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Is India really capable of building a 5th gen fighter

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I would higly recommend you all to read the post before commenting anything.
1 hafte ki research lagi hai yaar (I have spent over a week writing this article)​

India has been working on its own 5th generation fighter for quite some time now, but it seems far-fetched that India would be able to develop a fifth generation fighter, particularly since the country has primarily been a license manufacturer and has only one indigenously designed and developed fighter aircraft, the 4th generation LCA Tejas, which itself was plagued with delays and numerous other shortcomings.

However, some exciting developments have been taking place in the country that can change this situation in favor of India.

So let's take a closer look. Is India really capable of developing a fifth-generation fighter aircraft?

Before going any further let's first define what a 5th generation fighter really is, Although there is no universally accepted definition of what constitutes as a fifth generation fighter, we can make an informed guess by examining currently operational fifth generation fighters, such as the F22, F35, and J20.

Typical fifth generation characteristics include
• Stealth along with the ability to store munitions internally.
• Supercruise i.e. prolonged supersonic cruise without the use of afterburners.
• Advanced avionics, like flight control systems, radars, electro optics etc.
• Networked data fusion and Advanced AI integration, enabling situational awareness on the battlefield.
• Superior build quality


Now let's see how many of the technologies, needed to make a 5th gen aircraft India actually possesses.

1. Stealth While no aircraft is totally invisible to radars, stealth makes it more difficult for conventional radars to detect and track an aircraft effectively, increasing the odds of the aircraft's survivability in hostile environments by avoiding detection by enemy radar and/or being targeted by enemy's radar guided weapons.
Aircraft stealth is a combination of passive stealth features such as geometric stealth, RAM coatings, and active stealth features such as Electronic Warfare Suites for electronic countermeasures etc.

As a result of the Tejas program, India has gained considerable experience in designing aircrafts, and given that the ADA (Aeronautical Development Agency), the main design agency in the country, has been working on refining the AMCA design for over 8 years, it would not be wrong to assume that India has the capability to design an aircraft with geometric stealth baked into its design.
DRDO (India's premier research organization) even displayed an internal weapons bay in Aero India 2023, a critical technology required for storing munitions internally and achieving geometric stealth.

2. RAM- Radar Absorbant Materials are an essential part of an aircraft's stealth as they absorb the radar waves and convert them into heat energy, thereby preventing the reflection of the waves back to the radar making it difficult for the radar to detect the aircraft. DRDO has been working on these RAM coatings with various Indian academia and private sector companies for quite some time now and recently showcased them at Aero India 2023.

3. Radar- Over the years India's Electronics and Radar Development Establishment has developed all sorts of radars, from 2D PESA surveillance radars like INDRA to GaAs based AESA radars for Netra AEWACS, showing India's expertise in this field. DRDO is currently working on a GaN based AESA radar called UTTAM Mk2 for its Tejas MK1A and MK2 aircrafts. An upscaled version of this radar is intended to go on AMCA. Currently the radar is in its final stages of testing and if DRDO officials are to be believed its performance surpasses the Isreali Elta EL/M 2052 radar used on Tejas MK1.

3. Flight Control Systems (FCS) are the components of an aircraft responsible for controlling the movement of the aircraft in flight along the three main axes (pitch, yaw and roll), thus making them a very crucial part of the aircraft's avionics.
Given the excellent track record of the quadruplex digital fly-by-wire Flight Control System of the Tejas and the experience DRDO gained during its development it won't be wrong to assume that DRDO has the expertise and capability to develop a state of the art FCS for the AMCA.

4. Electronic Warfare suite - While India has traditionally preferred to outright import electronic warfare equipment such as Self protection Jammers, Radar warning receiver, signal processors, IFF systems, Low Band Jammers etc things are slowly changing now as India's premier research organization DRDO has been slowly replacing various subsystems of the imported EW suite with indigenous ones for quite sometime now and finally has the capability to design and develop its entire EW suite all by itself.
While Indian EW Suite might not be as advanced as their western or Chinese counterparts due to superior hardware and better algorithms on their part but having an indigenious EW suite (called DARE Unified Electronic Warfare Suite) is quite an achievement in itself.

5. Production - Mass producing 5th gen fighters requires extremely tight tolerances and a highly optimized production process. Although India has been license producing fighter aircraft's since the 60s none were as advanced and complex as AMCA. It would be interesting to see whether Indian companies would be able to match those tolerances and properly optimize the aircraft production.

