ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to explore the many offsets that were demanded, offered, and agreed to in connection to India’s Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) competition. It does so by first tracking the MMRCA (2.0) competition through several rounds of negotiations from 2001 to 2023, before then evaluating Rafale’s offset performance over the entire fulfilment period. In doing so, this chapter provides further support for the liberal-rationalist theory of defence offsets developed in this book. The ‘mother of all defence deals’ had bidders offering India considerable offset packages, with European packages from EADS, Dassault, and especially Saab regularly outbidding those by less export-reliant American suppliers. However, Dassault, EADS, Rosoboronexport, as well as US diplomats invariably mentioned India’s small and relatively backward defence industrial base as a factor that limited the level of engagement with Indian manufacturers. Furthermore, this chapter confirms that defence companies in public governance ecosystems are more able to impose their preferences on their home states than those in public ones. Indeed, though both Boeing and Lockheed weresaid to be ready to satisfy India’s offset demands, Washington discontinued cooperation on jet engine technologies with New Delhi. By contrast, France’s DGA was either unwilling or unable to influence Dassault’s decision not to transfer sensitive technology to India.
