Russia building nuclear submarines for India

www.hindu.com ^ | 13-10-04

[sukhoi-30mki]

Russia building nuclear submarines for India

By Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW, OCT. 13. Russia is building two nuclear submarines for the Indian Navy, a leading business daily here reported.

The construction of two unfinished nuclear submarines of Project 971 resumed this month at the Amur Shipyards in Komsomolsk-on-the-Amur, the Kommersant newspaper said. The building of the submarines was suspended several years ago due to lack of funds.

Under an agreement with Russia, India will lease the two submarines and will provide money to enable the Amur Shipyards to complete their construction. According to the report, India has already made an advance payment of $100 million on the contract worth $1.6 billion to $1.7 billion. Even though there are no international restrictions on the sale of nuclear submarines to India, the Defence Ministers emphatically denied they had as much as discussed the deal during their meeting in Delhi in January.

Improved version

The Project 971 improved version of Akula-II class submarine is a far more formidable man of war than a Charlie-class nuclear submarine India leased from Russia in 1988-1991.

Akula-II is the most advanced Russian nuclear attack submarine that is comparable to the U.S. Sea Wolf and modernised Los Angeles-class submarines. It features an Air Independent Propulsion (AIP) which enables the 12,770-tonne vessel to remain underwater for three months.

The Russian Navy's Project 971 submarines are equipped with 28 cruise missiles each armed with nuclear or conventional warheads with a striking range of 3,000 km.

However, the Indian version is expected to be armed with the 300-km Club nuclear-capable missiles already installed on the Krivak-class frigates and Kilo-class diesel submarines Russia has built for India.

Experts said the two submarines would strengthen India's naval might and advance India's indigenous nuclear submarine programme.

[sukhoi-30mki]

Wow!!!These rumours have been around for well,ages.The Russians had initially offered 2 Akulas as carrots for India to buy the Russian aircraft carrier,Admiral Gorshkov.Now that deal's been signed,I think the sub lease would logically have followed.The icing on the cake would be for India to fit the Israeli Popeye Turbo cruise missile on this sub(& Give that India is Israel's largest arms buyer-it is realistic).That would really give the folks in Beijing & Shanghai a bit to think about. Afterall,nuke subs are the only real 2nd strike capability ,India can think of against China.These subs will be complemented by India's own homebuilt nuke subs which will hit the seas by 2007-08(& The Israelis offered to help out with that when Ariel Sharon visited New Delhi last year). & before anybody says it,these subs have NOTHING TO DO with the Pakistanis-India's D/E subs are more than effective against them.

[BladeLWS]

Russia giving two 971's to India? Holy cow, those subs are some of the fastest in the world, and one of the most powerful types.

[sukhoi-30mki]

well it was offered so that India would accept the price that the Russians quoted for the carrier Gorshkov & besides India wanted a 2nd strike capability against China.Moreover,though China buys more weaponry from Russia,India still remains Moscow's more favoured arms buyer.Just check who brought the Klub cruise missile & Su-30 fighter first??

[BladeLWS]

Here's some data on Project 971, Akula class. They are more powerful than anything China has in its naval arsenal.

http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ship/row/rus/971.htm

http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/akula/

[ruready4eternity]

Canada should offer them their referbished British Subs from WW2. Them things are dandy! BTW, are not subs irrelevant in a day of GPS systems? WHat can a sub actually do ? WHere can it hide from the satellites?

[George Smiley]

I can see it now:

Inbound torpedoes detected, Captain!

Helmsman Chidambaram Palaniyappan! Take evasive action immediately!

Helmsman Chidambaram Palani-(BOOM!)

[shankbear]

I really hope India has very deep water ports where these Ruskie made deathtraps can sink!!!!

[ruready4eternity]

"deathtraps "
Thats all they are, poor B***ards who have to operate them. Nothing like being enclosed in that capsule and have a lazer in the sky put a little red dot on you and "highlight" you. What a splash!

[sukhoi-30mki]

Ping!!!

[rmlew]

What the heck are you talking about?
Surfaced subs are viewable by sattelite, not submerged ones.

