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por Marino » Dom Ago 14, 2011 12:09 pm
UK proposes building future warships with India
Ajai Shukla / New Delhi August 11, 2011, 0:24 IST
If deal goes through, one of our new pvt sector shipyards could bag
contract
With defence ministry shipyards unable to meet the Indian Navy’s
growing need for warships, New Delhi had no choice but to look to
Russian shipyards. Now, with Britain looking to partner India to cut
the UK’s warship building costs, one of India’s new private defence
shipyards — which have high-tech facilities but no experience in
building large, complex warships — could get the opportunity to build
its first line of world-class frigates.
Business Standard has learnt that a cash-strapped UK government has
approached New Delhi to jointly design and build a next-generation
frigate, designated the Global Combat Ship (GCS). While the UK had
originally planned to build this alone (then designated the Type 26
frigate), shrinking defence budgets have forced it to seek
international partners. And, India, along with other countries,
including Brazil, has been invited into a consortium to design and
build the GCS.
The British shipyard that will participate in the GCS project belongs
to BAE Systems. The ministry of defence (MoD) in New Delhi will
nominate an Indian shipyard. With public sector shipyards unable to
deliver even the existing orders on time, South Block has little
choice but to turn to one of the three new private defence shipyards —
L&T, Pipavav or ABG Shipyard.
“There have been meetings at the government-to-government level. There
are continued discussions with the Indian government. There has been
clear interest from the Indian Navy. But nobody has made a commitment
yet,” says Andrew Gallagher, president, BAE Systems India. The
response of the other countries approached by the UK is not known.
Senior MoD officials say, off the record, that no decision is imminent
on the British offer. But they admit the offer is attractive, since it
would provide a learning opportunity for one of India’s big new
private sector shipyards to gain experience in building frigates.
The three private shipyards already have orders for small vessels for
the navy and the coast guard, none larger than a few hundred tonnes. A
frigate, which typically weighs 5,000-6,500 tonnes and has complex
electronic battle management systems, is far more difficult to design
and build.
BAE Systems has described to Business Standard how Whitehall envisages
the designing and building of the GCS. The countries that eventually
form the consortium would join heads to frame broadly common
specifications for the warship. Presently, the GCS is planned as a
flexi-role frigate. This means each vessel could be optimised for any
one of the three traditional frigate roles: anti-submarine, air
defence or general-purpose. To cater for these different roles and the
different requirements of participating countries, the basic GCS
design would have 80 per cent commonality in design and components,
with 20 per cent remaining flexible.
PLUS FOR INDIA
While design responsibility would be shared between consortium
members, each country would build its own frigates. This would protect
jobs in the politically sensitive warship-building industry in the
West. In the case of India, it would develop the capabilities of a
fledgling shipyard.
“The Indian Navy has significant warship requirements and so, India
would be extremely influential in such a partnership…The GCS
commonality would generate operational benefits between friendly
navies. The additional benefit would be that a user, say the Indian
Navy, could logistically support these frigates from ports in friendly
foreign countries that operate the same ship,” says Gallagher, making
the case for India’s participation.
For the force structure of Britain’s Royal Navy, the GCS, (or Type 26
frigate) is crucial. It survived the UK’s budget cuts of 2008, by
paring the Royal Navy’s order for the successful Type 45 destroyer.
Last year, the Type 26 frigate survived the ruthless spending cuts
imposed in Britain’s Strategic Defence and Security Review. But now,
with Whitehall having concluded it cannot go it alone, the partnership
of countries like India is essential.
So far, India has entered joint development projects only with Russia
and Israel and those in the fields of aeronautics and missiles. But
the MoD realises the need to expand warship building to the private
sector. Defence shipyards, besides already running to capacity, are
plagued by time and cost overruns.
Last week, responding to a question in Parliament, defence minister A
K Antony admitted, “The cost escalation in major indigenous warship
building projects of the Navy, which are running behind schedule, has
already been about 225 per cent for Project-15A (destroyers), about
260 per cent for Project-17 (frigates) and about 157 per cent for
Project-28 (anti-submarine corvettes).”
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