Deterrence

[kit]

Putting one more zero to the "number" of Indian nukes might be a "little" more accurate ..there is more and enough material for thousands of nukes but India is a responsible nuclear power, no need to scare the shit out the neighbors musharaffs

[ShauryaT]

During Indo-US notsoclear deal I had made a rough estimate of enough stock of pu to make 800-2000 warheads in the 80s. Now at present that stock would have gone up only by multiple times. How many they could/wanted to convert into weapons was a choice of the govt of the day. So how many weapons is a always a trick question in guise of an 'opinion of xyz institute' which is more like a fishing expedition to obtain some answers from some quarter.

You can say we may only have 120 deployed, but at what stage rest of material is sitting is the part of guesswork.

I think best NOT to factor any low burn mode use of PHWR for WG Pu. Now, having said that, what is your estimate for India especially in light of IUNCA with permanent safeguards on 2/3rds of the reactors and only a handful earmarked for strategic use. Is the CIRUS replacement up yet?

[rsingh]

How long before stored weapon grade Pu is no more suitable for A pum?

[kit]

Pu-238, (half-lifea 88 years, alpha decay to U-234, releasing 5.6 MeV)
Pu-239, fissile (half-life 24,000 years, alpha decay to U-235)
Pu-240, fertile (half-life 6,560 years, alpha decay to U-236)
Pu-241, fissile (half-life 14.4 years, beta decay to Am-241)
Pu-242, (half-life 374,000 years, alpha decay to U-238)


Pu 239 is the most likely isotope from Indian reactors. So take a guess how long it's going to be around!

[ShauryaT]

How long before stored weapon grade Pu is no more suitable for A pum?

IIRC, it is in the order of many decades and even then the reduction in potency is gradual.

[Haridas]

^^ no core is 100% made of an isotope. For Pu based pits, even for Weapons grade maal, core pits crystaline alloy structure changes due to decay of other isotopes, has impact on explosive compression. Nuclear stewardship program required for that reason; to understand long term stockpiling material science issues, renew weapons by refining material, remake pits, replace with new Chem explosives etc. It will never be build once & to be store in stockpile till it is called for use, for that will results in duds when you need it most. Like the curse to king Karna by his Guru Sri Parashuraam
https://www.quora.com/Did-Parasurama-forgive-Karna

[dinesha]

Stabilizing Sino-Indian Security Relations: Managing the Strategic Rivalry After Doklam
https://carnegietsinghua.org/2018/06/21 ... -pub-76622

Some relevant excerpt..

...

THE IMPACT OF INDIAN FORCE POSTURING
Developments in India’s conventional and nuclear military posturing over the last decade, and striking differences in how Beijing and New Delhi perceive these advancements, have contributed to the sense of strategic rivalry and mistrust between the two countries. The rise of increasingly aggressive sentiments from Chinese and Indian analysts regarding their future security relationship are even more striking, given that China still does not consider India to be its primary geostrategic rival and that India, until recently, was more focused on Pakistan-centric defense contingencies and planning.

Indian Conventional Military Developments
Until the mid-2000s, New Delhi refused to upgrade the poor condition of its military roads near the border with China, out of the apparent belief that such shoddy transport links would slow down the inevitable Chinese cross-border advance that would take place in the event of a war, allowing additional time for Indian forces to be mobilized from the interior.11 Two Indian defense experts reflected such thinking when they once remarked that the “single-lane road to Tawang at most places is nothing more than a dirt track where vehicles get routinely stuck for hours.”12

In 2004, however, then prime minister Manmohan Singh and his military chiefs began to consider enhancing India’s military presence and readiness along its border areas with China for defensive purposes. As a former brigadier close to defense policymaking observed, the “military asymmetry could become too pronounced to be manageable” if India did not make efforts to bolster its military capabilities directed against China.13 In 2006, the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), India’s highest defense decisionmaking body, authorized the construction of seventy-three new border roads to improve military connectivity and responsiveness.14 As of September 2017, only twenty-seven of these roads have been completed, indicating that logistical mobility remains an issue for the Indian Army.15

India is gradually increasing its ground and air forces along its land border with China. Two new divisions—the Fifty-Sixth and Seventy-First Mountain Divisions, which encompass around 35,000 troops—were raised for Arunachal Pradesh defense missions in 2009–2010. The divisions have been equipped with artillery and T-90 tanks, matériel normally used for penetrating assaults.16 The establishment of the Seventeenth Mountain Strike Corps, scheduled for full induction by 2021, will add approximately another 35,000 troops to India’s ground posture against China. This new corps will be India’s first China-specific strike corps built to launch forward offensives into Chinese territory; it will include two armor brigades, two infantry divisions, and an artillery division.17 In addition, in August 2016, the Indian Army positioned 120 T-72M1 tanks in the plains of Ladakh in eastern Kashmir, an area that witnessed Chinese advances in the 1962 war between the two countries.18

India is gradually increasing its ground and air forces along its land border with China.

Once these new formations are fully raised, India will be able to draw on an estimated 221,000 forces in the Western, Central, and Eastern Army Commands close to the border; the majority of these units are located far closer to the actual border than their Chinese counterparts.19 Meanwhile, the Indian Air Force (IAF) is acquiring Sukhoi Su-30MKI and Dassault Rafale fighter aircraft and opening multiple new advanced landing grounds (ALGs)—runways close to the border that can act as logistical and attack staging posts. These new runways will both improve India’s air power flexibility and increase the number of airfields that China would have to attempt to seize or eliminate in a conflict.

