Russia- India defence relations
This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content. |
Contents |
An overview
India’s dependence, As in 2022
Krishn Kaushik, March 3, 2022: The Indian Express
How strong are Indian and Russian defence ties?
India was reliant, almost solely on the British, and other Western nations for its arms imports immediately after Independence. But this dependence weaned, and by the 1970s India was importing several weapons systems from the USSR, making it country’s largest defence importer for decades when it came to both basic and sophisticated weapons systems. In fact, it has provided some of the most sensitive and important weapons platforms that India has required from time to time including nuclear submarines, aircraft carriers, tanks, guns, fighter jets, and missiles.
According to several people, the defence trade, which remains significant, is one of the important causes why India has not taken a critical stand openly against Russia. However, India-Russian ties cannot be viewed only from that perspective.
The legacy of buying weapons from Russia has made India somewhat dependent on it, and even though India has tried to expand the base of countries from which it buys new military systems, Russian-origin weapons still have the lion’s share. According to one estimate, the share of Russian-origin weapons and platforms across Indian armed forces is as high as 85 per cent.
According to an April 2020 working paper published by Sameer Lalwani of the Stimson Center, along with other researchers, the “breadth of Russian-origin platforms in the Indian military—which our analysis suggests composes 85 percent of major Indian weapons systems rather than the 60 percent figure often cited—have created a ‘lock-in’ effect, while the depth of relative support to India’s technology base and strategic systems have engendered a relatively high degree of indebtedness and trust in key strategic circles.
However, it added that the paper found “scant evidence that India’s extended arms collaboration and geopolitical relationship with Russia have led to a diffusion of strategic thinking that has directly or indirectly shaped military doctrine.”
What is the value of weapons India has bought from Russia?
Russia is the second largest arms exporter in the world, following only the United States. In the five-year period between 2016 and 2020 America’s share in the global arms trade was 37 per cent, compared to 20 per cent of Russia’s, as per the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), which tracks the global arms trade and military expenditure.
For Russia, India is the largest importer, and for India, Russia the largest exporter when it comes to arms transfer. Between 2000 and 2020, Russia accounted for 66.5 per cent of India’s arms imports. Of the $53.85 billion spent by India during the period on arms imports, $35.82 billion went to Russia. During the same period imports from the US were worth $4.4 billion, and from Israel it was worth US$ 4.1 billion.
According to a SIPRI report on international arms transfer trends published in March 2021, between 2016 and 2020 Russia delivered major arms to 45 states. “India remained the main recipient of Russian arms in 2016–20, accounting for 23 per cent of the total, followed by China (18 per cent).
Russia’s share in Indian arms imports was down to about 50 per cent between 2016 and 2020, but it still remained the largest single importer. SIPRI noted that although “several large Russian arms deals with India, including for combat aircraft, were completed by 2020, India placed new orders for a variety of Russian arms in 2019–20. The ensuing deliveries will probably lead to an increase in Russian arms exports in the coming five years.”
What are the kinds of weapons Russia has given India?
Almost everything, over the years. At the moment there are two major defence deals between India and Russia that might be jeopardised by the current crisis. First, and most significant, is the deal to buy five units of the state-of-the-art S-400 Triumf air-defence system. It is among the most advanced in the world, and India placed an order for five units for around $5 billion in 2018. The first unit was delivered in December 2021, and has been deployed at an Indian Air Force base in Punjab.
The deal has been under the threat of American sanctions, even as the US had not decided on it yet. But the fresh round of sanctions on Russia could sound alarm bells for it.
Similarly, India and Russia had just signed a deal to manufacture around 6 lakh AK 203 rifles at a factory in Amethi. But apart from these ongoing projects, Russia has also pitched to make six AIP-powered conventional submarines for the Navy under the P75-I project, along with four other international bidders. The final call is yet to be taken.
In fact, the first submarine India ever got was also Soviet. The first Foxtrot Class submarine bought from the USSR entered Indian service in 1967 as INS Kalvari. Of the total 16 conventional diesel-electric submarines with the Indian Navy, eight are Kilo class, of Soviet origins.
India is also in talks with Russia to lease two nuclear-ballistic submarines, Chakra 3 and Chakra 4, the first of which is expected to be delivered by 2025. Earlier too, INS Chakra 1 and INS Chakra 2 were Russian vessels, both of which were returned after their leases expired. India has one indigenously manufactured nuclear ballistic submarine commissioned, of the four that are being built. However, a lot of the technology is based on Russian platforms.
The only aircraft carrier in service with India, INS Vikramaditya is a Soviet-made Kiev-class vessel that came into service for the Indian Navy in 2013. India’s first indigenously-made aircraft carrier is expected to be commissioned this year.
