Behind The Game of Critical Tech Transfer

The deafening noise about the transfer of critical technology to India, generated by America’s Joe Biden Administration, is unlikely to lose pitch anytime soon. Concurrently, the chorus that India will become the number one economy in the world is hilarious. But there is a need to look closer and decipher what game the US is playing.

American businessmen, including those of Indian-origin, are traders who know human psychology well. So, when John Chambers, Sundar Pichai, David L. Calhoun, Andrew R. Jassy and others forecast that India will become the number one economy in the world, all they are doing is fanning Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ego, to promote their own business interests.

Perhaps they forgot to mention that in order to facilitate India becoming the number one global economy, US and China, who are much ahead of us, will have to stop the progression of their technology and economies to let India overtake them.

Should we forget the CIA operations of eliminating our nuclear scientists starting with Dr Homi J. Bhabha? Should we ignore the leak that NATO was secretly discussing how to undermine Indian and Chinese economies at Norfolk, United Kingdom in 2014, and such discussion would be a periodic feature? Is the plan now to make India technology dependent and pull the rug when required?

The US aircraft carrier in the Bay of Bengal, and the British flotilla in Arabian Sea to ward off India invading East Pakistan to liberate Bangladesh, is vintage news of 1971. But, what about 28 years later, during the 1999 Kargil Conflict when the US switched off the GPS to deny Indian Navy blockading the Karachi Harbour?

Social media posts in circulation state that the British Defence Ministry has signed a deal for £65 million (US$80 million) with America’s General Atomics for 3 x MQ9B Sea Guardian drones ($26.6 million per drone), whereas, India is paying $3 billion for 30 such drones at $100 million apiece. Newspapers quote an “unnamed” government official saying our import price of Sea Guardian drones would be 27 percent lower than the price other countries have paid, and the final price could come down further during negotiations.

This would be super cool because if we can get these drones 27 percent cheaper than what the British are getting. Then our price per drone would come down to $19.41 million, giving us upwards of 150 x Sea Guardian drones instead of 30.

But as the saying goes: ‘Dil Ko Behlane Ko Ghalib-Ye-Khayal Accha Hai’. But such discussions have no meaning because no defence deal in India has been, or will be, without ‘cuts’, whichever the government. For any incumbent Indian government it is child’s play to justify the price paid.

Coming to the GE-HAL GE engine deal, Gp Capt T. P. Srivastava (Retd) a former fighter pilot has analysed that not only will the Indian Military have to depend on the US GE 414 aero engine till at least 2100 AD, this deal will have far reaching consequences. All future airframes of Indian fighters jets will have to be configured to enable the fitment of the GE F414 aero engine, thereby restricting the freedom of different airframe designs.

He also writes that India will likely have at least eight or 12 LCA squadrons which in addition to the TEDBF will depend on GE414 aero engines for the next six to eight decades to sustain these fleets.

The claim of GE transferring 100 percent technology of the GE 414 engine to India would be akin to claiming that US President Joe Biden is joining the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan. The DRDO-HAL has failed to produce a requisite aero-engine over the past 60 years though we claim that we have the best brains notwithstanding the brain drain.

Not only France, Russia, the US and the UK have indigenous aero engines, so does China which at one time was 50 years behind us. There is no point saying China achieved this by reverse engineering; looking at the moralistic fibre of India’s deep state.

As to cooperation in the chip industry, India naturally is trying to lure more semiconductor investments like other counties. According to foreign media, the Modi government is providing substantial subsidies to make the Micron deal happen. Micron has said that the total investment would amount to $2.75 billion, including fiscal support from India’s Central Government and the Gujarat State Government. In other words, the Indian government is putting up ”most” of the money, and while the plant won’t make advanced chips, which every country wants, it could push India up the technological ladder.

So much for the transfer of high-end technology from the US, but our governmental defence-industrial complex should learn from the US how to improve their functioning and end products through automation of defence. The US companies like Lockheed making defence products have no productivity problem due to machine learning.

America’s statisticians produce price indices for kit, covering everything from missiles to ships, indicating that US Armed Forces procurements have been getting relatively cheaper. Quality-adjusted missile prices have fallen by about 30 percent since the 1970s. In cash terms, America spends about the same on military aircraft as it did in the mid-1980s. Even though the purchasing power of the dollar in the wider economy has fallen over that period, it will buy about the same amount of airpower.

Some Indo-Americans opine that for India to succeed as a manufacturing alternative to China, we must address structural issues including creaky infrastructure, red tape and quality of labour-force participation, especially for women.

Lt General Prakash Katoch is a veteran of the Indian Army. Views expressed are personal.

Cover Photograph: ‘The Indian Military might well have to depend on the US GE 414 aero engine till at least 2100 AD, this deal will have far reaching consequences.’