INS Viraat has life left: Commanding Officer

[ANPP]

Its a life extension, the IN is trying desperately to keep at least one carrier operational somehow.
Those Harriers are limited in range, lack in air refueling and have outdated avionics. The Viraat would have to get very close to enemy territory and remember that its defense systems are outdated as well, except of the Barak SAM.

Twice of ACC VIkramaditya & IAC1 is too small for any offshore operation alone. They cannot create air superiority & conduct gnd support/raid simultaneously and also for long time. So either they need air force support, thats limit their operational range.
In that case Viraat would provide a great benefit in operations. It would decrease load & operation would be more effecient

And about Harrier, they are very good palteform especially in gnd attack. They armed with now better radar, missiles which provide constant threat to our enemy(miraj3,f7 like fighter).

So untill IAC2, Viraay is feasible.

 

[Koovie]

Twice of ACC VIkramaditya & IAC1 is too small for any offshore operation alone. They cannot create air superiority & conduct gnd support/raid simultaneously and also for long time. So either they need air force support, thats limit their operational range.
In that case Viraat would provide a great benefit in operations. It would decrease load & operation would be more effecient

And about Harrier, they are very good palteform especially in gnd attack. They armed with now better radar, missiles which provide constant threat to our enemy(miraj3,f7 like fighter).

So untill IAC2, Viraay is feasible.

Absolutely no way. The IAC 2 will not enter service before 2020. And keeping this ship in service till that is a crime.

 

[cloud]

The very simple reason why IN is still operating it, to keep the existing talent/experience alive. Guess what would happen if IN doesn't have an ACC for even 2-3 years.. We will loose most if not all the experience we have had since decades of operating an ACC, it is because knowledge is best transfer by human interaction when we talk about experience/strategy.

But now when VIK comes, many people(atelast the commanders/enggs etc) working on VIRAT can be directly given the responsibility of VIK after a little training or to at-least train the new ones on a new ship immediately.

What bothers me is that Due to our Babus and no motivation in Govt and usual delays in everything, we actually retire everything from the ships to fighters after extracting every single drop of life from the machine. meaning it is not at all useful after next 4-5 years of retirement. Now what I want to say is that, If we were to get the full replacement for the Our MIGs by now, then we could have used the old ones rarely from now on (keeping it in force untill the operational maturity is gained on the new platform and use these MIG/Jag babies for (rare/very occasional training), so that they can still be made fully operational after around 2025 if need arises or even 2035.

In short, I meant retiring a machine 5 years before its life cycle and storing them except for rare/occasional use/maintenance. same way VIRAT could have turned into a very very good training ship for us untill even 2025-30(basically training the crew for upcoming 3 planned ACCs and still could be more then useful along with new ACCs in case of war, if we were to retire it from 2010 onwards from active duty and just giving it minor maintenance periodically. This also saves us from the huge cost of upgrading. As we don't need to upgrade them with the latest and costly techs urgently, we can wait and upgrade them later much cheaply.

 

[ANPP]

Absolutely no way. The IAC 2 will not enter service before 2020. And keeping this ship in service till that is a crime.

If it can, than no one should have any problem......right.

 

[Koovie]

If it can, than no one should have any problem......right.

It cant. The IN does want to operate it beyond 2020. The IN is just desperately trying to have at least one AC.

 

[janon]

The IN is just desperately trying to have at least one AC.

Yes, it is. But it is doing so for legitimate reasons, and not just for reasons of pride. They are not doing it just to be able to boast about being the only Asian navy that operates an aircraft carrier. They are doing so for the reasons I explained in my earlier post, for reasons that do give them real results of operational capability and warfighting ability.

If they had got the Vicky by 2008, they may have retired the viraat by now. But since they don't have any other carrier, they have no choice but to keep the viraat and harriers in operational condition, using every trick up their sleeve, and resorting to the good old Indian way of "jugaad".

 

[Koovie]

Yes, it is. But it is doing so for legitimate reasons, and not just for reasons of pride. They are not doing it just to be able to boast about being the only Asian navy that operates an aircraft carrier. They are doing so for the reasons I explained in my earlier post, for reasons that do give them real results of operational capability and warfighting ability.

If they had got the Vicky by 2008, they may have retired the viraat by now. But since they don't have any other carrier, they have no choice but to keep the viraat and harriers in operational condition, using every trick up their sleeve, and resorting to the good old Indian way of "jugaad".

Yap, experience in operating an AC is probably the most important factor. And yes, we Indians know how to use completely outdated stuff into eternity

 

[Mritunjaya]

INS Viraat remains the MOST POWERFUL attack and defense platform for the Indian Navy.

No other ship including INS Delhi can compete against an Air Craft carrier.

Viraat has a longer reach to strike the enemy due to its air borne assets and longer eyes and ears to defend itself. It has more helicopters to detect and destroy submarines than any other destroyer with the Indian Navy.

Even with only 2 harriers INS Viraat will be more powerful than INS Delhi. Its a bunch of nonsense to claim a destroyer or a frigate can ever be more powerful than an Aircraft carrier.

 

[Sergi]

@Koovie : CBG operation doctrine of IN is not like US navy and will not be like that in coming decades as well.
Non of our carrier and CBG is mean to project force beyond IOR and we might never use them as a offensive tool. And situation is not likely to change even after arrival of much awaited "VikiDi" and "IAC-1"

IN is NOT a fully blue water navy yet. We need a lot more things for that which are not on the horizons in near future.