These military developments mean that Chinese analysts perceive India to be increasingly more dedicated to offensive military posturing as opposed to peaceful dialogue and economic cooperation. This perception is elevating hostility toward India within this body of Chinese discourse, and generating pessimism among Chinese observers regarding the possibility of nonmilitary ways of stabilizing the strategic relationship. While it is still too soon to see how these darkening attitudes might be translated into policy—such as the creation or permanent movement of new Chinese forces closer to Indian border areas—China’s shifting strategic perceptions of India heighten the potential for Chinese policy to move in this direction.

Indian Nuclear Developments
Beyond these conventional military developments, the absence of substantive strategic dialogue between China and India, including on their respective nuclear intentions, is further driving the security dilemma between the two countries. As a result, misperceptions that can shape policymaking on both sides are going uncorrected.

The sophistication and range of India’s strategic nuclear forces have long paled in comparison to those of China. External experts have commonly concluded that India’s nuclear arsenal presently can only hold Tibet and parts of southwestern China at risk, in contrast to Beijing’s ability to deploy multiple nuclear missile types that can reach any target in India.20 An authoritative external analysis by Hans M. Kristensen and Robert S. Norris judged that India has positioned one nuclear-certified squadron of Jaguar IS fighters at each of its Ambala and Gorakhpur air force bases and one or two nuclear-certified squadrons of Mirage 2000H fighters at the air force base at Gwalior.21 These fighters, equipped with nuclear gravity bombs, form a crucial element of the nuclear threat India poses to southwestern China.

However, the U.S. National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC) and the aforementioned authoritative external analysis by Kristensen and Norris both have assessed that India has begun deploying the 2,000-kilometer-range Agni-II and 3,200-kilometer-range Agni-III missiles.22 The Indian Ministry of Defense claimed that the Agni-III was “in the arsenal of the armed forces” in 2014; meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Indian Army’s China-facing Eastern Command asserted back in 2008 that the missile brought Shanghai (and, by extension, less-distant Beijing) into Indian nuclear range. However, Kristensen and Norris still claim that the missile’s “full operational status is uncertain.”23

There is evidence, although not conclusive proof, that these missiles have been deployed in northeastern India. In order for the Agni-III to reach Shanghai and Beijing in line with the Indian Army Eastern Command’s stated operational expectations, the missile would have to be based in northeastern India, a fact highlighted by Kristensen and Norris and illustrated in figure 1 below.24 Furthermore, additional recent evidence—gathered by intelligence and private sources from three Asian states— suggests (but does not definitely confirm) that India may have fielded
both Agni-II and Agni-III missiles in India’s northeastern state of Assam. Figure 1 provides a full picture of the author’s assessment of which China-facing nuclear forces seem likely to have been deployed based on the aforementioned sources.25 If this is the case, this placement of the Agni-IIIs would mean that India holds Beijing, Shanghai, and all other significant Chinese population and military targets at nuclear risk.


Figure 1. India’s Estimated China-Facing Nuclear Forces

NASIC estimates that fewer than ten Agni-III launchers have been deployed, and Kristensen and Norris assess this number to be around eight.26 If and when these missiles are fully operationalized in Assam, this small Indian nuclear force would pose a nuclear risk to locations on China’s east coast, rather than a certain ability to strike such targets. Such a posture would adhere to the minimum deterrence logic that has long informed both Indian and Chinese nuclear thought.

If India were to attempt to be assured of a certain ability to destroy targets on China’s east coast by developing a much larger number of long-range missiles and a larger arsenal of nuclear warheads, this latter approach would more closely align with the alternative logic of maximalist deterrence. This school of thought holds that nuclear deterrence can only be established when a country attains numerical and destructive supremacy, or at least parity, vis-à-vis its nuclear rivals.27 By contrast, minimalists judge that this maximalist condition is unnecessary for nuclear deterrence to operate and that a small, survivable nuclear force is enough to create enough risk of nuclear retaliation that an adversary will be deterred from first nuclear use.28

If one assumes that India is deploying Agni-III missiles in northeastern India, then the country has already established a minimalist deterrence against China. Any Indian movements toward developing a larger, longer-range nuclear arsenal would undermine its stated adherence to minimum deterrence, a nuclear posture that entails minimizing arsenal size and the role of nuclear weapons in national defense. These efforts would signal to China and other adversaries that India seeks to unnecessarily elevate the role of nuclear weapons in their strategic relationships, an approach that would risk generating further strategic tensions.29 Indeed, a Chinese expert has already remarked that “the fact that India’s nuclear weapons can reach Chengdu has the same [deterrence] effect [on China] as being able to reach Beijing.”30 Nevertheless, it is unlikely that Indian strategic planners would be satisfied with limiting their retaliatory nuclear reach to Chengdu.

[China fears] that India's military modernization is principally driven by its quest for offensive great-power competition with China.

However, the full operationalization of Agni-III forces in northeastern India would create a credible risk that India could achieve nuclear retaliation against any significant Chinese target. If and when that is the case, further arsenal expansions, including the development of the 5,000-kilometer-range Agni-V and nuclear-armed submarine fleet, would be unnecessary for the Indian goal of attaining nuclear deterrence against China. Indeed, the aforementioned Chinese expert also remarked that “It doesn’t matter to China if one day India achieves numerical nuclear force parity with China . . . I’m happy to see India wasting their money on more nuclear weapons.”31 This Chinese impressionthat India is building its nuclear arsenal to wield a destructive capability beyond what is required for deterring China reinforces the underlying view among Chinese analysts that India’s military modernization is principally driven by its quest for offensive great-power competition with China, rather than as a limited, defensive response to Indian perceptions of Chinese aggression.

