Letters: Looking to Russia

This refers to Ajai Shukla's column "Yokel at a country fair" (Broadsword, January 20). The author has argued for a substantive Indo-US partnership in the defence arena such as the joint development of aircraft carriers, anti-ballistic missiles (ABMs) and so on. But in my opinion, any such development should be considered a strategic blunder and India should never allow history to repeat itself.

Let us not forget that Indo-US joint development programmes had come to a grinding halt after the US imposed sanctions on India (in the aftermath of our nuclear tests). The development of aircraft carriers involve huge cost and time, and there is no guarantee that the US will not repeat the same and put us in an intricate position. Given the recent incident in the Arabian Sea, I believe India needs frigates and not costly aircraft carriers.

Regarding the joint development of ABMs, it would be better for India to engage with Russia to have another BrahMos-like joint venture to acquire or jointly produce S-300/400 ABMs - the undisputed leader in that category (let us not forget the amount of pressure that the US puts on Russia to prevent the sale of S-300s to Iran). It is high time India engaged with the Russians constructively rather than dealing with the government in Washington DC.

M Natarajan Chennai

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