smoke on a battleground 30 km away is not a problem at all. can anything visually ID a bit of smoke on the ground that distance away ? don't think so.
it's different for AAMs because of the clear background of the sky and for ATGMs since the distance involved are small.
even the russians have moved away from this kind of thinking. in a country like India, much of the AD net depends on the fighters. would you slice away a load of multi-role fighters from their ground attack roles to this AD force ?I think you have raised a very important question - " Who is responsible for defending India against incoming cruise missles" and " what differentiates the AD responsibilities of IA and IAF ?
AD possibly is our biggest weakness in defence right now.
I think time has come to create a separate and independent AD Force - which is given the responsibility of defending India against all aerial threats. Elements of this force could then serve with IA, IAF, and IN units/locations as per requirements.
{most certainly not ! creating a specialised force will lead to unnecessary duplication of resources and serious lack of coordination, not to mention sub-optimal use of existing resources.}
This area needs a lot of importance and funding - if it stays within each service, it may not get enough of both.
ideally, the army would have only theater AD roles for its moving forces with the IAF providing top cover and situational awareness with its fighters and AEW&C aircrafts.
and the IAF would have overall responsibility of defending the airspace from all kinds of missiles and aircraft. it does look like this how the future is going to look.
is the the bolded part correct ? the air force's AD net would cover all ingress routes into India, not around a few installations -- that job is left to the SR QRMs like spyder. of course, it makes no sense to deploy ABM systems on the border unless the installation it is protecting is at the border.The army is acquiring this to cover its battle groups, the airforce to cover major air bases and important installations. Is it possible to have a line of SAM's that can cover the airspace on the sensitive part of the borders and provide an additional layer (apart from a layer around major cities) to protect against a salvo?