In the face of China's rapid development, India and the military have developed a competitive mentality. Despite the huge gap in economic and military power between the two countries, India is still trying to compete with China in areas such as aircraft carrier construction.
India plans to invest billions of dollars to build a brand new aircraft carrier. According to the design, the displacement of this aircraft carrier will reach 450,000 tons, which is almost twice the displacement of the current Indian aircraft carrier in service. India has also expressed its hope that it will speed up the construction of the new aircraft carrier and strive to build up its strength as soon as possible. This fully reflects India's eagerness to narrow the gap between major countries such as China.
What is even more surprising is India's claim that the new aircraft carrier will be equipped with a nuclear power system. Considering that only the United States and France have really mastered the nuclear power technology of aircraft carriers, this claim of India is immediately questioned. Critics argue that India has neither the necessary technological accumulation nor a strong industrial base, and that it is irresponsible to rush into the pursuit of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers.
In the face of doubts, India** did not take a low profile, but continued to high-profile its plans. For example, officials have publicly stated that about 28 warplanes will be deployed on the new aircraft carrier, which may include F-35s from the United States. These measures will undoubtedly exacerbate the suspicion of neighboring countries and will hardly convince the international community.
In fact, under the current technical conditions, India has many difficulties in independently designing and building a large aircraft carrier. First of all,India does not have a mature and complete manufacturing industry chain, and key components and equipment still need to rely on imports. Secondly, India has not independently developed core technologies such as electromagnetic catapults, and can only buy them from other countries.
Just recently, it was revealed that China's self-developed electromagnetic catapult may have begun to operate normally. In contrast, it is understandably difficult for India to design an aircraft carrier that is completely domestically produced and has advanced performance.
In fact, the external "support" currently provided to India is limited to some non-critical technologies, such as hull design and configuration.
Despite all the difficulties, India ** and the military.
Apparently still ambitious. They have openly stated that they hope to follow China's example and also build and operate three domestically produced aircraft carriers. To this end, India is already preparing to start the construction of a second aircraft carrier and has pledged to invest a huge amount of more than $5 billion.
In the absence of key technologies and experience, it is doubtful whether India's next-generation aircraft carrier program can finally be realized in the blind pursuit of scale expansion and advanced equipment. At present, most countries, including China, are waiting for India's performance. Looking ahead, India still has a long way to go if it wants to truly build a world-class aircraft carrier battle group.