The Indian 5^th generation- an axiomatic review

Part 1 of 3. The Politics

Prof. Prodyut Das

What I am going to say:

1.     Warfare is changing due to AI

2.     We may want a real 5^th.generation not a poodle faked 4^th.generation like the F 35.

3.     From 1. And Op, Sindoor it follows that we have time. From 2 it follows that the proposed engine collaboration is not required which seems to be  the usual fund bait. If required the 120 kN engine can developed from the Harrier’s Pegasus. 

21^st January 2026

A summary of the change

In the 1971 war the IAF took 48 hours (180 sorties, 8 losses, 3 KIAs) to knock out Tejgaon /Kurmitola air bases complex. In Op. Sindoor India had Pakistan on the phone within 15 minutes and, half a year later, PAF Nur Khan is still hors de combat. The angry posts in the Western Financial papers downplaying Op. Sindoor is sweet confirmation of its success.

The changing warplane

Missile technology along with AI -new emerging technologies has transformed warfare and the IAF re-wrote the book; it is going to be a best seller. We have the capability to defend our airspace and attack hostile assets with “impunity”. This raises the question:

Why are we wasting time with the AMCA? It is a purposeless copy and paste of the US F 35 which is not a fifth generation but a “Dolly” fifth gen. aircraft. If the IAF can defend that it needs such a fifth generation it should import the fifty Su- 57/75 for, without a purge and reforms, I don’t expect ADA to deliver. We must focus everything on getting the Tejas Mk1A including the Kaveri engine into IAF service and back that up with the HF 42. The Tejas, I fear, will remain “a monkey on a grease pole”.

Fifth ….?

There are two varieties of the 5^th gen, The true fifth generation are the ones that are designed to infiltrate air defence. They rely heavily on stealth, AI weapons and data processing and are long range waffenstragers. Typical examples are the F 117, B 2.  Being specialist weapons, they were built in very limited numbers of 100-200  which is why importing our even more limited quantity make sense and are, because of secret technology, deployment is restricted to avoid leakage of technology and they have never been offered for export. They are “gunboat diplomacy” warplanes.

Note that Europe and Russia have quietly sat out the fifth-generation aka F 35. They cannot politically enforce independent “gun boat diplomacy “, therefore do not need a true fifth generation and they know that dollar dominance and the international banks will not permit sale of their “dolly fifth” to compete against the US F 35 even if they were to develop one. Financial Politics is a powerful factor in aviation development!

…or Dolly Fifth?

The Dolly Fifth is a pseudo 5^thgen package meant to sell the F 16 replacement to NATO, the Mandi for US weapons. To sell it has to be “better” than the 4^th gen. In the “Dolly Fifth” generation- super cruise, stealth, sensor fusion are “markers” to differentiate it from the previous 4^th generation. To justify the price, they have thrown in engineering wise contradictory engineering features. Why are we going for the AMCA which is not the 5^th generation we need but a “Dolly Fifth” waste of effort.

Looking to History

Our problem as posed, with the possible deployment of enemy Fifth and Dolly Fifth generations, is how do we intercept and destroy them within the ambit of our present levels of technology. This calls for a calm use of frugal engineering. If our tactical problem is to stop the F 35 or J 20s the sturdiest answer would be to develop the LF radar net to detect and have a very small hybrid fifth gen “sniper” to destroy the F 35s using existing Indian technical abilities.

Changing the nouns and looking to History, our problem of intercepting a F 35 or a J 35 is a repetition the Vietnam air war where a low technology combination of Radar, AAA, SAMs and MiG 17s defeated the US plan to bomb Vietnam back into the stone age. The combined technologies plan of Vietnam air defence worked.  We do NOT need “chrome plated “solutions. History says that British “Chain Home “system that won them the Battle of Britain was not the best. Its own creator said it was the third best solution and that the second best would come “tomorrow”. The amusing History of the British Chain Home development because of its innovative thinking will also have lessons in shaping development strategy, organization and teamwork whose relevance shine through time.

Disdain Collaboration

I view any proposal for collaboration as fund bait i.e. a procedure where the technologically illiterate “maalik” is guided into releasing easy funds without a searching skilled audit being involved. An Indian Dolly Fifth AMCA it will need a 120/150 kN engine which will need a collaboration. So, what and how many were the discussions on a frugal solution using an existing Kaveri or Pegasus engine base? Probably none because GTRE and ADA lacked the ability to tackle the IAF’s job competence when it comes to discussing customer requirements. This happened with the Tejas and look at the mess! 43 yrs. and counting!