India continues to adhere to a policy of no first use for nuclear weapons and, from New Delhi’s perspective, these nuclear developments are in line with the overarching Indian perception that a credible defense must give India the ability to threaten Chinese mainland targets. This new attitude assumes that greater Chinese strategic caution toward India would be induced if India can pose these credible offensive strike capabilities. This approach contrasts with New Delhi’s previous preference to rely on poor internal border infrastructure to slow down a Chinese offensive and give more Indian forces sufficient time to arrive. India’s new thinking extends to both conventional and nuclear posturing transitions, including the formation of a China-facing strike corps in the northeast, deployment of Brahmos missiles, establishment of new ALGs, and development of nuclear ballistic missiles such as the Agni-V. While each of these Indian programs are still works in progress, they are already prompting China to darken its views toward India.

Indian Self-Perceptions
It is critical to note that Indian civilian and military leaders see the purpose of its conventional advancements to be credibly deterring potential Chinese military actions, rather than attempting to permanently annex Chinese territory. The key to credible conventional deterrence, in the eyes of Indian strategic planners, is demonstrating the ability to take and hold limited tracts of Chinese land in areas where India enjoys a localized force superiority, as a form of bargaining leverage.32 With regard to nuclear deterrence, Indian strategists are convinced that China will only view India as a serious nuclear actor, posing a credible deterrent threat, when New Delhi is able to hold major metropolitan targets on China’s east coast at risk.

The overarching perception among Indian policymakers and strategic experts is that [the country's] approach remains essentially defensive in nature.

The overarching perception among Indian policymakers and strategic experts is that such an approach remains essentially defensive in nature.33 One assumption (not publicly stated) that informs India’s view that its posture is defensive is the (arguably incorrect) notion that India must still play catch-up to China’s formidable regional military capabilities. A second inbuilt Indian assumption is that, as the weaker power, it should be obvious that India has no interest in initiating a war. China, however, sees these military developments, and Indian views of their essentially defensive nature, very differently.

Chinese Perceptions of Indian Military Developments
Chinese security planners have long viewed India as a secondary or even tertiary challenge compared to the United States, Russia, and Japan. Editions of the Science of Military Strategy, which represent the authoritative consensus of PLA strategists, along with other similar official defense studies, regularly reiterate this ranking by virtue of the level of comparative attention devoted to each state.34 However, in recent years, Chinese officials and experts have begun to pay closer attention to India’s improving military capabilities. While the most recent Science of Military Strategy iteration elevated India’s position in its nuclear risk analysis, it appeared to recognize the limited offensive intentions of its conventional force modernizations. Nonetheless, this conclusion has not diffused into the wider Chinese security discourse on India.35

Recent Chinese internal briefing documents and articles have begun to gloomily characterize the Sino-Indian relationship as a “security dilemma,” noting that Beijing’s previous attempts to expand economic cooperation with India as a means of disincentivizing military competition appear to failing.36 Much of this analysis instead emphasizes the provocative, aggressive nature of recent Indian military advancements near the border areas. A 2013 article in the China National Defense Daily concluded that India was conducting a “surge of forces” toward the Chinese border, while a Nanfang Daily survey of Chinese strategic thinkers observed that “the defensive strategy of the Indian Army (has begun) to shift . . . toward an offensive [one].” 37 Meanwhile, authors from the PLA Nanjing Army Command College have framed India’s nuclear missile program not as an effort to assure minimum credible deterrence, but as revealing New Delhi’s nuclear intentions to “compete” with China.38 Chinese experts have expressed open concern about the implications of India’s positioning of Brahmos missiles close to Chinese border areas, with some suggesting that this forms part of India’s nuclear strike capacity.39

With regard to nuclear force developments, Chinese experts have observed India’s continued progress on developing and fielding long-range and diversified delivery vehicles, such as the Agni-V missile and a nuclear-armed submarine fleet. Chinese analysts tend to view India’s apparent aspiration to attain the capability to reach targets beyond Tibet and southwestern China as unnecessary for establishing a credible Indian nuclear deterrent against China; they instead cite this aspiration as evidence of India’s desire to militarily compete with China as an end in itself and to build the portfolio of defense capabilities commensurate with great-power status. This reinforces the growing consensus among many in Beijing that its relationship with New Delhi in the years to come will be characterized more by military competition and tensions than peaceful cooperation and dispute resolution.40

[dinesha]

THE RELENTLESS PURSUIT OF MISSILES
-Pravin Sawhney

The Agni series of ballistic missiles has matured with a few add-ons. However, since global technologies have moved strides ahead, the Agni-V no longer serves the original purpose of deterrence

India’s 5,000-km range Agni-V surface-to-surface ballistic missile is expected to be inducted into the Strategic Force Command soon. This is the latest version of the Agni series of ballistic missiles which was launched 34 years ago as Agni technology demonstrator in 1984. The then envisaged technology, with a few add-ons, has matured.

However, since global technologies have moved strides ahead, the Agni-V — contrary to claims made by the scientists — no longer serves the original purpose of deterrence. Especially for China against whom it would be fielded. It has, thus, been reduced to an expensive showpiece.

Deterrence means that the adversary, in this case China, should be cautious if not scared of Agni-V. It should desist from military activism on the disputed border for fear of escalation which might go out of control culminating into a nuclear exchange.

Given this, it becomes evident that deterrence comes by creating strategic imbalance: By owning a weapon system which the adversary does not have and one which is capable of damaging the adversary’s core military strength, or which takes the war to a higher or new level for which the adversary is not prepared.

Two examples, one each from Pakistan and China, will help clarify the essence of deterrence. Subsequent to India’s 1998 nuclear tests, the United States, in order to prevent a subcontinental nuclear arms race, was keen that Pakistan should not follow suit; various inducements ranging from financial doles to F-16 aircraft to whatever else was up for discussion with Pakistan.

The Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was so stunned that he refused a meeting with the US interlocutors Strobe Talbott and Central Command chief, General Anthony Zinni. He simply did not know how to respond. At that point, the Pakistan Army Chief, General Jehangir Karamat met the US team; after listening to them patiently, he told them that Pakistan would do its own nuclear tests to restore the strategic balance.

Since India had demonstrated nuclear weapons capability, Pakistan would need to do the same, he added. General Karamat was proved right as within hours of India’s nuclear tests, the then deputy Prime Minister LK Advani boasted that Pakistan would now have to re-think on Kashmir.

Take China’s case. It cannot match the US in either conventional war-fighting platforms or in the range and variety of nuclear weapons. There is a huge gap in the finances that the two spend on developing technologies and annual defence allocations.

So, instead of attempting to match US capabilities aircraft carrier for aircraft carrier, China has focussed on developing asymmetric warfare capabilities (a) to hit and destroy US’ existing state-of-art weapon platforms, like the aircraft carrier and so on, and (b) by attempting to catch up, if not outdo the US in newer domains like cyber, space, electromagnetic spectrum and psychological warfare. By doing so, China has created deterrence through strategic imbalance vis-à-vis the US, a much more powerful adversary.

China has developed rockets as anti-satellite weapons; laser pulses to disrupt satellite communication; accurate land and sea-based anti-ship cruise missiles to hit carriers and ocean-going ships; a large number of conventional and nuclear attack submarines (accounting for 45 per cent of its naval combatants); excellent cyber warfare capabilities, largest numbers of armed unmanned aerial vehicles and so on. More than anything else, the race for Artificial Intelligence (AI) in warfare has broken out between China and the US.

On nuclear weapons, since China cannot match the US, it has declared a no-first-use policy. Making virtue out of necessity, China has said that it will not enter the nuclear arms race; it would only maintain limited stocks of nukes which are being upgraded and modernised. China, like other major powers, is aware that sooner rather than later AI weapons (which are useable) would take over the role of strategic deterrence from nuclear weapons once fully autonomous weapons are introduced into inventories. An interesting book titled, Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War, by Paul Scharre provides insight into where the global AI is headed.

Chinese new deterrence has rattled the US. The US President Donald Trump has recently ordered the creation of a new Space Force; the sixth joint command for the US Armed Forces. This move would militarise the space but it might ensure that Chinese capabilities to disrupt and destroy US’ communications, which are the lifeline for their stand-off operations, remain mitigated.

Given all this, where does Agni-V fit into the warfare with China? Nowhere. For one, nothing more than a limited border war between India and China is envisaged. For another, given Chinese existing conventional capabilities, it has little need to even threaten a nuclear exchange. India, which like China, has a no-first-use policy, would ensure that Agni-V in not brought into the war discourse.

Pakistan’s case is different. It matches the Indian military at the decisive operational (war-fighting) level of war and it has an ambiguous nuclear weapons policy. While no military planner on either side envisages a nuclear exchange, India needs to retain land-based, in addition to the ultimate sea-based, deterrence against Pakistan. The Agni-I, with a range of 700 km, which covers Pakistan’s entire elongated geography, should suffice.

Thus, as far as the Agni series is concerned, except for the Agni-I, all other missiles, namely, Agni-II, Agni-III, Agni-IV, Agni-V, and even the obsolete liquid-fuelled Prithvi should be gradually eased out keeping pace with the induction of newer technologies. These comprise cruise missiles, sea-based deterrence, armed unmanned aerial vehicles, stand-off and precision weapons. Concurrently, research in space, cyber and AI weapons for the future should be redoubled.

This will not be easy for two reasons. One, there is an inherent tendency in the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) to claim technologies they have not produced as indigenous. Two points will help make this point: The carbon-to-carbon composite heat shield in all ballistic missiles (used in Agni-V which re-enters the atmosphere from space at temperature of 4,000 degree centigrade to ensure systems in payload remain safe), which is a critical technology, as well as the propulsion used in the Nirbhaya subsonic cruise missile are procured from a friendly country.

The other problem is the setting of unrealistic targets by the Defence Ministry. For example, the 2018 draft Defence Production Policy envisages India to become a leading world player in AI and autonomous weapon systems by 2025; seven years hence. This target seems to have been borrowed from China’s Vision-2025. Surely, the Government does not believe that we are in the same league.

(The writer is editor, FORCE newsmagazine)

[rsingh]

This will not be easy for two reasons. One, there is an inherent tendency in the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) to claim technologies they have not produced as indigenous. Two points will help make this point: The carbon-to-carbon composite heat shield in all ballistic missiles (used in Agni-V which re-enters the atmosphere from space at temperature of 4,000 degree centigrade to ensure systems in payload remain safe), which is a critical technology, as well as the propulsion used in the Nirbhaya subsonic cruise missile are procured from a friendly country.

That is BS. i know this that is why i am writing.
Concerning obsolete technology ,,,,,,,Timbaktou has more modern fibre-optic network than Paris. Copper wires served Paris when there was no post system in Timbaktou. Things evolve with time. Agni of 2018 in not exact copy of first production. Scientists and defence planners know this.