India’s missile programme has been developed with significant help from Russia or the Soviets earlier. The BrahMos missile, which India will begin exporting soon, has been developed jointly with Russia.
Russia has also been one of main exporters of fighter aircraft to India, including hundreds of Sukhoi and MiG jets.
A US Congressional Research Service report on Russian arms sale and defence industry, published in October 2021 has quoted figures from the Military Balance 2021 report of the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS), a global security, political risk and military conflict think tank, that “India’s present military arsenal is heavily stocked with Russian-made or Russian-designed equipment.”
It mentioned that the Indian Army’s main battle tank force is composed predominantly of Russian T-72M1 (66 per cent) and T-90S (30 per cent). The Indian Navy’s sole operational aircraft carrier is a refurbished Soviet-era ship, and its entire complement of fighter and ground attack aircraft are Russian-made or produced in India on license (the Navy’s fighter fleet comprises 43 MiG-29K/KUBs). Four of the Navy’s 10 guided-missile destroyers are Russian Kashin class, and 6 of its 17 frigates are Russian Talwar class.
The Indian Air Force’s 667-plane fighter ground attack (FGA) fleet is 71 per cent Russian-origin (39 per cent Su-30s, 22 per cent MiG-21s, 9 per cent MiG-29s). All six of the service’s air tankers are Russian-made Il-78s.
Is India trying to expand its weapons base?
Over the last few years there has been a conscious effort to expand the weapons platform bases to not only other countries, but also domestically as well.
SIPRI noted in its international arms transfer trends report last year that between 2011–15 and 2016–20 arms imports by India decreased by 33 per cent. “Russia was the largest arms supplier to India in both 2011–15 and 2016–20. However, Russia’s deliveries dropped by 53 per cent between the two periods and its share of total Indian arms imports fell from 70 to 49 per cent. In 2011–15 the USA was the second largest arms supplier to India, but in 2016–20 India’s arms imports from the USA were 46 per cent lower than in the previous five-year period, making the USA the fourth largest supplier to India in 2016–20.”
France and Israel were the second and third largest arms suppliers to India in 2016–20, it said.
According to the report, the “overall drop in India’s arms imports between 2011–15 and 2016–20 seems to be mainly due to its complex and lengthy procurement processes, combined with its attempts to reduce its dependence on Russian arms by diversifying its network of arms suppliers. As India perceives increasing threats from Pakistan and China and as its ambitious plans to produce its own major arms have been significantly delayed, it is planning large-scale programmes for arms imports.”
It added that based on India’s outstanding deliveries of combat aircraft, air defence systems, ships and submarines, India’s arms imports are expected to increase over the coming five years.
But it is important for India to diversify its base, to not become too reliant on any single nation, as it can become a leverage that can be exploited by that nation.
The US Congressional report had stated: “Many analysts in India and beyond conclude that the Indian military cannot operate effectively without Russian-supplied equipment and will continue to rely on Russian weapons systems in the near and middle terms… In this sense, much of Moscow’s influence in India comes through its willingness to provide weapons systems and technologies that no other country will export to India. Russia also continues to offer advanced weapons platforms at relatively attractive rates.”
YEAR-WISE DEVELOPMENTS
2016
See graphic:
Russia- India defence relations and related issues as in 2016
Rajat Pandit, October 16, 2016: The Times of India
2017
Defence projects (under execution and being planned)
See graphic:
Russia- India defence projects under execution in 2017 and being planned in 2017
2018
Reducing India’s reliance on Russian defence goods
India moves to reduce its reliance on Russia's defence imports, April 16, 2018: The Times of India
HIGHLIGHTS
India’s defence scientists have developed a new indigenous system that identifies missile targets to replace the Russian-developed seeker on all future BrahMos missiles
Russia accounted for 68 per cent of India’s arms import from 2012 to 2016
India is reducing its dependence on Russia for critical defence programs, with the joint venture BrahMos missile set to be guided by a locally-developed target tracking device in the next year.
India’s defence scientists have developed a new indigenous system that identifies missile targets to replace the Russian-developed seeker on all future BrahMos, Sudhir K. Mishra, the chief executive officer of BrahMos Aerospace said.
"Our objective is to make use of the Indian seeker on all future BrahMos missiles," Mishra said in an interview on the sidelines of India’s defence show, DefExpo, on Wednesday in Chennai. "The Russians say if the Indians supply a cheaper, cost-effective and reliable seeker, then let us take it from India."
There are also plans to use a locally-made warhead on the missile, he said, without specifying a time frame.
