Expected, according to several reports, to be cleared by the Indian government at any time, DefenseNews reports now that India’s Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), the apex body that paves the way for contract signing, has cleared the Indian Air Force Mirage-2000 upgrade deal with Dassault (also MBDA, Thales and HAL). The deal, expected to be between $2.1-2.4 billion will involve the upgrade of 51 platforms.
There’s no official confirmation yet on the DefenseNews report. Will post if it comes in.
More Livefist posts on the IAF Mirage-2000 upgrade here and here.
Hi, there is lot of buzz online that the upgrade is rip-off at 50mil/fighter. But some are saying that it is a good deal. For as not-so-informed-but-interested person can I know how MoD substantiates this deal to go-ahead.
IAF is looking for much more as there a talk in the air that India may more
mirage( that of Greece which they will exchange with Rafale and from Qatar too)
Looking in to the modern times, this upgrade may be costlier. But in overall perspective this effort may be fruitful to India in the long run, because many of these upgrades are supposed to be advanced.
This news only means one thing i.e. EF has been selected in the MMRCA competition.
Stop this holy crap and focus on AMCA. Spending billions on Mirage, Mig-29 and Jaguar is silly. Our effort should be to put the best available and acquirable Tech on AMCA and roll it out almost in the same timeframe as Indian version of FGFA.
AMCA is the only ray of hope for India.
The road is now clear to award the MMRCA contract to Thoofan. US gets big C-17 job, France got the Mirage upgrade, Russia got the PAKFA deal and so now time to please England and Germany. The poor Swedes get nothing.
Cujo
does it has to do anything with mirages success at high altitude during kargil and the fact that it is supposed to carry nukes if needed.
Shiv wats ur take on as why India is goin for upgrade instead of an outright purchase new jets…wats behind the scenes
What's the story behind dumping Derby (Israeli missile).
– nanovacuum (US)
Being a complete novice in these matters, I fail to understand how is it sane to pay for upgrades, a price equivalent to the price of a new aircraft? That too for aircrafts which were procured in the 1980s? Aren't the aircrafts already more than 20 years old and hasn't the technology advanced during these years?
India got into the strangle hold of the Russian bear for decades until it realized very recently that the bear got very greedy and wanted as much as it can squeeze from us.
Now it looks like the French has taken over that role. The French having found that Indian baboos can be bought has inflated the cost of refurbishing the Mirage fighters to an exorbitant USD50million a piece. That is so much more than a new Tejas Mk2 or slightly lower than a GripenNG.
The Scorpeone submarine deal is languishing and the promised TOT is not forthcoming at a good pace. The reason given by the French is that Indians are slow at picking up cutting edge technology and are slow in ramping up the necessary tooling. The first submarine is slated to be inducted in a few years!
The Rafale is a good fighter, no doubts about it but is it prudent to give the French everything like what was done before with the Russians. The greed with which the French demand for the refurbishment of the Mirage shows they are no better than the Russians.
The IAF might as well order more Rafale or channel that USD2+billion to produce Tejas Mk2. The required R&D put in might come in handy for the AMCA.
Could be a price factor, its cheaper for the french to use their existing avionics for Mirage 2000-5 Mk2 based on Rafale.
I hope the french do not try to have such a restriction (of using french missiles only) for Rafale. It will significantly affect the MMRCA decision against France, as India would seek for commonality of armament in its fleet. Also Israel missiles are and will be a significant part of India's arsenal.
MiG upgrades 63 A/C for $965 million whereas 51 Mirage costs us $ 2.4 Billion….Babu mathmatics is great !!!
Can anyone say rip-off?
Dear
Shiv Aroor
Its now certain that Rafale and Typhoon have been finalized for final negotiations on MMRCA, but I have few querries which I would be glad if you answer.
Q1 Reports are floating that Gripen was disqualified chiefly because it could not field a viable AESA radar, is it true.
Q2 Saab plans to re-enter the MMRCA race stating that as the AESA it will fit on Gripen will also be used by Rafale and if Rafale is selected so should be Gripen, is it possible?
Q3 Some talk is going round that India will sign the US$ 2 billion plus deal to upgrade Mirage 2000, and once the upgrades start France will handover the Mirage 2000 jets to India which it planned to buy from Qatar (which has reportedly been returned to France) for upgrade and use.
