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Text/Editor/Xiao Yan's view of the world
India's Arjun tank, developed in 1972, after 48 years of twists and turns, was finally delivered to the army in 2004. As a tank full of expectations and controversy, Arjun's development journey reflects India's challenges and ambitions in independent research and development of military technology. It was once billed as the heaviest and most expensive main battle tank in the world, but it was also questioned and ridiculed. What problems did India face in this multi-decade project? What is the true strength of the Arjun tank, and what does this much-talked-about military project mean for India?
India has always had ambitions to make a major breakthrough in the military sphere, especially in the development of third-generation main battle tanks. This field is not only a technical challenge, but also a manifestation of a country's comprehensive military industrial strength. There are very few countries in the world that can independently develop advanced main battle tanks, and India, with a strong desire for independent research and development, is facing many difficulties because of its weak industrial base. Despite this, India is determined to devote significant resources to the development of the main battle tank, known as the Arjun, but its performance is far from what it expected, and it is even seen as a great disgrace among modern main battle tanks.
Historically, India has always been a country that values the land forces. Tanks, as an important part of modern land warfare, naturally became the key to India's military strategy. India has a long history and has experienced a long period of British colonial rule, so its army equipment has a strong British tradition of weapons.
After independence, India continued to rely on second-hand tanks imported from the British, which played a key role in numerous foreign wars. However, the strategy of dependence on imports has a significant weakness - the problem of the supply of tanks in wartime. Tanks are expendable equipment, and wartime attrition must be replenished quickly, but the strategy of relying on imports is inadequate in an emergency. This situation forced India to begin to consider the possibility of developing tanks on its own in order to ensure continuous supply and strategic autonomy in wartime.
India's decision stems from deep considerations for national security and military modernization. During the Cold War, with geopolitical changes and the increase in regional conflicts, India became more aware of the importance of having its own military industry. In addition, domestic politics and national pride have motivated India to pursue military and technological independence. Therefore, India has embarked on the difficult process of self-development of its main battle tanks, which is not only a challenge to its industrial capabilities, but also a test of the country's strategic thinking and technological innovation capabilities.
In the history of the Indian military industry, the development of the Arjun tank represents a major turning point. Through this project, India hopes to demonstrate its technological capabilities and industrial prowess as an emerging military power. However, limited by the level of basic industry and the ability of technological innovation, the research and development process of the "Arjun" tank was full of twists and turns. This not only demonstrates India's limitations in the research and development of high-tech military equipment, but also reflects the challenges of its overall defense industry development strategy.
India's Arjun tank project, from its launch in 1972 to its delivery in 2004, has gone through 32 years of tortuous development, which not only exceeds the number of years of India's independence, but also becomes the longest experience in the history of global tank research and development. The project was slow to progress, encountered technical difficulties and design modifications, and the final product did not live up to the original vision, but instead revealed a number of technical and strategic shortcomings.
In the development of the Arjun tank, the choice of engine became a thorny problem. India initially planned to develop a powerful 1,500 hp diesel engine on its own, but this plan never materialized due to technical barriers. As a last resort, India switched to the German MTU 1400 hp engine, but this expensive imported engine did not match the design of the Arjun tank perfectly, resulting in the overall weight of the tank exceeding expectations, reaching more than 60 tons, far exceeding the original requirements of the Indian Army. In order to find an alternative solution, India tried to introduce a Ukrainian 1200 hp 6TD-2 engine. However, stability and serviceability issues with this engine led to its final rejection by the Army. To this day, the engine problem of the Arjun tank has not been effectively resolved, which has become a major challenge for India in the process of finding a more suitable alternative.
The difficult course of the Arjun tank project actually reflects a dilemma in the Indian military industry. The total cost of the project is estimated to be more than $3 billion, and the cost of each tank is as high as $8 million, which is even more than the German Leopard 2 tank. And such a high-cost investment has not brought corresponding technological breakthroughs or battlefield advantages. Due to the long development time, the Arjun tank was no longer able to compete with the third or fourth generation main battle tanks of the new generation in other countries by the time it finally entered service. Even the Indian Army itself was dissatisfied with the performance of the tank, and in the end only 124 units were ordered, much lower than the originally planned 2,000 units.
