India Navy Aircraft Carriers

[Nilgiri]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1548993605292867584

 

[Gessler]

CSL has officially handed over the INS Vikrant to the Indian Navy - Commissioning scheduled for next month

 

[Gessler]

Some more pics:

 

[Nilgiri]

Jai Hind.

 

[Nilgiri]

Lot of Indians often say Russia has been some extremely reliable partner in defence tech.

But Russia also played games with India @Ecderha @UkroTurk et al., only solution is to establish and develop as much capacity by oneself.

Especially with Russia and China coming together in stronger alliance now.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1561288204581384192

 

[UkroTurk]

Lot of Indians often say Russia has been some extremely reliable partner in defence tech.

But Russia also played games with India @Ecderha @UkroTurk et al., only solution is to establish and develop as much capacity by oneself.

Especially with Russia and China coming together in stronger alliance now.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1561288204581384192

Asian continent needs Anti-Communist and liberal superpower so İndia suits the role.

 

[Gessler]

Commissioning announced for September 2!

Somebody on Twitter visualized what an SH could look like on the Vik, in place of the -29K:

 

[Nilgiri]

Navy pushes for third aircraft carrier after INS Vikrant to retain edge over China in Indian Ocean Region | India News - Times of India

India News: With India’s first indigenous aircraft carrier (IAC) set to be commissioned as the 45,000-tonne INS Vikrant on September 2, the Navy believes the proj

timesofindia.indiatimes.com

NEW DELHI/KOCHI: With China aggressively building new aircraft carriers and a blue-water navy to counter the US and project power around the globe, the Indian Navy is now pushing hard for its long-standing case for a third and much bigger aircraft carrier to retain its combat edge in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).

With India’s first indigenous aircraft carrier (IAC) set to be commissioned as the 45,000-tonne INS Vikrant on September 2, the Navy believes the project for a third carrier should be launched as soon as possible since it will take at least a decade to build a 65,000-tonne one.

The force has for long said three carriers are needed to ensure at least two are operationally available, one each for the eastern and western seaboards, while the third undergoes its maintenance-and-refit cycle.

India, incidentally, has been without an operational aircraft carrier for almost two years now since the 44,500-tonne INS Vikramaditya, acquired from Russia for $2.33 billion in November 2013, is undergoing a major refit.

“The indigenous ecosystem has been created by building the IAC. The stage is now well set to take the next step forward to indigenously build the next aircraft carrier to ensure the expertise gained is utilized to the maximum in times to come,” Navy vice chief Vice Admiral Satish N Ghormade said on Thursday.

INS Vikrant, once fully combat-ready by mid-2023, will play a role in ensuring peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region. “Commissioning of the carrier will provide the required deterrence, considering the growing strength of our neighbours, and enhance our maritime capability,” he added.

After building the Rs 20,000-crore IAC, which took 13 years from keel-laying to delivery after being first sanctioned by the government way back in January 2003, the Cochin Shipyard (CSL) is all gung-ho for the next carrier project.

“Now, once we get the go-ahead, we can build a warship similar to IAC in eight years. We can even build a 65,000-tonne carrier since our new 310-meter dry dock will be ready by 2024,” CSL CMD Madhu S Nair told TOI.

Even as the Navy is holding “deliberations” with the defence ministry on the proposed IAC-2, the prevalent view is the new carrier should be at least 65,000-tonne to ensure requisite combat capability and cost-effectiveness. This will ensure the carrier can carry more aircraft than the 30 capacity of the IAC.

Moreover, the IAC-2 should have CATOBAR (catapult assisted take-off but arrested recovery) configuration to launch fighters as well as heavier aircraft for surveillance, early-warning and electronic warfare from its deck. Both INS Vikramaditya and IAC have only angled ski-jumps for fighters to take off under their own power in STOBAR (short take-off but arrested recovery) operations.

China already operates two carriers, Liaoning and Shandong, and is fast building two more with CATOBAR configuration. The third Chinese carrier, the over 80,000-tonne Fujian, was `launched’ in June. The US, of course, has 11 `super’ 100,000-tonne nuclear-powered carriers, each of which carries 80-90 fighters and aircraft.

 

[TR_123456]

it will take at least a decade to build a 65,000-tonne one.

Why a decade?

 

[NEKO]

Have Indian navy decided between Rafale and F18?

 

[Afif]

Navy pushes for third aircraft carrier after INS Vikrant to retain edge over China in Indian Ocean Region | India News - Times of India

India News: With India’s first indigenous aircraft carrier (IAC) set to be commissioned as the 45,000-tonne INS Vikrant on September 2, the Navy believes the proj

timesofindia.indiatimes.com

NEW DELHI/KOCHI: With China aggressively building new aircraft carriers and a blue-water navy to counter the US and project power around the globe, the Indian Navy is now pushing hard for its long-standing case for a third and much bigger aircraft carrier to retain its combat edge in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).

