Obama puts hold on sales of Gas turbines (Naval) to allies

[TimothyC]

Monday, March 16, 2009 : 1935 Hrs
Navy's frigate induction plan hit by US ban on engine supply


New Delhi (PTI): India's plan to induct newly built Shivalik stealth frigate in the Navy this year may be hit with the US Administration halting the warship's gas turbine engines supplier from operationalising the contract.

Mumbai-based Mazagon Docks Limited (MDL) built the warship fitted with two LM 2500 gas turbine engines and was readying it for sea trials in a couple of months when the bad news from General Electric (GE) came as a shocker for the Indian Public Sector Undertaking shipyard, Navy sources said here on Monday.

Interestingly, LM 2500 is the engine Navy chose for its Indigenous Aircraft Carrier currently under construction in Cochin Shipyard and for which the keel laying was done by Defence Minister A K Antony in the last week of February this year.

The GE communication, sources said, indicated that it could take up to three months for the matter to be resolved with the new Obama dispensation, which was currently reviewing its military relations with several countries.

Not just with India, GE was instructed to halt work with even US allies such as United Kingdom and Australia, sources said.

However, the Navy's top brass, putting up a brave face, claimed the US ban would not impact its Shivalik project, codenamed P-17, under which a series of three guided missile frigates are to be built, with the other two being named Sahayadri and Satpura.

Emphasis Mine. I would like to know why the gas turbines are being held back? India is a defacto partner, and is a (somewhat) technologically advanced democratic nation.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

India is a defacto partner, and is a (somewhat) technologically advanced democratic nation.

That's putting a very large stretch on the truth. For a democratic nation, there are way too many class and ethnic issues and they make the US' own race problems look like some local bar fight.

As for the gas turbines, if the US plays dirty, the Indians would just go back to Russia or Ukraine for the gas turbines. Likely Russia.

[TimothyC]

India is a defacto partner, and is a (somewhat) technologically advanced democratic nation.

That's putting a very large stretch on the truth. For a democratic nation, there are way too many class and ethnic issues and they make the US' own race problems look like some local bar fight.

Excellent point. I presume the phrase, "Not a Dictatorship" would be a better description of the situation?

[Pelranius]

Indian political infighting is truly the stuff of madhouses. And their party bosses aren't above starting deadly riots to gain electoral advantages (Congress, the Communists, the BJP, various regional followings, are all guilty of that little trick).

[Coyote]

We're throwing a bone to Pakistan, I think.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Excellent point. I presume the phrase, "Not a Dictatorship" would be a better description of the situation?

Probably oligarchy, kletocracy and what ever we can think of to throw into the mix.

The Communist party, according to someone I met and talked to, is only communist in name.

[K. A. Pital]

There's like 10 different communist parties in India, and lots of other parties. And praytell, if their democracy isn't functioning, what's a functioning democracy? Democracy is a political system, not a measure of relative wealth of a society.

Also, so what if a nation is democratic or not? The US never shied selling weapons to assholes when it fit their interests. You're reading too much into morals here when there's nothing to be found. The US simply dicks around with other nations.

The end result of this would be someone else selling the turbines.

[Sea Skimmer]

Anyone who thinks this has anything to do with how democratic India is an idiot who didn’t even spend the time to read the damn bolded underlined sentence in the article pointing out that even the UK and Australia are being fucked over by Obama’s latest ignorance based policy. He’s forcing a review of literally every weapons and maintenance and technical support contract the US has, and the result is for months no work can be done. Great job stimulating the US economy Obama! Make foreign powers even less willing to accept all the political strings that come attached with the best manufactured goods we still make in the USA.

If Obama had any sense he’d know that selling weapons to even states which marginally meet US standards is a good thing, because if they can afford US weapons, they can afford a much larger pile of Russian or Chinese weapons. Except if they buy US, then we can control the maintenance and spare parts access when it actually matters.

[weemadando]

Fucking hell, this is going to push Wedgetail back yet again. Not to mention JSF acquisition, Superbug transition, Growler acquisition, stand-off JDAM partnership development and a whole fuckton of other issues. Does this mean we might also get delays on more C-17s too?

Maybe this can be spun as the evil agent of European liberalism stalling the American contractors for the greater glory of EADS?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

I'm getting the huge impression that the Obama administration anally wants to review every single deal with every nation, and it's putting the brakes on every single deal pending a complete review. I'm not sure what the intent is, but from the looks of things, they are going to be irritating just about any country that has commercial interests in the US.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Where's some press releases on this policy? What's the stated and unstated motivation?

[phongn]

Where's some press releases on this policy? What's the stated and unstated motivation?

State doesn't seem to have any press releases on the matter; it looks like some sort of internal policy review.

[Dartzap]

Is this going to be a further delay to the new Carriers that are being built currently over here? Fantastic, just what we need, heh. That'll add a few bob to the overall price, I suppose.

[Starglider]

Is this going to be a further delay to the new Carriers that are being built currently over here?

No, those will use Rolls Royce engines (of course, as they are some of the best gas turbines in the world, so why wouldn't we use domestic ones?). It would be amusing if RR picked up some extra sales due to this; karma for the gift of unplayable DVDs perhaps.

[Kanastrous]

Fucking hell, this is going to push Wedgetail back yet again.

Huh? Wedgetail aircraft are already flying...

[weemadando]

Yeah, they're already flying but they were meant to have been in active duty already, but they've been pushed back several years now. And a review of technology release could push that further still.

[Sidewinder]

We're throwing a bone to Pakistan, I think.

Considering GE was ordered to halt work with long-term US allies such as the UK and Australia (Pakistan declares itself a US ally because India is a Soviet/Russian one, and the US humors them because the alternative is China gaining power and influence at American expense), I think it's a bureaucratic fuckup, nothing more, nothing less.