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The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Indian Navy, on 22 April, successfully conducted a maiden flight trial of a sea-based endo-atmospheric interceptor missile off the coast of Odisha in the Bay of Bengal. According to a statement by the defense ministry, the purpose of the trial was to engage and neutralize a hostile ballistic missile threat, thereby elevating the country into the elite club of nations having Naval Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) capability.

“Prior to this, DRDO has successfully demonstrated land-based BMD system with capability to neutralize ballistic missile threats, emerging from adversaries,” the statement added.

Defense minister Rajnath Singh congratulated DRDO and Indian Navy for achieving the feat. DRDO chief Samir V Kamat also complimented the teams involved in the design and development of the missile. “He said that nation has achieved self-reliance in developing highly-complex network-centric anti-ballistic missile systems,” the statement said.

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Development of Phase-I of the two-tier BMD, which is designed to track and destroy nuclear missiles both inside (endo) and outside (exo) the earth’s atmosphere at altitudes from 15-25 km to 80-100 km for “a higher kill probability”, was completed by DRDO some time ago.

The government, however, has so far refrained from sanctioning its full-scale operational deployment at any vital location, sources said. This could be due to the high costs involved, or even strategic calculations that it may provoke Pakistan to go in for a larger nuclear arsenal and countermeasures to defeat the BMD system.

India, of course, has inducted the Russian S-400 Triumf surface-to-air missile systems that can detect, track and destroy incoming strategic bombers, jets, spy planes, drones and even some intermediate-range ballistic missiles.

DRDO, on its part, is going ahead in developing the requisite technologies for a full-fledged BMD system. As per the original plan, Phase-I of the BMD system, with interceptors flying at 4.5 Mach supersonic speeds to intercept enemy missiles, was meant to tackle hostile missiles with a 2,000-km strike range. The Phase-II, in turn, is supposed to take on the 5,000-km range class of missiles.

On 2 November, the new interceptor missile called AD-1, with “a large kill altitude” was successfully tested against “an electronic target” from the APJ Abdul Kalam Island off the Odisha coast. The flight-test was carried out with elements of the BMD system being placed at different geographical locations.
“The AD-1 is a long-range interceptor missile designed for both low exo-atmospheric and endo-atmospheric interception of long-range ballistic missiles as well as aircraft (like AWACS or airborne warning and control systems),” the defence ministry said.

Propelled by a two-stage solid motor, the AD-1 is equipped with indigenously-developed advanced control systems, navigation and guidance algorithms to precisely guide the vehicle to the target.

Defence minister Rajnath Singh said AD-1 “is a unique type of interceptor with advanced technologies available with only a very few nations in the world”, while expressing confidence that it will further strengthen the country’s BMD capability and take it to the next level.

DRDO chairman Samir V Kamat, in turn, said the AD-1 interceptor will provide “great operational flexibility to the users and has the capability to engage many different types of targets”.

Only a few countries like the US, Russia, Israel and China have fully-operational BMD systems, with an overlapping network of early-warning and tracking sensors, reliable command and control posts, land and sea-based batteries of advanced interceptor missiles.

India’s BMD programme has been in the works since the late-1990s, with its first interceptor missile being tested in November 2006. Having conducted over a dozen tests of the BMD system since then, a few of which have failed, DRDO in the past has said that it has a “kill probability of 99.8%” with the mix of exo and endo-interceptor missiles. AD-1 is a new and flexible endo-interceptor missile.

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What have been the drivers which have propelled me to take up the project? Well, over the years, I always felt, that there is an abiding deficit of quality and researched reference material on the very many aspects of Ground Based Air Defence; though sporadic articles do appear in various professional journals by Subject Matter Experts. That was my first driver for putting before a discerning reader, a treasure- trove of information which a professional soldier in general and an air warrior on either side of the see-saw of attack and defence in particular, would like to fall back upon, in satiation of their multiple professional needs.

The other driver, of course, is the fulfilment of my own life’s dream, as I said. Starting from the humble beginnings of small snippets in small time magazines, slowly graduating to analytical and researched pieces in magazines of standing and repute-one wanted to take the next-pedestal of cumulating the humble efforts in the form of a book. The first break was provided by USI which published my first book on air defence issues. Duly emboldened by the success of this maiden endeavour; I ventured out to pen down a bigger and a more comprehensive work. This time around, the honour to provide a platform for my two-penny worth of effort was provided by Maj Gen RK Arora, Retd, CEO, IMR under the prestigious banner of IMR Media, to whom I express my most grateful thanks and indebtedness.