6. Sensors - Aircraft sensors of a 5th gen fighter are a highly complex systems, consisting of numerous components such as cameras, infrared sensors, Helmet Mounted Display (HMDS), electro-optical target system (EOTS), Missile Approach Warning System (MAWS) and other integrated technologies. These sensors provide the pilot with a heightened level of situational awareness by offering a comprehensive real time view of the battlefield, making them more accurate and effective in combat.
Although Indian companies and research institutions are working on many of these subsystems like infrared sensors, Missile Approach Warning System (MAWS), IRST sensors etc with significant progress there are still various subsystems such as Helmet Mounted Display (HMDS), electro-optical target system (EOTS) etc which India would need to import from friendly countries like Israel and USA due to a lack of local alternatives which could make the project costlier and could also compromise the security of the system.

7. AI algorithms and sensor fusion are fast becoming an important part of 5th gen fighters, as they reduce human intervention thereby allowing pilots to concentrate on other more important tasks which reduces their reaction time. AI algorithms also improve the accuracy and efficiency of the aircraft by performing tasks such as automated target recognition, flight path optimization, suggesting corrective measures to the pilot, etc. Moreover, AI allows for a deeper level of sensor fusion by combining data from multiple sensors like radar, infrared sensors, MAWS and Cameras in order to provide a more comprehensive view of the battlefield, which in turn allows for a greater level of situation awareness and more accurate decision making.
Judging by India's Massive IT Industry and number of research papers coming out of Indian educational institutes in the field of AI it won't be wrong to say that India has the expertise and capability to make advanced AI algorithms for its fighter jets.

8. A fighter is useless without its weapons, and since 5th gen fighters are used for air dominance and suppressing enemy air defences, they require special weapons that are low observable in nature and can be fitted into the fighter's internal weapon bay, so as not to compromise the aircraft's stealth.
India has already developed and deployed such weapons namely the Astra MK1 and ASRAAM BVR and WVR missiles for Air dominance roles and Rudram MK1 anti radiation missile for suppression of enemy air defences.

9. Jet engine arguably the most crucial part of an aircraft, Although Indian companies and research institutions like GTRE are working on jet engine technology they have failed miserebly. The Indian Kaveri jet engine program failed to achieve its objectives thus forcing India to import jet engines for its indigenious fighters from friendly countries like the USA making projects costlier and also compromising the security of the systems by making them susceptible to sanctions.
However not all hope is lost as India has been aggressively trying to form a joint venture with an established aerospace player to get hold of the technologies needed for filling in the technological shortcomings of the indigenous Kaveri program but for the time being AMCA will fly with a foreign engine namely the General Elecreic 414 afterburning turbofan engine


Although India has made remarkable progress in various technologies related to a 5th gen fighter, there are still some technological hurdles like jet engine technology India needs to overcome ,not to mention the archic delays and cost overruns defense projects in India face. However, it would not be wrong to say that with some outside help India has the necessary capacity, capability and resources to build a 5th generation platform, however will it be able to do so in a timely manner remains to be seen.
 
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Did you even read the entire post, or are you just saying that based on your own preconceived notion,
Please explain why do you think India will not be able to make a 5th gen fighter alone
You've already answered your question in your OP. Engine tech is nowhere close to what is required (at the moment).
 
How is Turkey doing so much better than India despite economic gap and population size?
 
How is Turkey doing so much better than India despite economic gap and population size?
Lack of R&D funding, (Turkey uses rapid prototyping method which is costlier but faster where as India uses conventional method which is slowe but cheaper)

Defence projects actually being matter a of national importence and pride in turkey where as in india its just jumlebaaji and PR Stunt.
For example tejas mk2 had completed CDR and was sitting idle for a year but wasn't sanctioned money for prototyping, where as in turkey money for prototyping was released just after pdr.

Lack of support from IAF due to corrupt IAF generals (setting unrealistic deadlines and expectations, not inducting fighter jets until they reach FOC, yada yada yada)

Bureaucracy, lack of proper communication (DRDO used to be unknown to what HAL is doing and vice vesa) and lack of motivation in Research institutes and other government owned defence sector companies. (even a small project needs approval from atleast 12 different departments)

Stubbornness of indian scientists on insisting to reinvent the wheel everytime (what puropse does spending money on devloping a LED display serve) and instead of treating defence projects as actual product that someone will use they treat it as a personal research item that will remain a prototype.
 
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Lack of R&D funding, (Turkey uses rapid prototyping method which is costlier but faster where as India uses conventional method which is slowe but cheaper)

Defence projects actually being matter a of national importence and pride in turkey where as in india its just jumlebaaji and PR Stunt.
For example tejas mk2 and AMCA had completed CDR and were sitting idle for a year but weren't sanctioned money for prototyping, where as in turkey money for prototyping was released just after pdr.

