Was Exercise Indradhush all about Gauging Eurofighter’s performance?

[$@rJen]

Was Exercise Indradhush all about Gauging Eurofighter’s performance?
Published October 29, 2015 | By admin
SOURCE: SUDESH CHARI / FOR MY TAKE / IDRW.ORG

Earlier this year India air force and Royal Air-force were pitted against each other in Joint Air and Ground Exercise Indradhush. 4 Sukhoi-30MKI aircrafts of No 2 Squadron ” Winged Arrows ” based at Air force base in Tezpur Assam flew all the way to United kingdom for combined exercise against Eurofighter Typhoons.

Two-week long exercises by Indian contingent of 4 Sukhoi-30MKI aircrafts and 185 Personnel’s saw accomplishment of different missions between IAF and RAF but much stressed were laid on Air defence Missions both in BVR and WVR exercises which progressed from one versus one DACT to Two versus then even to large fixed formation flying which saw almost 20 aircrafts .

As soon as Sukhoi’s landed back in India there were reports in Indian media about Superior performance and scoreline of 12.0 was confirmed by Gp Capt Ashu Srivastav in favour of Indian Sukhoi’s. Srivastav also confirmed that in one versus one or in two versus one both in WVR and BVR engagement Sukhoi’s were able to out turn Eurofighter.

Later Both Indian Air force and MOD retracted their initial claim after a protest was lodged from RAF and soon after matter went cold. Many Defence Analyst now believe that Excercise Indradhush was all about informal pitting of India’s Sukhoi against Eurofighter to decide whether to accept German offer of reconsidering on Eurofighter aircrafts after it lost the MMRCA Bid to French Rafale.

15 Pilots and 5 WSO send to the UK for Excercise Indradhush were all experienced campaigners, Gp Capt Ashu Srivastav who headed the contingent himself has been credited with more than 2000 hours on Sukhoi’s while Squadron leader Avi Arya who is qualified Weapons instructor for Sukhoi’s was also part of the team, many of the other pilots selected for the Exercises were familiar with Royal Airforce tactics since many had been trained under RAF in Hawk Ajts training programme.

Gp Capt Ashu Srivastav had also confirmed that onboard forward-facing NIIP N011M Bars Radars while in Training mode where having maximum Scan range like it could under operational missions which along with IRST and Thrust vectoring enabled Sukhois in getting an edge over Eurofighters.

Srivastav also confirmed that BVR Missiles like R-27/R-77 were simulated in the BVR Missions and R-73 in WVR missions and Sukhoi high AOA ( Angle of attack ) and Thrust vectoring engines played Crucial roles and IRST proved to be a distant advantage for IAF’s Pilots in close combats.

Few Weeks later after Excercise Indradhush the German Ambassador to India Dr Martin Ney officially announced that German Government’s decade-long Eurofighter Typhoon fighter plane campaign in India was over and German Chancellor Angela Merkel while in India earlier this month also didn’t pitch for the possible sale of Eurofighter Typhoons to India, bringing end to their MMRCA Competition.

It’s now pretty clear that Exercise Indradhush was used has an informal event to test the performance of Eurofighter against an similar aircraft which it could have likely faced near China front where IAF plans to situate its current Rafale fighter jets.

 

[Razia Sultana]

Euro fighter is mostly equated with Dassault Rafale and often the EF is given a slight edge. If Sukhoi could prove superior to Euro fighter then what is the need for Rafales?

 

[jaiind]

i was thinking the same about this exercise.. some thing was cooking behind some scenes to analyses and test the ET.

Euro fighter is mostly equated with Dassault Rafale and often the EF is given a slight edge. If Sukhoi could prove superior to Euro fighter then what is the need for Rafales?

SU Could nt be used as a fighter bomber... its mainly used for air dominance...

 

[Styx]

we should stage another "informal event" with France to see how the Rafales hold up to the MKI. So much drama with the French when we have a great vendor with top of the line products, why a "medium" fighter when IAF could just get more Russian heavies ?

 

[jaiind]

we should stage another "informal event" with France to see how the Rafales hold up to the MKI. So much drama with the French when we have a great vendor with top of the line products, why a "medium" fighter when IAF could just get more Russian heavies ?

i think they had evaluated the rafales with su's. thats the reason rafale is making noise by IAF.

 

[volatile]

we should stage another "informal event" with France to see how the Rafales hold up to the MKI. So much drama with the French when we have a great vendor with top of the line products, why a "medium" fighter when IAF could just get more Russian heavies ?

I think this has been done already also during MRCA evaluation phase IAF evaluated all these birds in and out so whats the point of this article ,Is IAF not confident about there own evalution ?

 

[topgun047]

Rafale is better than EF at low level flying which makes it better for CAS and deep penetration strikes.

 

[$@rJen]

Euro fighter is mostly equated with Dassault Rafale and often the EF is given a slight edge. If Sukhoi could prove superior to Euro fighter then what is the need for Rafales?

