India has decided to develop a 1000km sub-sonic cruise missile. The test firing will take place around 2009. The details can be seen here.
The first thought after reading this article was that scientists have reconfigured Brahmos to decrease the speed around 0.7 Mach and increase the range. Though it is not as easy as it sounds yet the experience of Brahmos must have come in handy, and it is not hard to believe that Nirbhay may be based on Russian blueprints.
Nirbhay will help India strike deep in Pakistan and will act as a credible deterrent against China, provided it can be launched from sea/submarines. However, there is another submarine launched cruise missile (SLCM) under developed by the name of Sagarika so it is really doubtful if Nirbhay will be configured to be launched from submarines.
Nirbhay should be seen as an intermediate step between longer range hypersonic cruise missile, which will supposedly go by the name of Brahmos 2. Having a 1000km range missile in India’s arsenal should boost India’s position as a global player in world politics and economy.
More details and analysis, as and when they come, good luck India!
Friday, July 27, 2007
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Brahmos 2: Development Path
Do a search on ‘Brahmos’ and you will get to know that it is a cruise-missile jointly developed by India and Russia, that it is ‘universal supersonic cruise missile’ and many believe it’s potency lies in its supersonic speed which makes it difficult to intercept. All this is a kind of feel-good news stories given by reporters who have a lot many other things to cover and we will not get into criticising them. We will talk about Brahmos and its future.
Brahmos cruise missile, though one of its kind in Asia, has a very severe limitation – its range. At a mere officially-quoted range of 280-300km, and 120 km in lo-lo-lo trajectory (a flying path in which missile always flies close of ground/sea) it is difficult to use the missile from sea-based systems to land targets without getting dangerously close to the enemy.
Speculations are rife about development of Brahmos-2, a hypersonic cruise missile (mach 7) with a range of about 1000km. This range will undoubtedly gives an upper hand to the navy and army over at least Pakistan because cruise missiles are relatively cheaper than ballistic missiles and can be used for carrying conventional war heads; this essentially translates to having a very high lethality without the fear of involving nuclear weapons. However, we must not be jumping with joy because firstly Brahmos was hugely successful because Indians had got the technical know-how about propulsion and guidance from Russia, this will not be the case for Brahmos 2 because Russia is a signer in MTCR which limits transferring missiles having range greater than 300km to other countries.
What might be the development of path of Brahmos 2 or, to quote President Kalam - Brahmos Mark-II? Assuming Brahmos 2 will indeed have the capabilities of flying at hypersonic speeds then at this point of time India does not have any system capable of cruising at this speed either in military or civil domain. Development of hypersonic plane Avatar is in progress by ISRO which will, technically speaking, give India the capability of developing a hypersonic cruise missile but ISRO is a civilian agency and as such does not have anything to do with defence organizations and it is not advisable to make ISRO serve a dual purpose because of two reasons:
1. ISRO is gradually making an entry into commercial satellite launch market and a majority of countries will stop using ISRO’s services, even though cheaper, for the fear of funding India’s defence establishments. In fact, many analysts feel that USA should dissuade other countries from using ISRO’s launch vehicles even now (page 18, http://www.npec-web.org/Essays/060207SpeierICBM.pdf).
2. ISRO will stop getting any assistance or special materials for the construction of its satellites, which will gravely limit India’s civilian satellite usage including weather-prediction.
Given these facts, it will be fair to assume that Indian government will dare not transfer the technology from civil agency to military agency. Unlike what was done in 1980s when ISRO’s SLV was converted into missile, because ISRO’s stakes were very low at that time. Having said this, there are many covert methods of transferring technology such as, at the very basic level, transferring ISRO scientists to DRDO.
Coming back to the development path Brahmos 2 might take, reports suggest that Avatar will make its test flight around December, 2008. Moving ahead from December, 2008 I feel that another 10 years will go in development of Brahmos 2 (given the dubious track record of DRDO this is a very optimistic estimate) because I wonder if Russia will ever agree to providing technology which will breach MTCR, such technology if at all transferred will be done undercover. And then from test-flight to induction into armed forces again may take 5-6 years (as it did in case of Brahmos).