Getting to the book at hand, I have deliberately chosen the subject content applying the twin-tests of contemporary relevance, as well as, the prospect of further growth and development of the subject in the foreseeable future. I hope that my selection will match the expectations of the discerning reader cutting across the rank hierarchy and relating both to the ground soldier, as well as, a scholar air warrior.

The book opens with the celebration of the ‘Unmanned Revolution’; I call it a revolution because it is my sense that the `Unmanned Story’ riding on the twin wings of the UAVs and UCAVs is something whose time has come and whose place of prominence in the comity of aerial threat vehicles cannot be wished away. The book reviews the amazing evolutionary journey of these wonder machines starting way back from the end of Nineteenth Century working through the two Great Wars, the Cold War years, the Vietnam War, the Arab Israeli Conflict to the later years of Desert Storm, Bosnia, Kosovo right up to the contemporary Global War on Terror in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. It highlights the many combat virtues of UAVs/UCAVs in terms of zero crew fatalities, no training deficit, incredible endurance, wide mission spectrum, open architecture, flexible mission payloads and and more. While the book flags the huge versatility of UAVs and UCAVs, it is also tries to expose its soft underbelly by bringing out the vulnerability of these machines when faced with a resolute air defence warrior equipped with hard and soft kill options. As to the face of the future, the book highlights the emerging research areas riding on nano-technology, robotics and AI, the exciting world of VTOL/SVTOL UAVs, liberation from the Ground Control Station, towards full vehicle autonomy, next generation morphing, the orinthropters, the arrival of SWARMIES and the growth of stealth in UAVs. In the context of bringing down a UAV, the book highlights the multiple challenges in terms of detection, much akin to finding a needle in the haystack, and killing the UAV optimally through hard / soft kill options, lest we end up killing a fly with a sledge hammer.

Coming to the contemporary and the futuristic scene in the UAV / UCAV domain, the book describes the latest concept of MUMT or Manned and Unmanned Teaming, wherein, the experts are trying to extract disproportionate gains by combining superior human intelligence, intuition, grit, tolerance for ambiguity and instant decision making capability of the combat pilot in manned platforms with the brute precision, range, stealth, endurance, immunity and versatility of the unmanned machine. Interestingly, what precipitates out of such teaming are conceptual issues that not only reside in the operational domain, but also in the ethical one. In this, the book tries to pose questions that still beckon for answers; the most pertinent being, ‘Are we ready for Machine over Man?” Probably, not as yet.

The book thereafter presents a comprehensive review of the subject of ‘Ballistic Missile Defence; Capabilities Across Nations and Where Technology is Leading to’. Essentially, an endeavour has been made to capture the nuances of the amazing growth journey of BMD starting from the ‘Era of Vengeance’ where Adolf Hitler’s V2 Rockets came screaming down from the upper atmosphere causing untold devastation on a hapless population to the current date when SSMs are crossing new and newer frontiers in range, reach, lethality and precision. While the defenders are busy in developing counters constituting the complex of Sensors, Shooters and Battle Control Systems, trying to take on the Ballistic Missiles from Terminal to Re-entry to Midcourse and to the yet dream destination of Boost Phase Engagement. Taking a global look, the Chapter describes how the leading BMD makers of the world are trying to synergize the sensor-shooter capabilities across multiple domains spanning across land, sea, air and space – the ultimate high ground. The Chapter also deliberates how the kill options in the BMD domain are moving from the conventional hard kill to electronic kill using High Power Microwaves or Charge Particle Beams trying to debilitate and incapacitate the incoming threat by concentrating on it a few hundred million electron volts of KE in a few seconds, thus destroying the integrity of the material mass of the incoming missiles or the thermal kill using the lasing medium to deliver a shock pulse of coherent beams instantly leading to thermal collapse of the target missile. This Chapter ends by building a hypothetical situation of the possible scenario of transition of capability from ASAT to BMD. In that, it is argued that since the leading space faring nations of the world (most notably, China in our case) have already developed and demonstrated ASAT capability, thus its metamorphosis into a BMD capability on the same scale is not a flight of fancy; it is an ominous reality.

