Chandigarh: INS Vikrant, the Indian Navy’s first indigenously designed aircraft carrier (IAC-1), is expected to be available imminently for operational deployment, some 16 months after its feverish commissioning in September 2022.
Vice Admiral M.A. Hampiholi, who heads the Southern Naval Command, told reporters in Kochi on December 3 that Vikrant would be “operationalised” by the end of January 2024, after completing its mandatory ‘guarantee refit’ at Cochin Shipyard Limited (CSL), where it was constructed. A ‘guarantee refit’ is akin to the first service of a newly acquired vehicle, which entails repairing, re-equipping, and re-supplying the concerned platform to certify its overall functioning and operability.
But even so, the air arm of the 40,000-tonne short-take-off barrier arrested recovery (STOBAR) power projection platform – comprising 18 Russian MiG-29K/KUB fighters, of a total of some 30 embarked aerial assets – inspired ‘limited’ confidence. A cross-section of veteran Indian Navy aviators and industry officials said that since their induction in 2009, the navy’s entire MiG-29 fleet had proven ‘inadequate’ in meeting the operational requirements of forces, as they had demonstrated their inability to deliver their specified weapons payload to their stated ranges with a full fuel load, in addition to numerous other drawbacks.
Eventually, however, Vikrant is expected to operate the under-purchase 26 Dassault Rafale-M (Marine) multi-role carrier-borne fighters (MRCBF) from France, including eight twin-seat trainers. Negotiations to import these fighters for an estimated $6 billion are ongoing, and the deal for them, according to Indian Navy officials, is likely to be inked by March 2024. Thereafter, fighter deliveries are expected to commence 36 months later, with the possibility of the French Navy even ‘loaning’ some Rafale (M)’s to the Indian Navy in the interim to ‘familiarise’ it with the aircraft.
Senior Indian Navy officials have iterated that the Rafale (M)s are being inducted as an ‘interim’ measure and, in due course, would be supplemented, and eventually replaced, by the under-development indigenous twin-engine deck based fighter (TEDBF), also known as the light combat aircraft (Navy).
The Indian Navy is optimistic that the prototype of the TEDBF, under development by the Aeronautical Development Agency and the public sector Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, would be ready by 2026, followed by its series production 2032 onwards, but extended slippages remain endemic in all such ambitious domestic programmes.
Vikrant’s air arm, which also comprises 12-odd rotary wing platforms like Russian Kamov Ka-31 early warning and control (AEW&C) helicopters and the under-induction Lockheed Martin/Sikorsky MH-60R multirole naval helicopters (MRHs), in varying numbers, will be managed by the carriers Aviation Flight Complex (AFC) supplied by Russia’s Nevoske Design Bureau. The carrier air wings’s situational awareness, surveillance capability and capacity to track multiple aerial and surface targets will, in turn, be supported by the EL/M-2248 MF-STAR (multi-functional digital active electronically scanned array radar) provided by Israel’s IAI-Elta.
But for now, Vikrant has no alternative but to make do with MiG29K/KUBs, 45 of which were acquired by the Indian Navy between 2009 and 2017 for $2.29 billion, but only around 40 of which were presently available, following losses in accidents.
In July 2016, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) rigorously criticised the Indian Navy and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) for technically accepting the MiG-29K/KUB fighters, despite them being “riddled with problems, discrepancies, and anomalies”. In its damning audit, the CAG had revealed the fighters’ multiple deficiencies, which included shortcomings with its airframe, its RD-33 MK engines and fly-by-wire systems; in short, the entire fighter. The report also stated that the fighters had suffered repeated engine failures, with at least 10 cases of single-engine landings. Of the 65 RD-33MK turbofan engines received from their manufacturer Klimov, the Indian Navy had rejected or withdrawn at least 40 from service due to defects, the CAG stated.
Consequently, operational availability of the MiG-29Ks between 2014 and 2016 had fluctuated from 15.93% to 37.63%, while that of the MiG-29KUB dual-seat trainers was just between 21.20% and 47.14%, the CAG disclosed. It also revealed that these technical deficiencies would considerably reduce the MIG-29K’s overall service life of 6,000 hours and that even its full-mission simulator had proven “unsuitable” in training pilots for carrier operations.
Additionally, the MiG-29K/KUB fleet continued to face severe maintenance problems, as a large number needed repair after each deck landing that damaged many of the fighters’ on-board components. There were also complaints from the Indian Navy regarding Russia’s inability to incorporate all agreed-upon features into the MiG-29Ks.
This state of affairs had resulted from the 2014 sanctions, still in place, imposed on Russia by the US, European Union states and other international organisations for its military intervention in Crimea, all of which prevented Moscow from providing several of the MiG-29/K’KUBs components. This situation had only deteriorated over the past 22 months following additional embargoes imposed on Russia for its ongoing assault on Ukraine.
Hence, seven years after the excoriating CAG report, little had changed with respect to the MiG-29K/KUBs operational efficacy. “The inefficiency of the MiG-29k/KUBs was well known to the MoD and the IN for years, but for inexplicable reasons they failed to acquire a substitute platform to coincide with Vikrant’s commissioning” said Amit Cowshish, former MoD acquisitions advisor. This avoidable lapse had adversely impacted the navy’s operational timetable, he added.
