Army to equip counter-insurgency units with Israeli firearms

Army to equip counter-insurgency units with Israeli firearms

PTI[ SUNDAY, DECEMBER 29, 2002 05:30:35 PM ]
NEW DELHI: In a major deal, the Army is all set to move into the new year with the most modern and lethal Israeli Tavor multipurpose assault rifles and Galil super sniper rifles to give its counter-insurgency forces in Jammu and Kashmir greater fire power as top Army officials hinted at decisive action against the militants in the coming months.

The decision to arm counter-insurgency forces with advanced weapons comes at the end of the longest-ever troop mobilisation lasting almost the entire 2002, which may not have completely checked Pakistan-supported cross-border terrorism despite assurances to the contrary from Islamabad.

India has started the process of acquiring high quality weapons worth $20 million. That includes Tavor-21 5.56 mm assault rifles, Galil 7.62 mm super sniper rifles, 5.56 mm ammunition, night vision sights, laser range finders and other targeting equipment.

Army sources said that while special forces had already been equipped with American and Israeli weaponry, New Delhi is considering purchase of several thousand more Tavors to equip the entire counter-insurgency forces operating in Jammu and Kashmir, who are currently armed with AK-47 rifles imported earlier from Romania.

With the country's top leaders asserting that India may have to go it alone in its fight to uproot Islamabad-inspired terrorism, Army officials exuded confidence that with greater fire power and sixty per cent of special gadgets like ground sensors, UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) and hand thermals in place, it would be too hot for militants to operate in Jammu and Kashmir, analysts said.

The year-long troop mobilisation saw India coming close to war with Pakistan with reports coming to light recently that the Indian forces had considered several times the option to strike at terrorist camps in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

Defence Minister George Fernandes confirmed in Parliament that Air Force fighters had been used to evict Pakistani intrusion along the Line of Control in Machil sector.

Top Army officials have indicated that special forces have been training with Air Force's multipurpose Mirage 2000 fighters for carrying out joint missions, specially in mountainous terrains.

Air Chief S Krishnaswamy has said that IAF now had the capability to carry out precision strikes from stand-off distances as far as 100-150 km and this could be used if need arose along the LoC to stall intrusions.

The troop mobilisation dominated 2002 even as the year saw Indo-US military-to-military ties reaching an unprecedented level and the armed forces attaining a new high with the induction of a most modern fighter aircraft, the SU30 MKI.

An almost eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation between the Indian and Pakistani forces created ripples worldwide as major powers appeared worried whether a conflict between the nuclear armed neighbours could lead to a nuclear catastrophe. Major diplomatic moves were launched to defuse the situation.

" In a major deal, the Army is all set to move into the new year with the most modern and lethal Israeli Tavor multipurpose assault rifles and Galil super sniper rifles to give its counter-insurgency forces in Jammu and Kashmir greater fire power as top Army officials hinted at decisive action against the militants in the coming months."

There goes INSAS down the tube! As suspected and predicted, the indiginous indian 5.56mm rifles are useless. Kargil was the first instance when the impotency of the INSAS system came to light, and now this. BTW, even though the Tavor bullpup design has been around for a while, even the IDF have not been seen using it widely. Most of the IDF units still use the Galil and Colt systems. I wonder what prompted another round of hasty Indian buying frenzy of this Isreali product? It seems like the Indians are just dying to buy anything with a "made in Isreal"
tag regardless of how unproven a design/product is.

Steyr AUG should do just fine for Pakistan as long as there is a ToT involved.

Syed Saad,

Here's a web page on Tavor-21

Looks like India is buying Tavor carbines and not regular rifles. It would be safe to assume that INSAS carbines are duds and therefore junked.

As far as the INSAS assault rifle goes, I guess the jury is still out.

I am not sure if there is enough information to tell which version of the bullpup the Indians have gone with. Although the report states " Israeli Tavor multipurpose assault rifles" which essentially means that it is the basic design. There is no real breakdown of the TAVOR interms of a carbine or assault rifle since it is a bullpup design and that essentially means a change in the barrel will provide the functionality either way.

I personally think the INSAS 5.56 weapons have been total duds, regardless of type, i.e. carbines (short barrel) or rifles. This failure can also be gauged by the fact that the bulk of IA is still using the FN FAL, AK-47 or sterling SMG with a very limited 150,000 or so INSAS rifles having been produced in the state factories in neshapur and given to the Indian Armed Forces.

