Defense Minister Suren Papikyan is in India as part of a working visit, this is the minister’s second visit to that country. Papikyan today participated in the opening ceremony of the Aero India exhibition at the Yelahanka Air Force Base of the Indian Air Force.
During the conclave of defense ministers held within the framework of the exhibition, Papikyan had a brief conversation with the Chief of the General Staff of the Indian Armed Forces, Anil Chauhan.
It should be noted that the Indian press has numerous publications, according to which Armenia has concluded a number of deals with India over the past four years to import missiles, artillery, missile systems, radars, body armor and night vision devices, as well as a wide range of ammunition and artillery. The Armenian Ministry of Defense does not comment on military purchases.
However, has India become the main source of arms supplies for Armenia, as Russia once was? According to military expert David Harutyunov, India does not produce all the weapons that Armenia needs.
“Now, in fact, according to some experts, India has become the main supplier in the sense that the main purchases that the Armenian side makes, based on the information that is in the press, are from India. But, of course, there is a difference with Russia in the sense that Russia is one of the few countries that can independently produce almost all types of heavy weapons.
There may be questions about quality, difficulties, volumes, but in any case, it has that potential. India, naturally, does not have such opportunities. That is, India is now the main seller in the assortment that the Armenian side buys, but there are some types of weapons that it simply does not produce, and in general, their military-industrial complex is relatively new to the international market. It seems to me that if we try to see in the future what form it will take... in fact, India is not alone now, it is the main one in terms of volumes, but we see that the Armenian side also has such relations with France, and contacts with Russia do not stop. In other words, I think that in the future, if the situation develops like this, there will be some kind of hybrid option, that is, there will be several main suppliers, and the Russian side will somehow, in smaller volumes, but will remain as a partner, because in addition to the fact that there are some types of weapons that India does not produce and it will be difficult to buy from the West, there is also a problem with the maintenance of previously supplied Russian or Soviet weapons.
In other words, some kind of support from Russia will be needed, for this, it seems to me, they will still participate in these processes in some way. Therefore, apparently, there will be some kind of diversified hybrid option, but to say that India can become the only partner, then no, they naturally do not have that potential,”Harutyunov said in an interview with Euromedia24.
We asked the expert what he thinks, how does Russia relate to the fact that Armenia is trying to replace it with India? "There are already some reactions from there, in general they are not satisfied."
But there are some peculiarities here: first, Armenia is making this transition under duress, because in the conditions of the Ukrainian conflict, Russia simply has a number of external obligations related to the supply of weapons, which it cannot fulfill.
In other words, the problem is not only in Armenia, that is, here they say, right, that they paid for the weapons, they were not supplied, etc., but in reality this has happened in the case of several countries, and by the way, India is also on that list: a batch of weapons intended for a specific country, already manufactured, was later observed during hostilities in Ukraine. Therefore, first of all, it should be said that if the Armenian side now turns to Russia, it is not known whether they will be able to fill that demand in such volumes. Their military-industrial complex is now working primarily for their army, ”said the military expert.
According to Harutyunov, Armenian-Indian relations are the least tense for Russia, because India continues to remain an important partner for Russia both in terms of military-technical cooperation and in terms of economy.
Armenia's relations with the West are different, which is causing greater tension in Armenian-Russian relations. Koryun Simonyan
