Posted on 03/11/2005 11:37:24 PM PST by Righty_McRight
WASHINGTON - (KRT) - The Bush administration is expected to dramatically shift U.S. policy toward nuclear rivals India and Pakistan by approving F-16 fighter plane sales for each, industry officials said Friday.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit both nations next week as part of a six-country Asian tour and may confirm the sea change in U.S. arms sale policy during her visits, said an industry official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
India, which since the 1960s has refused to buy U.S. arms because of periodic sanctions that interrupted supplies, is soliciting bids for a purchase of 126 multirole fighter planes - a program estimated to be worth $7 billion to $9 billion.
Lockheed Martin Corp., which builds the F-16 in Fort Worth, Texas, won State Department approval in November to give India information on the plane.
Rice may use her visit to tell Indian officials that an F-16 sale will be approved if India chooses the plane, an industry official said.
Pakistan has been frustrated for years in its desire to buy new F-16s for its air force, which already has 32 older model F-16As and F-16Bs.
Congress canceled a sale of about two dozen F-16s to Pakistan in 1990 because of Islamabad's pursuit of nuclear weapons.
Pakistani officials hope Rice will confirm approval of their request to purchase 18 new F-16Cs and F-16Ds along with "mid-life update kits" to modernize their older models, the industry official said.
State Department spokeswoman Nancy Beck declined to comment.
Until terms of a sale are reached, Lockheed can't estimate how many jobs might be created in Fort Worth from such a sale.
Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Mary Jo Polidore said, "The potential sale of F-16s is a matter to be addressed by the United States Government with those countries. As usual, we stand ready to support the U.S. government's direction."
The Pakistan Times, quoting "diplomatic sources," reported from Islamabad on Friday that Rice was expected to "make an important announcement" there expressing a U.S. "willingness to resume the supply of F-16 fighter planes to Pakistan."
Policy analysts said any such arms deals likely would spark heated debate in Congress, but they saw little likelihood that sales to either country would be blocked.
Tight sanctions on selling arms to Pakistan or India were triggered when both countries tested nuclear devices in 1998, but the strictures have been eased in the intervening years.
"In Congress, the India lobby will say that Pakistan deserves nothing," said Stephen P. Cohen, a South Asia expert at the Brookings Institution. "The liberal arms controllers will say we're just fueling both sides of an arms race. But there aren't that many arms controllers in Congress anymore."
Husain Haqqani, a South Asia scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said, "By and large, Congress follows what the administration recommends in such matters" but "not without a fight."
"There will probably be a fight and the administration will probably win it," he said.
If India and Pakistan both buy the F-16, it would be good news for Lockheed's Fort Worth plant. But how good would depend on how a potential India contract was structured.
India wants to buy only 18 planes directly from the manufacturer. New Delhi proposes to get the other 108 in the 126-plane package by building them in India under license.
Structuring a deal that way would reduce the amount of work for Fort Worth, though a number of workers would be needed to put together parts kits for Indian workers to use in building the aircraft.
"It's like assembling a model kit for them, and the actual model kit is where the money is," aerospace industry analyst Richard Aboulafia of the Teal Group said.
Rice is to visit India and Pakistan as part of a March 14-21 trip that will include stops in Afghanistan, Japan, South Korea and China as well - her first Asian tour as secretary of state.
Such major arms sales would open a new chapter in U.S. relations with India - long a leader of the non-aligned movement - and indelibly mark the end of American efforts to use sanctions as a means of trying to curb India's and Pakistan's development of nuclear weapons.
Mostly Hindu India and mostly Muslim Pakistan have fought three wars since they were created by the British partition of colonial India in 1947 and have come close to armed conflict several other times.
India has traditionally bought most of its weaponry from Russia, and the Russian-made MiG-29M is one of the planes New Delhi is considering for the multirole fighter deal. Other planes under consideration are Sweden's Saab Gripen and France's Dassault Mirage 2000-5.
The administration has been fostering better relations with India since President Bush's first term, seeing the South Asian giant as a key potential ally.