Indian claims of autarky in Infantry weapons (individual weapons) can be clearly questioned with the limited
deployment of the INSAS rifle. Sooner of later, they will start license production of a western origin rifle as they did with the FN FAL.

Syed, you are quite wrong about the INSAS. The annual production has been around 90,000 for the past 3-4 years, and even a cursory look at magazine, newspaper and internet pictures shows the INSAS in widespread use with Indian army and paramilitary troops. Until the most recent report about the possible major purchase of these Israeli guns (the confirmed report is for a small $20 million special forces purchase), the major problem with the gun has related to its high altitude performance. This is a relatively minor issue, in comparison with the performance of the British SA80 bullpup, and even early versions of the M-16.

If there are more serious problems with the INSAS rifle, we will find out soon enough. But the INSAS program is considered successful by most.

I recently talked to some army jawans at New Delhi Railway station and the view of the jawans for personal weapons was

For CI work

1. AK series because of its high rate of fire
2. INSAS
3. FN FAL

For normal infantry work

1. INSAS
2. FN FAL
3. AK series

Quote:

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Originally posted by Amitabh
Syed, you are quite wrong about the INSAS. The annual production has been around 90,000 for the past 3-4 years, and even a cursory look at magazine, newspaper and internet pictures shows the INSAS in widespread use with Indian army and paramilitary troops. Until the most recent report about the possible major purchase of these Israeli guns (the confirmed report is for a small $20 million special forces purchase), the major problem with the gun has related to its high altitude performance. This is a relatively minor issue, in comparison with the performance of the British SA80 bullpup, and even early versions of the M-16.

If there are more serious problems with the INSAS rifle, we will find out soon enough. But the INSAS program is considered successful by most.

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Depends on the sources you consider. The fact that IA is already looking at Israeli hardware in the individual weapon (IW) role, does not bode well for INSAS.

Pick up most sources on Infantry arms and they would describe the INSAS design, in terms of technology used, to be a mating of the already existing technology used in the AK series of weapons and some of the older European technology incorporated from the FAL rifles.

The fact that the INSAS has been developed indiginously (internal politics!!) may have a lot more to do with it being pushed out to the field than on the merit of the gun itself. With the INSAS 5.56 mm caliber already in use in Kashmir, the TAVOR (with Same caliber) purchase seems to be redundant especially when the INSAS is being produced as a rifle as well as a carbine.

Pakistani troops would probably say the same about the AK-47 and HK G-3s as the Indian Jawans say about the rifles in their use. I think that due credit should be given to Indian entities for developing their own IW for the first time. however, apart from that, we must not deny that it is simply a derivative of the technology that has been in use for the last 20 years or so and is not much of an improvement over anything other than switching on to a 5.56 caliber from the Nato round. It seems that eventually Indian armed forces will be or are already looking at other alternates (Tavor being one of them).

No one has every suggested that the INSAS is anything other than an evolutionary design to replace the FN FAL. The idea was to develop an inexpensive, light and reliable infantry weapon.

If you read the original news article, you will see that the Tavor purchase is destined to replace AK-47 rifles in service with COIN forces in Kashmir and elsewhere. INSAS continues as before.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Amitabh
No one has every suggested that the INSAS is anything other than an evolutionary design to replace the FN FAL. The idea was to develop an inexpensive, light and reliable infantry weapon.

If you read the original news article, you will see that the Tavor purchase is destined to replace AK-47 rifles in service with COIN forces in Kashmir and elsewhere. INSAS continues as before.

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I hope so. My point simply was in regards to the fact that the INSAS is a 5.56mm Caliber weapon and so is Tavor, yet the AK's are not being replaced by INSAS. Especially when the INSAS system comes in Rifle and carbine modes. It sort of puts the utility/capabilities of the INSAS weapon systems in question.

One reason is that the INSAS rifle has been denied a fully automatic mode, which the army considers necessary in a COIN environment. The INSAS is seen as suitable for a convenional war of maneuver (say, with Pakistan) in which logistics would be a concern, but not for close combat with militants in Kashmir which requires heavy firepower without taxing logistical lines. So you are likely to see Tavors being distributed to the Rashtriya Rifles in Kashmir, while regular infantry continues to use the INSAS.

It is possible that the carbine version of the INSAS had been less successful, necessitating purchases of the Tavor. But the rifle version continues in widespread service.