Capt Valette, a French Mirage-2000 fighter pilot and a Kosovo veteran, has a few tricks up his sleeve. Tricks and skills that his Indian counterparts in the ace Tiger and Battle Axe Mirage-2000 squadrons are paying heed to with great detail.The ongoing joint Indo-French combat aircraft exercises, Exercise Garuda, which began here on February 6, is the beginning of a minor revolution in India’s air power doctrines. For the first time in over 40 years, Indian fighter pilots are rubbing shoulders with a major Western power. And for the first time, they are getting a peek into NATO doctrines, which have till now been uncharted territory for Indian military planners. Brahmos successfully test-fired from INS Rajput NEW DELHI: India on Wednesday achieved a milestone when it successfully test-fired its super-sonic cruise missile, Brahmos, from a ship off the Orissa coast. This is the first time that the missile has been test-fired from a ship and the success is a major step forward in the missile’s evolution. The 290 km range Brahmos is a joint venture of India and Russia. About 40 Russian scientists along with their DRDO counterparts witnessed the trial. According to defence sources, the missile was test fired from INS Rajput, a frontline Kashin class guided missile destroyer. It can carry a payload in the range of 200 to 300 kg and has a top speed in excess of Mach 2. In Islamabad, Pakistan’s Information Minister Sheikh Rashid called India an “extremist country” and the test a “sign of extremism deliberately timed to attract minimal world attention”. (ENS) Air Marshal Ajit Bhavnani, Senior Air Staff Officer, Central Air Command, feels that both air forces have ‘‘gained a lot from the first-ever joint fighter operations’’. Bhavnani, who has been a key figure in India’s Mirage-2000 programme right from the beginning, feels that the relationship could go beyond fancy terms such as the ‘‘kills’’ scored by the Indian and French fighter pilots when pitted against each other. While the series of Indo-US military exercises that started in 2001 have been mostly tactical in nature, the few naval exercises have been more friendly than educational. But the present set of exercises is helping Indian fighter pilots understand new doctrines.Sitting behind their French counterparts in their Mirage-2000 or flying on either side, the Indian fighter pilots have been paying attention to ways to lock on to a massive KC-135 air-to-air refuelling tanker. For India, which is awaiting its IL-78M tankers, this is a crucial learning curve. The fact that the French Mirages have covered 10,000 km, making extensive use of the oil tanker, indicates the strategic jump that India will make when it gets its first mid-air tanker.Indian fighter pilots are also excited about flying with an air force that depends extensively on technology. Still dependent on their dog-fighting skills in close air combats, this is an experience that is helping them look at their recently acquired radars and missiles with beyond-visual-range capabilities.