[ruready4eternity]

You think submerged subs cannot be spotted on the ocean floor?

[ASA Vet]

are not subs irrelevant in a day of GPS systems?

You think the Global Positioning Satellite system is a recon platform?

[CarrotAndStick]

WTF!?! Hey man, I think a stronger India is in the interests of a safer America. When the Chinese come screaming, it wouldn't be a very pretty picture for most of us. Sure, you'll go all jingoistic and say that the US can counter any of the Chinese threats, but as far as I know, there are twenty-odd Chinese nuclear ICBMs pointed at America, which the latter can do nothing(nada) to counter at present. If nothing is done about the Chinese now, the way they are progressing, it won't be soon before they cross the point of no-return, if they haven't done so already.

[TalonDJ]

You demonstrate a significant lack of knowledges about the technology. Combat subs can't even reach the ocean floor except near land. And no, they are not trackable by satellites unless there are some new magic voodoo satalites out there. They are probably equipped with those 'Y' shaped sticks. I hear you can find anything with those.

[sukhoi-30mki]

Dude,Palaniyappan Chidambaram is not a fictional character-he is the finance minister of India.

Shankbear,

India does have excellent deepwater facilities in Visakhpatnam(east coast) & Mumbai(west coast)-infact the security & facilities at Indian naval bases is one of the reasons that attracted the Israelis to further naval cooperation with India. India has operated Russian & German D/E subs since the late 60s & has had no problem .It even leased a 'Charlie-1' nuclear cruise missile sub in the late 80s.Besides haven't US nuclear subs faced problems(IIRC ,2 have been lost)??

[sukhoi-30mki]

Yep ,you can spot combat subs on the Ocean Floor, slight problem is they will be in a thousand pieces!!!For common sense sake,naval subs will simply pop like a balloon at that dept-such is the pressure exerted down there.If im not mistaken,most nuke subs don't go down more than 450 metres & D/Es always have to stay higher than that.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Good to hear India is getting the "improved" version of Russia's submarines. That must mean a lead nut cup is optional.

[Nowhere Man]

WTF!?! Hey man, I think a stronger India is in the interests of a safer America. When the Chinese come screaming, it wouldn't be a very pretty picture for most of us. Sure, you'll go all jingoistic and say that the US can counter any of the Chinese threats, but as far as I know, there are twenty-odd Chinese nuclear ICBMs pointed at America, which the latter can do nothing(nada) to counter at present. If nothing is done about the Chinese now, the way they are progressing, it won't be soon before they cross the point of no-return, if they haven't done so already.

I've had similar thoughts especially with the war on Islamo-fascism, we might have to have a three part axis in Eurasia with Russia, Red China, and India since those three powers are very conserned with the Islamo-fascists. I don't consider Red China a true blue friend at all, at least in their current form, but they are concerned about the rise of Islam in their Western provinces. Of course, you pointed out the threat of Red China in their current form so India can be used as a counter to that.

[rmlew]

It is my understanding that Russian subs are behind American and British nuclear subs in two key areas, accoustic signature, and sonar processing.
The ChiComs are trying to get around this by using French equipment.
Are the Indians going to work on the electronics for their new Akulas? I imagine that using off-the-shelf processors for analysing accoustic data will increse the effectiveness of these subs.

[sukhoi-30mki]

whatever!!the Indian military have been known to work their Russian systems to the limits & squeeze out more than the expected performance.For eg,in the 1971 Bangladesh war,Indian missile boats used their SSN-2 'Styx' missiles to sink Pakistani ships & also hit land based oil facilities at Karachi(a good 20 years before the Tomahawk went sightseeing over Baghdad)-the Soviets were stunned by this & never even expected that the Styx could be used in such a role.In the mid 90s,when Israeli military observers witnessed Indian armour exercises,they exclaimed that they "never expected the T-72 was this capable"-all they had seen was Syria's few T-72s blow up before they rolled into battle.Now that can be expected for these boats too,esp if Israeli or French electronics are used.