Rafael fires Spike missiles in Indian evaluation

[jha]

APACHE will come with its own weapon set..SPIKE/PARS is being bought for RUDRA (LUH if LCH is delayed )..Since SPIKE has proved itself and is already a success, there is no point in going for a new system like PARS..

 

[sancho]

@ guest11

124 is the number of Arjun mk2 ordered so far. 114 LCH and ~40 Rudra are supposed to carry ATGMs. Do you really think that they are going for the commonality between 124 tanks and 150 + choppers? And one more thing, Lahat is subsonic(wiki) whereas Pars has a speed of ~ 1.5 mach and much higher penetration level.

It's not about commonality between tanks and choppers, it's about reducing cost! Even if we take your fugures (which are not correct, since the MK1s will be upgraded to use the same missile as well and more orders of Arjun are likely), 124 tanks + 40 Rudra and just take to account 8 x missiles per unit => 1312 missiles ! ! ! The real figure will be much higher and that alone shows what potential there is to reduce the procurement and logistical costs. Besides that, I already showed that the lighter LAHAT is more suited for Rudra, since in can carry more of them and still can attack armored vehicles with it, so capabilitywise it would be an advantage as well.

MH-60L Direct Action Penetrator (DAP) is an example of air assault helicopter or an armed helicopter. Don't get mixed up between armed and attack helicopters. Dropping troops in a hot zone providing fire support while doing so and having a limited anti armour or air defence capability is how you can define an armed or air assault chopper.

You are comparing it with the requirements of US forces, which is the first mistake, since Indian forces have other doctrines andrequirements. But you also compare the Dhruv plattform with the Black Hawk, which is a class above the Dhruv! It makes much more sense to use such an helicopter for special ops, because it is bigger, can carry more passengers/payload and has longer range too. That was also the reason why IN rejected the naval Dhruv as an ASW solution and prefers the bigger Sea Hawk, or NH90s instead. What makes the difference to the MH 60L even more obvious is, that they even increased the range with inflight refuelling capability and customized it with special avionics like terrain following modes, which are needed for such special ops, but that is not the case for Rudra!

Again, the major difference to the normal Dhruv is, that Rudra is a weaponised version to provide fire support!

New Delhi: Army's aerial firepower capabilities will get a boost as it is soon going to induct the attack version of indigenously-built Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH) 'Rudra'.

The 'Rudra' is the first weaponised chopper built in the country and will be inducted into the Army Aviation Corps in the current financial year, army officials said...

...Integration of the weaponised aerial platform into the army will provide the field commanders the ability to apply decisive combat power at critical times anywhere in the battle field, they said.

Rudra is an armed variant of the ALH Dhruva chopper and "necessary changes have been made in the airframe of the chopper to give it agility and speed to make it a suitable support weapon for the ground troops".

Army to soon get indigenous weaponised chopper


During Kargil war IAF was forced to use weaponized Mi 17 helicopters to not only transport troops to higher altitute areas, but also to provide fire support, because the Mi 35 combat helicopters couldn't be used there. Dhruv in general is developed with the aim of beeing used in high altitudes and Rudra will take over the same fire support role ( later added with LCH), even independently from IAF.


From BR:

Mil Mi-17 [Hip] Pratap

Progressively replacing the Mi-8 in IAF service. The Mi-17s were very active in providing CAS (Close Air Support) to Indian troops during the Kargil campaigns during 1999 at altitudes in excess of 15,000 feet.

From Vayu Sena:

A Mi-17 fires rockets on Pakistani positions in the summer of 1999 during Op Safedsagar. The operations over Kargil were at a much higher altitude compared to the rest of Jammu and Kashmir.

With its chinmounted gun, the defence systems and the fact that it is smaller, faster and more agile than the Mi 17, they will be more capable in this role, especially if IA operates them as they need it. With this in mind, rocket pods and the lighter LAHAT ATGMs in higher numbers should be more useful (and cost-effective) than carrying limited numbers of heavy weight ATGMs. But the forces has often a tendency to buy different weapons and systems, just to distinguish from each other and MoD should interfere here.