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Apart from planning for quicker combat fleet enhancement in view of fast depleting numbers, the Indian Air Force is focussing on strengthening combat enablers to retain its lethality and increase its reach in coming years.
In an exclusive interview to Editor-in-Chief Nitin A. Gokhale, Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhuri dwelt on lessons learnt from the Russia-Ukraine war, the changing nature of war and why the Air Force will always be the first offensive choice in any conflict.
Discussing the recently held firepower demonstration Exercise Vayushakti 2024, the CAS said that exercises at such massive scales are undertaken only once in a few years. The exercise being wide in scope allows the coordinated employment of all IAF resources, to include fighter, transport and rotary wing assets, all kinds of ammunition, ISR resources, radars etc. Normally, the IAF practices weapon delivery within a unit or small formations. This was an occasion where IAF synchronizes the weapon deliveries of precision munitions, conventional weapons, surface-to-air and air-to-air weapons.
The CAS also informed that additional AWACS will be built on Airbus 321 to enhance their numbers with the IAF. He also dwelt upon the necessity of air-to-air refuelling capabilities. As far as ISR capabilities are concerned, the MQ-9B has been a big help.
Talking about the operational readiness aspects, the CAS informed that the induction of C295 does mitigate the transport fleet situation. The induction of LCAs will have a similar effect on the fighter aircraft holdings.
Talking about lessons drawn from standoff with China in Eastern Ladakh, the CAS highlighted leadership, ability to adapt, and training among other factors that the IAF has inculcated.
The Ladakh experience has also boosted jointness. According to the CAS, common platforms, common systems will have common maintenance. Complete interoperability between the Army and the IAF.
Author, thought leader and one of South Asia's leading strategic analysts, Nitin A. Gokhale has forty years of rich and varied experience behind him as a conflict reporter, Editor, author and now a media entrepreneur who owns and curates two important digital platforms, BharatShakti.in and StratNewsGlobal.com focusing on national security, strategic affairs and foreign policy matters.
At the beginning of his long and distinguished career, Gokhale has lived and reported from India’s North-east for 23 years, writing and analysing various insurgencies in the region, been on the ground at Kargil in the summer of 1999 during the India-Pakistan war, and also brought live reports from Sri Lanka’s Eelam War IV between 2006-2009.
Author of over a dozen books on wars, insurgencies and conflicts, Gokhale relocated to Delhi in 2006, was Security and Strategic Affairs Editor at NDTV, a leading Indian broadcaster for nine years, before launching in 2015 his own digital properties.
An alumni of the Asia-Pacific Centre for Security Studies in Hawaii, Gokhale now writes, lectures and analyses security and strategic matters in Indo-Pacific and travels regularly to US, Europe, South and South-East Asia to speak at various international seminars and conferences.
Gokhale also teaches at India’s Defence Services Staff College (DSSC), the three war colleges, India's National Defence College, College of Defence Management and the intelligence schools of both the R&AW and Intelligence Bureau.
He tweets at @nitingokhale
