Agni - V: ICBM for India

(AGNI-V missile, with a range of 5,000 km (3,100 miles), successfully lifts off from Wheeler s Island of Indias east coast in Odisha.) However, Chinas strategic experts and the official media are trying to provoke western countries saying the Agni-V missile has a longer range than India would admit, and it can hit cities in Europe. In comments that are obviously authorized by the defense ministry, Chinese experts said the Indian missile actually has a range of 8,000 kilometers and not the shorter range of 5,000 kms, as claimed by India. There are signs China will try to pressure the US and Russia not to sell missile guidance systems to India. The missile brings the whole of Asia, 70 per cent of Europe and other regions under its strike range and puts India among a select band of countries in the world to possess the technology of intercontinental ballistic missiles, the official Xinhua news agency said in a dispatch published in dozens of Chinese newspapers. Another paper, the Global Times, even carried a map showing Moscow, Tehran and Jakarta among cities coming within the range of Indian missiles. An expert at the PLA Academy of Military Sciences said the Agni-V actually has the potential to reach targets 8,000 kilometers away, according to the Communist Party-controlled Global Times. It quoted the researcher, Du Wenlong, saying the Indian government had deliberately downplayed the missiles capability in order to avoid causing concern to other countries. According to Chinas standard, an ICBM should have a range of at least 8,000 kilometers. The Agni-Vs range could be further enhanced to become an ICBM, the paper quoted another expert, Zhang Zhaozhong, a professor with the Peoples Liberation Army National Defense University, as saying. As for Agni V, lets begin with the range, its most celebrated aspect: all of China, most of Europe. That the range of Agni V was said to be 5,000 km, just 500 km short of the conventional minimum range for an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), was a deliberate strategic restraint imposed by the Manmohan Singh government. It is among the many aspects of UPA governments strategy that is defining Indias military projection, or the lack of it. Continuing over-dependence on military imports, lack of major efforts to leapfrog technologies, over-zealous celebrations over achievements like Agni V and failure to achieve fresh goals in military research are defining Indias military ideology that is woefully inadequate given the challenges. But yes, the intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM), is a game changer in many ways. It is the most modern variation of the Agni family, providing a quicker response under Indias no-first strike policy, in case an adversary was to launch a nuclear attack. Agni V is a three-stage missile, each stage powered by solid propellants and with a canisterlaunch system, capabilities that make it a more agile system. It can be launched quicker than older missiles. It definitely is a very valuable land based second-strike capability, a crucial component of the triad (on ground, air and sea) of nuclear capability towards which India is making definite strides. The DRDO would carry out two more tests in about a year-and-half before the production of the missile would commence. It will then be handed over to the Strategic Command. DRDO would now

be working on equipping Agni V with multiple independent re-entry vehicles (MIRVs), which would allow launching several warheads on different targets from a single missile. MIRV would further firm up Indias second-strike capability with a limited number of missiles. The euphoria over the success of Agni V, when put to a realistic assessment, shows a desperate effort to cover up for the bigger failures of Indias indigenous military research, and its political inability to workout a definite roadmap for its peaceful rise next to China, in the post-Cold War era, where strategic focus has shifted to Asia with foreign powers from the US to UK maneuvering in the nearby waters. As a scientific achievement, the missile technology developed isnt any breakthrough on the global stage, given the fact that China, US and many European powers have much more advanced, longer range and more sophisticated missiles in their armoury. While it is developing an anti-ballistic missile shield, India has failed to really address the immediate threat of a missile strike from Pakistan, or by rogue elements, where the response time would be just a few minutes. Indias military research has failed to come up with unique solutions. In conventional military spend, India would never be able to match up to China and other global powers. While US spent 45.7% of the global military expenditure last year, China was second at 5.5%. India is way below at just 2.3%. China is galloping ahead, and is estimated to overtake the US by 2035. A military strategy, to protect its autonomy and economic growth, cannot be mere development of longer-range missiles or other conventional weapons. It has to be unconventional technological leap, of achieving capabilities within the limited resources available. That would call for determined efforts to bring in domestic industries and revamping of military research. That means a really radical change. This would require a firm political leadership, something the UPA government has failed to exhibit so far. Agni V isnt fiery enough for India. Lets look at some of interesting questions that arose after the recent test of the Agni-V missile. The first is whether it is really an inter-continental ballistic missile being undersold as an intermediate range ballistic missile out of reasons of political correctness. Well, other than for the purposes of international arms control negotiations, what fourletter acronym we use to refer to a missile is irrelevant. For example, an artillery shell fired across the 14.3 km-wide Straits of Gibraltar is, factually, an intercontinental ballistic missile. The classification of missiles with ranges less than 5500 km as intermediate range is a relic of Cold War era arms control negotiations and an outcome of the strategic geography of that era. So while pedants, lawyers and negotiators can agonize over whether Agni-V is an ICBM or an IRBM, what is important from the perspective of our national security is its range and its payload capacity. Officially, Agni-V has a range of 5000kms and can carry 1000kg of multiple warheads. In contrast to the usual cynical they are inflating their claims comment, some foreign commentators have alleged that India is under declaring the actual range. Chinese experts have claimed that the actual range is 8000kms, thereby allowing Europe to be targeted. Could there be something in these claims? Now,