In a Dog fight thumps up to mki... but it still has a huge RCS... for a sead or surgical strikes inside the enemy area we need rafale that's why IAF is hell bend on inducting them

 

[vayuputhra]

This euro fighter BS is not going to come to India the GOI has serious doubts on this because it is manufactured by multiple agencies in multiple countries and Italy which India cannot trust, they have many times threatened to withhold supply of spares or other materials if India doesn't listen to it, so euro fighter is gone, and as for evaluation it has been evaluated a lot, there is not much difference between rafaele and eurofighter.

 

[rockstarIN]

I think this has been done already also during MRCA evaluation phase IAF evaluated all these birds in and out so whats the point of this article ,Is IAF not confident about there own evalution ?

They had evaluation points and reports just like, engine performance, AoA etc. It is not necessarily on all around performance. Also not that, EF won the evaluation along with Rafale.

i think they had evaluated the rafales with su's. thats the reason rafale is making noise by IAF.

They just love Mk2, due to its performance and low maintenance along with availability ratio.

54 rafales will be available out of 60 (90% availability if you calculate with M2K ) for combat where as only 50 MKIs will be available out of 100 (50% availability)

Thats the advantage with french planes.

 

[$@rJen]

54 rafales will be available out of 60 (90% availability if you calculate with M2K ) for combat where as only 50 MKIs will be available out of 100 (50% availability)

Thats the advantage with french planes.

I think the availability of mki's raised to more than of 70% and next goal to raise around 90% in 2-5 years

 

[zebra7]

LOLZ what a article heading Indradhanush exercise for gauging Eurofighter then what was they doing in MMRCA with more than 600 evolution tests. It was the most extensive and detailed evaluation in the whole world between fighter planes, and all of the participant countries praise for its unbiased way. When the result and data is already with the IAF and GOI, now how are they relying on the pilots experiencing DACT fight with MKI. Pure indication of Yellow Desi author desperate to write something on defense.

These types of DACT exercise is not meant for competition, but to know each other Airforce, how they work, and to develop some way of understanding so that they could work together during Multi-nation exercise or Mission.

Onething is Clear these Eurofighter consordium haven't loose their hope till now. Remember how they gives the statement that Dasault could never deliver Rafale on time- 2years.

Those who are thinking that something is cooking behind the scene few question :-

1. Both EF and Rafale are Multirole but EF is Airsuperiority with ground role as secondary, and Rafale as Ground attack with secondary A2A. . We already have MKI and later Super MKI in high number, why we need EF and who think EF > MKI

2. When both govt and IAF have zeroed on Rafale, why wasting time on EF.

3. Requirement --- Which is long range terrain following, terrain masking, radar avoidance aka Rafale, why EF which will have AESA in 2020, don't have carrier version, very Costly, Deal from 5 countries instead of 1.

4. Do you agree that Rafale is the shortgap requirement till FGFA/PAK-FA is ready.

5. What is the benefit of EF instead of Rafale

Regards

 

[PARIKRAMA]

Air Superiority vs omnirole... one is getting A2G via upgrades over time. Other has a mix bag running already for different missions..

One side note for sure is if India was "signing" EF deal now then i can guess even in signing ceremony Italian representative may hold a playcard saying "free marines"!!!

The consortium with UK Germany is still acceptable but Italy.... I think GOI did a very good thing as avoiding EF.. seems we have to keep pleasing too many nations for a sustained supply...

Anyways adding more of Air superiority (primary) platforms does not make too much sense...if needed it should be a either PAKFA 5th gen when it comes or add more Su30MKI for air superiority buildup..

 

[Agent_47]

54 rafales will be available out of 60 (90% availability if you calculate with M2K ) for combat where as only 50 MKIs will be available out of 100 (50% availability)

MKI availability will increase to 70% by year end.

India defence minister admits Su-30 serviceability issues - IHS Jane's 360

 

[Abingdonboy]

LOLZ what a article heading Indradhanush exercise for gauging Eurofighter then what was they doing in MMRCA with more than 600 evolution tests. It was the most extensive and detailed evaluation in the whole world between fighter planes, and all of the participant countries praise for its unbiased way. When the result and data is already with the IAF and GOI, now how are they relying on the pilots experiencing DACT fight with MKI. Pure indication of Yellow Desi author desperate to write something on defense.

These types of DACT exercise is not meant for competition, but to know each other Airforce, how they work, and to develop some way of understanding so that they could work together during Multi-nation exercise or Mission.

Onething is Clear these Eurofighter consordium haven't loose their hope till now. Remember how they gives the statement that Dasault could never deliver Rafale on time- 2years.

Those who are thinking that something is cooking behind the scene few question :-

1. Both EF and Rafale are Multirole but EF is Airsuperiority with ground role as secondary, and Rafale as Ground attack with secondary A2A. . We already have MKI and later Super MKI in high number, why we need EF and who think EF > MKI

2. When both govt and IAF have zeroed on Rafale, why wasting time on EF.

3. Requirement --- Which is long range terrain following, terrain masking, radar avoidance aka Rafale, why EF which will have AESA in 2020, don't have carrier version, very Costly, Deal from 5 countries instead of 1.

4. Do you agree that Rafale is the shortgap requirement till FGFA/PAK-FA is ready.

5. What is the benefit of EF instead of Rafale

Regards

Well said- yet more BS from IDRW.