Abhijit Bhattacharyya | IAF must rely less on US’ troubled aircraft makers

Till not so long ago, whenever one thought about aviation, it was mostly about the United States and its world-dominating aircraft manufacturers. This was even more so when talking about military fighter aircraft. In the 1970s, there were several manufacturers in the US, Europe and the then Soviet Union, but American aircraft were usually preferred. The Europeans -- France and Sweden in particular, as well as the Anglo-French consortium -- too made fighter jets, but they had a narrower customer base of non-Western developing nations who could not afford or get American combat aircraft.

US warplanes then (and today) have a restrictive process for foreign buyers, and needed political clearance from Washington, which meant that the most modern aircraft went to “friendly” nations, and definitely not those linked with its perceived enemies. The Pentagon and the state department called the shots.

This continued till the Soviet Union’s dismemberment in 1991, with the world fighter market dominated by the mutual “fear” factor created by “threat perception” of the US-led West and the USSR and its allies. Moscow then had 10 large fighter-cum-transport companies: Antonov, Beriev, Ilyushin, Kamov, MiG, Mil, Myasishchev, Sukhoi, Tupolev and Yakovlev. Though not perceived at par with “superior” Western technology, it still had its loyal, committed customer-base and a growing Third World clientele, mainly due to the West’s strong “pick-and-choose” policy, of which India is well aware.

As the West, primarily the US, tried to “contain” New Delhi over its perceived closeness to Moscow, and blocked its access to fighter and military technology it’s no surprise the USSR’s share of India’s defence market kept increasing. The United States too had over a dozen mega corporations competing among themselves to supply the needs of the Pentagon and its friends and allies, as it tried to enhance the profitability of its corporations and curb other aircraft manufacturers in the West to check cut-throat competition.

When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in December 1979, the US had 84 “live” aircraft makers, of which 17 companies -- Beechcraft, Bell, Boeing, Cessna, Fairchild, Learjet, General Dynamics, Grumman, Gulfstream, Kaman, Lockheed, McDonnell Douglas, Northrop, Piper, Rockwell, Sikorsky and Vought were dominant.

In its heyday, the American aviation industry offered a variety of fighters, helicopters and transports to every buyer. But things

rapidly changed from late twentieth and early twenty-first century. Two defining developments posed a serious challenge to US civil and military aviation manufacturing. The vacuum created by the USSR’s demise was promptly filled by an initially benign but subsequently hostile and aggressive Dragon, challenging the “Made in USA” tag.

From the 1970s, the US sold over 4,600 F-16 fighters to 30-plus air forces, but the range and variety dwindled fast owing to mega-mergers and acquisition of its big corporations in the post-Cold War era. Biggies like General Dynamics, McDonnell Douglas, Rockwell and Vought no longer exist as independent outfits. Northrop and Grumman combined into one Northrop-Grumman company since 1994, making B-21 strategic bombers and E-2 Hawkeye Airborne Early Warning and Control Systems (AWACS). The biggest and largest combat aviation company, McDonnell Douglas, is Boeing since August 1997. Clearly, the US system won’t tolerate anything other than “survival of the fittest and strongest”, with deep pockets. Little wonder that the two main combat US aircraft companies now are Boeing and Lockheed as all others have been consumed by them, thereby making it a duopoly fighter market.

America’s internal turbulence was thus a God-sent opportunity for the Dragon to penetrate deep into the US economic, commercial, technical, research and development facility system and create a tsunami, which also led to destabilisation of the American polity. Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) movement can be attributed in part to the clear qualitative decline of the US’ once redoubtable fighter aircraft dominance. Due to a series of monumental blunders by the US leadership and the big investors’ sole motive being profits, US aviation has been stung deep. The main combat aircraft companies do not any longer produce in-house aircraft parts. Outsourcing is resorted to in order to save time, costs and labour and enhance profits. In the process, the US has compromised with the safety, security and quality of its aviation products. The best of companies with reputation for quality are facing a crisis of confidence as their future appears bleak.

How else does one justify or defend the inexplicable Boeing 737 MAX accidents and the subsequent grounding of the entire fleet for over two years, leading to a colossal loss for the 107-year-old company’s credibility, quality, manpower and balance sheet?

That’s not all. Today, the worst possible nightmare for US military aviation is being faced by Lockheed Martin, the maker of the much-hyped F-35, which stands as the sole combat aircraft without any quality backup to fight and fly in the sky. That’s really unusual as traditionally the US Air Force had the flexibility of at least a pair of fighters to complement each other, such as for “high” or “low” altitude air warfare. But the rot gripped the F-35, and incredible though as it may sound, the Dragon in the US company’s boardroom disrupted and ruptured the pride of the West, at least for the foreseeable future. The F-35’s “request-for-proposal” took place in 1995, and the first delivery happened only in 2011; after over 15 years! Most devastating, however, remains the recurring problem of accidents, some of which are mysterious and inexplicable.

Jane’s Defence Weekly reported on November 10, 2010: “Troubled F-35 faces further US government review”. On May 12, 2012, BBC News said: “Year-long probe found 1,800 cases of fake parts in US military aircraft; weak US supply chain and China’s counterfeit market parts used in C-130J and Navy P-8A Poseidon” aircraft. Both the latter aircraft are, incidentally, in the Indian Air Force’s inventory today.

Worse news came in January 2014: the Pentagon itself had “waived laws banning China-built components in US weapons systems to keep the $392 billion Lockheed-Martin F-35 fighter programme on track”.

Today, all Washington DC is complaining loudly at the China-inflicted damage to its weapons systems. But who created the Dragon menace in the first place? Why did the senior most US officials continue with their frequent visits to Beijing despite the clear evidence of Chinese espionage?

The eternally profit-pursuing Americans may themselves be destroying the US State forever. The Indian Air Force should take note of the plight of American aviation today and focus solely on indigenisation as it celebrates its 91st foundation day on October 8.