U.S. relations with Pakistan have warmed steadily because of the staunch backing of its president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for the war on terrorism. The administration has approved $1.2 billion in other weapon sales to the country so far this year.
Haqqani, a former adviser to Musharraf's predecessors as leader of Pakistan, predicted that F-16 sales to Pakistan would anger many Indians and F-16 sales to India would stir anti-American sentiment in Pakistan.
"I think Indian public opinion always takes Pakistan receiving military assistance from the United States negatively," he said.
Aerospace analyst Aboulafia said of the expected sale to Pakistan: "India is disturbed by this possibility, and the Indian newspapers are full of editorials fretting over the prospect of a longstanding nemesis with real combat aircraft."
"Their (India's) program of buying second-rate Russian planes and inferior local fighters only makes sense if the neighbors don't have anything threatening," Aboulafia said. "If Pakistan gets F-16s, India has to get serious about its Air Force."
I don't think "arms" were given though there was intelligence cooperation & also the US navy made matters far more easier for the Iraqis by thrashing Iran's navy.Besides,the US didn't raise a lot of noise when France & Germany shipped weaponry to Iraq or when the Iraqis were gassing Iranian soldiers.
Anyway coming to the point on this issue.Pakistan is unstable & a hotbed of Islamic terrorism & has been a close ally of China for over 40 years.Besides selling F-16s to them will mean American taxpayers having to empty a bit of their pockets for a military aid package.
The buzz is that Musharraf has agreed to give up Pakistani persons involved in the nuke trade with Iran, so that the US has first hand material evidence of Iranian perfidy. This would prevent the Euroweasels from expressing doubt on our intel sources tainted by the Iraq WMD fiasco. The F-16s are a reward for that. Musharraf will also be squeezed for Pakistani bases and airstrips near the Iranian border.
The offer to India is a smokescreen because India does not want the F-16s but rather the Patriot PAC-3s, P-3C and E-2C Hawkeye 2000s. But this way, the US can say - hey we offered it to India too and they chose not to take the F-16s.
I feel that this is yet another case of sacrificing the long-term interests with Pakistan in favor of expediency.
BTW, this Aboulafia character needs to enter the 21st century. The Indians right now have the airpower to decimate the Pakistani air force in a week. If anything, the F-16 sale might force them to up the ante and get more Su-30s and maybe Rafales!
Indeed. With all of India's tech savvy, I'm surprised they're not building bigger, better more sophisticated weapons than we could ever sell them.
Cheaper too.
LOL. That's just the Pakistanis trying to needle India in the latter's own backyard.
India will induct the LCA-the government has given an order for 40 & the number could rise to a 80 odd in the next decade or so.Before we compare the LCA with anything,one should remember that it was not designed to be equal to or better to the F-16/Mirage-2000 etc-it was designed with the sole purpose of REPLACING India's Mig-21/23 series.It's payload of 4 tonnes & range of under 1000kms is nowhere near an F/A-18 ,but is miles ahead of a Mig-21.By that logic,the LCA makes a lot of sense given that there are still thousands of Mig-21s flying around the world.Of all the current systems around,one can only take the Swedish JAS-39 Gripen for objective comparison & their specs more or less match.The LCA mind you is still in development & India is working with Israel on it's EW & threat management systems.It's air to air armament will probably be the Israeli Python-5/Derby combo or the Russian AA-11/AA-12.So all in all,if you are talking about a replacement for the Mig-21 or F-5 Tiger,the LCA seems a handy system to have.
PS-The Indian navy is working on a navalised variant of the LCA for it's homebuilt carrier to be ready by 2012.It will have a reinforced undercarriage & slight difference in avionics.
Nope by purely technical standards,the best F-16s in the world are the F-16 Block 60 variants which are currently being built for the airforce of the UAE.This version has an AESA radar,conformal fuel tanks,a new engine(greater payload capability) etc.Israel's variants are Block 52 ones.Anyway putting the pilot in there will probably make the Israeli variant more capable.
PS-Israeli F-16s have always been rated as better than their American counterparts.Better pilots,ECM & the capability to operate the Python-4 AAM are the reasons being given.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.