India needs to upgrade its weapon technology for future wars

[prasad1]

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All through the history of warfare, the attempt by every country has been to place a weapon in the hands of its soldier which is better than what the potential enemy has or at least of the same quality. No military commander would contemplate arming his soldier with a weapon inferior to that with the enemy soldier.

Countries that have overlooked or relegated such imperatives for fighting a war have ended up paying a heavy price on the battlefield. Thus, when Babur appeared on the battlefield of Panipat with artillery guns, Indian troops were placed in a hopeless situation and they merely wasted their gallantry and lives attacking the guns with no matching weapon in their support. The outcome needs no recalling.

DETERMINING FACTOR

Since then, weapons technology has relentlessly moved ahead and is more and more the determining factor in the outcome of battles. While the man behind the gun still matters, the scales are tipping in favour of the weapon. However at present, in this man and weapon combination, the quality of the man still holds and will be so till artificial intelligence and robotics take over.


China has successfully upgraded its weapons technology to almost match that available to, say the United States of America. In some fields, it has possibly moved ahead of America, as in the case of developing electro-magnetic guns for its naval fleet.

On the other hand, India has failed to develop its weapons technology. Though India has over four dozen establishments, manned by thousands of scientists, there is very little to their credit. Even with repeated transfer of technology in a range of weapons, they have failed to take that knowledge and technology forward.

The country continues to import 70% of its requirement of weapons and equipment. What needs to be noted in this import of weapons is that no country exports weapons which are at the top end of technology. So even with the import of weapons, the country is unable to place the best weapon or a weapon of equal technical advancement as may be available with the potential enemy.

India needs to upgrade its weapon technology for future wars

No country exports weapons that are at the top end of technology. So even with the import of weapons, the country is unable to place the best weapon or a weapon of equal technical advancement as may be available with the potential enemy

www.hindustantimes.com

 

[prasad1]

FREE DRDO OF BUREACRATIC CONTROL

So, why has India, with these over four dozen establishments of Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO), failed to develop contemporary weapon technologies? It has even failed in reverse engineering. Repeated demands for a science audit of these establishments has never been met for obvious reasons. The bureaucratic control of these is the reason and an audit will reflect on the performance and consequent call for accountability.

It is only one of the three DRDO establishments dedicated to naval technology that has provided some positive results and that one establishment out of these three has always been under the control of Indian Navy, with a naval officer heading it.


The user, in this case the defence services, project their requirement for a weapon or weapon system to the DRDO, through what is called General Staff Qualitative Requirement (GSQR). This GSQR spells out performance parameters and related features required of the weapon. This is normally, based on the knowledge of what has been developed and available to other armies. It may not be the very top of the line weapon asked for, because often advanced countries do not give out details of their very best weapon systems. In any case the developing agency (DRDO in this case) would take a few years to develop a weapon that meets the requirement as spelled out in the GSQR for that weapon.

By the time DRDO develops this weapon, as is often the case, further advancement would have taken place in such a weapon or weapon system. Possibly, this better weapon may already be available with the enemy, which in any case is well advanced in weapon technology.

India needs to upgrade its weapon technology for future wars

No country exports weapons that are at the top end of technology. So even with the import of weapons, the country is unable to place the best weapon or a weapon of equal technical advancement as may be available with the potential enemy

www.hindustantimes.com

 

[prasad1]

OVERHAUL THE DRDO


If one is to lower the essential feature of the weapon or weapons system in the GSQR to 70%, as advocated by India’s Chief of Defence Staff (to do away with import of weapons), then what the DRDO (or those private enterprises that may come in this field in future) will place in the hand of the military will be far inferior than what the enemy would have.

So, what is required is not lowering the GSQR to 70% but to overhaul the DRDO, which in spite of the availability of top of the line laboratories, connected equipment and abundant funds has failed in the last seven decades, to deliver even a suitable rifle, which the army is now trying to import.

Till such time the DRDO or private industry, as and when it is brought into weapons development field, is able to develop weapons and equipment that meet the desired performance parameters, it would be advisable for the CDS to refrain from tampering with GSQRs and instead let, as of now, import of such weapons and equipment continue.


Else, we may end up in the same situation as we faced during the First Battle of Panipat.

India needs to upgrade its weapon technology for future wars

No country exports weapons that are at the top end of technology. So even with the import of weapons, the country is unable to place the best weapon or a weapon of equal technical advancement as may be available with the potential enemy

www.hindustantimes.com

 

[prasad1]

All the personnel involved in manufacturing and designing a weapon system should be held responsible. If the system fails to perform some heads should roll.

In government laboratories our "scientist" just clock their time, they never produce any results.
There should be some accountability.

 

[mahe_magesh]

The current government’s motto is ‘Minimum Government and Maximum Governance.’ This presumes that the executive is efficient and effective to take on the task of administrative processes. But, the last 70 years of babudom have only shown them to be totally inept, uncoordinated and morally corrupt. The netas, bapus and citizens need to realize that for the country to move forward, the government needs to TRUST its citizens more and move out of their day-to-day lives and pursuit of happiness. The bureaucrats have usurped India’s democracy and continue to subjugate Indians in one way or the other. Only the masters have changed, the slaves remains the same. India is a pseudo democratic nation. What Indians need is LESS GOVERNANCE! Unfortunately, it’s not going to happen in the present scenario. India’s governing elite have let India to be surrounded by enemies on all sides, just like the Hindu kingdom of VijayaNagaram. Unlike USA, India is not geographically isolated nor have the luxury of time to inherently develop into a ‘true’ free society. It’s only a matter of time before external forces will once again redraw the future of this nation and its people. Nature’s processes constantly remind us that only the fit survive. India’s bapudom is neither fit nor adept. Maybe, it’s not a bad thing! New dharmic nation(s) may arise out of the ashes of the old decrepit one.