anyone whos tinkered around with automobile engines or over clocked their computers knows that there is often more juice to be squeezed from the machines because the engineers who design them are a conservative lot. Many foreign media reports connected Indias test with North Koreas and suggested an Asian arms build-up. Meanwhile, a few Indian commentators attributed it to Prime Minister Manmohan Singhs foreign policy. Both are wrong, because they ignore the fact that Agni-Vis part of a missile development programme that was started in the early 1980s and has been consistently pursued by all governments since then. The broad timing of the test is more related to the development cycle than to contemporary events the exact timing might well be influenced by factors ranging from the diplomatic calendar to the direction of the wind. Relating it to Pyongyangs latest shenanigans or Chinas recent assertiveness would be impute a causation where none exists. Unlike mothers facing unexpected dinner guests, DRDO cant cook up a new missile just like that. It is fashionable to argue that Indias fractious democratic system does not allow it to pursue long term intergenerational projects. This is only partly true. Indias nuclear strategy contradicts this argument the minimum credible deterrent has been pursued for at least the last three decades. Will Agni-V change the balance of power in the broader Asian region? Not quite. For that India will need to regain the economic growth trajectory that it fell out of over the last decade. What remains to be seen is whether the security the missile provides will make us even more complacent about implementing the secondgeneration reforms necessary to accumulate power. This is also why Moscow, Beijing and Tokyo react differently to missile tests in North Korea. The first two countries dont want any trouble just because the Japanese and Americans are afraid of the North Koreans. However, Pyongyang is very unlikely to fire a missile at China or Russia. In other words, the intentions and interests of superpowers are more important in strategic planning than their capabilities. What are the intentions of Russias friend India, which has increased the striking range of its nuclear arms delivery vehicles? Russian President Medvedev shakes hands with Chinas President Hu Jintao during their meeting at the BRICS summit in New Delhi. Reuters. The most obvious answer is that this is bad news primarily for China, which is, by the way, Russias friend, too. Indeed, theres no reason for India to aim its nuclear weapons against Africa or the United States, all the more so since Agni cant reach U.S. shores anyway. However, all of Chinas territory is now within reach. For several years now, various political forces in India have been saying officially (and especially in private) that Indians arent dumb enough to turn their country into a missile base against China just because, for example, the US wants it to be this way. Both major Indian parties agree on that. Pakistan, whose government is either unwilling or unable to control the jihadist groups residing on its territory, remains Indias primary threat. Pakistans nuclear arsenal is not the only concern here. The philosophy underlying the establishment of Pakistan as a Muslim alternative to Hindu India is another major consideration. Its not clear what this nation will become without this idea, and whether Pakistan will remain a nation without it.

This is not all there is to it. Jihadism is not only about Pakistan. Lets not forget that in addition to nuclear tests in 1998, India stepped up its political involvement in the Middle East and became very close with Israel. Today, with the Gulf monarchies successfully promoting the jihad philosophy across all Arab nations, such as Tunisia, Egypt and Libya to name a few, it has become clear that Indias policy was quite reasonable and the expansion of its missile range wont hurt either. Next comes Iran. The Indian opposition strongly criticizes its current government for its incoherent policy towards Iran. However, the real threat to India doesnt come from Iran. Hypothetically, if the US or the Gulf monarchies manage to sow the seeds of chaos in Iran as well, then, in the worst case scenario, extremist regimes will spring up from neighbouring Pakistan westward all the way to the shores of the Atlantic. This is something that China would like to avoid as well because it has more shared strategic interests with India thanwith its old friend Pakistan. It is assumed that Indias failed war against China in 1962 and the loss of an uninhabited glacier in the Himalayas are a major problem that makes these two key international partners of Russia bitter enemies. If this were the case, then the launch of the Agni would spell real drama for Russian foreign policy. Lets keep in mind that Russia is Indias key partner in the area of armaments. This month Russia supplied to India the nuclear submarine Nerpa aka Chakra on a longterm lease. By late 2012, India will at long last receive the aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov aka Vikramaditya. Theres a whole list of armaments that Russia is either selling to India or designing together with India. If Beijing viewed India similar to the way Japan looks upon North Korea And if India saw China which, by the way, became Delhis first trading partner as a source of permanent threat Things are different in reality, though. The foreign ministers of Russia, India and China (RIC) met this month. As it turns out, the original triangle of this group exists as a separate entity despite its expansion to include Brazil and South Africa (BRICS). And the three have more and more reasons for private meetings. Among other things, an important topic for discussion is coordinating efforts in Afghanistan once the US and NATO forces withdraw. The problem is that the spread of jihad policies in Afghanistan represents a direct threat to northwestern China. As a result, Beijing and Delhi now have more reasons for rapprochement and Moscow has long been a willing intermediary. As for nuclear arsenals and their delivery vehicles, even with an enhanced strike range, they do not interfere with such efforts. On the contrary, they are a source of calm for the partners in their complicated relations with each other.