Indian Missiles and Munitions Discussion

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 24 Sep 2010 01:27

The problem with ABM is it is akin to our intelligence and security apparatus. It has to be "accurate" 100% of the time; where as the enemy nuke is like a lone-terrorist with a big-punch.

The moment enemy knows that our deterrence is ABM centric then they can overwhelm our ABM umbrella with a mixture of BMs and CMs with a mix of conventional and nuke payloads.

JimmyJ · Post by **JimmyJ** » 24 Sep 2010 03:17

RamaY wrote:The moment enemy knows that our deterrence is ABM centric then they can overwhelm our ABM umbrella with a mixture of BMs and CMs with a mix of conventional and nuke payloads.

While the above stated can be true for a non nuclear state where the deterrence would be its ABMs in India's case the primary deterrence is the nuke weapon and ABMs further add to it. I believe ABM is an effort to support India's No First Use policy.

Yes the enemy can overwhelm us using the above stated method, but imagine the difference it would make by taking out a nuke tipped missile. Even one reduced makes a difference, isn't it. Life and Death. And possible survivors of the calamity.

The story does not end with the nuking, there is still left. We must look at what after a nuke war too rather than considering it as the Armageddon.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 24 Sep 2010 04:52

JimmyJ wrote: While the above stated can be true for a non nuclear state where the deterrence would be its ABMs in India's case the primary deterrence is the nuke weapon and ABMs further add to it. I believe ABM is an effort to support India's No First Use policy.

Yes the enemy can overwhelm us using the above stated method, but imagine the difference it would make by taking out a nuke tipped missile. Even one reduced makes a difference, isn't it. Life and Death. And possible survivors of the calamity.

Absolutely.

JimmyJ wrote:The story does not end with the nuking, there is still left. We must look at what after a nuke war too rather than considering it as the Armageddon.

This should scare the crap out of many potential adversaries.

srai · Post by **srai** » 24 Sep 2010 07:02

Kanson wrote:quote="sum"
From Orbat:
#

India and the SAM-10 For years people have been saying that India has the SAM-10 (S-300) SAM/ABM. Three batteries are supposed to have been acquired, one for Delhi, one for Bombay, and a third battery no one knows where, but speculation is it has been disbanded and the equipment given to the India's defense R and D people to help develop an indigenous ABM.
#

Several years ago a very knowledgeable person told us India did not buy the SA-10 or anything like that from Russia. Yesterday another informed source said the same thing.
#

If anyone has any ideas on this, please write.
/quote

Chacko was hinting on the other day about this SAM. There was always people saying Yes and No, kind of 50:50. Rather than trying to make perfect answers, why not we share what we know about this Indian procurement.

Though there is no word about this for delhi, there are some rumors of this SAM installed near Trombay. What is more intriguing is the maintained silence on this acquisition.

IMO, the confusion comes from IAF purchasing the 36D6 (TIN SHIELD) radars (6 units?) in ~1995 with a surveillance range of 180-360km. These 36D6 radars are typically used with the S-300P (SA-10 GRUMBLE).

However, it seems IAF bought only the 36D6 radars "as it can provide both target track data to SAM batteries as well as GCI support for Russian-origin fighter aircraft such as the MiG-29 (FULCRUM) or Su-30MKI (FLANKER-H)." IAF most likely did not buy the entire S-300P system ... only its surveillance radar.

Arya Sumantra · Post by **Arya Sumantra** » 24 Sep 2010 08:25

Singha wrote:the overwhelming amts of MIRV warheads and robust delivery systems in the hands of P2 made ABM systems even at today's tech levels useless to even try out.
the gorgon and galosh interceptor grid was more like a H&D thing imo around moscow.

ABM only started getting mindshare when IRBMs proliferated in small numbers everywhere courtesy the lizard. thats a more manageable problem than deciding what to do about 300 topol's rising steely out of siberia, each tipped with MIRVs.

