{"id":244341,"date":"2023-05-25T20:38:35","date_gmt":"2023-05-25T15:08:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=244341"},"modified":"2023-05-25T20:38:35","modified_gmt":"2023-05-25T15:08:35","slug":"eyes-in-the-sky-how-iaf-secured-indias-air-dominance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/eyes-in-the-sky-how-iaf-secured-indias-air-dominance\/","title":{"rendered":"Eyes In The Sky: How IAF Secured India\u2019s Air Dominance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Source-<\/strong> The post is based on the article \u201cEyes In The Sky: How IAF Secured India\u2019s Air Dominance<\/strong>\u201d published in \u201cThe Times of India\u201d<\/strong> on 25th May 2023.<\/p>\n

Syllabus: <\/strong>GS3 \u2013 INternal Security<\/p>\n

Relevance- <\/strong>Capabilities of defence forces<\/p>\n

News<\/strong>– The article explains the history of evolution of use of early warning systems by the Indian Air Force.<\/p>\n

What is the historical background of deployment of early warning systems by the Indian Air Force?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The British Royal Air Force deemed radars too advanced and \u201cunnecessary\u201d for IAF<\/strong>. It left behind damaged and sabotaged equipment. <\/strong><\/p>\n

After Independence, IAF decided to rebuild its radar capability<\/strong>. A mobile radar set recovered from sabotaged equipment was christened No 1 Radar Unit<\/strong> and moved to Palam. It became the first-ever Signal Unit in IAF. By 1949, six more sets were operational. <\/strong>These served predominantly as early warning radars.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 1949, IAF ordered five static Sector Operations Centres (SOC)<\/strong> from Marconi UK. These were intended to replicate the British hub and spoke air defence setup. <\/strong><\/p>\n

The first SOC was established in Delhi in 1954. By 1962, IAF had set up five SOCs<\/strong> at Delhi, Ambala, Jodhpur, Barrackpore and Bombay.<\/p>\n

IAF\u2019s Air Defence Ground Environment System philosophy<\/strong> was to protect Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta and have protection along the western boundary via SOCs at Ambala and Jodhpur.<\/p>\n

However, the insufficient number of radars<\/strong> did not provide any defence in depth. Vital areas, except Delhi, were covered with a maximum of 80-170 km of early warning. It gave fighter aircraft less time to react.<\/p>\n

The 1962 war led to more significant changes<\/strong>. Immediately after the war, modern equipment <\/strong>was acquired from the US and USSR.<\/p>\n

Western nations also conducted \u201cExercise \u2013 Shiksha<\/strong>\u201d in India in November 1963, which included training as well as two mobile radar units. This led to IAF contracting six US-made Star Sapphire radars. <\/strong><\/p>\n

The USSR also agreed to provide SA-2 surface-to-air missiles and the P-30 radar<\/strong>. SA-2 units were deployed in Chandigarh, Ambala, Calcutta, Delhi and Baroda, while twelve P-30 radars were stationed nationwide.<\/p>\n

However, IAF had only operationalised two P-30s and one Star Sapphire<\/strong> when the 1965 war broke out. 230 SU at Amritsar was one of the two P-30s operational. It played an important role in both wars with Pakistan.<\/p>\n

How has the landscape of the early warning system drastically changed after 2010?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

On September 14, 2010, IAF launched the Air Force Network (AFNET)<\/strong>. It replaced its old communication network<\/strong> which used the tropo-scatter technology<\/strong> of the 1950s with a dedicated fibre-optic wide area network<\/strong>. It offers encrypted, and secure bandwidth.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Building on the AFNET backbone, IAF rolled out the Integrated Air Command and Control System or IACCS<\/strong>. It has provided for automated control and monitoring<\/strong> of air operations by linking real-time feeds<\/strong> from defence and civil sensors throughout the country.<\/p>\n

To ensure all-weather surveillance, IAF has ordered indigenously built radars<\/strong> to augment the IACCS feed. These are now in advanced stages of deployment <\/strong>along critical regions.<\/p>\n

The integration of IACCS with AWACS, UAVs and surface-to-air missiles<\/strong> has improved the ability to launch fighter aircraft against hostile targets promptly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source- The post is based on the article \u201cEyes In The Sky: How IAF Secured India\u2019s Air Dominance\u201d published in \u201cThe Times of India\u201d on 25th May 2023. Syllabus: GS3 \u2013 INternal Security Relevance- Capabilities of defence forces News– The article explains the history of evolution of use of early warning systems by the Indian… Continue reading Eyes In The Sky: How IAF Secured India\u2019s Air Dominance<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10320,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1230,9],"tags":[216,10496],"class_list":["post-244341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-pm-daily-articles","category-public","tag-gs-paper-3","tag-times-of-india","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10320"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244341\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}