The book then looks at the evolving domain of stealth and counter stealth. Picking up the thread from the days of German Horton Ho 229, which marked the arrival of stealth in the closing years of Second World War, the Chapter chronicles the continuous growth of the stealth concept on both sides of the fence, namely the attacker and the defender. Wearing the realities of Dollars vs Cents in the game of Stealth vs Counter Stealth, it is shown how in the long run, the possession and continous revamping of counter stealth capability will be more economically sustainable and will have lesser ethical burden than doing the same with offensive stealth. Exposing both sides of the coin, while the contents on one hand describe the cutting-edge technologies propelling the growth of stealth, on the other hand, they highlight how the defender is smarting up with enabling capabilities in the counter stealth domain. So while on one side are the RAMs, smart-skin technologies, plasma-driven stealth, the planform alignment and more, on the other side there is an amazing growth in passive sensing capabilities, use of lasers (LIDARs), Schilieren’s Photography and so on. Mention has also been made of the tremendous growth in sensor technology to defeat the Very Low Observable threat using VHF, C/X band radars, OTH radars, MIMO radars, LIDARs and CELLDARs etc stand explained. The Chapter ends in recognition and acknowledgement of the eternal cause effect cycle on both sides of the stealth continuum.

The next Chapter describes the emerging kill options in the air defence weapons of the future. In order to put the felt need in perspective, it starts off by highlighting the very many deficits of the Hard Kill option in terms of range, reach, altitude, reaction time, finite arsenal, response time and so on and how most of these can be overcome using the multiple advantages of the soft kill. It brings out how the leap of technology is fast weaponising the laser option in a multitude of emerging weapons from the mobile tactical variety to advanced medium range capability using innovative ideas for generating adequate lasing energy. The Chapter further describes the promise which the HPM and CPB weapons hold, though, much of it still remains in the pipeline of realisation. Describing the sword and shield relationship, it is stated that so long as the severity and lethality of the air threat continues to grow by way of multiplicity of threat vehicles, precision strike capability and a slew of smart and intelligent munitions, the combat teeth of the defenders will grow alongside in the truism for every sword; a shield. As to the foreseeable future, the day is not far when HPM and CPB weapons will become hard realities. These weapons are not stand alone, other enabling technologies, which are likely to mature by around 2020 include multi-spectral sensing without giving away the position of the fire unit, high data flow with real time signal processing, sensor fusion, multi-sensor, multi-step, multi-mode guidance and control, special fuzes, warheads and more.

The next Chapter highlights yet other non-conventional kill options for the GBADWS. This is through the Electronic Counter Measure (ECM) enablement of GBADWS. This option is based on the growing dependency of aerial threat vehicles on the Electromagnetic (EM) spectrum, both for their own avionics and operations, as also, for guiding the smart / precision munitions from the mother aircraft to their intended targets. This kill option aims to provide such an ECM muscle to the GBADWS which enables them to soft kill either the electronics / electromagnetics on board the mother aircraft or to cut/interfere/severe, even for a short while, the umbilical chord represented by the electronic / EM link between the mother aerial threat vehicle and the munitions being guided. It is believed that at speeds in magnitude of several machs and split-second response timings, the link once severed even for a wink can not be restored. Such kill options provide enhanced range effect as it is not limited by the range and reach of hard kill weapons, as also, an unlimited magazine as the ECM capability will be alive so long as the power remains pumped in. Befitting the concept described, the Chapter then highlights the existing weapon systems in the world that are based on this kill option. The Chinese 970 Radar Jamming System, the Israeli Multi-Platform Radar Jamming System, the Russians SPN series of equipment, the UK’s S373 ECM system and the US Mobile Ground to Air Radar jamming system find a mention.

In response to that school of Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) who have long written the obituaries of the lowly air defence guns and their ammunition, the next Chapter makes an emphatic statement to declare that the air defence guns, the original warhorse of air defence warriors are here to stay as the last sentinels of terminal defence, ready to face the determined attacker that manages to penetrate all the layers of a defender‘s line up. The world scan that follows in support of the above claim highlights a few truths. It firstly reveals that no country has ever discarded its guns, the war horses of 50s and 60s are still around, albeit with fantastic and all enabling qualitative upgrades. Most of these include a state-of-the-art Electro Optical Tracking System (EOTS) complete with its gyro-stablized day camera, high definition night camera with FLIR optics, eye-safe Laser Range Finder (LRF) and a digital Fire Control System (FCS).

