RBT's Defense Blog

   DSDBO Road The 255 km long Darbuk-Shyok-Daulat Beg Oldie road also called Sub-Sector North Road, is a strategic all-weather road in eastern Ladakh in India, close to the Line of Actual Control with China. It connects Leh, capital city of Ladakh with the Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO) post next to Depsang Plains via the villages of Darbuk and Shyok along the Shyok River Valley. The work started slowly with 220-km long stretch between Shyok and DBO built between 2000 and 2019 by Border Roads Organisation. The road was meant to reduce travel time between Leh and DBO from 2 days to just 6 hours. Indeed this road would have given Indian Army a strategic advantage whenever it wanted to defend the Depang Plains and DBO area, with the LAC being just 10 kms away. The road itself is about 5 – 6 kms further away from Depsang Plains, north of the Depsang Bulge, a 900 sq. kms area. The road was important but when China unilaterally moved forward occupying positions west of LAC (one of which led to

It has been over a year since the Russia and Ukraine war has been raging. Though Indian government has refused to take sides in the war, calling for its end but effectively it has been on Russia’s side being one of its biggest customers of cheap crude oil that is being refined and exported to Europe, becoming a bigger exporter that Saudi Arabia  😊 . What’s more Europe happily and knowingly buys it, effectively showcasing its hypocrisy. Anyways Ukraine has been trying too hard ever since to get at India for giving tacit support to Russia. But India has always ignored Ukrainian blabbering’s over India’s support to Russia. However, fact is not just Indian government but by and large most of the Indian public too has always stood beside Russia, as they never forget how Russia helped India when the West/Europe actually tried to give pains on various matters. Ukraine on various public forums and on one-to-one interactions has requested for Indian support against Russia, but India politely t

           (sample image) India’s MoD has initiated a project to design and develop Extra Large Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (XLUUV) for Indian Navy to bridge the glaring gap in its underwater capabilities due to significant delays to Project-75I. As per reports, Indian Navy needs up to 12 XLUUVs. But I would say India must operate at least 2 dozen (24) XLUUVs with an endurance of at least 75 days. The XLUUV may reportedly have a maximum ‘length with payload’ of up to 50 meters, a width of up to 5 meters, a height of no more than 10 meters, and gross weight without ballast under 300 tons making it one of the largest submarine drones at par with Germany’s Modifiable Underwater Mothership, US Navy’s Orca XLUUV, and Russia’s Sarma-D, that are in the prototyping phase. The XLUUV is intended for ISR, anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface warfare, and mine warfare. An external payload of up to 10 tons by mounting two 533 mm torpedo tubes and mine laying capability for the XLUUVS is being cons