With India’s first indigenous aircraft carrier (IAC) set to be commissioned as the 45,000-tonne INS Vikrant on September 2, the Navy believes the project for a third carrier should be launched as soon as possible since it will take at least a decade to build a 65,000-tonne one.

The force has for long said three carriers are needed to ensure at least two are operationally available, one each for the eastern and western seaboards, while the third undergoes its maintenance-and-refit cycle.

India, incidentally, has been without an operational aircraft carrier for almost two years now since the 44,500-tonne INS Vikramaditya, acquired from Russia for $2.33 billion in November 2013, is undergoing a major refit.

“The indigenous ecosystem has been created by building the IAC. The stage is now well set to take the next step forward to indigenously build the next aircraft carrier to ensure the expertise gained is utilized to the maximum in times to come,” Navy vice chief Vice Admiral Satish N Ghormade said on Thursday.

INS Vikrant, once fully combat-ready by mid-2023, will play a role in ensuring peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region. “Commissioning of the carrier will provide the required deterrence, considering the growing strength of our neighbours, and enhance our maritime capability,” he added.

After building the Rs 20,000-crore IAC, which took 13 years from keel-laying to delivery after being first sanctioned by the government way back in January 2003, the Cochin Shipyard (CSL) is all gung-ho for the next carrier project.

“Now, once we get the go-ahead, we can build a warship similar to IAC in eight years. We can even build a 65,000-tonne carrier since our new 310-meter dry dock will be ready by 2024,” CSL CMD Madhu S Nair told TOI.

Even as the Navy is holding “deliberations” with the defence ministry on the proposed IAC-2, the prevalent view is the new carrier should be at least 65,000-tonne to ensure requisite combat capability and cost-effectiveness. This will ensure the carrier can carry more aircraft than the 30 capacity of the IAC.

Moreover, the IAC-2 should have CATOBAR (catapult assisted take-off but arrested recovery) configuration to launch fighters as well as heavier aircraft for surveillance, early-warning and electronic warfare from its deck. Both INS Vikramaditya and IAC have only angled ski-jumps for fighters to take off under their own power in STOBAR (short take-off but arrested recovery) operations.

China already operates two carriers, Liaoning and Shandong, and is fast building two more with CATOBAR configuration. The third Chinese carrier, the over 80,000-tonne Fujian, was `launched’ in June. The US, of course, has 11 `super’ 100,000-tonne nuclear-powered carriers, each of which carries 80-90 fighters and aircraft.

A fleet of SSN propably will be more effective to deter chinese naval present in indian ocean

 

[Jackdaws]

Have Indian navy decided between Rafale and F18?

Now the concentration is probably going to be on indigenous fighters.

 

[Jackdaws]

Why a decade?

Indian Project Management.

 

[Nilgiri]

Why a decade?

The way I see the situation,

I would imagine Indian navy logisticians/analysts have factored in such things as:

- 2 years off the bat simply to get the new drydock (at CSL) online at this size (310 m and 65,000 ton DWT). There is no other drydock currently to handle this size and type of ship in India.

- Funding and trained labour crunch/pressure baked into the estimate (all the capital resources needing to be allocated into other ongoing and projected navy projects and managing known saturated dockyard capacity versus relative priorities of these programs)

- Clean sheet design for the most part, hence the detailed design needed that cannot be carried over from much smaller IAC-1

- Novel critical elements such as the IFEP propulsion, CATOBAR, EMALS etc.... (now that nuclear is foregone given that will be a 10 - 20 year project just by itself) that need foreign cooperation (which is just starting) and all extra time/funding/new design work like the previous points

- The proven time (now realised and factored in) that it took for vikrant project compared to optimistic projections made for it at the time (early 2000s when it started). i.e Halving of total time for much larger capable carrier is actually quite some progress IMO in Indian context.

Simply put, Indian shipyards are doing capital and labour investment ramp at same time the (ever mounting) project load pressure comes especially at an apex endeavour (largely sunk in costs given militaries are not commercial and revenue generating-oriented), hence Indian navy has to be realistic as possible with some time frames.

Carriers also need large amount of support ships (destroyers, frigates, subs) for adequate sustainable power projection with enough protection of such an expensive asset.... whereas the reverse is not so true (the smaller assets can operate much more independently depending on the mission).

So destroyers + frigates + subs simply must get more priority i.e you can have a navy with just destroyers and frigates....but a navy with just aircraft carriers is stupid and just top-heavy vulnerable.

This leads to longer time for making the carrier (combination of the previous points) with say X amount of total and projected resources (funds, manpower, design capacity etc) given production and maintenance competition of these resources with the other kinds of more vital ships to the navy (especially a growing navy like India).