It is also revealed that while calibres have gradually come down for 100mm to 85mm-76mm-57mm-40mm-35mm-30mm-23mm-20mm-14.5mm etc, there is no standard fit. While Sweden, Italy and Singapore celebrate their 40mm machines; Germany, Greece and Italy are busy perfecting their 30mm calibre; Russia, Poland, Belgium and Finland are going strong with their 23mm as much as US, France, Israel and Korea are spitting fire with their 20mm Gattlings and more. Besides the gun, ammunition is smarting up along multiple verticals to include warhead triggering at optimum point through embedding of near real-time intelligence at the muzzle end by way of rd-to-rd feeding of muzzle velocity and time of flight, then there is the course-correction strategy through impulse manoeuvre technologies and a whole lot of research is on in the designing of special effect ammunition. Some of these include air burst munition concepts, modular ammunition, other special effects to include higher penetration, higher incendiary, higher fragmentation and more. The various ammunition types include the DART ammunition, Telescoped Ammunition, and the ultimate 3P-Pre-Fragmented Programmable Proximity Fuzed ammunition. In sum, the days of air defence guns and gun ammunition are far from over.

The next Chapter deals with the key trends in the Integrated Air Defence Systems Concept. The central point being made in this Chapter is that of metamorphosis borne out of necessity. Some four to five decades into history there was a time when air threat was linear essentially riding on the twin shoulders of aircraft and helicopters in the visual domain while the number of assets to be protected were finite, thereby enabling themselves to be protected by terminal GBADWS in the point defence mode where fire units were VA/VP centric and were deployed in single and sometimes multiple rings around them.

All the above changed over time as the air threat re-vamped itself both qualitatively and quantitatively. The air threat vehicles grew in multiplicity, their range and reach envelope grew spatially and in range, reach, accuracy, precision and long range stand-off capability. Alongside this, the number of assets to be protected hit the roof, thereby making earlier forms of deployment impossible All this gave rise to the Integrated Air Defence System (IADS) concept, where GBADWS were deployed not as VA / VP centric but grid centric, implying that multiple layers of GBADS provided area air defence cover to a large No of VAs / VPs which were fixed / transiting the defended areas. Also all the three verticals of the air defence resources, viz the sensors (radars, visual observers and other technical means), shooters (guns, SAMs, air superiority fighters and interceptors) and Battle Management Systems (BMC⁴I²SR) are amalgamated synergistically into one cohesive unit ready to address the air threat. This concept of IADS has matured over time as an integrated family of GBADWS consisting of sensors, shooters and battle management systems. Such a system is eminently suitable to take on the contemporary, as well as, the futuristic air threat and possesses both the hard kill, as well as, soft kill options which I mentioned earlier. Enabling technologies today empower the IADS with enhanced survivability sensors having a high degree of immunity against radiation and EO sensors. Lately, IADS are also acquiring an anti-stealth muscle. In sum, IADS is the way to go in the foreseeable future.

Picking up the threads from the IADS, the next Chapter describes one of its key constituents; i.e the Air Defence Battle Management and Control System in some detail. If there is one life line of the air defence battle, it is ADBMC² system. Why? Simply because, so much of the entire battle sequence depends upon it; the surveillance of the air space, identification of multiple air threat vehicles, recognizing them as to friend-or-foe, generating a Recognised Air Situation Picture (RASP) through Multi-Sensor Tracing (MST), threat prioritization, weapon assignment and the dynamic and minute-to-minute control of air defence battle – all depends on ADBMC² system. If this one foundational link is weak, the best of sensors and the best of shooters will simply operate sub-optimally and fall like nine-pins. The Chapter describes the multiple challenges of BMC² system; must prominent being the MST challenge, i.e, the uphill task of filtration and fusion of multiple sensor inputs to remove duplications and provide the RASP. Then, there are other issues of forging a seamless compatibility among disparate systems in the sensor-shooter domain, measuring up to the challenges of survival in a hostile EW environment coupled with relentless SEAD operations by the adversary. The other challenges of BMC² systems include threat processing in a time urgent scenario, positive identification of friend-or-foe to keep fratricide at bay and reducing the response time cycle have been explained. The Chapter ends with a presentation of a panoramic view of the scene of the BMC² and ADC&R systems the world over to bring out the emerging challenges and smart solutions to address them. The countries included are USA, Germany and UK.