Russia accounted for 68 per cent of India’s arms import from 2012 to 2016, according to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. It’s been the largest defence supplier to India since the 1960s when the MiG-21 supersonic fighter jets were bought to equip the Indian Air Force. These were then license-produced at the state-held Hindustan Aeronautics Limited until recently, when India began to junk the MiG jets and plan a complete phase out of the aircraft by 2022.
MILITARY MODERNISATION
As Prime Minister Narendra Modi pushes ahead with his military modernization process with a targeted $250 billion spend over 10 years till 2025, India has widened the scope of its arms purchases to include equipment from the US In the last two years, the US has emerged as India’s top defence supplier. Since 2007, the US has won defence orders from India worth $17 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
India is preparing to test an anti-ship version of the seeker sometime in October-November this year, Mishra said. A successful second test would allow it to go into production soon after.
HYPERSONIC DEVELOPMENT
In the next five years BrahMos Aerospace plans to develop the hypersonic BrahMos missile that can achieve speeds of Mach 5, or five times the speed of sound, Mishra said. The Indian-Russian joint venture is working on overcoming the technological challenges involved in achieving hypersonic speeds for the present Mach 2.8 missile.
BrahMos is also working to extend the missile’s range to 800 km, he said, without giving a time frame. In March 2017, after India formally joined the international Missile Technology Control Regime, BrahMos successfully tested an extended range of 400 km for the missile.
US law attacks India’s Russia defence ties
With Caatsa, Trump Tries To Wean Delhi Off Moscow’s Arms And Grab World’s Biggest Defence Market
The malign shadow of US sanctions hangs over the informal summit between PM Narendra Modi and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in Sochi on Monday, with New Delhi becoming a cat’s paw not only in the scrap between Washington and Moscow, but also in the turf war between the White House and Congress.
Although India has asserted that it will not allow any third country to dictate its ties with Russia, the so-called Caatsa (Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act) legislation has become Washington’s poison-tipped arrow threatening New Delhi’s long-cherished and long-nourished defence ties with Moscow which Washington is trying to whittle down.
While assuring New Delhi that it will do its best to avert the Congress-mandated sanctions against countries that have cozy ties with Russia, the Trump administration, pleading that its hands are tied by tough waiver conditions, is also using it to wean countries such as India away from the Russian arms industry to sell more American weapons.
In India’s case, the immediate efforts are aimed at nixing New Delhi’s plans to buy five S-400 Triumf air defence systems for around $4.5 billion from Russia, a prospective deal that is expected to be part of the India-Russia defence cooperation talks that will also take into account the Caatsa wrinkle and how to get around it.
On the weekend before his departure to Sochi, Modi tweeted that he is “confident the talks with President Putin will further strengthen the Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership between India and Russia”, indicating his determination to get around the roadblock set up by Washington, with which too New Delhi has an increasingly close defence ties. The US wants an even closer relationship.
While some US officials have expressed understanding of New Delhi’s dilemma, considering that some of India’s legacy weapons system are of Soviet and Russian origin and it needs to maintain defence ties with Moscow to keep them operational, others have cautioned that Caatsa is Congressionally-mandated and the administration’s hands may be tied in terms of waivers if India goes in for new purchases.
“Caatsa is a feature and we need to take it seriously. The (Trump) administration is always bound by US law. This is a US law. I’m hoping that not just India, but all of the partners that we engage with will understand that we will have to evaluate any potential large defence purchase from Russia seriously because that'’ what the law demands of us,” Tina Kaidanow, principal deputy assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs, said at a press meet on Saturday.
Kaidanow is travelling to India next week for talks on defence trade and peacekeeping, which are among two key areas of the rapidly growing US-India partnership as envisioned in the administration’s Indo-Pacific strategy.
Referring to the conversation that the US is having with India and other countries on Caatsa, Kaidanow said the US wants this to be a positive discussion. “The intent is not to sanction our partners. The intent is to emphasise how important it is that Russia’s malign behaviour all over the world is countered and by virtue of purchasing large-scale Russian system, what you’re doing is enabling that kind of behaviour. That’s the intent of the legislation.”
She also underscored the “positive incentives” to buy American products which are “good” and address relevant security needs besides making their forces interoperable in certain instances. “Think about what you’re doing when you purchase Russian product. It has a distinctly negative byproduct and that is you are creating an environment in which they are better able to do some of the things that we know are problematic,” she added. Section 231 of Caatsa mandates secondary sanctions on those who conduct significant transactions with the Russian defence and intelligence sectors. US and Indian officials at the cabinet and secretariat level have been in contact over the matter, and Trump administration officials have assured New Delhi the sanctions are aimed at Russia, not India. But at the same time, Washington is attempting to take advantage of the situation to sell more American arms.