All this makes the Arjun tank not only the longest tank development project in the world, but also considered one of the most unsuccessful. It not only failed to achieve the expected goals, but also exposed India's shortcomings in the high-tech military field, and at the same time provided valuable lessons for future military research and development. The story of Arjun Tank becomes a classic case of ambition and reality, challenges and failures.
The Indian Army, faced with the ongoing challenges of the Arjun tank project, has long wanted to put an end to the seemingly fruitless project. They are well aware that for many countries, more than a decade is enough time to develop a new fighter, and the development of the Arjun tank is in a difficult situation. Nevertheless, the Government of India has decided to stay ahead and unswervingly devote more resources to the completion of this project.
During the R&D process, India had to replace several key components due to technical compatibility issues, which led to escalating project costs. The Arjun tank was eventually mass-produced in 2000, but the Indian Army was not enthusiastic about it, believing that despite the huge cost, the Arjun tank still performed as well as the T72 tank imported from Russia.
The total cost of the project is about $3.5 billion, not including some odd expenses. India faces a classic dilemma: huge investments have become sunk costs, and the Army's dissatisfaction with Arjun tanks has been exacerbated. Eventually, in 2000, the Indian government had to invest 17,000 crore to buy 124 Arjun tanks.
In the course of mass production, it is even more ironic that due to production line problems, the cost of Arjun tanks soared to twice the original budget, reaching a staggering $4.7 million per tank, which in turn had to be covered by the Indian Army.
Although the development of the Arjun tank was full of challenges and uncertainties, it also ended up creating three "world's bests". First, it became the longest in the development of the third-generation tank, secondly, it set a record for the highest cost of the third-generation tank with its staggering cost, and finally, despite the use of high-end parts from Europe and the United States, the resulting Arjun tank became one of the least advanced third-generation main battle tanks.
In the face of so many challenges, India has not given up on its expectations of the Arjun tank, but has continued to improve on its foundation and launched the Arjun Tank 2. Although the Arjun tank project has been full of twists and turns in the past, India still hopes that through further improvements, it can give the project a new lease of life.
Between 1994 and 1996, the Arjun tank underwent continuous tests, but each time the test results showed a decrease in performance and problems became increasingly prominent. In 1999, the Indian government decided to officially start production of the Arjun tank, although the army was not satisfied with the tank. The cost of manufacturing is staggering, with a price of about $4.7 million per tank, while the total cost of the entire project, including weapons, ammunition, accessories and maintenance, amounted to a staggering $3.5 billion. This figure is almost equal to the total budget of some countries for the development of several new types of weapons.
Although the army was not interested in Arjun tanks, in 2000, the Indian military reluctantly invested Rs 17,600 crore to buy the 124 Arjun tanks at the strong request of the government. Despite this, these tanks were hardly ever used on real battlefields, and most of the time they were only shown at military parades.
The performance of the Arjun tank was hyped in the Indian media, claiming that it was capable of competing with three Type 99A tanks on the battlefield, and even claimed that its performance was comparable to that of the Leopard 2 and M1A1 tanks. This exaggeration has been widely questioned by the international community. However, the Indian government is still proud to announce that by 2025, the Indian Army will be equipped with 700 to 800 Arjun tanks, making it the main tank force in South Asia.
The response to such a plan has been cynicism, and the Indian army is well aware of it and worried about the future prospects. The story of the Arjun tank is a prime example of a country's difficult challenges in the development of high-end military equipment, as well as the contradiction between policy decisions and military needs. Despite the difficulties, the Indian government and military are still looking for ways to solve the problem in order to improve the performance of the Arjun tank and realize its potential in the army.