The book changes track here from the mainframe sensor-shooter- BMC² stuff and exposes the ever evolving and ever exciting world of simulators and simulation. The chapter explains how simulators are great enablers and are hugely relevant for Army AD where operational equipment is scarce, live training/firing are extremely costly, training space in crew compartments is restricted and operational hours are at a premium. The Chapter explains the hierarchy of simulation from the basic individual trainers to higher order simulation with GIS enablement, 3D simulation to include Aircraft Recognition Simulators and Radar Coverage Predictions Simulators. The former transforms the entire concept of aircraft recognition training ‘to as real as it can get’ while the latter gives a qualitative boost to the entire sequence of sensor deployment. While multi mode EW Simulators have cut down the dependence of live air sp for EW trg, the Class Room Variants of sensors enable an entire class to get trained with live equipment at one go. And finally come the ‘Total Effect Simulators’ which bring alive the complete air defence battle end-to-end thanks to the exciting world of simulators which holds a million promises in the foreseeable future.

The book at this point makes a departure from the contemporary and the futuristic to present a period piece aimed at providing some ‘Takeaways’ to the Air Defence warriors from the Air and Air Defence Campaign in the Gulf War, 1991. Why this war alone? Well, simply because of the amazing facts and figures on both the warring sides. In that, the Coalition Air Force flew something like 1,14,00 sorties in less than two months, averaging about 2000 sorties per day, dropping a colossal 88,500 tons of explosive, executing a strategic airlift of more than 5,00,000 personnel and 54,000 tons of cargo. The Iraqi Air Defence warriors ensured that a formidable Air Defence Punch came to a naught through absurd planning and a criminally sub-optimal exploitation of the might of a slew of GBADWS. In fact it came to such a pass that the defenders actually ‘gave away the battle unfought’. This war brought out the power of ‘smart planning’ by the attackers, who first broke the back of the defenders by crippling the Electronic Order of Battle through selective precision attacks. Once the soul was gone, the passive body of GBADWS was destroyed through a furious campaign of SEAD and precision strike in a technologically enabled and comprehensive mission planning environment. Out of all this the most amazing fact is the ‘fleeing away’ of some 121 of the defenders aircraft to Iran instead of putting up a fight (sic).

It is in the monumental destruction of the defender due to colossal SEAD and sub-optimal exploitation of a formidable AD punch of the defender that lie some takeaways. The caution of not to play into the adversary’s SEAD game come out loud and clear, the ‘Fleeing Away of Iraqi Air Force is beyond comment’, the critical requirement to build the redundancies to overcome dependencies on open communication architectures, the effectiveness of man portable SAMs and the inevitability and last line effectiveness of the gun systems came out loud and clear.

Towards the end, the book carves a brief comparative evaluation of the Chinese WZ10 Attack Helicopter and the AH 64E of USA. A comparison of factual details combined with a comparative evaluation of performance parameters of the two machines reveals that the two are not really comparable one-on-one in the same mould. The Chinese machine enjoys higher manoeuvrability due to a smaller and a lighter profile as required for the topography of Chinese borders, the American helicopter possesses brute fire-power better suited for achieving a higher kill effect in the offensive role.

And finally before signing off, as if to thread the preceding Chapters in one seamless sequence the book presents a Status Summary in the eternal and abiding cause effect cycle between the prosecutors of air threat and the defenders. Catching one end of the thread, the Chapter gives words to the cutting edge developments in the continous revamping of the air threat. In that, it briefly describes the FGFA of front-line nations credited with such amazing features like all-aspect stealth, Low Probability of Interception Radar or LPIR, high performance and structurally lighter airframes with minimal RCS; thanks to nano-materials, high advanced avionics with a capability to network dissimilar platforms in a net-centric domain, array of on-board sensors to provide high degree of immunity, hence, survivability in a hostile EW environment and armed to the teeth with smart / intelligent / precision arsenal capable of BVR delivery from long stand-off ranges.

Inspired by fascination and fear, electrifying moves and devastating capabilities it describes the front-line attack helicopters and gives a flavour of UAVs and UCAVs, the wonder threat vehicles whose time has come. The MUMT and the ethical debate of machine over arms, the SWARMs, the slew of SSMs, ARMs, Cruise Missile and more …. So much for the prosecutors of air threat.

