Kortversjonen: India ville prøve å bygge egne droner, men det ble lagt effektivt lokk på da det ble besluttet å handle fra General Atomics.
Oct 31, 2024,
01:59 PM
A General Atomics MQ-9B Reaper drone sits at Yuma
Proving Ground, Arizona, in 2019. (U.S. Marine Corps/Lance Cpl. Colton Brownlee)
CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand — As India struggles to
develop its own medium-altitude, long-endurance drones, the government pulled
the trigger this month on a purchase of 31 MQ-9Bs from General Atomics.
The tri-service buy is worth 320 billion rupees, or
US$3.8 billion, with 15 SeaGuardians to be delivered to the Indian Navy (IN)
and eight SkyGuardians each for the Indian Air Force and Indian Army.
Officials in New Delhi have not fully explained why
they opted for expensive, U.S.-manufactured MQ-9Bs instead of domestic designs
that would follow the country’s dogma of localizing arms manufacturing. India’s
operational needs – including observing Chinese troops along its mountainous
northern border, and monitoring Chinese and Pakistani naval activity in the
Indian Ocean – are urgent.
“Our MQ-9B aircraft
deliver valuable, actionable intelligence over land and over sea, and allow
their operators to see, know and respond faster than ever before,” General
Atomics spokesman C. Mark Brinkley said. The new order stands to make India the
largest operator of MQ-9Bs.
Indian defense leaders believe they can no longer wait
for government agencies to satisfactorily develop domestic drones like the
TAPAS BH-201, a platform that has experienced difficulties and has yet to meet
performance requirements.
The Indian Navy’s vice chief, Vice Adm. Krishna
Swaminathan, told reporters on Oct. 22 that “the TAPAS drones in their current
form do not entirely meet our requirements,” which was why it had sought MQ-9Bs
instead.
Swaminathan added: “We hope the next version of TAPAS
will be much better. We look forward to that day when we can make such drones
like the MQ-9B, and maybe TAPAS is the right way to go.”
India is struggling to compete with nemeses China and
Pakistan in the field of high-performance drones. The latter, for example, has
procured the TB2 Bayraktar and Akinci from Turkey, as well as Wing Loong and
CH-4B drones from China.
Delhi initially expressed interest in the MQ-9A in
2016. The U.S. offered the navy 22 MQ-9B SeaGuardians in 2017, before the army
and air force decided to also procure the type in 2018. As negotiations
continued to drag on, the Indian Navy leased two SeaGuardians in 2020, one of
which fell into the Bay of Bengal in September.
India signed a contract with General Atomics Global
India for performance-based logistics for the new MQ-9Bs, allowing depot-level
maintenance, repair and overhaul to take place in India.
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