@Gessler @Paro @Anmdt @MisterLike @AlphaMike et al.

 

[Nilgiri]

Have Indian navy decided between Rafale and F18?

For transient foreign platform (i.e these 2), I would say F-18 is looking more likely at this point. It is not officially chosen yet though.

India intends to have its own TEDBF as the "final" selection for use in its carrier program, but that is well after say F-18 is acquired.

 

[Nilgiri]

A fleet of SSN propably will be more effective to deter chinese naval present in indian ocean

I entirely agree. That was always what I have suggested for some time now given the stretched resources and priority matrix I foresee.

 

[Afif]

I entirely agree. That was always what I have suggested for some time now given the stretched resources and priority matrix I foresee.

Looks like we can at least agree on something! yeah! I mean, every body talks about how big and advanced the new chinese destroyers are! Or how 'Fujian' the new aircraft carrier is on per with us carriers ! But that's barely the point! Just a single seawolf or verginia can sink the 'Fujian' if it doesn't have the proper escort! And at least for next 6 7 years it won't have any credible escort for sure! The Current Chinese SSN's are at best on per with old mproved LA class and no way near as good as V class! They are simply just too noisy and doesn't have proper sensors! I always thought the best deal india can have after rafale is to go for an SSN deal with france, something similar to brazil's deal. Any suffren design based sub would be a mile ahead of chinese type93a in term stealth and sensor technology! However, now it seems that, 'SIZE' is the primary priority for indian strategic naval planners!

 

[Gary]

@Nilgiri bro iirc there's a table you shared here about India's naval building efficiency, clearly that might explain the long time it need to build an aircraft carrier.

I mean aircraft carriers are a very complex manufacturing to begin with. Just look at the Fords CVN

I entirely agree. That was always what I have suggested for some time now given the stretched resources and priority matrix I foresee.

China has 3 path in which it could enter the Indian Ocean

China--SCS-Malacca strait
China--SCS--Sunda strait
China--Philippine sea--Makassar strait--Lombok strait

all of which are perfect for ambush predators like that of a submarine, waiting in the mouth of the strait. Also submarines are likely the department where India's navy could keep up with the Chinese when it comes to that of accoustics signature reduction.

 

[Gary]

anyway 65000 tons, CATOBAR carriers remind me of this : the CVV medium carriers with 2 catapult

would IN go for EMALS or traditional steam catapult ?

 

[Nilgiri]

Looks like we can at least agree on something! yeah! I mean, every body talks about how big and advanced the new chinese destroyers are! Or how 'Fujian' the new aircraft carrier is on per with us carriers ! But that's barely the point! Just a single seawolf or verginia can sink the 'Fujian' if it doesn't have the proper escort! And at least for next 6 7 years it won't have any credible escort for sure! The Current Chinese SSN's are at best on per with old mproved LA class and no way near as good as V class! They are simply just too noisy and doesn't have proper sensors! I always thought the best deal india can have after rafale is to go for an SSN deal with france, something similar to brazil's deal. Any suffren design based sub would be a mile ahead of chinese type93a in term stealth and sensor technology! However, now it seems that, 'SIZE' is the primary priority for indian strategic naval planners!

We just started off on wrong foot on this forum, it happens (trust me I share lot of your concerns about India, but this forum has a way to go about it best that you will find with time and experience here).

So there is no real reason to not agree on many things on all kind of topics simply going by just a first clash.

Lot of people online I have agreed very much on things past the "first clash" we had....some even have become friends.


As for rest of your post, yes I agree I would have a French SSN basis as urgent/better priority for Indian navy well over another carrier.

Vikrant itself will provide lot of capacity to test out and get better at now anyway in carrier domain and has sustainable accomodation w.r.t India Naval ORBAT (this decade) for any conflict past peacetime.

That can be taken to next stage when Indian fiscal and security resources are hopefully in much better shape in future to provide such buffer and room in apex relative "prestige" realms...... compared to now where there is intense demand pressure relative to supply.


But unfortunately Indian navy has dropped the ball on submarine realm strategy for a few decades now....with piecemeal and counter-intuitive approach ever since the HDW versus DCNS debacle in 80s/90s and switch (and having to restart ToT and networking all over again in SSK compared to say Koreans who have benefited immensely by consistency with HDW).

SSN chapter would have needed extra political, bureaucratic and economic capital to fit on top of this to take forward more seamlessly and robustly in Indian context....but since these SSK foundations are shaky, from Indian defence establishment POV it will be expensive to insert and accelerate relative to above-surface domain capital assets (big or small).

The above-surface conventional ship stuff India has much better track record, consistency and bureaucratic inertia, this is likely part of the reasoning to go for 3rd carrier (and all required/allocated surface ships to support it) against more neutral objective assessment (which would push for SSN).