As seems to have been rightly suggested by this article, Indian arms exports to foreign countries are not intended to offer any sort of competition to Russian arms manufacturers, but to fill the niche where countries hard pressed for foreign exchange reserves are facing existential military threats from more powerful neighbours armed by western exporters, and where Russian arms manufacturers are not exactly in a position to fulfill the entire demand because of prioritisation of domestic demand engendered by the conflict with Ukraine, over exports. The lower cost of manufacturing in India is filling the gaps of genuine needs faced by such countries. An obvious advantage to the buyers is the possibility of seamless interoperability with Russian arms as and when Russian sales should resume to those countries in future, because Indian military tech has largely been evolved through incremental innovations to Russian technology rather than being based on an entirely different platform that could pose compatibility challenges.
If not for airplanes and hypersonic missiles (not needed in many emerging countries), then India's small arms and infantry weapons, and ammunition should be good enough. Basic infantry communication systems should be good as well. And these items are probably designed and manufactured with more consideration of jungle warfare and battlefield robustness. I know India can and do manufacture a lot of other weapon systems. However, since many systems are licensed productions, I do suspect the export of them will be subject to foreign governments' approval.
The arms deal with the Philippines was done in ‘24 which was Biden being asleep at the wheel. Philippines is a territory of the US and right now this type of deal would be impossible in my estimation. Trump will be more invested to what’s going on there and will no doubt make a deal with them for US armaments. It’s egregious this sale happened in the first place and why they needed it at all needs some investigation. This most likely was small arms and for local police use as there are US naval bases there and protection is guaranteed. Well done bringing this out Andrew.
Therefore, can I extend your statement to say that by then the Russia had judged that the US hypersonic weapon development had surpassed or was soon to surpass the BrahMos-II at that time?
I am not sure. However, given that the speed of a typical air-to-air missile can reach Mach 3, my thinking is that it should not be difficult to make it to Mach 3 for the US military contractors. However, they cannot announce a successful test run with Mach 3 as India had reached that several years ago with an anti-ship heavy missile (BrahMos-II). Given that Russians claimed Mach 10 for Oreshnik, the US defense contractors will need something closer to Mach 10 to have something worthy of announcement. I think the US has not reached Mach 7 or 8, but there is a good chance for the US prototypes to reach Mach 5 already. Sometimes people may want to announce their advanced weapons early to scare others. Some other times, some other people may want to delay the announcement until there is an actual need to present a deterrent. Or even better, for a battlefield surprise, like the T-34 and KV-1. It seems to me that Putin prefers to announce late, while China and the US prefer to announce early. But this is merely my unscientific observations without solid data.
As seems to have been rightly suggested by this article, Indian arms exports to foreign countries are not intended to offer any sort of competition to Russian arms manufacturers, but to fill the niche where countries hard pressed for foreign exchange reserves are facing existential military threats from more powerful neighbours armed by western exporters, and where Russian arms manufacturers are not exactly in a position to fulfill the entire demand because of prioritisation of domestic demand engendered by the conflict with Ukraine, over exports. The lower cost of manufacturing in India is filling the gaps of genuine needs faced by such countries. An obvious advantage to the buyers is the possibility of seamless interoperability with Russian arms as and when Russian sales should resume to those countries in future, because Indian military tech has largely been evolved through incremental innovations to Russian technology rather than being based on an entirely different platform that could pose compatibility challenges.
Exactly!
If not for airplanes and hypersonic missiles (not needed in many emerging countries), then India's small arms and infantry weapons, and ammunition should be good enough. Basic infantry communication systems should be good as well. And these items are probably designed and manufactured with more consideration of jungle warfare and battlefield robustness. I know India can and do manufacture a lot of other weapon systems. However, since many systems are licensed productions, I do suspect the export of them will be subject to foreign governments' approval.
The arms deal with the Philippines was done in ‘24 which was Biden being asleep at the wheel. Philippines is a territory of the US and right now this type of deal would be impossible in my estimation. Trump will be more invested to what’s going on there and will no doubt make a deal with them for US armaments. It’s egregious this sale happened in the first place and why they needed it at all needs some investigation. This most likely was small arms and for local police use as there are US naval bases there and protection is guaranteed. Well done bringing this out Andrew.
Therefore, can I extend your statement to say that by then the Russia had judged that the US hypersonic weapon development had surpassed or was soon to surpass the BrahMos-II at that time?
USA has hypersonic weapons that have tested effectively?
I am not sure. However, given that the speed of a typical air-to-air missile can reach Mach 3, my thinking is that it should not be difficult to make it to Mach 3 for the US military contractors. However, they cannot announce a successful test run with Mach 3 as India had reached that several years ago with an anti-ship heavy missile (BrahMos-II). Given that Russians claimed Mach 10 for Oreshnik, the US defense contractors will need something closer to Mach 10 to have something worthy of announcement. I think the US has not reached Mach 7 or 8, but there is a good chance for the US prototypes to reach Mach 5 already. Sometimes people may want to announce their advanced weapons early to scare others. Some other times, some other people may want to delay the announcement until there is an actual need to present a deterrent. Or even better, for a battlefield surprise, like the T-34 and KV-1. It seems to me that Putin prefers to announce late, while China and the US prefer to announce early. But this is merely my unscientific observations without solid data.