For the defenders, it talks about the exponential growth of GBADWS over time, the evolving and fast maturing concept of layered-and-tiered air defence, the Integrated Air Defence System (IADS) complete with its trio of sensors, shooters and BMC² systems, fast re-vamping along separate verticals. The fast evolving art of invisibility and the enabling techniques of finding the needle in the haystack as appropriate similies for stealth and counter-stealth. A word on the last line defence of terminal AD weapons and their evolving ammunition types. The complete hierarchy of SAMs covering the entire range-reach continuum get a mention as the Chapter talks about the missile centric defence of VSHORADS-SRSAMs-QRSAMs and MRSAMs. A discussion on the emerging story of BMD and the quest to reach the ultimate aim of boost phase intercept follow. Then comes the mention of a whole new arsenal of soft kill weapons and what is latest in the field. The curtains finally come down with a brief mention of the ADBMC² system and the challenges involved therein.

In the last words the author makes a confession thus “So much is happening (in the field of air attack-defence continuum), so fast is the technology providing options on both sides of the fence that it is a full time job for SMEs to keep track on the latest at the cutting edge; the eternal duel continues.

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The Indian Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) programme consists of a multi-layered system to protect India from ballistic missile attacks. Phase 1 has been successfully tested and completed and deployment awaits final official permission. Phase 2 is under development.

The system consists of two land and sea-based interceptor missiles, namely the Prithvi Air Defence (PAD) missile for high altitude interception, and the Advanced Air Defence (AAD) Missile for lower altitude interception. The two-tiered shield should be able to intercept any incoming missile launched from 5,000 kilometres away. The system also includes an overlapping network of early warning and tracking radars, as well as command and control posts.

The PAD was tested in November 2006, followed by the AAD in December 2007. With the test of the PAD missile, India became the fourth country to have successfully developed an anti-ballistic missile system, after United States, Russia, and Israel. The system has undergone several tests but system is yet to be officially commissioned.

Out of about a dozen interceptor missile tests, about ten of them were successful, where they destroyed an incoming missile, mimicking the path emanating from an enemy country. These interceptions took place in a direct, hit-to-kill mode, pulverising the enemy missile in mid-flight in exo-atmosphere (above an altitude of 40 km) and in endo-atmosphere (below an altitude of 30 km). In January 2020, the first phase of BMD programme was completed. After the government’s approval to install the missile shield for the national capital it will take three to four years to install shield.

System Configuration

The deployed system would consist of many launch vehicles, radars, Launch Control Centres (LCC) and the Mission Control Centre (MCC). All these are geographically distributed and connected by a secure communication network.

The MCC is the software intensive system of the ballistic missile defence system. It receives information from various sources such as radars and satellites which is then processed by ten computers which run simultaneously. The MCC is connected to all other elements of the defence through a WAN. MCC performs target classification, target assignment and kill assessment. It also acts as a decision support system for the commander. It can also decide the number of interceptors required for the target for an assured kill probability. After performing all these functions, the MCC assigns the target to the LCC of a launch battery. The LCC starts computing the time to launch the interceptor based upon information received from a radar based on the speed, altitude and flight path of the target. LCC prepares the missile for launch in real time and carries out ground guidance computation.

After the interceptor is launched, it is provided target information from the radar through a datalink. When the interceptors close onto the target missile, it activates the radar seeker to search for the target missile and guides itself to intercept the target. Multiple PAD and AAD interceptors can be launched against a target for high kill probability.

Prithvi Air Defense (PAD) Exercise

On 27 November 2006 a PAD missile successfully intercepted a modified Prithvi-II Missile at an altitude of 50 km. The Prithvi-II ballistic missile was modified successfully to mimic the trajectory of M-11 missiles.

On March 6, 2009 DRDO carried out a second successful test of the PAD interceptor missile. The target used was ship launched Dhanush missile which followed the trajectory of a missile with range of a 1,500 km. The target was tracked by Swordfish (LRTR) radar and destroyed by the PAD at 75 km (47 mi) altitude.

On March 6, 2011 DRDO successfully test-fired interceptor missile from AAD, which destroyed a ‘hostile’ target ballistic missile, a modified Prithvi, at an altitude of 16 km over the Bay of Bengal.

Advanced Air Defence (AAD) Missile

Advanced Air Defence (AAD) is an anti-ballistic missile designed to intercept incoming ballistic missiles in the endo-atmosphere at an altitude of 30 km. AAD is single stage, solid fuelled missile. Guidance is similar to that of PAD: it has an inertial navigation system, midcourse updates from ground based radar and active radar homing in the terminal phase. It is 7.5 m tall, weighs around 1.2 tons; and has a diameter of less than 0.5 m.

