Noted & Quoted: RIA Novosti on India’s Arms Market

From RIA Novosti’s op-ed feature “India’s Arms Market: Everyone In, Nobody Out” :

“The Indian arms market is an extraordinary place even by the standards of the markets of the Gulf oil monarchies, which buy weapons indiscriminately, provided the batch is big and the price is high. But India, although it also buys many weapons, does so only after serious consideration and for far-reaching reasons. This is why arms talks with India are like a complex dance with a large number of partners, not unlike a Bollywood movie…

Unlike Chinese reverse-engineering efforts, India honors [intellectual property]… However, India also burdens arms acquisition contracts with so many requirements for localized components production, technology transfer and reinvestment of revenues in the Indian economy that any other client with such exacting tastes would have long been shown the door… But the Indian market is so large and attractive that global arms corporations are fighting for a place on it.”

Rapid Fire May 18, 2012: Chinese Military Assessment

Not a “heart” emoticon

The US Department of Defense released its annual report [PDF] to Congress on Chinese military developments. Analysis of spending is pretty bare-bones: “Using 2011 prices and exchange rates, DoD estimates China’s total military-related spending for 2011 ranges between $120 billion and $180 billion.” The report is thankfully more detailed on capabilities. For context, earlier reports in this series from 2010 and 2011 [PDFs] estimated military spending at $150B and $160B respectively. Last month the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission stated that many observers are drawing false conclusions from fixating their rear view mirror.

This comes as a good backdrop for recent news: