
This is the third aircraft to be delivered under an option contract for four additional aircraft that the Ministry of Defence awarded in 2016 in addition to the eight aircraft already in service.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh is on a visit to Ladakh a day after India’s foreign ministry categorically said no territory had been ceded in the region. The fire onboard the U.S. Navy’s amphibious assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard at San Diego Naval Base has finally been put out, Japan has inducted it’s first Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft and Saudi Arabia has announced a new defence exhibition.

China calls US rejection of its claims in the South China Sea completely unjustified, as the United Kingdom makes plans to base an aircraft carrier in the Far East, Boeing has been awarded a USD 1.2 B contract for the first eight F-15EX fighters, the US Navy is still dealing with a fire onboard a forty thousand ton aircraft carrier, the Delhi High Court has rejected a serving Indian Army officer’s plea to allow him to keep his Facebook account and the British government has finally settled the issue and banned equipment supplied by China’s Huawei from it’s 5G networks.

Part III of this analysis examines the implications of the single most interesting data point to emerge from the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India. This date has never been mentioned in earlier media reports, and what is almost startlingly significant is not only what transpired on this date, but the fact of the date, itself.