Reply posted in Newbie thread here

http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... 25#p946325

dinesha · Post by **dinesha** » 24 Sep 2010 08:51

Prithvi-II to be test-fired today
http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/scienc ... 790739.ece

Hindu: (Prithvi - II lifting off from it's mobile launcher at Integrated Test Range at Chandipur off Orissa Coast in this June 18, 2010 picture. Photo: DRDO)

sum · Post by **sum** » 24 Sep 2010 10:40

^^ One pocch onlee:

Why does the IA missile regiment have to come to ITR to do a "user trial"

Wont it be more effective if done in a actual deployment zone? Since it is only ~300 km range, closeness to border etc need not be worried about.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 24 Sep 2010 10:43

the pokhran range is not 300km long perhaps? they probably do not want to overfly populated areas enroute to impact point in pokhran?

there is no other such giant range like nellis or new mexico or canada others are blessed with for overland testing.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 24 Sep 2010 10:45

sum wrote:^^ One pocch onlee:

Why does the IA missile regiment have to come to ITR to do a "user trial"

Wont it be more effective if done in a actual deployment zone? Since it is only ~300 km range, closeness to border etc need not be worried about.

Most likely because these places are instrumented and have telemetry , radar etc to track the launch.

Yes ideally it is better to do user trial at deployment areas and as part of major exercises because the way you train is the way you will fight.

dinesha · Post by **dinesha** » 24 Sep 2010 11:16

Prithvi-II ballistic missiles fails to take off
Indian Express
A user trial of the nuclear weapons capable, surface-to-surface Prithvi-II ballistic missile from Chandipur in Orissa ended in an embarassing failure .

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/Prith ... off/687011

A user trial of the nuclear weapons capable, surface-to-surface Prithvi-II ballistic missile from Chandipur in Orissa ended in an embarassing failure for the government as the missile did not take off.
The nine metre-tall, single stage liquid propelled missile with a maximum range of 350 kilometres was fired from a mobile launcher at 10.03 am from the Integrated Test Range in Chandipur-on-sea, Orissa. But sources in the Defence Research and Development Organisation said the missile just did not launch as the launchpad was enveloped in smoke. There was no clear word on what caused the failure. The test was being conducted by the Strategic Forces Command. The missile was last tested on June 18 this year, but for a shorter range.
The missile weighs 4.6 tonnes and is capable of carrying warheads weighing 500-1,000 kilograms. It has already been inducted into the Air Force. It is equipped with an advanced inertial navigation system and has features to deceive anti-ballistic missiles.

sum · Post by **sum** » 24 Sep 2010 11:21

BDL and RCI, we have a problem !!!

( paraphrasing "Houston, we have a problem")

Scary this this was a "indicted missile" which would have passed all IA QCs.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 24 Sep 2010 11:30

a certain number of such products always seem to fail no matter what one does - SLBMs that churn like diwali chakris, AAMs that fail to guide...thats why people keep a good inventory.

thats what scares me about the bhooka-nanga 'minimum' deterrence we profess to pursue. we just do not have the inventory to make up for such failures in a real war.

Pratik_S · Post by **Pratik_S** » 24 Sep 2010 11:44

The problem I think lies in the manufacturing process. We have seen many user trials ending up in an embarrassment but have achieved a great deal of success while conducting development trails. It seems like the missiles don't have long shelf-life ! SFC and other bodies should take a good look at the manufacturing process and make necessary changes if required.

Nihat · Post by **Nihat** » 24 Sep 2010 12:00

smpratik wrote:The problem I think lies in the manufacturing process. We have seen many user trials ending up in an embarrassment but have achieved a great deal of success while conducting development trails. It seems like the missiles don't have long shelf-life ! SFC and other bodies should take a good look at the manufacturing process and make necessary changes if required.

I don't know about that - previous trials of Prithvi (all versions) have been succesful and there was a twin trials also (not so long ago) which was succesful.

Its probably more a case of as Singha stated, in such technically complex missiles some component always has a small chance of malfunctioning. Question is though, what would have happened if the missile contained a nuclear warhead in a war situation.

Kersi D · Post by **Kersi D** » 24 Sep 2010 13:54

shiv wrote:
JimmyJ wrote: While the above stated can be true for a non nuclear state where the deterrence would be its ABMs in India's case the primary deterrence is the nuke weapon and ABMs further add to it. I believe ABM is an effort to support India's No First Use policy.

Yes the enemy can overwhelm us using the above stated method, but imagine the difference it would make by taking out a nuke tipped missile. Even one reduced makes a difference, isn't it. Life and Death. And possible survivors of the calamity.
Absolutely.

JimmyJ wrote:The story does not end with the nuking, there is still left. We must look at what after a nuke war too rather than considering it as the Armageddon.
This should scare the crap out of many potential adversaries.

No Shiv no.