On 6 December 2007, AAD successfully intercepted a modified Prithvi-II missile acting as an incoming ballistic missile enemy target. The endo-atmospheric interception was carried out at an altitude of 15 km. The AAD with the help of midcourse updates and its terminal seeker manoeuvred itself towards the target. The AAD scored a direct hit at an altitude of 15 km and at a speed of Mach 4.

Due to two successful interceptor missile tests carried out by India, the scientists said that the AAD missile could be modified into a new extended range up to 150 km.

On 15 March 2010, AAD interceptor missile test was aborted, as the target missile deviated from its path and plunged into the sea. But on 26 July 2010, AAD was successfully test-fired. Again, on 6 March 2011, the interceptor AAD missile achieved the desired result with precision. The interceptor missile had its own mobile launcher, secure data link for interception, independent tracking and homing capabilities and sophisticated radars.

On 10 February 2012 and on 23 November 20212, the AAD was again successfully test-fired

Swordfish Long Range Tracking Radar

Swordfish is the target acquisition and fire control radar for the BMD system. The Swordfish Radar, derived from the Israel GreenPine Radar, is a L band Radar.  L band Radar is not a imaging radar.  It is unable to discriminate decoys.

The Long Range Tracking Radar (LRTR) has a range of 600 to 800 km and can spot objects as small as a cricket ball. The DRDO has upgraded the capacity of Swordfish to 1,500 km. The variant is called Super S Cruise missile defence.

Defence Against Cruise Missiles

Defending against an attack by a cruise missile is similar to tackling low-flying manned aircraft and hence most methods of aircraft defence can be used for a cruise missile defence system. The AAD will be able to handle a cruise missile intercept.

In order to ward off the threats of nuke-tipped cruise missile attack India has a new missile defence programme which will be focused solely on intercepting cruise missiles.

India has also acquired airborne radars like EL/W-2090 AWACS to ensure detection of cruise missiles in order to stay on top of the threat.

The naval version of the Barak-8 long-range anti-air and anti-missile naval defence system developed jointly by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and DRDO has the capability to intercept incoming enemy cruise missiles and combat jets targeting its warships at sea.

The Indian Air Force and Indian Army have inducted a variant of Barak 8 missile to meet its requirement for a medium-range surface-to-air air defence missile. The Akash missile defence system also has the capability to “neutralise aerial targets like fighter jets, cruise missiles and air-to-surface missiles”.

XRSAM (eXtra-long Range Surface to Air Missile) is a long-range mobile surface to air missile defence system under development by DRDO. The missile system will have a range of 250 km against fighter jets, 350 km against cruise missiles, sea skimming anti-ship missiles, AWACS and mid-air refuelers and will be capable of bringing down ballistic missiles and stealth fighters in the terminal stage. The naval version of the missile will also developed to supplement the LR-SAM missile in the Indian Navy.

Chinese Missile Defence

China’s has an advanced anti-satellite programme since 1964. Since its inception, the ASAT program has made progress on the development of three ASAT capable Systems: direct fire, directed-energy weapon, and microsatellites. Tests of these systems have either been directly acknowledged by China, or reported on as ASAT capable. China is pursuing a broad and robust array of counterspace capabilities, which includes direct-ascent anti-satellite missiles, co-orbital anti-satellite systems, computer network operations, ground-based satellite jammers, and directed energy weapons.

The US Defense Intelligence Agency has claimed that China has space weapons capable of shooting out satellites during the early stage of a conflict, including anti-satellite missiles, manoeuvring satellites and lasers and electronic jammers.

People’s Liberation Army has formed military units and begun initial operational training with counterspace capabilities that it has been developing, such as ground-launched ASAT missiles.

Anti-Missile Test

Under a test christened “Mission Shakti”, DRDO’s audacious anti-satellite missile test on 27 March 2019, caught the world’s attention. A three-stage missile launched from the APJ Abdul Kalam Island raced towards a satellite called Microsat-R, which was in low-earth orbit a and destroyed it in a direct “hit-to-kill” mode. Microsat-R was orbiting at a velocity of ten km a second at an altitude of 274 km above the earth when the missile intercepted it and blew it to pieces.