[dinesha]

Not exactly related to Deterrence but posting in this thread as it is more relevant for discussions here:
Declassified Documents Include Eisenhower's Briefing to President-elect Kennedy on the "Satchel" Containing Information Needed to Conduct Nuclear War
https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book ... s-football

Today’s posting includes documents published for the first time on the early history of the Football/Black Bag/satchel, including what may be the first declassified reference to the Football. Included in today’s materials are:

The record of a briefing in January 1961 by President Dwight D. Eisenhower and White House Staff Secretary Andrew J. Goodpaster to President-elect John F. Kennedy about the contents of the emergency “satchel”
White House questions from January 1962 about whether the president could order a nuclear strike in an emergency without consulting the Pentagon
A Pentagon memorandum from November 1962 on an “Emergency Actions Folder” forwarded to a White House Naval aide concerning actions that could be taken under various Defense Readiness Conditions [DEFCONs].
Documents from 1963 on the making of the “SIOP Execution Handbook,” created expressly for the president’s use in a crisis and one of the major items in the Football.
Documents from 1964 on the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s creation of the “Gold Book,” the renamed emergency actions folder, for inclusion in the emergency satchel.
Memoranda from 1964 on President Johnson’s first briefing on the nuclear war plans, the Single Integrated Operational Plan (SIOP), with White House military aides among the listeners.
A draft memorandum from early 1965 suggesting that President Johnson did not like to “be followed so closely” by a military aide carrying the Football and that he wanted other arrangements.
A June 1965 memorandum by a White House naval aide explicitly referring to the “FOOTBALL

[dinesha]

With the Berlin situation on his mind as a possible source for a nuclear conflict, President Kennedy even considered the possibility of a preemptive strike against the Soviet Union in the event that country was preparing an attack. Although the “black bag” included information on how to the Joint Chiefs would get in touch with the president, Kennedy wanted more than that: he sought a reliable set of procedures in place for the control of nuclear use decisions.

According to questions prepared for JCS Chairman Lyman Lemnitzer by White House naval aide Captain Tazewell Shepard, the president wanted to know whether in an emergency he could order a nuclear strike without consulting the Joint Chiefs or the secretary of defense, what he would say to the War Room when he called, how could it be proven that the caller was in fact the president, and whether it was necessary to authenticate to the secretary of defense presidential approvals for nuclear weapons use.

For Shepard the key problem was whether the procedures described in the “JCS Emergency Actions File” were flexible enough to enable the president to take such actions. Plainly, Kennedy did not want to be in a position where he would only say “yes” or “no” to the Joint Chief’s request for strike authorization in a crisis.
https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu//dc.html?doc ... dent#_edn9

[dinesha]

Prepared by two of President Johnson’s military aides, this memorandum describes the SIOP briefing given to President Johnson by Joint Staff vice director J-3 (operations) General John McPherson. The briefing reviewed the “five decisions [not specified] which the President must make, together with the advice he might expect from the Joint Chiefs for each decision,” the JCS’s procedures for implementing the decisions, and the “consequences of SlOP execution in terms of human casualties.”

Apparently “absorbed” by the briefing, Johnson “expressed particular interest in the casualties which would result from a nuclear exchange.” When he asked what would happen if a crisis occurred when he was in mid-air, Wheeler said that the Chiefs would communicate with him by radio and implied that General Clifton or other military aides would help the president with the “interpretation of the problem at hand.” Generals LeMay and Wheeler made another effort to convince Johnson to participate in a SIOP exercise, but no president would be willing to do so until Jimmy Carter.
https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu//dc.html?doc ... epared-for

[dinesha]

some perspective on the history of the Football and its antecedents: “the development of the requirement for the president to have certain documents accompanying him and be made available to him on short notice has developed over the past 15 years, largely because of the possibility of the Presidency being destroyed by nuclear attack.”

https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu//dc.html?doc ... -President

[dinesha]

President Johnson did not like to be “followed so closely” by the Football carrier and that he had discussed with McNamara a system that would eliminate the “need for an aide to be in constant attendance upon him.”
https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu//dc.html?doc ... morandum-n

[wig]

Colonel Gopal Kaushik, formerly of the 58th Engineering regiment, talks about the N tests in pokharan 2 decades ago
It was this regt of the Army tasked with digging and maintaining the shafts for the N tests that were scheduled

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ind ... 991434.cms

[ramana]

Colonel Gopal Kaushik, formerly of the 58th Engineering regiment, talks about the N tests in pokharan 2 decades ago
It was this regt of the Army tasked with digging and maintaining the shafts for the N tests that were scheduled

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ind ... 991434.cms

interesting....

One note.
Vipin Gupta of US Labs had published an article in mid 1990s, which showed that US had satellite pictures of Pokhran in 1960 when the site was acquired for military testing. The picture was from a film satellite whose top priority was mapping Soviet Union.
For them to arrange for a flyby of Pokhran shows they had some inkling of its future use.

Also note the shaft depth is stated to be over 800 feet.
Chengappa had said it was close to 200 meters i.e over 650 feet.

[wig]

the billiards analogy was a wonderful adaptation to meet the situation. May Bharat Mata be blessed with more such sons and daughters

[Prem]

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/ne ... n=ETTWMain
India to get own nuclear missile tracking ship in December

NEW DELHI: India’s secretive nuclear missile tracking ship, which will become part of an elaborate missile shield being planned against attacks is successfully undergoing harbour trials and is set to be delivered by December, a top official in charge of the project has confirmed. The VC11184, a specialised Ocean Surveillance Ship being built for the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO), is on its way to completion just over four years after it was ordered as part of the Modi government in creating a nuclear missile shield for the nation. The next step will include sea trials by a joint team of the Indian Navy and the NTRO in which its specialised surveillance systems – three dome shaped antennas packed with sensors – will be extensively tested before the handing over. “We have as of now finished the basin trials. There were done alongside and were successful. The complex vessel, which will generate over 14 MW of power just to power up its tracking radars, will have multiple roles for India – from tracking enemy missiles to accurately giving data on tests that are routinely carried out of indigenous strategic missiles.The 15000-tonne class vessel was initially constructed in a covered dry dock at the shipyard – the country’s largest -to keep roving satellites and spying attempts at bay. However, for the past several months, the vessel has been docked alongside and is now visible from the Vizag channel with its distinct shape. A large globe shaped radar placed on the aft gives it distinctive visibility.