It has been suggested that 5 years R.I for the proposers in case of sustained delay may be considered. Punitive measures against failure and serial excuses are necessary. Andrei Tupolev designed the “Sotka”, the brilliant Tu 2, from prison; the suggestion of imprisonment for failure is thus not without distinguished precedent.

Every license agreement since the Vampire was de facto a technical collaboration. We failed to utilize every one of those yet we expect everything will be right this time. What is special this time that we will be given the enabling knowledge?  

The other problem is these “serial excuse” projects are urged into action by organizations and agencies , GTRE. ADE of DRDO and ADA comes to mind, which benefit from the massive fundings- a rumored 60,000 crores for the engine alone- but do not, unlike the IAF, suffer any of the consequences of failure. The IAF stood down 15 squadrons due to delayed (by 20yrs plus!) development of ADA but how many divisions of ADA has been closed down or how many Directors of GTRE imprisoned?

The Maalik

The present system, though crippled by paperwork, does work. There have been some really brilliant successes but the successes depended heavily on the quality of local leadership. There was no interest and oversight of projects at the Raisina level. The post 2014 Raj has ensured closer monitoring but close monitoring alone is not sufficient. The domain knowledge of the Maalik is still missing and I fear they are being “conned”. Full time professional management is essential.

Development Targets.

Struggling with a 4^th, generation 43 yrs from project start, is unaffordable. The target rate of development is 3-4 yrs. to first flight, 6 years to IOC or else we are wasting time. In excess of a decade such delays have the dimensions of a fraud. Project studies is continuous background work and does not need more than petty cash.  This fast-paced industry. A knowledgeable full time Maalik and the Labs as adjunct not lead to the main Industry is called for. Unless we reorganize to put the horse back before the cart, continued failure is certain.

Span, Length and Politics

A legendary and acerbic British fighter designer speaking about the TSR 2 said “An aeroplane has three dimensions. Length, span and politics. The TSR 2 got the first two right” He condensed into a few terse sentences his vast experience. An aircraft that is designed without the “politics” in mind will be a failure as the Tejas has shown. The same seems to be the case with the AMCA.

The “politics” in this case of the Dolly 5^th.gen, begins with some axioms.

1.      The Financial Houses that fund Big Pharma, genetically modified crops, Metformin for diabetes, Healthcare, Covid virus and it’s vaccine also invest in Aerospace and weapons development and with the identical aim. - to maximize the Investors profits. Weapons are made to absorb US Government spending on “defense”- not necessarily to win wars.

2.      Winning wars is done by Regime Changes- a technique in which the US has skill and experience. For us countering regime change has priority.

3.      The US Technical press push a strong element of marketing “ours is the best and only way” element. Occasional or incidental successes are given wide publicity- Bekaa Valley, Iraq War as proof of “quality over quantity” but how better tactics and frugal improvements could turn the table, for obvious reasons, not discussed. As in Marxist written  History, there is a one-sided look ignoring the substantial other narrative. Spectacular failures of the above idea are explained away by the portmanteau explanation of “Asymmetric warfare” rather than the failure of the elaborate specifications.

The above is a sample of many “soft” factors involved in design. Without taking cognizance of such factor’s our efforts will be dismally unproductive as the Tejas has shown by it’s delays. We now see that even if the Tejas is got right technically- we will still have supply chain issues. It will always be a monkey on a grease pole.

The Tejas is an experience we will not care to repeat. Some believe that from the start it was organized to fail so that the IAF continued to depend on imports. Only Raisina level investigations can establish that. What is clear is the scientists ignored the task (MiG 21 replacement) and chased “technology” (“four essential technologies”) ignoring engineering realities -which in any case they, as “Scientists” they had no base. Have we taken the right corrections in this matter? The AMCA specifications certainly does not reassure and continuing this as an ADA led programme will guarantee the same fate as the Tejas programme.

The 5^th.Generation sniper requires invesigation

The challenge posed by Chinese supplied J 20 and -35 needs a reversion of the “missile with a man in it” concept: a small interceptor based heavily on 2^nd /3^rd generation technology airframe “stealthified” and equipped  with sensor fusion data fusion, capable of being guided by data links sufficiently close to intruding F 35s to be able to engage and destroy the F 35 using existing IR missiles/ guns in WVR combat. It is assumed that BVR technology will be rendered ineffective by stealth. The details will be discussed in the future but obviously the IAF will have to play a major role in shaping the design by generating data.