The Indian Air Force (IAF) contest for mid-air refueling tanker aircraft will depend on how a United States Air Force (USAF) competition for a massive order for 179 tankers plays out towards the end of the year.
The Indian tender is being reprocessed after India’s Finance Ministry thought the IAF’s earlier choice of the Airbus A330 MRTT (Multi Role Tanker Transport) over the Russian IL-78 too expensive, earlier this year, and compelled the IAF to start over, to select six tankers that could cost over a billion US dollars.
The IAF is keen on making sure the Russian IL-78 faces sufficient competition and that the relative abilities of the respective aircraft are rendered patently evident. This, coupled with the calculation of life-cycle costs of the aircraft, under the Air Staff Qualitative Requirements (ASQRs), is likely intended to preempt the objections of the Finance Ministry.
In addition to the earlier two contestants, the IAF would also like to get US defense and aerospace major Boeing into the running to make the contest more interesting, if nothing else.