Following up on the visit to Washington of foreign secretary Vijay Gokhale and defence secretary G Mohan Kumar in April, US secretary of state Mike Pompeo and national security advisor John Bolton have also had phone conversations with their Indian counterparts on the subject. The outcome though is still uncertain.
S-400 systems: India tries to please both Russia, USA
PUTIN IN DELHI TO INK DEFENCE PACT AMID US THREAT
As India and Russia prepare to sign a deal for S-400 missile defence systems on Friday, New Delhi is playing the greatest balancing act of all — steering its defence needs and a long standing strategic relationship with Russia past the threat of US sanctions while protecting growing ties with Washington.
It wasn’t this bad even during the Cold War, when despite cries of non-alignment, India was squarely on the Russian side of the field and the US did not see New Delhi as an ally.
Russian leader Vladimir Putin landed in Delhi on Thursday evening and drove straight to a dinner with PM Narendra Modi. The official programme begins on Friday morning with a breakfast followed by delegationlevel talks. A large number of agreements are likely to be signed — normal for India-Russia summits.
But all eyes will be on the defence agreements for the S-400 missile defence system, frigates and assault rifles. The US only last week slapped sanctions on China for buying the same S-400s.
Putin’s visit comes almost exactly a month after the first 2+2 dialogue with the US, where James Mattis and Mike Pompeo had discussed this scenario with Nirmala Sitharaman and Sushma Swaraj. India made it clear it needed the S-400 and had a long legacy of sourcing defence equipment from Russia, which New Delhi was unwilling to compromise. The US side reassured Delhi that the Countering America’s Adversaries through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) law would not apply to legacy platforms or spares, but new buys could be impacted.
What is less known is that Mattis and Pompeo spent over an hour with national security advisor Ajit Doval for a deeper conversation on two issues — imports of Iranian oil post sanctions that will kick in from November 4, and the S-400 from Russia. Sources said both sides emerged with a better understanding of each other.
The Trump administration, however, still has to certify to Congress that India is reducing its weapons buys from Russia. That is a condition for a waiver on CAATSA, a provision written into the otherwise inflexible law by sustained diplomacy by the Trump administration. The waiver will be available to India, Indonesia and Vietnam. But, as Randy Shriver, US undersecretary in the Pentagon said, India should not treat this as a blanket waiver.
India is in a slightly difficult place — the US relationship is vital for India to balance China and its aggressive growth. It’s also the economic partner of choice for Indian industry. Russia, however, remains an old partner, with a huge piece of the Indian defence pie. But its closeness to China is a problem that India is uncomfortable about.
India has been reducing its weapons buys from Russia, but it does not want to ditch their deep partnership. In fact, India has increased its investments in Russia’s energy sector with oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan officially asking Russia to partner in India’s effort to gassify its economy.
Russia is also opposed to India’s Indo-Pacific policy, and has unequivocally opposed it. “We urge all our allies and partners to forgo transactions with Russia that would trigger sanctions under CAATSA,” a state department spokesperson said when asked about India’s plan to purchase the multi-billion S-400 missile defence system. “The administration has indicated that a focus area for the implementation of CAATSA Section 231 is new or qualitative upgrades in capability, including the S-400 air and missiles ,” the spokesperson said.
Russia enjoys support from across the political spectrum — for instance, Sonia Gandhi, who doesn’t travel too much, went out of her way to travel to St Petersburg recently for a women’s conference.
2019
India inks $3bn N-sub deal despite US sanctions threat
Rajat Pandit, March 8, 2019: The Times of India
India on Thursday inked yet another mega defence deal worth over $3 billion for the lease of a nuclearpowered attack submarine from Russia, despite the threat of US financial sanctions still looming over the earlier $5.4 billion contract for Russian S-400 Triumf missile systems inked last October.
Defence sources said the over $3 billion (around Rs 21,000 crore) contract for the Akula-1 class submarine, which will be ready by around 2025, includes a comprehensive package for refurbishment of the nuclear boat lying mothballed at Severodvinsk, its sustenance and spares support for 10 years, as well as training and technical infrastructure for its operations.
This submarine will replace INS Chakra, the Akula class submarine taken on a 10-year lease from Russia in April 2012, under a secret over $900 million deal inked way back in January 2004.
“INS Chakra’s existing lease will be extended till at least 2025 through another contract till the new submarine, which will be bigger and more advanced, becomes operational,” said a source.
The deal, however, will further raise hackles of the US, which under its new law Caatsa (Countering America’s Adversaries through Sanctions Act) seeks to prevent countries from buying Russian weapons or Iranian oil. Though India is hopeful of eventually getting US presidential waiver for the S-400s, the latest deal could complicate matters.