Getting nuked may scare the Chinese. Their global agenda is to be THE WORLD POWER. And they know that any war would delay them by a few years

But not Pakistan

Their global agenda (or one of them) would be to go to the 72 virgins, carrying a damn what happens to the rest of the country. Their global agenda may be to be THE WORLD TERRORIST POWER.

K

dinesha · Post by **dinesha** » 24 Sep 2010 14:42

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article792794.ece

“The failure to lift Prithvi-II was due to a snag either in the main missile or the sub-system, including the launcher,”

So except the Truck everything else could have failed...

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 24 Sep 2010 14:48

nothing wrong in starting out with a open mind.

I somehow think they should drive around our missile TELs in the harshest of conditions for like one week to simulate war shoot-n-scoot tactics (desert, rain the works), and then fire on depressed trajectories at pokhran targets to see if all goes well including the C3I radio links.
and they need to do it a lot to ensure a robust confidence in our systems.

Dmurphy · Post by **Dmurphy** » 24 Sep 2010 15:30

dinesha wrote:http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article792794.ece
“The failure to lift Prithvi-II was due to a snag either in the main missile or the sub-system, including the launcher,”

So except the Truck everything else could have failed...

After years of R&D, I thought we had in place a system which would monitor sub-systems and tiny details as is the case with our NTFS monitoring Tejas' flights - so that we can zero in on the exact cause of the failure sooner than now.

dinesha · Post by **dinesha** » 24 Sep 2010 16:41

“The failure to lift Prithvi-II was due to a snag either in the main missile or the sub-system, including the launcher,”

has been edited and now reads :

The missile having a range of 350 km was launched by personnel of the Strategic Forces Command as part of training exercise around 10 a.m. However, the rocket engine stopped functioning a few seconds after the launch command was given and failed to provide the necessary thrust for the missile to blast off from the launch pad.

Various likely causes for the malfunctioning of the engine, including whether there was a problem with the liquid propellant or if there was an absence of free flow of the fuel in the pipelines or if there was a snag during the command were being looked into, according to official sources. Exact reasons would be known in two or three days after the entire data was analysed.

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article792794.ece

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 24 Sep 2010 17:08

sum wrote:^^ One pocch onlee:

Why does the IA missile regiment have to come to ITR to do a "user trial"

Wont it be more effective if done in a actual deployment zone? Since it is only ~300 km range, closeness to border etc need not be worried about.

To check if transport and storage have caused problems. The missile may be one which is approaching its date of expiry perhaps?

nits · Post by **nits** » 24 Sep 2010 18:13

India’s Ballistic Missiles

As per the article

AGNI-III

First tested in 2006 which was a disaster it was retested almost year after in 2007 which was a huge success, DRDO and India rightly have under quoted the missile range has 3500km but western defense experts believe that missile can achieve 5500 km plus range and even up to 7000km with a lighter conventional payload, bringing in whole of Asia and Easter Europe , this is the first time Indian missiles will be able to over whole Asian continent and volatile middle eastern sector , induction has been going on for a while now but it seems to be in smaller numbers now .

AGNI-V

Which will be based on Agni-III but will have one more stage to achieve greater range, officially it has been told to media by DRDO that it will have 5500 km range, but with lighter or even decent payload of one ton it will be able to deliver a payload over 8000km far away, it has been described has china specific missile but AGNI- III can hit almost every Major city in China, AGNI-V has been described by many western Defence experts has show of India Military strength , and to prove to world that India can hit any country over .

Gurus - See bold portion; is it true and we can hit Unkil also

?

Katare · Post by **Katare** » 24 Sep 2010 18:26

They do user trial/test in test range because it has tracking and other equipment that will generate data and validate results.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 24 Sep 2010 19:01

JimmyJ wrote: Yes the enemy can overwhelm us using the above stated method, but imagine the difference it would make by taking out a nuke tipped missile. Even one reduced makes a difference, isn't it. Life and Death. And possible survivors of the calamity.

The story does not end with the nuking, there is still left. We must look at what after a nuke war too rather than considering it as the Armageddon.

This logic is useful when the scenario involves 1 nuke vs Zero nukes; but falls on its face when we are facing 12 nukes vs 11 nukes.

The second point is a well understood item and need not be repeated every day. The reality demands that we do not rely on philosophy when dealing with potential enemies.

geeth · Post by **geeth** » 24 Sep 2010 20:38

This logic is useful when the scenario involves 1 nuke vs Zero nukes; but falls on its face when we are facing 12 nukes vs 11 nukes.

