Showing posts with label Navy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Navy. Show all posts

Tuesday, 13 September 2016

Pakistan - A failed Nation based on Islamic Radicalism

The words that define 'Pakistan' in the 21st century are Terrorist Attacks, Drone Strikes, Suicide Bombers, Nuclear Weapons, Natural Calamities, Political Instability, Military Rule, Radical Islam and an Economy on the verge of collapse. Currently the country's economy is failing dangerously to even meet its external payment obligations.

External debt servicing of Pakistan rose to an alarming $7 billion in 2014 which is 80% of Pakistan's
foreign exchange reserves. With no foreign inflows, no release of installments from the IMF and no interest of foreign investors in the country has made the gravity of the situation even more alarming.

The Nawaz Sharif civilian government that was elected 14 months ago has failed to defeat the terrorists or even stop their advance, get the economy back on track and also tame its own military.

Islamic Radicalization in the country has reached a completely new level where the same soldiers who swore to protect the country were involved in hijacking a Pakistani Navy Missile Frigate a week ago. The extent of radicalization within the armed forces of Pakistan is clearly visible.

The question now is "How safe are Pakistan's Nuclear Weapons?"
It is just a matter of time when Islamic Terrorists attack Pakistan's Nuclear installations and Nuclear Missile Command Centers and take control of the country's dreaded nuclear arsenal.

Both India and Pakistan started off together as independent nations in the August of 1947. India choose a path of becoming a Republic Nation not aligned with any one religion in spite of an 82%+ Hindu majority and on the other hand Pakistan committed its biggest mistake of declaring itself as an ISLAMIC Republic. This religious branding over the years has fueled radicalization and hatred towards every non-Islamic culture within and outside of Pakistan.

India leaped into the 21st century to become the world's 3rd largest GDP in terms of Purchasing Power as of 2014 according to the IMF, World Bank and CIA Reports. India took major economic strides, expanded its Armed Forces and continues to modernize them at a frantic pace. An expanding economy that sees no signs of slowing down even in the next decade has allowed successive governments in New Delhi to increase the Defence Budget every year that now stands at USD $37.5 billion dollars. The figure rises to $47.8 billion as of 2014 if Pension of ex-servicemen and funding for secretive military projects is included in the calculation.

Pakistan cannot match India man-for-man or gun-for-gun. India is pursuing an ambitious modernization program across all of its armed services. Formations of Aircraft Carrier Battle groups, raising of new Mountain Strike Corps to take on China, building and inducting an array of hi-tech stealth warships, launching dedicated military satellites, nuclear submarines, state-of-the-art fighter jets and bombers is just the tip of the iceberg when one talks about India's military modernization.

One the other hand with a defence budget of $5.7 billion, Pakistan has very few options when it comes to modernizing its armed forces. The majority of the funds are utilized in salaries, pensions and upkeep or maintenance of defence equipment. There is barely anything left for the armed forces to purchase or induct newer systems. The Pakistani Army gets 48% of the whole defence budget while 20% goes to the Pakistani Air force and the Navy gets only 10%.

The new Narendra Modi government in India which has been in office for a little over 100 days has already begun shaping the country's future to challenge China's economic and military superiority in Asia and the Indian Ocean. PM Narendra Modi is personally overlooking every national infrastructure and defence project of India and has sworn to end Red Tapism from the country. Signs of that are clearly visible with the stock markets of the country booming at all time high and foreign investors queuing with billions of dollars for investments in India.

Pakistan is no longer even a contestant to the race to the top. There is no way Pakistan can catch up to its big brother and hence it has now indulged in a game of cat & mouse by trying to pull India down in every way possible. Pakistan now focuses on terrorists infiltration, injecting fake currency notes into the Indian financial system and increasing tensions on the border with India. This has partly helped Pakistan get the attention of the international community to settle the J&K dispute.

But the more India turns itself into an Economic & Military powerhouse, the lesser the chances are for anyone to bring India to the table. The birth of Bangladesh which was India's master plan is by far the biggest wound Pakistan has ever received from India since independence and hence it has always wanted to take J&K away from India. But it is difficult to imagine how a nation which is on the verge of bankruptcy would defeat or force a regional superpower like India to let go even an inch of its territory.

Gone are the days when the decision makers in New Delhi use to worry about Pakistan's military. They are more worried about a nuclear armed Pakistan collapsing which would eventually destabilize and threaten every non-Islamic country in the world.

Sunday, 9 November 2014

India Vs China: Military Might

India Vs China Military might: "/" separates two with India on left and China on right. Active military: 1,325,000/2,285,000. Reserve: 1,155,000/510,000. Paramilitary: 2,288,407/1,132,000. Total Aircraft: 1970/2780. Total Helicopters: 532/856. Total Airports: 352/505. Tanks: 3578/9150. APC: 5085/4788. Self propelled guns: 290/1710. Towed Artillery/Howitzers: 6445/6246. Multiple launch rocket system: 292/1770. Marine ports: 7/14. Navy ships: 183/469. Aircraft carrier: 2/1. Submarines: 19/69. Frigates: 15/45. Destroyers: 11/24. Corvettes: 25/9. Minesweepers: 7/119. Patrol Craft: 51/182.

India is way ahead of China if number of troops is concerned. IAF is much more sophisticated and modern than reverse engineered Chinese Aircraft. So thats not a big problem too as Rafale or Eurofighter is joining the IAF fleet soon along with LCA Tejas. India also has Hypersonic Prithvi Air Defence (PAD) and Advanced Air Defence (AAD). China has no Air defence. That means India is very well defended to Pakistan and Chinese missiles.

India is good with their stealth Ballistic missile too as Agni-IV, Agni-V ICBM, Nirbhay, BrahMos, Prahar, Dhanush, Prithvi are doing successful test and induction, though the number is less. India is also getting hyper tactical ballistic missile as a BrahMos variant. China has no such tactical ballistic missile. While Chinese missiles have not went through much success and so does its ally's Pakistan with number of failures. India is also getting a new mountain corp numbering 40,000 along Chinese border by mid 2016. India also has a force of thousands of ATGM and also getting more than 8000 Spike ATGM from Israel next year. What India really lacks against China is in waters. India needs to focus more on Navy with their ageing fleet becoming obsolete.

 Possible allies with India in the wake of a conflict: Russis (Financial + Equipment;), Japan (Financial + Equipment), USA (Equipment), Israel (Equipment), France/Germany/UK: (Financial/Equipment), Vietnam/Tajikistan/Singapore/Australia: (Strategic Regional Partners).

Possible allies with China: Russia (Financial), Ukraine (Equipment), Pakistan/North Korea/Bangladesh: (Strategic Regional partners).

India is still a massive power in the Asia with these forces. Engaging a war with India would be a long one and destructive, catastrophic. Pakistan should be aware of that before any provocation along the border.



India_Navy
INS Vikramaditya taking a swift maneuver during trial.