India to buy guided missiles from Israel
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INDIA has chosen to buy anti-tank guided missiles from Israel, rejecting a rival US offer, as the right-wing government clears projects worth US$13.1 billion to modernize its aging military, official sources said yesterday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government will buy 8,356 Spike missiles and 321 launchers from Israel in a deal worth 32 billion rupees (US$525 million), defence ministry sources said.
The government is moving to speed up long-delayed defence orders and bolster its military.
The procurement deals, worth 800 billion rupees in total, were cleared at a meeting of India’s Defence Acquisition Council, headed by Defence Minister Arun Jaitley, on Saturday.
“It (the council) has cleared a deal for Spikes,” a defence ministry official said.
“It’s a fire and forget kind of missile,” the official said, referring to the fact the missile locks onto targets before firing.
“You can say there was a rival bid from the US for its Javelin missiles,” the official said, adding that India’s army tried out the Spike missiles “successfully last year.”
India, the world’s biggest arms importer, is in the midst of a US$100-billion defence upgrade program and cleared proposals worth nearly US$3.5 billion in June.
Nationalist leader Modi, who stormed to power at elections in May, has said India must build up its military might to the point that no other country “dare cast an evil eye” on the South Asian nation.
A series of corruption scandals under the previous government had brought defence procurement to a near standstill.
Modi and US President Barack Obama agreed on greater defence cooperation during a meeting in Washington last month, when the US reportedly lobbied for its Javelin missiles.
“The DAC (Defence Acquisition Council) took the decision based on purely technical reasons and based on hard facts. It had been on the agenda for some time,” another unnamed defence ministry official said.
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