Having enough Nukes to burn the hell out of your perceived enemies, would you prefer to have an ABM system in place or not?

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 24 Sep 2010 20:44

Liquid Propulsion has numerous points of failure. Quite tricky. Good thing they had a user trial.

This looks like whats called hangfire.

Hota hain. No need to panic.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 24 Sep 2010 20:46

geeth wrote:
This logic is useful when the scenario involves 1 nuke vs Zero nukes; but falls on its face when we are facing 12 nukes vs 11 nukes.
Having enough Nukes to burn the hell out of your perceived enemies, would you prefer to have an ABM system in place or not?

Shiv and the other person support NFU and put forward ABM as a credible security line in case of PRC first strike. I think that is not a good strategy.

I personally do not support India's NFU policy. So in my strategy, ABM acts as the security line to ward of enemy 2nd strike capability. I do not believe in ABM's capability w.r.t PRC's first strike.

Added Later: Having said that, ABM is a must have for India in view of the present non-state actors in its immediate borders. But do not present it as the comprehensive deterrence-policy for India.

sum · Post by **sum** » 24 Sep 2010 21:47

AGNI-II

First test fired in mid-99 and later inducted into Indian Army ,initially it had a range of 2500km with one ton payload but was able to hit 3300km with lighter payload , it was the first missile in Indian arsenal which was capable of hitting some major cities in china but was not enough to bring whole china into its range . it has been inducted in full force and has been considered until now has most reliable Agni missile in Agni Series .

AGNI-II AT

This new 2.0 gen Agni-2 missile will be tested soon by end of September 2010, it will incorporate newer technologies developed over the years, and improved Agni-2 will have better range (3900km) with same 1 ton payload this could be achieved by using advance composite and lighter materials, it seems that Agni-2 missile will be work horse of India’s deterrence in Agni series of missiles.

Am seeing such precise figures of 3200 km for A-II and 3900 for A-IIAT for the 1st time in MSM....Would assume that these are the actual ranges for which the missiles were designed and tested ( not the usual 2000km range quoted by GoI for A-II and A-IIAT)

vasu_ray · Post by **vasu_ray** » 24 Sep 2010 23:02

There are multiple launch pads at Chandipur and if these are purely user trials they can position 2 or more TELs and should one fail as happened now, the second one can be launched with in the same time window and thats how IA would use them anyways

the same thing happened when in the last but one ABM test the target failed midway and the test was postponed for few months which wasn't necessary if they had a backup

rsingh · Post by **rsingh** » 25 Sep 2010 00:27

Test faliure is not big set back. such things do happen.............when you really test something. IMO there are only two countries which never had this problem. No inam offered to guess name of these two countries.

vasu_ray · Post by **vasu_ray** » 25 Sep 2010 03:59

The below document details plans for airborne boost phase interception, its quite long however it talks about the following

a) US deploying airbone boost phase interceptors (ABI) aganist NK and Iran launches of MRBMs and ICBMs

b) The destabilizing effect it would have on Russia and China (page 57)

http://cisac.stanford.edu/publications/ ... e_defense/

The conclusion in short is,

geography of the target state is critical for the success of ABI

and it has relevance to theater level missiles (China vs Taiwan) and does not affect strategic arsenals of the five nuclear powers

I believe its relevance for us is,

In a geographic sense, TSP equates with NK due to the Arabian sea and Tibet under chinese control equates to Iran

The NK missiles referred in the study are representative of TSP's missiles

Chinese strategic arsenal isn't impacted but its ability to use tactical BMs in the Tibet theater will be, which is of relevance to us

due to us sharing borders with both of them ground based boost phase interceptors are also feasible as technology progresses

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 25 Sep 2010 09:39

BrahMos Complex

koti · Post by **koti** » 25 Sep 2010 11:17

Austin wrote:BrahMos Complex

In one Picture, Shaurya is mistakenly quoted as Brahmos block II.

geeth · Post by **geeth** » 25 Sep 2010 12:01

>>>So in my strategy, ABM acts as the security line to ward of enemy 2nd strike capability. I do not believe in ABM's capability w.r.t PRC's first strike.

