Hitting a rock

Defence relationships are both complex and long-term. Transactions for big platform equipment like planes and ships are few and of high value, so whether you win or lose a contract can make the difference between running and shutting down a production line. That puts buyers in a strong position to negotiate, but because they are negotiating on behalf of a national government, there is the temptation to do a deal on the side. Hence the pervasive corruption in defence deals, irrespective of the safeguards built into buying processes.

Once an expensive platform has been bought, the buyer is now at the mercy of the seller, because spare parts and technological support are required through the life of the equipment, usually two or three decades. Throw into this fluid equation the additional factor that only two or three countries usually make any one kind of equipment, like a heavy tank or a fighter-bomber, just as only half a dozen armies are large buyers of major armaments, and the mutual dependencies become even more complicated in terms of power dynamics.

All these elements are at play just now between India and Russia, countries that have had a time-tested defence relationship that has suddenly turned rocky. If the Russians are miffed that India is making a conscious attempt to diversify its sources of defence hardware, linked perhaps to the cosying up that is happening with the United States, their handling of the Gorshkov sale and refitting "" with massive cost and time over-runs in what was a fixed-price contract "" is almost certainly serving to convince India that it had better diversify supply even more. However, India needs the Russians because it has to get spares for its existing hardware; that the Russians are playing hardball on this as well has not helped reduce stresses in the relationship. So India is almost certainly going to listen more sympathetically to the argument of western defence suppliers that while their equipment may be more costly at the start, total lifecycle costs tend to be lower. Indeed, Russia would do well to remember that it became India's dominant defence supplier precisely because of the unreliability of western suppliers.

While the Russians are being unwise in risking their best long-term customer, India is left with some hard choices with regard to the Gorshkov, for which no alternative is available within the navy's operational time frame. It does not help matters that the Eurocopter deal has been called off at the last minute because of problems with the selection process "" more evidence if it were needed that defence buying remains a process that is open to abuse.

The escape route for large economies with technological prowess is to develop and make their own weapon systems. India has tried to do this from the early 1960s, when it made a supersonic fighter. But experience with projects like the Arjun tank have thrown a large cloud over the efficacy of this approach. The way out may be shown by the offsets programme linked to large import orders, which would help the private sector get into the act and start building a sustainable link between civilian industrial ability and military production. However, while bringing in private domestic suppliers has been broadly agreed upon by the government, there continues to be resistance to the idea from the existing public sector players. What will emerge from the current flux remains therefore in the realm of speculation.