Given the scenario, we are still about 16 years away from having a hypersonic cruise missile, it is likely that many other countries would have acquired cruise missiles by that time, India too may have joined the group of developed countries and Delhi Police may start accepting credit cards for taking bribes!
Brahmos cruise missile, though one of its kind in Asia, has a very severe limitation – its range. At a mere officially-quoted range of 280-300km, and 120 km in lo-lo-lo trajectory (a flying path in which missile always flies close of ground/sea) it is difficult to use the missile from sea-based systems to land targets without getting dangerously close to the enemy.
Speculations are rife about development of Brahmos-2, a hypersonic cruise missile (mach 7) with a range of about 1000km. This range will undoubtedly gives an upper hand to the navy and army over at least Pakistan because cruise missiles are relatively cheaper than ballistic missiles and can be used for carrying conventional war heads; this essentially translates to having a very high lethality without the fear of involving nuclear weapons. However, we must not be jumping with joy because firstly Brahmos was hugely successful because Indians had got the technical know-how about propulsion and guidance from Russia, this will not be the case for Brahmos 2 because Russia is a signer in MTCR which limits transferring missiles having range greater than 300km to other countries.
What might be the development of path of Brahmos 2 or, to quote President Kalam - Brahmos Mark-II? Assuming Brahmos 2 will indeed have the capabilities of flying at hypersonic speeds then at this point of time India does not have any system capable of cruising at this speed either in military or civil domain. Development of hypersonic plane Avatar is in progress by ISRO which will, technically speaking, give India the capability of developing a hypersonic cruise missile but ISRO is a civilian agency and as such does not have anything to do with defence organizations and it is not advisable to make ISRO serve a dual purpose because of two reasons:
1. ISRO is gradually making an entry into commercial satellite launch market and a majority of countries will stop using ISRO’s services, even though cheaper, for the fear of funding India’s defence establishments. In fact, many analysts feel that USA should dissuade other countries from using ISRO’s launch vehicles even now (page 18, http://www.npec-web.org/Essays/060207SpeierICBM.pdf).
2. ISRO will stop getting any assistance or special materials for the construction of its satellites, which will gravely limit India’s civilian satellite usage including weather-prediction.
Given these facts, it will be fair to assume that Indian government will dare not transfer the technology from civil agency to military agency. Unlike what was done in 1980s when ISRO’s SLV was converted into missile, because ISRO’s stakes were very low at that time. Having said this, there are many covert methods of transferring technology such as, at the very basic level, transferring ISRO scientists to DRDO.
Coming back to the development path Brahmos 2 might take, reports suggest that Avatar will make its test flight around December, 2008. Moving ahead from December, 2008 I feel that another 10 years will go in development of Brahmos 2 (given the dubious track record of DRDO this is a very optimistic estimate) because I wonder if Russia will ever agree to providing technology which will breach MTCR, such technology if at all transferred will be done undercover. And then from test-flight to induction into armed forces again may take 5-6 years (as it did in case of Brahmos).
Given the scenario, we are still about 16 years away from having a hypersonic cruise missile, it is likely that many other countries would have acquired cruise missiles by that time, India too may have joined the group of developed countries and Delhi Police may start accepting credit cards for taking bribes!
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Capping of ICBM – Uncapping of Debate
As per the news on 19 June 2007, government of India has decided to limit the range of any Indian missile to 5000 km, just falling short of the range of an inter-continental ballistic missile. At a point when world is waking up to the importance of India both militarily and economically, does it look like a right thing to do?
The answer can not be given in a clear ‘yes’ or ‘no’, because on one hand it will strengthen the case on Indo-US 123 agreement and hence ease the supply of nuclear fuel for the Indian nuclear power plants which they sorely needs to fulfil domestic power needs. On the other hand, India is seriously jeopardising its stakes in the international community by constraining itself to be just a regional power when it can grow its stature to that of a global power and be counted in the leagues of US, Russia, China, France and UK.