If you don't believe in ABM's Capability w.r.t PRC's first strike, then your strategy goes for a toss - because in first strike, majority of your ABM capability could get knocked off. IMO, ABM is there to negate, to whatever extent possible, the damage that could be caused by first strike.

D Roy · Post by **D Roy** » 25 Sep 2010 12:42

ABMs are always seen by the enemy as destabilizing.

Given the physics and numbers it would always seem to an enemy that the ABM is designed to absorb whatever remains of their second strike capability after a debilitating first strike. This was the chief problem during the negotiations between the two cold war camps in the eighties. The soviets ultimately started looking at space based with the Polyus and Buran programs with of course Energiya underpinning the success of both.

kit · Post by **kit** » 25 Sep 2010 17:26

Wont investing in a good ICBM/IRBM force make better political,strategic and economic sense given the relative less technological maturity of ABM technology versus the offensive missile tech ?

Pratyush · Post by **Pratyush** » 25 Sep 2010 17:29

In the Indian context, me feels that the ABM is geared more towards the launch from the "non state actor", that has some how managed to get hold of the launcher and the codes to launch.

koti · Post by **koti** » 25 Sep 2010 18:15

It could make a lot of sense given that both Pak and China have the Nuke keys available at military levels.
So, the actions of any rouge general can be dealt with be ABM and thus avoid a full scale Armageddon.

JimmyJ · Post by **JimmyJ** » 25 Sep 2010 21:10

kit wrote:Wont investing in a good ICBM/IRBM force make better political,strategic and economic sense given the relative less technological maturity of ABM technology versus the offensive missile tech ?

When we say less matured right now, the immediate question that we need to ask is who will make it mature?

Do we wait for Russia/US/Israel to do that? Or if maturity is related to technology/components/ideas, do we have to wait right now and then start a catch up game like what we are doing with LCA & Kaveri? What if they are reluctant to share ABM technology?

Also the easiest choice may not be the good choice. Rather than considering BM and ABM as two separate developments we must consider them as an integrated system. Look at how SAMs and fighters play their role in the air force. Would it be right to say that we will have SAMs and not aircraft as SAMs may be cheaper and less riskier than developing a fighter or we will have fighters alone as offence is the better solution?

JMT

Kanson · Post by **Kanson** » 26 Sep 2010 15:29

ITR sources said the missile would be tested for 320 km range.
Earlier on June 18 last, the missile was conducted for a range of 273 km.

vasu_ray wrote:
Kanson wrote:
Wow! Missile range is gradually increasing. If the max. range is 350 km what is the significance of testing @ 320 km from the previous 273 km range.
Probably they are trying the same maneuver on Prithvi that they did with the last test of Brahmos, its a pull in trajectory of the warhead which makes the range 320km instead of 350km

No. no..I'm referring to this...

http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/scienc ... 306715.ece

Correction

The first paragraph of a report “Test-firing of Prithvi-II, Dhanush today” (March 27, 2010) said that the medium range surface-to-surface Prithvi-II and ship-based Dhanush missiles, both having a range of 330 km, would be test-fired as part of user trials on Saturday, while the third paragraph of a report “Dhanush, Prithvi-II test-fired successfully” (March 28, 2010) said that each missile had achieved its full range (Dhanush 350 km and Prithvi-II 290 km). This led to a query.

The writer clarifies that while Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO) sources (on March 26, 2010) incorrectly mentioned the range of both the missiles to be 330 km, the next day, following the successful launch, stated that the missiles had touched a range of 350 km (Dhanush) and 290 km (Prithvi-II). The full range of Dhanush is 350 km while Prithvi-II's is 295 km.

Interesting to see Prithvi-II range quoted as 295 km, 5 km less than 300 km. Are they planning to export Prithvi? And the news also says,"The officials said range independent software for carrying out the two flight tests almost simultaneously was also validated." What it means?

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 26 Sep 2010 21:02

geeth wrote:>>>So in my strategy, ABM acts as the security line to ward of enemy 2nd strike capability. I do not believe in ABM's capability w.r.t PRC's first strike.

If you don't believe in ABM's Capability w.r.t PRC's first strike, then your strategy goes for a toss - because in first strike, majority of your ABM capability could get knocked off. IMO, ABM is there to negate, to whatever extent possible, the damage that could be caused by first strike.

You have to read others post clearly first. In my post, I clearly mentioned that India will not be constrained by NFU and will be the first to launch a nuke strike. So PRC's retaliation would be their 2nd strike.