Opinion - Editorials   

Sagarika’s significance

The successful test of the Sagarika missile marks a public declaration of the progress India has made towards establishing its own submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) capability. Nuclear warheads delivered by aircraft, land-based ballistic missiles, and SLBMs together form the deadly ‘triad’ considered necessary for ‘stable nuclear deterrence,’ whatever that means in this day and age. Carried onboard by specially designed nuclear-powered submarines that can lurk undetected in the depths of the ocean for months at a time, the SLBM promises a devastating riposte should a nuclear first-strike by an enemy destroy or severely cripple the country’s air- and land-based nuclear weapon systems. The political implications of the latest test are a matter of serious concern, with Pakistan registering its protest against what it sees as a new phase in a South Asian arms race. Technologically, launching ballistic missiles from a submarine moving underwater requires a series of complex steps. Powerful gas generator systems must be activated to eject each missile from the vertical tube in which it is carried onboard the submarine. The missile’s rocket motor must fire as soon as it breaks the ocean surface and the onboard guidance system must quickly orient the missile along the correct launch trajectory. India has proven solid propulsion technology within the civilian space programme as well as the missile programme run by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). The February 26 test was carried out from a submerged pontoon that performed the role of a submarine’s missile tube. The success of this test, as also of previous ones — DRDO officials have now disclosed — indicate mastery of the intricacies of launching a ballistic missile underwater.

For SLBM capability, the ballistic missile is only half the story. In the 1970s, India embarked on the Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV) project to build a nuclear-powered submarine. For years, a key problem was developing a nuclear reactor compact enough to fit inside a submarine. Using highly enriched uranium produced at the Rare Materials Project near Mysore, the miniature reactor became fully operational only in December 2004. Media reports speak of a plan to build by 2015 a fleet of three nuclear submarines, each carrying 12 nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles. It is instructive, however, to remember that although China launched its first Xia-class nuclear submarine capable of carrying ballistic missiles in 1981, a missile was successfully launched from it only seven years later. The political implications aside, Indian defence scientists and naval personnel have several technological hurdles to overcome before they achieve their dream of SLBM capability.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Sagarika’s significance
Cyprus’s new president
Equitable access to quality higher education
Across the Himalayas, to skip the rigours of school
Turkey move to rewrite basis of sharia law
Hadith: their influence and what they relate
Prozac: compulsory international trials register needed
Corrections and clarifications
Railway budget
Terror condemned
Of intolerance

Copyright © 2008, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu