Tuesday, 17 June 2008
Arjun versus T-90: Army avoiding trials (link is the title)
by Ajai Shukla
Business Standard, 17th June 08
India’s Arjun tank is fighting its first battle even before it enters service with the army. The Defence R&D Organisation (DRDO) and key Ministry of Defence (MoD) officials, confident that the Arjun is superior to the army’s Russian T-72 and T-90 tanks, are demanding “comparative trials”, where the Arjun, the T-72 and the T-90, are put through endurance and firing trials in identical conditions.
But the army --- particularly the nodal Directorate General of Mechanised Forces (DGMF) --- is shying away. Earlier, the DGMF declared that the T-72 and T-90 were proven tanks, which needed no further trials. Now, with the MoD adding its voice to the demand for comparative trials, the DGMF has told Business Standard that they must be put off until the army gets a full squadron of Arjun tanks (14 tanks) and absorbs the expertise to use them.
DRDO sources say the army is stonewalling on accepting the Arjun by demanding levels of performance that neither of its Russian tanks can deliver. Meanwhile, more T-90s are being imported from Russia on the plea that the army is falling short of tanks.
The DRDO’s fears are grounded in experience. On 28th July 2005, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee informed Parliament, “The Arjun tank is superior to (the) T-90 tank due to its high power to weight ratio, superior fire on the move capability during day and night and excellent ride comfort. MBT Arjun has gone through all the tests and it is meeting the (requirements) of the Army.”
But a year later, in December 2007, India bought 347 more T-90s for Rs 4900 crores. That despite the MoD’s admission in Parliament that the 310 T-90s purchased earlier had problems with their Invar missile systems, and the thermal imagers that are crucial for night fighting.
A comparative trial, says the DRDO, will conclusively establish that the Arjun is a better tank than the T-90. That will at least put a stop to the import of more T-90s.
But the DGMF is putting off such a trial. The DG of Mechanised Forces, Lt Gen D Bhardwaj, told Business Standard, “The Arjun is based on a very stringent GSQR and is in a class by itself. User trials are conducted based on this GSQR. Nevertheless, comparative trials will be conducted once a squadron worth of tanks (i.e. 14 Arjun tanks) are inducted in the army.”
This new insistence on 14 tanks will delay the trials at least till December 08. In 2005, the army had agreed to comparative trials, with five Arjun tanks pitted against five T-72s and an equal number of T-90s. The DGMF had even written the trial directive, spelling out how trials would be conducted. Those trials were postponed as the Arjun was not ready to operate in high summer temperatures. Now the Arjun is ready, but the army is not.
Top MoD officials are no longer buying the DGMF’s argument that the Arjun is a dud; the MoD wants comparative trials too. Minister of State for Defence Production, Rao Inderjit Singh, told Business Standard, “The proof of the pudding will be in comparing the Arjun tank with the T-90 tank, as imported. The T-90 is supposed to be a frontline tank; let it have it out with the Arjun. Let them slug it out in the desert… and see which comes off best.”
Besides demanding more Arjun tanks in the trials, the DGMF is also proposing to conduct the trials differently. Comparative trials are normally a straightforward test of equipment capability, with all the tanks driving through the same course and firing at similar targets to determine which of them does better. But the DGMF now plans to add a tactical --- and therefore subjective --- dimension. The Arjun, the T-72 and the T-90 squadrons will be given operational tasks, e.g. capturing a hill some 150 kilometres away.
The DRDO is crying foul. Major General HM Singh, who spearheaded the Arjun’s development for the last 28 years until he retired a fortnight ago, points out that inserting tactics into the trials would give the army a way of putting down the Arjun. In a tactical exercise the tactical skills of the crew --- something that is irrelevant in evaluating a tank ---can determine the outcome of the trials. Gen HM Singh asks, “What is it that cannot be determined with five tanks, but can be with fourteen?”