The sale of thirty-six aircraft Rafale to India on the point of being concluded – The World

the minister of defence, Jean-Yves Le Drian, visited India on Thursday for a possible signature of this contract by 7 to 8 billion euros.

The sale of combat aircraft Rafale to India appears to be imminent. The Elysée palace announced the trip to New Delhi, Thursday, September 22, the minister of defence, Jean-Yves Le Drian, without specifying the object. Several news agencies say, however, that a security committee, chaired on Wednesday by the indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, has approved the purchase of thirty-six devices.

If the signature with India, scheduled for Friday, was confirmed, the aircraft manufacturer French Dassault would suffer, for the Rafale, its largest export order. In 2015, Qatar and Egypt had acquired each twenty-four aircraft.

This is nine years of negotiations, which are nearing their end. In 2007, India had launched a call for tenders for the acquisition of 126 combat aircraft, of which 108 devices assembled on its ground, in partnership with the public enterprise Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), and eighteen other ready-to-fly. January 31, 2012, the Rafale won the call for tenders for which the government of india entered into exclusive negotiations. But the victory was short-lived.

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In April of 2015, prime minister Narendra Modi, then newly elected, and on a visit to Paris, buries the “contract of the century” and proclaims instead the acquisition of thirty-six aircraft ” on the shelf “, out of the factories of Dassault. India has decided not to assemble her on the ground the aircraft Burst to avoid additional production costs linked to the formation of teams or the creation of new production chains on its soil.

This failure of the policy of ” make in India “, so dear to Mr. Modi, will be offset in part by the negotiation of” offset ” in the new contract, including a portion of the value will need to be transformed in investment and jobs in India.

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An aging fleet

This agreement, if it is modest in comparison to the “contract of the century” formulated at the outset, would also be of benefit to Thales, Safran and MBDA, the missile air-to-air latest-generation Meteor could equip the French aircraft delivered to India. The financial terms of the agreement will be disclosed at the time of signature. The indian press suggests a figure of between 7.6 and 8.1 billion euros.

the purchase of The Rafale would allow for a modernization of the air fleet is aging, claimed for a long time by the indian air force to be able to compete with that of neighbouring pakistan and face the rise of Chinese power.

India did not have in 2015 that thirty-five squadrons of eighteen aircraft each, while it assesses its needs to be at least forty-two squadrons to protect its borders west and north with Pakistan and China. Its aircraft fleet is also composed of devices of a mixed bag as airplanes Russian Mig 21, Soukhoi, or Su-30 MKI, the French Mirage, or even a plane of local manufacture, the Tejas.

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Strong tensions between India and Pakistan

Among the specialists in indian, the Rafale does not, however, unanimous. The analyst Ajai Shukla believes, for example, that the aircraft Dassault is going to ” to kill the future of the indian air force “ in securing the necessary financial resources to the development program of a fighter of fifth generation, in partnership with the Russians.

If confirmed, this signature will take place within a context of extremely tense between India and Pakistan. Four attackers armed with grenades and automatic weapons have been infiltrated Sunday in a military base in indian Kashmir, killing eighteen soldiers, which is the heaviest attack in the region for nearly fifteen years.

Mr Modi, under pressure to punish Pakistan after the attack this weekend, has multiplied the meetings with the leaders of the army in recent days. The acquisition of thirty-six Burst would send a strong signal to Islamabad.

In a speech Wednesday before the united Nations general Assembly, the prime minister of pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, for his part, pointed the finger at the arms race ” without a preceding “ of India, while regretting that the international community, ” ignores the rising tensions in south Asia, at his own risk “.

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