No headway on Navy’s third carrier
Meanwhile, the IN was continuing to grapple with securing MoD approval for a third carrier, designed and built indigenously to supplement Vikrant and INS Vikramaditya (ex-Admiral Gorshkov), the 46,000-tonne refurbished Russian Kiev-class platform commissioned into the IN in 2013. News reports, quoting senior IN officials had stated that the MoD’s Defence Acquisition Council was likely to approve the construction of the proposed carrier-a follow-on to the Vikrant-at its meeting in early December. But for reasons unknown, this did not occur.
Over years, successive IN Chiefs of Staff had argued and lobbied hard for a third carrier – one for each seaboard and one in reserve – and in 2015 the MoD had even sanctioned Rs30 crore to the Directorate of Naval Design in New Delhi to begin conceptualising plans for a 65,000-tonne IAC-2, but little came of that endeavour.
In this undated file photo, the Indigenous Aircraft Carrier (IAC) Vikrant sails in the sea. Photo: Handout via PTI
Nevertheless, in recent months IN officials confirmed that due to a financial resource crunch, the force had settled on building a 40,000-tonne flattop, analogous to Vikrant, principally to ensure that CSL’s skills in carrier construction, developed at great expense and over an extended period, did not dissipate. But alongside many navalists also questioned the operational efficacy of constructing another less-capable ‘lightweight’ carrier, which they said would be forced to operate within the engagement envelope of its enemy’s shore-based missiles and air defence systems.
Retired Commander Abhijit Singh contended recently that the IN’s decision to opt for a smaller carrier, which was a ‘valuable’ asset in peacetime activities, stemmed from diminishing financial options. Yet, policymakers ought to know, he cautioned, that a small aircraft carrier will ‘not cut it in combat with a worthy adversary in the littorals. Moreover, with its two 60,000 and 80,000-tonne carriers, China was unlikely to be deterred by the presence of a 40,000-tonne Indian flat-top in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR), added the analyst from the Observer Research Foundation.
The debate over the proposed IAC-2 has been long and tortuous, plagued not only by its astronomical cost, but also its overall operational efficacy in an environment of burgeoning anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) capability via long-range ballistic and cruise missiles. Steadily declining domestic military budgets and vacillation by the MoD in approving the programme, too had collectively thwarted the carrier project.
Nonetheless, even within the navy, senior officers question the monetary logic of building a new carrier at the cost of inducting additional diesel-electric submarines (SSKs) – whose numbers presently equalled 16. And, of these, seven were Russian Type 877 EKM ‘Kilo’ class variants and four were German-origin HDW Type 209/1500 boats, all between 20 and 34 years old, with several of them due either for retirement, or in limited instances, upgrade. The remaining five SSKs were licence-built French Kalvari (Scorpene) class boats, with a sixth scheduled for commissioning in early 2024, taking thereby the total number of such boats to 17.
But these SSK numbers were seven boats less than the 24 submarines that the navy was projected to operate by 2030 in accordance with its Maritime Capability Perspective Plan (MCPP). Correspondingly, equally critical surface combatants like corvettes, mine-sweepers, destroyers and frigates were in short supply, as were naval utility helicopters and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and other assorted missiles and ordnance.
India and China’s naval prowess
Aircraft carrier operations represent the apex of flexible naval power projection, and nuclear rivals China and India have placed these platforms at the centre of their maritime force development plans in their respective strategies of ‘dominating’ the strategic IOR. By comparison, China is relatively new to carrier operations, having had to start from scratch in the mid-1980s with neither naval aircraft, vessel, training pipeline, or operational experience to build upon.
Starting in 1985, China began by acquiring four retired carriers to analyse and study in its quest to launch such platforms for the Peoples Liberation Army Navy (PLAN): the British-built HMAS Melbourne from Australia and three ex-Soviet carriers, Minsk, Kiev and Varyag. The last named underwent an extensive refit, to emerge as the Liaoning, the PLAN’s first operational carrier with 40 embarked fighters and helicopters and one which, in turn, served as a basis for China’s subsequent design iterations for similar platforms. Presently, other than Varyag, the PLAN operates the follow-on Shandong and Fujian, which is being kitted out. Naval analysts anticipate China operating a total of five or six such carriers by 2030, each one an improvement on the previous platforms.
India, by contrast, began operating carriers in 1961, with INS Vikrant (ex-HMS Hercules) a 16,000-tonne Majestic-class carrier followed by INS Virat (ex-HMS Hermes), a 23,900-tonne Centaur-class platform with vertical-take-off-and-landing (VTOL) Sea Harrier fighters that were retired in early 2017. IN officials maintain that the forces ‘institutional’ maturity, experience, and knowledge provide it with a decisive operational edge over rival navies, including China’s. The IN is also one of the world’s few navies to have operated CATOBAR [catapult-assisted takeoff barrier arrested recovery], VTOL and STOBAR platforms, which not only gives it higher aviation skills but also advanced carrier tactics, techniques and procedures.
Other officers cautioned against such assertiveness, arguing that past performance was no guarantee of future success. They advised that it would be a grave error to underestimate the PLAN’s ability to telescope the basics of carrier aviation within a shorter timescale, and counselled the IN to adopt a more pragmatic and rational approach to capability building, shorn of the hard-sell.