By limiting the range India is clearly submitting to the wishes of USA, although government is and will continue to vehemently deny such allegations the fact remains that India is following the same path which it followed in the 1990s in the then Congress government of Narasimha Rao. At that time also India had not only postponed the missile tests of Agni-II but also postponed the nuclear tests, which were subsequently conducted in 1998. Incidentally, the current government of UPA is also led by Congress and the current Prime Minister of India is seen as far more submissive and docile than Mr. Narasimha Rao.
The process of making an ICBM had started as early as 1994 with the code name Surya. Surya-I was supposed to have a range of 12,000 km and Surya-II having range of 20,000 km. This program, to the best of my estimate, has been rechristened and the missile’s name will be in Agni series only. The reason why USA wants to stop this program is because it views Surya missile as USA-centric and would go to any length including blackmailing on 123-agreement to put this program on ice for ever.
Having vented my anger towards the government, an objective evaluation shows that any missile in the proximity of 5000 km range is sufficient for the short-term needs of India. The missile development is a long process, however, after testing Agni-III many crucial parameters have been verified and now it is a matter of possibly 12 to 18 months to add another stage in the current Agni-III and convert it into a longer range missile. If India makes a range long enough to reach USA or even Europe, then it may not be taken favourably by the international community and may deter the Nuclear Supplier Group to halt supplies despite the Indo-US agreement. The idea should be postpone the ICBM testing for a later time and in the mean time do not stop with the testing of missiles altogether and continue with testing of crucial technologies through shorter range missiles. There are many other missiles which can be improvised upon including Sagarika – a SLCM, Agni-III++ - a SLBM and Nag – an anti-tank missile.
This is what I believe the government has in mind but given the sensitive nature of this issue, the information remains highly classified and how the policy makers decide on the testing issue remains to be seen.
The answer can not be given in a clear ‘yes’ or ‘no’, because on one hand it will strengthen the case on Indo-US 123 agreement and hence ease the supply of nuclear fuel for the Indian nuclear power plants which they sorely needs to fulfil domestic power needs. On the other hand, India is seriously jeopardising its stakes in the international community by constraining itself to be just a regional power when it can grow its stature to that of a global power and be counted in the leagues of US, Russia, China, France and UK.
By limiting the range India is clearly submitting to the wishes of USA, although government is and will continue to vehemently deny such allegations the fact remains that India is following the same path which it followed in the 1990s in the then Congress government of Narasimha Rao. At that time also India had not only postponed the missile tests of Agni-II but also postponed the nuclear tests, which were subsequently conducted in 1998. Incidentally, the current government of UPA is also led by Congress and the current Prime Minister of India is seen as far more submissive and docile than Mr. Narasimha Rao.
The process of making an ICBM had started as early as 1994 with the code name Surya. Surya-I was supposed to have a range of 12,000 km and Surya-II having range of 20,000 km. This program, to the best of my estimate, has been rechristened and the missile’s name will be in Agni series only. The reason why USA wants to stop this program is because it views Surya missile as USA-centric and would go to any length including blackmailing on 123-agreement to put this program on ice for ever.
Having vented my anger towards the government, an objective evaluation shows that any missile in the proximity of 5000 km range is sufficient for the short-term needs of India. The missile development is a long process, however, after testing Agni-III many crucial parameters have been verified and now it is a matter of possibly 12 to 18 months to add another stage in the current Agni-III and convert it into a longer range missile. If India makes a range long enough to reach USA or even Europe, then it may not be taken favourably by the international community and may deter the Nuclear Supplier Group to halt supplies despite the Indo-US agreement. The idea should be postpone the ICBM testing for a later time and in the mean time do not stop with the testing of missiles altogether and continue with testing of crucial technologies through shorter range missiles. There are many other missiles which can be improvised upon including Sagarika – a SLCM, Agni-III++ - a SLBM and Nag – an anti-tank missile.
This is what I believe the government has in mind but given the sensitive nature of this issue, the information remains highly classified and how the policy makers decide on the testing issue remains to be seen.
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