The DRDO had developed this satellite which had defence ramifications and ISRO put it into orbit with its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) in January 2019.

An official press release said the anti-satellite test demonstrated India’s “capability to defend its assets in outer space”.

In a televised address to the nation soon after the test was executed, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, “Mission Shakti was a highly complex one, conducted at extremely high speed, with remarkable precision. It shows the remarkable dexterity of India’s outstanding scientists and the success of our space programme.” Modi said Mission Shakti was especial for two reasons: India was the fourth country (after the US, Russia, and China) to acquire such a specialised capability and the entire effort was indigenous.

On 28 April 2019, Dr. G. Satheesh Reddy, Chairman, DRDO said during an event of the Aerospace Society of India (AeSI), at Hyderabad, “The ASAT test demonstrated India’s technological capabilities to carry out such a critical mission with a very high degree of precision.” He said that the critical systems including software and sensors for the ASAT test were developed indigenously, and a team of scientists from various specialisations had worked with synergy day and night for six months. The most important challenge during the mission was to ensure that all the systems responded cohesively to ever-changing dynamics, Dr Satheesh Reddy added.

Dr U. Rajababu, Programme Director, AD (Air Defence), said at the meet “the high altitude and high-velocity interception” posed many technical challenges with respect to the development of seekers for early detection of target and trajectory corrections before the target was engaged. When the relative velocity of the systems involved was around 10 km a second, there was a pertinent need for high levels of precision, he said. “The booster [stage in the rocket] needs to provide the requisite velocities, the technologies such as dome-opening, heat-shield etc… need to be precise and smooth, apart from the highly accurate and secured data communications systems. Using accurate sensors and an onboard seeker, the ASAT missile was guided towards the target to ensure direct hit without employing any warhead,” the AesI press release said, quoting Rajababu.

In an informed paper titled “India’s ASAT Test”, published on March 28, 2019, in International Strategic and Security Studies Programme, National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), Bengaluru, Rajaram Nagappa, Mrunalini Deshpande, and S. Chandrashekar said: “DRDO has developed, as part of ballistic missile defence, missile interception capabilities. In this process, they would have developed kill vehicles with homing and manoeuvring capabilities. Extending the concept for achieving satellite kill is well within DRDO capabilities. Also, DRDO has ballistic missiles which have the capability of reaching 300 km-altitude for carrying out an interception.  In fact, it can be inferred from the press release that the missile was a two-stage solid propellant missile and the third stage was the kinetic kill weapon. Press reports talk of a three-minute time to hit the satellite. In three minutes, the satellite would have travelled 1350 km. The interception of Microsat-R, representing perhaps an area of two square metres, the related computations and the real-time manoeuvres needed of the war-head indicate the precision achieved in the missile guidance.”

Comments

While India’s demonstration of its ASAT capability is a major milestone in its space history, it is important for India to complement this capability with a robust Space Situational Awareness (SSA) infrastructure, C4ISR capability and related elements. (C4ISR stands for command, control, communication, computer, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance).  Major investments in military space and revamping of the military national security set-up as China, Russia and the US have done should receive some serious attention.

Agni-5 is a 3rd-generation ICBM, It is a solid fuel, road mobile missile. It provides reliable “second strike” capability. Agni V has been developed to offset China’s conventional weapons superiority. Agni with MIRVs can raise concerns in the enemy’s mind that India may have adopted “first-use” policy in its nuclear doctrine.

But while Agni surely enhances India”s credible minimum deterrence posture, it cannot strengthen the posture alone. India also needs to equally focus on aerial and sea-based nuclear delivery platforms – together the three legs would enable India to effectively launch counter and second strike vis-à-vis adversaries. 

In addition, missile systems especially land-based systems would also need to be protected from enemy attacks. That is where India’s ballistic missile defence (BMD) system to intercept incoming enemy missile systems assumes importance. At present the BMD system is mostly to protect counter-value targets. India should concentrate on protecting counter-force targets including land-based missile systems.

BMD can also be used both as an offensive and defensive system. Agni can be used to launch a “first-strike” on the enemy’s nuclear forces and use its BMD system to prevent adversaries’ missile systems to launch a counter-attack on India’s nuclear and conventional capabilities. However, India needs to clearly elaborate its BMD posture in order to avoid any confusion and state that the BMD would be deployed to strengthen India’s “no-first-use” doctrine.

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