It’s Official: IAF To Get ‘3 x BrahMos’
Load-Out Option By 2021
Shiv AroorJun 30 2017 9 20 am
The Indian Air Force’s original wish to deploy fighters
with three BrahMos supersonic stand-off cruise missiles is now an official,
timeframed project for the Indo-Russian partnership. Livefist can
confirm that BrahMos, which kickstarted an effort in 2012 to spin off a BrahMos
variant that weighed half as much as the original and dimensional smaller, has
formally committed to putting the new missile into test mode by 2021, with the
specific aim of giving the IAF a three-missile loadout option. The effort to shrink
the BrahMos, first revealed here on Livefist in 2012, also aims to
extend the capability to the IAF’s upgraded MiG-29s, incoming
Rafale jets and Indian Navy’s MiG-29Ks, none of which can currently
deploy a BrahMos-A. The smaller BrahMos is likely to be designated the BrahMos
NG (the BrahMos-2 is the in-development hypersonic
version of the missile).
While the Su-30 will be able to weild the BrahMos NG in a
three-missile load-out, other platforms will get the weapon system in a single
or twin missile load-out configuration depending on simulations that will be
completed this year.
The fresh effort actually brings things full circle for
the IAF. It had originally hoped the Su-30MKI platform could be modified
satisfactorily to deploy three BrahMos-A missiles — two on the wings, and one
on special belly hardpoint. Structural studies by HAL and Sukhoi Design Bureau
concluded that the modifications were technically risky and economically
unacceptable. Following six sets of
carriage and separation trials, one of two modified IAF Su-30 MKIs will
test-fire a BrahMos-A from its belly hardpoint for the first time next month
against a ship target in the Bay of Bengal.
Given the stand-off posture an air-launched BrahMos will
have with its 300 km range (to be extended progressively to over 900 km), a
three-weapon loadout option is an sharp leg up for mission flexibility and
planning.
Like the existing BrahMos base weapon, the BrahMos-3 is
being developed for submarine launch. While the original BrahMos will be
deployable from a vertical silo stack, the miniaturised BrahMos is being
developed for firing from torpedo tubes. Livefist can confirm that BrahMos
Corp. has held discussions with the likely contenders in India’s looming mega
conventional submarine build programme, the Project 75I, and locked down
assurances that their bids will include confirmation that the BrahMos can be
deployed for vertical launch from their platforms with necessary modifications.
Russia’s Rubin Design Bureau and Germany’s ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems have
made formal confirmations to this effect on their Amur 1650 and Class
214 boats respectively.
In an interesting related development at the
International Maritime Defence Show 2017 currently on in St Petersburg, Russian
officials have revealed the Rubin Design Bureau and India’s DRDO may sign a
cooperation agreement on their respective air independent propulsion (AIP)
efforts. DRDO chief S. Christopher, who visited Russia in March, is understood
to have been keen to forge a partnership so that India’s work so far on an indigenous AIP doesn’t lose
out to delivery timeframes to the Indian Navy.
To be executed under India’s new strategic partnership
policy, the P75I programme RFP is expected early 2018, with India’s L&T and
Reliance Defence likely to face off in the multi-billion contest to build six
winning submarine types in country.
Source: livefistdefence.com
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