Q4 Some say India plans to augment its fleet of Mirage 2000 with those from Greece which the Greek government wants to exchange with France in return for Rafales, upgrade them and ultimate field 40 of those under SFC. Can this be really a possibility
Awaiting your reply
Thanks
Joydeep Ghosh
Now it clearly makes sense to go for Rafale : commonality. The Mirage deal is an opportunity to get Rafale B and M at a lower price.
It seems it's better not to upgrade the Mirage-2000'S but utilize the money for speeding up the Tejas-Mark II variant and also to go in for mass production of Tejas aircrafts that will replace all the Migs and the Mirage-2000.
What happened to the Israeli bid to upgrade our Mirages? They did a pretty ok job with some of our planes. If reports are to be believed, they helped us with bringing Su-30 up to MKI standards.
Guess there is more to the deal than what meets the eye.
Joydeep, initial reports suggest Su's will form the SFC. Speculation rife that they could be Su-35's instead of MKI's. Lets see what eventually happens.
""What happened to the Israeli bid to upgrade our Mirages? They did a pretty ok job with some of our planes. ""
It was a failure actually and the israeli missile was a dud !
Paying $2.4 bn for 51 a/c seems like a rip-off given the fact that we have shortlisted Rafale. We should have bargained for a better deal. And even after upgrades, will Mirage 2000 be 4.5++ generation a/c? We could have bought new Gripen or F-16!
Well the upgrade is really expensive, why not just let the upgrades be, at abt 35 mil a plane we can get M-35 OVT.. though its not tried and tested, it is new aircraftl
Or let us try and bid with Israel, Israel has done well with their upgradations of Mirages called Kfirs so they should be interested too
45 mil + for a plane… how is going to Italy ??
47.5 million per plane is very high considering the price of upgrade, at that price we can buy outright F-16 IN super viper,
So i do think that some money is definitely going to Switzerland or ITALY !!!
This deal on another way to stop missiles/Technology flow from french to pakis , france has cancelled the offer to supply missiles and radar's for JF-17, even though the price for that is high , india naturally gained from it , mica is v powerful AAM it has two way sensors , no other AAM has this capacity .french price is naturally high but product support is perfect .
Meanwhile Dassault production chain is building Rafale First serie tranche 4 AESA+ osf ng+ improved sptectra etc to be delivered end of this year!
Things that Selex can only dream of, though they get only 19$m to fullfill the tiny starving team of under developped, under budgeted AESA EFT antenna only ( they keep the back end duhh ) till 2018
shiv
u dont reply to our questions ,what is the use of writing in this blog
Damn the "upgrade" mentality of this country! India is going nowhere with this type of procurement policy. They keep buying products and never learn how to make the products themselves. What a sick bloody country!
@ Anonymous 12.57 pm
I can understand the frustration but there are several points which you should know
a) No one makes aircraft and puts them in stocks for countries to buy. They are produced as per orders.
b) Production of Aircraft takes anywhere between few months to years as they have to arrange for jigs, secure the material, and ensure that the components are up to the optimum level.
Cost of new plane has cost of plane + part cost of research and development + higher price (so they can give their mother country cheaper planes than us also mostly the products are downgraded (we dont get a particular radar etc)
For example after the MMRCA order is given, we can expect the first aircraft well after 2014 (after 3 years)
For an upgrade the time taken is much lesser as when they anticipate the order, the company (here Dasasult) know that we cannot get upgrades from other for our Mirage 2000, it is question of just "when and what price"
The engines what will be upgraded will be from the latest Rafale Engines (these are in production for French Rafales)
The Avionics will be from Rafale
So physically the Aircraft will be Mirage 2000 but electronically and technically it will be more closer to Rafale
so we are able to get semi-Rafale at cheaper cost.
Also when we give 40 aircraft to upgrade, we dont send all 40 planes but in batches maybe 10-20 each so this way
the other aircraft are present and available for service. The next batch is sent after the first batch is back after
trial and testing and ensuring that the sytems are working and upgraded as per our requirment.
Upgrade time is usually very less what takes time is testing to ensure that the plane performs as per the expectations
I think only the main airframe stays same, rest all is upgraded.New Radar, new avionics, new software, better control of aircraft, they might put in a cushion just in case you want !
Hope now your question is answered.
Sachine