[ramana]

What is a nuclear missile tracking ship?

Looks like extra masala.

Its an ocean surveillance ship.
US, Russia and maybe China too have it.
Due to the range constraints India need such a ship to monitor test missiles.

Could be used to monitor ISRO launches debris too.

[Ashokk]

VC-11184 Missile Range Instrumentation Ship images


Aft radome(largest) of VC-11184


Side view, all three radomes visible

[ramdas]

Apparently an MRIS with multi object tracking capability is required for MIRV testing. At least that is what France uses a similar ship for. Given that ISRO made a multi object tracking radar only recently, lack of something like this may have also been a reason why we havent tested MIRV payloads so far.

[sum]

Thats what the panelists in the RSTV Agni 5 debate said and mentioned about how the Chinese gift of optical tracking system to TSP meant TSP was more advanced than us currently in terms of MIRV testing

[Aditya_V]

Thats what the panelists in the RSTV Agni 5 debate said and mentioned about how the Chinese gift of optical tracking system to TSP meant TSP was more advanced than us currently in terms of MIRV testing

And China Guarantee Pakis have clear skies, I dont think those telescopes have much of role in MIRV development. It is just China stating they are giving MIRV's to Pakis as a response to AGni V as giving Pakis longer range missiles while good for Paki H&D will hurt Chinese interests, Pakis will be able to Blackmail the Chinese and their forefathers and Israel and Uncle will not take too kindly to putting them in range of Paki Missiles. The more advanced our weaponry becomes the lesser choices Chinese have with respect to Arming Pakis.

[ramana]

Thats what the panelists in the RSTV Agni 5 debate said and mentioned about how the Chinese gift of optical tracking system to TSP meant TSP was more advanced than us currently in terms of MIRV testing

Optical tracking will help at missile launch as once it clears the atmosphere i.e. 350k feet you can t see the missile.
How does this help for MIRV which is down range?

I think the experts are just making it up.

Down range any way can be see by ordinary Panasonic imaging telescopes.

Just plain BS.

[ShauryaT]

India and the Global Nuclear Orderon NPT.

[ramana]

There is a seminar in Delhi IIC on "Nuclear Strictures after 10 Years"

Venue: India International Center. 40 Max Mueller Marg, New Delhi
Date: 9 August 2018, Time 6:30pm.
Loction Seminar Rooms I to III, Kamaladevi Complex

Will have Shyam Saran, S. Jaishankar and Cmdre. C. Uday Bhaskar as moderator.

Please attend if possible.

Mention BRF

[ramana]

OLD paper:
USI jouraal paper

Does India Need to Review Nuke Doctrine?

[ramana]

There is an interview with Col. Kaushik on Republic TV on Pok-2 testing

[Haridas]

There is an interview with Col. Kaushik on Republic TV on Pok-2 testing

https://youtu.be/YcUNfOCZeXw


Col. Kaushik on Republic TV says the atom bomb gave 15 kt as against expected 12 kt. Atom bomb is for aircraft delivered bum. Said the other smaller one is for missiles. (By small one he was imho not saying subKT but the hydrogen bum that is physically smaller then atom bum.)

He said the shaft was about 1000 ft.

[kit]

There is an interview with Col. Kaushik on Republic TV on Pok-2 testing

https://youtu.be/YcUNfOCZeXw


Col. Kaushik on Republic TV says the atom bomb gave 15 kt as against expected 12 kt. Atom bomb is for aircraft delivered bum. Said the other smaller one is for missiles. (By small one he was imho not saying subKT but the hydrogen bum that is physically smaller then atom bum.)

He said the shaft was about 1000 ft.

interesting .. timing!

[SaiK]

was this linked earlier this year here?
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10 ... 18.1438737

[ramana]

Dated 2010 & 2015 articles from CLAWS :




Unstable Nuclear Deterrence in South Asia


India's Nuclear Strategy to Deter

[Prem]

US Deterrent;

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-08- ... -test-drop
Pentagon Prepares 2020 Production Of Upgraded Nuclear Bomb, Releases Video Of Test-Drop

The upgraded, B61-12 LEP will replace all of the bomb’s nuclear and non‐nuclear components for another two decades, and improve the bomb’s safety, effectiveness, and security. This life extension program will address all age-related issues of the weapon, and enhance its reliability, field maintenance, safety, and use control.Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories are the design and engineering labs for the B61-12 LEP. In a recent presentation, the final design review will be conducted next month. Both firms indicated the first production unit would occur in FY 2020.Last week, Sandia National Laboratories released an unclassified five-minute video showing the entire preparation process and the actual drop of inert B61-3/4 tactical nuclear bombs at the Tonopah Test Range in Nevada back in July 2017. The data compiled from the test is expected to be submitted into a report for the final design review next month before the first production unit is manufactured sometime in 2020.

https://youtu.be/VzLwqAuncBQ?t=4

[Rudradev]

Zerohedge is a propaganda portal founded by two pro-Pakistan Russian investors. It should not be regarded as a serious source of news or commentary on anything, least of all deterrence.

[ShauryaT]

I have some issues with the article, where the author is confounding some institutional issues with our NCA structure along with a Modi bias. So, FWIW.

Modi at the Helm - Whither Nuclear Decision-making?

[Supratik]

I am not sure if a far-left journal like EPW should be taken too seriously although the column suggests as if they are very concerned about the subject and the English is good.