 

[ekaputra]

I fully subscribe to the opening thread.

To compare India with/ to China is not really fair. In China the party is all powerful - if the party decides that several million residents of a city will have to leave their homes as the entire city (infrastructure) is needed for defence or other research purpose the people cannot defy the order. In India, on the other hand opposition parties in spite of knowing fully well that India is under constant threat from hostile neighbours keep emphasizing that the defence budget allocation is way too high!

And the anti English policies of the central and state governments is compounding this problem. One has to accept that the best books on Science (or for that matter, most subjects) are in English. Probably there is abundant talent among children from smaller towns and even villages but they are handicapped by the fact that they have very poor grounding in English. Even in cities like Chennai the English standard is deplorably low and students who try to improve their English skills through conversation are ridiculed as "Peter England" (yes - currently that is a term meaning Anglophile snob). So a high percentage of present day students (owing to lack of fluency in English) do not really have access to the vast information available in books or even freely available on the internet. Organizations like DRDO depend on human resources - but our politicians are ruining the education system and doing it in the name of restoring the glory of our native languages and ancient literature.

I am not convent educated (but completed my SSLC almost 50 years back) and many of my friends who had their entire schooling in Tamil medium can read English books with ease - we started with Phantom and Tarzan comics and our school teachers encouraged us to read (at least abridged) classics like "Treasure Island" and "The Count of Monte Cristo" and ... . Many present day students who are studying in English medium are not able to even express basic ideas in English and this poor foundation is having a telling effect and probably adding to the woes of DRDO.

 

[Mannai_Murali]

I fully subscribe to the opening thread.

To compare India with/ to China is not really fair. In China the party is all powerful - if the party decides that several million residents of a city will have to leave their homes as the entire city (infrastructure) is needed for defence or other research purpose the people cannot defy the order. In India, on the other hand opposition parties in spite of knowing fully well that India is under constant threat from hostile neighbours keep emphasizing that the defence budget allocation is way too high!

And the anti English policies of the central and state governments is compounding this problem. One has to accept that the best books on Science (or for that matter, most subjects) are in English. Probably there is abundant talent among children from smaller towns and even villages but they are handicapped by the fact that they have very poor grounding in English. Even in cities like Chennai the English standard is deplorably low and students who try to improve their English skills through conversation are ridiculed as "Peter England" (yes - currently that is a term meaning Anglophile snob). So a high percentage of present day students (owing to lack of fluency in English) do not really have access to the vast information available in books or even freely available on the internet. Organizations like DRDO depend on human resources - but our politicians are ruining the education system and doing it in the name of restoring the glory of our native languages and ancient literature.

I am not convent educated (but completed my SSLC almost 50 years back) and many of my friends who had their entire schooling in Tamil medium can read English books with ease - we started with Phantom and Tarzan comics and our school teachers encouraged us to read (at least abridged) classics like "Treasure Island" and "The Count of Monte Cristo" and ... . Many present day students who are studying in English medium are not able to even express basic ideas in English and this poor foundation is having a telling effect and probably adding to the woes of DRDO.

 

[Mannai_Murali]

We certainly need English to learn technical books written in English.Certainly not a very high standard English . 'I is going' a butler English is more than enough.With butler English one can defenitely learn lectures of Stanford or MIT.Japaneese and Chineese mostly do not know English.Still they are successful.Our schools produce (Elite schools in metros) produce English speaking white color coolies.The best schools from Chennai etc can NOT send there students to IIT or make them crack NEET with out coaching.
Our defence lab scientists and Engineers are mostly from non from IIT (paritcularly B.Tech s).The talented are well paid in private and they go abroad.All the useless people land in to DRDO and other defence public sector units.They have no motivation.they work for salary.The do screw driver technology.
I worked in a public sector as an Electronic Engineer.In my defence project I had some difficulty at some point and needed academic support.The public sector Senior managers never tried to help me.They had a lot of funds which they wasted by buying costly imported equipments.The could have easily arranged for interaction with professors since they had funds.They never cared which lead to my quitting the public sector.After leaving I learnt in a hard way and after working in US and learning from MIT(USA) onlline courses I came forward to help them and I asked to provide some students with whom I will design and deliver free of cost.They did not provide me opportunity.The Engineers and managers are totally useless people with out any motivation and do only screw driver technology.
I even sent EMail to our PM and Tamilnadu CM and no one is ready to use my potential.
Today we see companies like google and other US corporates give trouble to Russia by stopping there support.
We fully depend on Russia and US for our defence needs.Tomorrow in a war if they go against us what will happen to our country is very well known.
Unfortunately our IIT professors show only interest in pleasing American corporate and end up with doing junk work.They do NOT keep themself technically fit and if they deliver there design even Bangaladesh will defeat us.