Russians hold up IAF chopper contests

The Indian Air Force (IAF) trials for an estimated USD 2 billion order for 22 attack and 15 heavy lift helicopters have been held up because the Russian contenders in the two shortlists have failed to arrive in India.

Senior IAF officials said on Monday that for reasons that were, as yet, unclear, the Russian Mil Mi-28 and the Mi-26 helicopters had not been cleared to come to India for trials. The trials for both categories of aircraft began in July.

IAF officials have chosen not to label this a delay and deny they’ve set any deadline for the Russian aircraft to arrive for trials, even though this could put the two acquisition contests in limbo. Boeing’s Apache AH-64D attack helicopter and the Chinook heavy lift helicopter are the other aircraft in the competition.

The IAF would, presumably, want to prevent the process of acquisition of the two types of aircraft from being jeopardized by the withdrawal of the Russian helicopters from the contest. Under the Indian Defense Procurement Procedure (DPP), any contest which results in the survival of only a single vendor is vitiated and the process has to be restarted.

The trials of both the Apache and Chinook helicopters have been completed. The weapons trials phase for the Apache helicopter ended last week in the United States.

  4 comments for “Russians hold up IAF chopper contests

  1. Satchandrag
    October 13, 2010 at 4:46 pm

    After British rule, India has been under C.I.A. rule. I am India’s expert in strategic defence and the father of India’s strategic program, including the Integrated Guided Missile Development Program. I have written in my blog titled ‘Nuclear Supremacy For India Over U.S.’, which can be found by a Yahoo search with the title, how a former senior C.I.A. official has described in detail how the C.I.A. has done “business” with Russian intelligence agencies for many decades, how the C.I.A. directly arranged the plane crash which killed Homi Bhabha but relied on Russian intelligence agencies, with which it did “business”, to assassinate Shastri who had given a go ahead for an Indian nuclear weapons program. P. V. Narasimha Rao sent the head of India’s submarine-launched ballistic missile program to Russia to get help, where he died as Shastri did. When, in a letter to the press, I pointed out that this was the “help” the Russians had provided, the Russians hastily withdrew a delegation visiting India for fear of retaliation. It will be the easiest thing in the world for Russian or other intelligence agencies to install devices in submarines etc. with which they can track them and, in keeping with their “business” relationship with U.S. intelligence agencies, enable the Americans to track them, too. I have said there should be an iron-clad rule against importing ANY defence equipment and I have also described the perils of importing electronic equipment, nuclear power plants and numerous other kinds of civilian and military equipment; see my blog.

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