[Rudradev]

Interesting article on US' nuclear command and control infrastructure from Politico

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story ... ump-219912

How Obama Made It Easier for Trump to Launch a Nuke
MARC AMBINDER

September 14, 2018

Most folks push to the back of their minds the harrowing notion that a single person could, with one command, launch nuclear Armageddon. And even when we do think about it, we still think in Cold War metaphors: Nuclear attacks have to be big. They have to destroy cities. They have to kill millions.

In fact, the opposite is true: America’s nuclear doctrine—the thing that actually tells our warfighters how to draw up the military’s nuclear war plans—makes it more likely that a modern president will be tempted to order a nuclear strike in response to a non-nuclear attack. And it’s now much easier to do so than ever.

Let me pause for a second to remind you that the president today is Donald J. Trump.

In Bob Woodward’s new book on the Trump administration, the author recounts a scene where, in a fit of anger over Syrian President Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons against innocents, the president orders Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to kill the dictator. “Let’s ****** kill him! Let’s go in. Let’s kill the ****** lot of them,” Trump is alleged to have said. According to Woodward, Mattis ignored the order, or he didn’t perceive it as a direct order, and instead presented the president with a menu of more limited options.

That moment has emerged as one of the most eye-opening scenes in Woodward’s book, largely because of the shock that a secretary of defense would derail a direct order from the commander in chief. But for national security experts, there’s another, potentially scarier reading on what happened in that room: That order could well have been nuclear. And in that case, only a bureaucrat willing to disobey an elected president would stand between us and the first nuclear attack in 70 years.

This scenario isn’t as crazy as it might seem. Thanks to upgrades to our nuclear systems under President Barack Obama, and recent shifts in Pentagon protocol, it has never been easier for an American president to launch a tactical nuclear attack anywhere on the globe. We know that our current nuclear war plans—OPLAN 8010-12—specifically envision a scenario where the president orders a limited nuclear strike to deter proliferators of weapons of mass destruction. Sarin gas qualifies. So, the Syria crisis is one of the scenarios in which that might happen.

The larger conversation we should be having about Trump’s Assad order isn’t whether the president is fit or not, or whether he commands the loyalty of his Cabinet. The conversation to have now is why the U.S. president—no matter who it is—still has an unchecked ability to launch a nuclear attack in the first place.

***

This question has become far more urgent because our nuclear protocols have changed in ways that the public doesn’t yet appreciate. Until very recently, the chart-topping superstars of the nuclear world were called “Major Attack Options.” These were nuclear-attack plans aimed at adversaries that the Pentagon considers “peer” or “near-peer” nations—the other big global powers. Examples might have been: Destroy all major Russian second-strike nuclear facilities. Another: Cripple the Chinese industrial base. These were blockbuster attack plans designed largely for their deterrent effects—discouraging America’s main foes from any significant geopolitical mischief. The actual attacks would have been colossal: Intercontinental ballistic missiles launched from the United States, bearing warheads packing the equivalent of 300,000 tons of TNT. Nukes in tubes on submarines or attached to the underbellies of fighter bombers would constitute our “second strike” capability, in case the enemy managed to destroy the missiles first. Given the power of our adversaries, one of the biggest guardrails preventing a strike was the likely scale of the response—miscalculate, and millions of our own tribe could die, too. All of this is standard stuff. Deterrence 101.

Around the end of the Cold War, a new set of adversaries was added to the target base: WMD proliferators, including smaller rogue regimes that might be developing their own nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. North Korea, or Syria, or Iran, at certain points, might find themselves subject to a similar apocalypse. It has been reported that Clinton and Allbright were considering a nuclear strike on India after our Pokhran II tests. A nuclear attack on one of these regimes might not trigger the same scale of retaliation as an attack on a peer nation, but it still came with the potential for horrifying unintended casualties. Any strike in this category—even a “limited” one—would cause huge amounts of collateral damage, and this again was a powerful disincentive for any president to launch a nuke.

But in 2018, America’s nuclear arsenal is starting to look very different than it once did, and the scenarios that might prompt the expenditure of a weapon have multiplied. The catalogue of weapons that Trump has at his beck and call now, and would have should he serve a second term, include nuclear gravity bombs like the one ostentatiously tested in Nevada in June by the Air Force. Called B61-12s, they’ve been upgraded with ground-penetrating firepower, hyper-accurate guidance systems and variable yield technology.

These enhancements mean that a nuke could be used on a relatively narrow target, such as the command and control facilities that Russia would need to strike at its former satellites, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. And they also increase the likelihood that a president might be tempted to use one elsewhere, for whatever military or even political purpose he wanted. The U.S. now also has the technology to attach tiny, precise, low-yield warheads to the newest cruise missiles it’s developing—the type that could be launched from somewhere in Europe, at, say, Syria. (Deploying these weapons is currently banned by the Intermediate Nuclear Forces treaty—but the U.S. believes Russia has already violated this treaty, and the U.S leadership could decide, via a classified presidential policy directive, to experimentally move a few of these to Europe, just in case.) A third toy for presidents:low-yield cruise missiles launched from submarines.

The Pentagon says, with some credibility, that these weapons are needed as a new kind of deterrent for a new variety of warfare. They argue that advances in Russian military strategy, such as Moscow’s theory of “coercive escalation,” might lead President Vladimir Putin or his successor to use tactical nuclear weapons to claw back territory in Europe, assuming the U.S. would not have—or did not have—the weapons in its arsenal to respond to a “limited” challenge.

