India, which is the largest buyer of Russian arms and military equipment, refused the BMP-3 infantry fighting vehicles offered to it. According to Defense News, on November 18, during a meeting of the Indian-Russian intergovernmental commission on military-technical cooperation, the Indian side announced its decision. The Indian military decided not to buy Russian-made infantry fighting vehicles and to continue developing their own project FICV (Futuristic Infantry Combat Vehicle - "Futuristic infantry fighting vehicle").
Promising Indian BMP FICV at DEFEXPO 2012
A possible contract for the supply of BMP-3 infantry fighting vehicles to India became known about a year ago. Then the Russian side offered the Indian military to update the fleet of ground forces by purchasing BMP-3 vehicles. Currently, the armed forces of India operate Soviet-made BMP-1 and BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicles. This technique no longer suits the Indian Ministry of Defense and to replace it, the FICV program was launched several years ago. As an alternative to the equipment of its own production, Russian officials in charge of the export of arms offered India to purchase the required number of BMP-3 vehicles.
Last December, it was reported that Russia could also sell a license to India to manufacture infantry fighting vehicles and transfer some technology. However, for this, according to Defense News, the Indian military had to abandon the implementation of its own FICV program. At that time, the Indian armed forces wanted to get 2,600 new vehicles with a total value of about 10 billion US dollars. Probably, it was the volume of the program that caused the final decision to be made only a few months later.
Another reason for this could be some features of the FICV program. The fact is that the program for the development of its own BMP has not yet yielded any results. Several Indian companies have already set up their designs and prototype construction will begin in the foreseeable future. Serial production of FICV combat vehicles will begin no earlier than 2017-18, which is why the Indian ground forces will have to use old equipment over the next years. In addition, it will take some time to build a sufficient number of production vehicles. Thus, the FICV program will not be able to have a noticeable impact on the state of the ground forces until the beginning of the next decade.
BMP-3
In light of the technical features, timing and cost of the FICV program, the purchase of Russian-made BMP-3 infantry fighting vehicles looked like a rather interesting proposal. The organization of licensed production and the transfer of a number of technologies also spoke in favor of abandoning their own project. Because of this, the Indian military, responsible for the choice of technology, had to analyze the capabilities of the industry and the consequences of this or that decision for several months. As it became known now, the Russian proposal did not suit the Indian Ministry of Defense.
The FICV program is challenging enough for the Indian industry, although it will have many positive consequences. Indian enterprises have not previously dealt with such projects and do not have any experience in the development of infantry fighting vehicles. At the beginning of the program, the Indian military emphasized that only local manufacturers would participate in the development of a promising BMP. Nevertheless, some of the participants in the competition for the development of technology attracted foreign colleagues to the design work. In particular, Mahindra Defense Systems is creating a new BMP in cooperation with BAE Systems.
According to the terms of reference, the development companies must submit a project of a tracked infantry fighting vehicle capable of transporting at least eight soldiers with weapons and equipment. The armored body of the vehicle must protect the crew and the troops from 14.5 mm armor-piercing bullets. The armament complex should include an automatic cannon, machine guns and an anti-tank missile system. The crew of the car must consist of three people. Finally, the FICV BMP must swim across water obstacles and be capable of landing from military transport aircraft.
The development of such a technique is a difficult task for Indian designers who have no experience in creating BMPs. Therefore, the FICV program is designed not only to provide the armed forces with new armored vehicles, but also to teach Indian engineers to create infantry fighting vehicles. It was this feature of the project that probably became the main reason for the final decision of the Indian military. The successful completion of the FICV program will allow in the future to start new projects of armored vehicles for the infantry. In addition, do not forget that when manufacturing equipment of our own design, most of the appropriations will remain in the country and will also support the local industry.
The timing of the implementation of the FICV program is such that over the next few years the Indian armed forces will have to operate equipment of old types of Soviet production. Currently, the Indian Ministry of Defense plans to carry out a large-scale modernization of BMP-2 vehicles. There is no exact information on this yet, but, most likely, Indian enterprises will be engaged in the repair and modernization of equipment.