Lack of support from IAF due to corrupt IAF generals (setting unrealistic deadlines and expectations, not inducting fighter jets until they reach FOC, yada yada yada)

Bureaucracy and lack of motivation in Research institutes and other government owned defence sector companies. (even a small project needs approval from atleast 12 different departments)

Stubbornness of indian scientists on insisting to reinvent the wheel everytime (what puropse does spending money on devloping a LED display serve) and instead of treating defence projects as actual product that someone will use they treat it as a personal research item that will remain a prototype.
Where is credible source saying AMCA has completed CDR ?
 
Where is credible source saying AMCA has completed CDR ?
pardon my mistake, it was reported earlier that DRDO will submit the CDR to Indian government at the Aero India 2023 and ask for funding which seems to not be the case.
However This report tells us that CDR is finished.

according to this report DRDO is asking for funds for prototyping,
(I know whoever wrote this article did so horribly as he himself didn't seem to understand what CDR actually mean and has mixed it up with prototyping)
 
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Did you even read the entire post, or are you just saying that based on your own preconceived notion,
Please explain why do you think India will not be able to make a 5th gen fighter alone

I am sorry my friend. I respect your opinion and hard work in creating a write-ups. But we are not even able to make a good helicopter or regular fighter aircraft that can be used fully by our air force. How can we believe about developing a 5th generation aircraft without any successful proven experience of building aircraft with earlier versions?
 
Alone? No, but they are capable of creating a 5th gen with help from key partners, in a similar fashion to South Korea.

I agree, its a non starter to develop everything in house and delay the project by another 10-15 years. We tried to develop everything for Tejas and we know how that turned out.

Indian approach should be to buy anything that is available off the shelve and cut down on development time and cost, and put focus on critical technologies that no is willing to share.

I am sorry my friend. I respect your opinion and hard work in creating a write-ups. But we are not even able to make a good helicopter or regular fighter aircraft that can be used fully by our air force. How can we believe about developing a 5th generation aircraft without any successful proven experience of building aircraft with earlier versions?

I recon Dhruv project has been fairly successful. Light Utility Helicopter moved from prototype to product in a fairly well managed timeframe.

We have to give credit where its due. And I am hopeful IMRH will be a successful product down the line.
 
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Isn't the era of fighter jets coming to an end?

I think we will have 5th gen robotic drones soon
 
pardon my mistake, it was reported earlier that DRDO will submit the CDR to Indian government at the Aero India 2023 and ask for funding which seems to not be the case.
according to this report DRDO is asking for funds for prototyping,
(I know whoever wrote this article did so horribly as he himself didn't seem to understan what CDR is)
When do you expect the first prototype will be completed ? 2026 ?
 
When do you expect the first prototype will be completed ? 2026 ?
that entirely depends upon when the funding is released, because according to drdo they will be able to make a prototype within 36 months, so i would say 2027
 
By the time Indian's fifth fighter achieved IOC, the world is already moving to sixth gen, this is still considering everything is done under timely manner.
 
By the time Indian's fifth fighter achieved IOC, the world is already moving to sixth gen, this is still considering everything is done under timely manner.
It will achieve IOC in 2032-35 (even after considering in the delays).
Do you really think, countries would have moved on to 6th gen that fast, except US no other country is even seriously working on 6th gen fighters, Europeans are still settling the work share agreement and searching new partners basically no real work being done, Japanese have entangled themselves in the European hotchpotch, as for the Chinese all we saw was a scale model and some researchers running simulations.
Many of the technologies (like loyal wingman's) that define a 6th gen fighter can be easily incorporated into 5th gen fighters, suffice to say 5th gen fighters aren't going anywhere before 2050-60.
1st 6th gen fighter won't be getting inducted anytime before 2035, and even then they would be inducted in very limited numbers (not exceeding double digits)
 
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It will achieve IOC in 2032-35 (even after considering in the delays).
Do you really think, countries would have moved on to 6th gen that fast, except US no other country is even seriously working on 6th gen fighters, Europeans are still settling the work share agreement and searching new partners basically no real work being done, Japanese have entangled themselves in the European hotchpotch, as for the Chinese all we saw was a scale model and some researchers running simulations.
Many of the technologies (like loyal wingman's) that define a 6th gen fighter can be easily incorporated into 5th gen fighters, suffice to say 5th gen fighters aren't going anywhere before 2050-60.
1st 6th gen fighter won't be getting inducted anytime before 2035.

So please stop spewing random insults, and analyse you write before posting.
ioc in 2032-2035, what about mass production? as for our timetable, you can't predict it by just looking at a scale model or whatever it is, J20 only shown up 20 days before its first flight, anyway, let's come back to this thread after 10 years, only time will tell. :-)
you seems to be pretty confident and doesn't take any opposite opinion, I would say it's normal when people outside India disagreed with you because of your country's track record, but I'll leave you to that.
 

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