But in the end, nuclear deterrence is still based on psychology, not technology. The bad guys have to believe that our weapons are actually weapons we would actually use in actual conflicts, or else they’re going to do things counter to our interests. The big problem is that the technology we use to deliver nuclear weapons has advanced to the point where a president might not find all that much reason to worry about using a nuclear weapon in a real conflict. If she or he can be assured that the radioactive fallout would be minimal, the threat to civilians basically zero and the scope of the destruction precisely tailored, then many of the disincentives fall away.

***

It may seem strange that Obama—a man who called passionately for a world without any nuclear weapons at all—was responsible for this dangerous suite of upgrades. But to achieve his nuclear-diplomacy goals, he had to expend enormous political capital. In 2010, he persuaded the Senate to pass a nuclear arms treaty with Russia reducing the number of warheads each country was allowed to keep at the ready. But the tradeoff, negotiated primarily with Sen. Jon Kyl, the Republicans’ point person on all things nuclear at the time, was that Obama essentially signed off on the purchase of hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of upgrades to the nuclear arsenal—upgrades that made it more likely that a successor will one day use one of the damned things.

Obama wanted to address this. Several of his advisers have told me that he intended to kick off a serious public debate in his second term about how the weapons might be used and who could legitimately authorize their use. In the end, he ran out of time and bandwidth.

Nuclear planners use a term, Directed/Adaptive Planning Capability Options, and its official meaning is classified. But the essence is this: Given the requirement to adapt to a worldwide crisis situation, the president can, within eight hours, direct a nuclear weapon delivered to any location on Earth. The president can order one of these things alone, and then, without consulting anymore—not his secretary of defense, not his national security adviser, not the Joint Chiefs of Staff—he can release his finger from the trigger. All it would take is a phone call.

The call could come from a regular, nonsecure cellphone if he wanted. On the other end would be the Emergency Actions controller working near a console at one of America’s nuclear command post facilities—a set of (at least) four that are online around the clock. There would be a quick exchange of authentication codes, and then—in less than the time it takes the president to fire off a tweet—a nuclear release order could be formatted and transmitted to the forces.

So if indeed there are forces inside the Executive Office of the President who are seeking to thwart the will of the duly elected leader, for reasons noble or nefarious; if breaking the brittle but enduring compacts that allow the most powerful person on the planet to exercise free reign over an enormous range of executive and deadly powers is now a rule, then let me suggest we use this period of creative destruction to ask some new questions.

That is: Is the ability of the president or the United States to order a nuclear strike against anyone, anything, anywhere on Earth, without being forced to consult with anyone who might urge him otherwise, ethical? Can we come up with a better system?

Thanks to time, money and ingenuity, America’s nuclear command and control system is more reliable than it used to be, but it is nowhere near as reliable as it should be, as on the record testimony from Air Force generals and others regularly demonstrate. Capabilities have “atrophied,” Gen. Robin Rand, the head of the Air Force’s nuclear strike command, told Congress in March. Critical warning systems have security flaws. Newer technology might be vulnerable to cyberattack and spoofing. Recently, CNN reported, somewhat opaquely, that the secretary of defense was so concerned about the state of our nuclear communications that he ordered a large-scale, classified reordering of who gets what nuclear orders.

Is this a good thing? A bad thing? Hard to say, because our politicians tend to be completely ignorant of these arrangements. Voters don’t ask about them. They don’t know what to ask. We have focused on the “demand” side of the equation—the nukes and how to use them—with only one congressional hearing, to my knowledge, on the more important question, which is: Under what circumstances do we, the American people, want the president and the president alone, to be able to order any nuclear strike?

Harry Truman first asserted the sole authority to decide the question for himself, and aside from presidents secretly pre-delegating this power in the event they’re killed or can’t be found, Congress has rarely raised a peep about this use of executive authority, which resides in the Constitution’s second article. But there is no law that codifies this, or qualifies it, or even figures out how to mesh it with Congress’s constitutional power to declare war. And though anyone in the military can refuse to execute an illegal order, there is very little guidance on what an illegal nuclear order might look like.

***

Obama could hardly have imagined he needed to spend time on the softer side of our nuclear doctrine—the laws and rules that govern the use of these deadly weapons—because he could not envision the United States electing a president whose temperament was so manifestly unsuited for the hair-trigger, always-on-alert posture the high priests of America’s nuclear weapons complex have spent 70 years refining.

Now we know that’s possible. So why not require that, in all but the most urgent situations, the president consult with select members of Congress during the process of deciding whether to launch even a single, targeted strike? And we might even debate whether we have a duty to humanity not to retaliate, even if it means absorbing our own casualties.

Politically untenable? Not really. A line in the National Defense Authorization Act would be sufficient to kick off a debate, and if the president decided to ignore the will of Congress, he or she would at least be forced to so do in public—pushing to the forefront of our minds the still-existential risks posed by not just the proliferation of nuclear weapons but the advancements in their accuracy, their quality, their deadliness, and the willingness that a president, perhaps in anger, might one day order their use.

Counting on Jim Mattis to ignore such a command seems like a risk most Americans wouldn’t want to take.

[arun]

Uranium constraints in Pakistan: how many nuclear weapons does Pakistan have? :

Current Science

[ramana]

Uranium constraints in Pakistan: how many nuclear weapons does Pakistan have? :

Current Science

Good paper. Reminds me of Aruns studies of Pak capability long back.

Good that India has own experts and not the NPA gang.

[Haridas]

^^^ On your coaxing I first met Prof. S Chandrashekher in 2001, and later his full team. Reminds me of their energy and determination to serve country as unsung hero/heroines.

Yes I also did the ractor days based calculations to also show to NPAyothullas that indian nuke plants have already made enough maal to swim in it, not needing any imported U fuel.