeated by western press, is derogatory at best and literally nonsense.
      2. After 300 years of scavenging by European colonialists the literacy rate (75%) and human development index of India is an achievement not a shame. After all we didn't invite invaders to come and steal everything from us, so why the shame? The thief should be shameful and not the other way round.
      3. The GDP of India is currently at $4.27 trillion and is projected to be the third largest by 2030. It's not in the same league as say China at $20 trillion, but please consider that China state economic reforms in 1978 while India started in 1991 That's a headstart of 12 years. In 12 years Indian GDP and human development index would be comparable. I would also like to remind you that China secured a huge US investment throughout the 1980s as a reward for the Sino Soviet split, by backstabbing the USSR in the back and breaking the socialist block forever. India doesn't believe in backstabbing friends, period.
      3. India faces a very real threat from China, due to the boundary dispute and the creeping territorial expansionism policy of the CCP. Please name one country with which China doesn't have boundary disputes! Perhaps the sino soviet border war is a good reminder. The second aspect of Chinese threat is its no holds barred armoring of Pakistan as a regional bulwark, against India (including nuclear arming). Pakistan for India has long been what Ukraine is to Russia now, a clear and present danger. How and why do you expect India to not safeguard itself against China, which has been an existential threat to India for the last 50 years.
      4. BRICS is not China's baby. Neither is it Indian. It's a collective effort for economic exchange, something which it has been achieving satisfactorily. However, that doesn't mean that member countries will not safeguard their own national interests. India has been more than accommodating with China, but it takes two to tango.

      Lastly, let me remind you that people of India generally look at Russia and its people with fondness. During various geopolitical turmoils, both countries have supported each other and will undoubtedly continue to do so. Russia has supported India diplomatically (in UN) and materially (weapons) in times of need and India has never voiced oppositions to Russian actions from Hungary to Afghanistan and now Ukraine. Compared to some other countries which have fought border wars with Russia and are waiting for an opportunity to encroach on Siberia soon, that's a pretty good record.
      1. 0
        14 February 2025 08: 07
        My statements were primarily not about Russian-Indian friendship, but about the political structure of the PRC and the Republic of India. The Republic of India is losing to the PRC primarily in the archaic functioning of society, where there are no clear goals. There is no social basis for an economic breakthrough in the interests of all members of society.
  2. 0
    31 January 2025 08: 13
    I just don't understand the map. Which two blocks of countries are highlighted in different colors, and by what principle? Does anyone have any guesses?
  3. +4
    31 January 2025 11: 44
    Unlike China, the Indian military-industrial complex cannot yet produce the entire range of weapons and is forced to announce international tenders and purchase foreign ones, including from the Russian Federation.
    As a former British colony, India inherited not only an English-language system of government but also a legal system that prevents India from producing copies of foreign goods under its own labels.
    The trade turnover between India and China is growing by leaps and bounds and is almost equal to their turnover with the USA. The main problem in trade protectionism is that India does not build its factories in China, and China, accordingly, in India, which prevents the merger of capital and the creation of Indochinese monopolistic associations and economic integration, but is limited to trade in goods, just as the Russian Federation does not have its own enterprises and banks in China, and trade relations are reduced to commodity exchange - raw materials for consumer goods.
    India and China are practically equal in size, and the stumbling block is not even territorial disputes, but the build-up of China's military presence in the Indian Ocean. This is explained not by China's threat to India, but by China's protection of its maritime trade routes in the Indian Ocean, nevertheless, India cannot help but react to this, and the US uses this to its advantage.
    1. -4
      31 January 2025 13: 52
      Aren't you tired of using these archaic "for now" and "only"?
      1. 0
        4 February 2025 21: 31
        "The winter crops were already sweating. The sun grew soft and spread its rays across the white world. Old man Romualdych sniffed his foot wrap and was completely bewitched." laughing
  4. +1
    31 January 2025 12: 52
    Greece is in NATO together with Turkey, which does not prevent them from being at odds. For the world "realpolitik" this is not such a rarity.
    As for China and India within the BRICS framework - in principle, BRICS is a rather loose thing, which arose due to a vacuum of necessity for something to emerge in the region, and not because of some "strong ties" between the participants. There are risks that in the future BRICS itself may suffer the fate of the "League of Nations", which also slid into a toothless talking club and swelled under its aegis.
    The geographical disunity itself, where three Eurasian states - Brazil and South Africa - are under one roof, already raises some questions in assessing the effectiveness of this brainchild.
    No, objectively BRICS needed and needs something like this, at least for the same dialogue, collective format and additional diplomatic ties. But as a "first pancake" it may turn out to be big, but not ideal. This is quite expected.