S-400 Triumf LR-SAMs Arriving By 2018 For Limited TMD, Plus Six SSNs & Four Batch-3 Project 1135.6 FFGs

As per the IAF’s projections, there exists a requirement for 12 Batteries of the JSC Almaz-Antey-built S-400 (each Battery using four TELs each housing four cannister-encased LR-SAMs), plus five long-range early warning/tracking radars (LRTR). In other words, as per the IAF’s appreciation, a total of FIVE strategic sectors in northern, western and southern India are urgently required to be protected against conventionally armed inbound TBMs and IRBMs like Pakistan’s solid-fuelled single-stage M-11 (Hatf-3/Ghaznavi//DF-11) 280km-range TBMs, and liquid-fuelled single-stage Hatf-5/Ghauri-1/Nodong-1.

Next on the shopping list will be the five LRTRs which, in all probability, will be the EL/M-2090U UHF-band active phased-array systems from Israel Aerospace Industries’ ELTA Systems subsidiary.

It may be recalled that when the MoD-owned DRDO began R & D work in 1996 on a home-grown TMD system, it had ordered two EL/M-2080 ‘Green Pine’ active phased-array L-band LRTRs in late 1998 from IAI/ELTA for target acquisition-cum-engagement, plus a TMD simulation testbed from Israel’s Tadiran Electronic Systems.

Following their deliveries in 2001, the DRDO began co-developing the applications software for a terrestrial TMD architecture and its distributed command-and-control network at a laboratory in Yalavara, Karnataka. 

Another inter-governmental agreement (IGA) to be inked in Goa as part of a secret annexure of the contract for building Units 3 and 4 of the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP) concerns the in-country construction of six 5,000-tonne, single-hulled, fifth-generation attack submarines (SSN) designed by the St Petersburg-based FSUE Central Design Bureau RUBIN for Marine Technology. SSNs of this design, powered by 60mWt (about 25mWe) high-density integral pressurised water reactors (PWR), will also enter service with the Russian Navy in the following decade.

It may be recalled the IGA that India and Russia Atomstroyexport signed on November 20, 1988 for the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP) officially involved the construction of two 1,000MWe Russian VVER-1000-type light water reactors (at a cost of US$3.5 billion) at Kudankulam in Tirunelveli district in Tamil Nadu State. However, a secret annexure of this contract also called for Moscow to offer its ‘consultancy’ and ‘vendor-development’ services, along with the supply of two KLT-40C PWR mock-ups (built by Afrikantov OKBM and designed to deliver 23.5mWe from the 82.5mWt reactor and using 45% enriched uranium-aluminium alloy, clad in zircaloy), their related heat exchangers and steam generators, plus their detailed engineering drawings off-the-shelf—all for the double-hulled S-2/Arihant, S-3 and S-4 SSBNs, and similar military-industrial assistance for building the larger double-hulled S-5, S-6 and S-7 SSBNs, also designed by FSUE Central Design Bureau RUBIN for Marine Technology.

Of the four Batch 3 Project 1135.6 FFGs for the IN, the first two will be built by Kaliningrad-based JSC Yantar Shipyard, while the remaining two will be licence-built by Gujrat-based Reliance Defence and Engineering Ltd (RDEL), formerly Pipavav Defence and Offshore Engineering Company Ltd (PDOECL).