India sets sights on cruise missile
market By Siddharth Srivastava
NEW DELHI - Long considered among the top
importing nations for defense hardware, India is
now looking to access the fast-growing
international market for cruise missiles,
considered a lethally efficient weapon.
US
forces used almost 1,000 such missiles when they
first entered Iraq in 2003, and the total
worldwide market is expected to be more than US$10
billion in the next decade. An inventory of more
than 80,000 such missiles is estimated already to
exist around the world. Indian Defense Minister A
K Anthony has said
New
Delhi is holding talks with "some countries" for
the sale of cruise missiles.
An Indian
version of the supersonic cruise missile BrahMos
has been developed in collaboration with longtime
defense partner Russia. The ground-hugging
BrahMos, with a 290-kilometer strike range, are
believed to be similar to the US Tomahawk cruise
missiles widely used in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Unlike ballistic missiles, cruise missiles do not
leave the atmosphere and are powered and guided
throughout their flight path.
According to
a joint survey by India and Russia, a global
demand for at least 2,000 BrahMos missiles exists,
with the figures likely to rise. New Delhi is now
looking to increase considerably the number of
BrahMos missiles produced at its Hyderabad
facility.
India is also looking to test
the undersea-launch version of the BrahMos with
the help of its navy. India has already inducted
the warship version of the missile and the
surface-to-surface version will also be ready for
use this year. Twelve successful tests of the
missiles have been conducted under extreme
conditions. New Delhi has also proposed that
initial tests be undertaken on a Russian naval
platform in Russian waters.
There were
some issues with Moscow over to which countries
the BrahMos missiles should be sold, but the
problems were scheduled to be discussed during the
recent visit to India of Russian President
Vladimir Putin.
Russian Defense Minister
Sergei Ivanov clarified that his country was not
opposed to selling the BrahMos to some "specific
third countries", termed as "friendly", which
could include Malaysia, Chile, South Africa, the
United Arab Emirates and Kuwait.
It is no
surprise that China and Pakistan are absent from
the list.
In 2005, Pakistan successfully
test-fired its first cruise missile, which India
believes could not have happened without the help
of China. The Chinese are more than willing to
oblige Islamabad, as they have never been
comfortable with India gaining military strength
without an effective check by Pakistan.
Pakistan's bid to acquire cruise missiles,
as well as accumulate ballistic missiles, is an
attempt to balance India's declared intentions to
incorporate the anti-ballistic missile defense
(BMD) system from Israel (Arrow) and the US
(Patriot). The BMD system can be effectively
checked by cruise missiles.
"There is a
huge market for cruise missiles. BrahMos is unique
among cruise missiles, due to its 2.8 Mach
supersonic speed [all other cruise missiles are
subsonic at present] and much longer strike
range," said BrahMos Aerospace chief A Sivanthanu
Pillai. "It's the ultimate force-multiplier. Once
BrahMos is installed, it will be the first
[country to have a] diesel submarine [with]
vertically launched strike missiles."
G
Leonov Alexander, first deputy director general of
NPO Mashinostroyenia, the Russian partner in the
BrahMos Aerospace joint venture, said: "I hope we
will be able to sell around 1,000 missiles to
friendly countries very soon. Our prospects are
very bright."
India's military
capabilities and arsenal are developed by the
government-controlled Defense Research and
Development Organization (DRDO), which works in
close coordination with space and nuclear power
institutions, with similar technologies for
satellite launch vehicles and long-range ballistic
missiles, such as Agni, capable of delivering a
nuclear payload.
At one level, the effort
to sell BrahMos is being seen as a way to deflect
criticism of DRDO red tape, delays and a long
development period. The DRDO is looking to stand
up and be counted even as aspects of government
functioning are increasingly being questioned,
with domestic private companies now looking to
enter the arms market aggressively.
The
DRDO came in for another round of criticism when
an Agni-III (range 3,500km) test failed last year,
with the missile dropping into the sea. Undeterred
by the failure, the DRDO has said it will go ahead
with the program and conduct another launch this
year.
There is also talk about reducing
the DRDO to a research unit, while involving
private manufacturing units, to improve its
performance. Most of India's advance defense
arsenal is being imported, in any case, from
countries such as Russia, Israel, France, Britain
and Germany, with the US the latest to join the
intense competition to win defense deals, after a
far-reaching agreement in June 2005.
For
now, though, the DRDO has the support of the army
brass. "We have had a mixed bag of successes with
the DRDO. Some of their successes are Pinaka
[multi-barrel rocket launcher], Nag [anti-tank
guided missile], and Nishant [remotely piloted
vehicle], etc. There have been failures also but
indigenous efforts must be promoted," army chief
General J J Singh said recently.
There are
also wider implications of aligning with Russia,
even as India looks to tap the country for its
vast energy resources. As per an ambitious joint
statement signed between Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh and Putin, Moscow will help India develop an
additional four nuclear power plants at Kudankulam
in the southern state of Tamil Nadu as well as the
construction of Russian-designed nuclear power
plants at new sites in India, all subject to
international safeguards and inspection.
Moscow has promised support to India at
the Nuclear Suppliers Group after the passage at
the US Congress of a civilian nuclear agreement.
The predicted stiff competition to garner nuclear
reactor contracts from India among countries such
as the US, France and Russia seems to have begun.
The attempt to sell the BrahMos is, of
course, not very significant when compared with
India's arms purchases. According to a US
Congressional Research Service Report, India was
the largest arms purchaser in the developing world
from 1998 to 2005, striking deals worth $20.7
billion. India is likely to make purchases of more
than $10 billion every year for the next 10 years.
In the near future, the biggest deal will
be the purchase of 126 multi-role fighters for
$6.5 billion to $10 billion.
In the past
few years, Israel has overtaken France, the United
Kingdom and other countries to become the
second-largest defense supplier to India, with the
value of deals nearly $1 billion each year for the
past three years.
Russia has managed to
retain its position as India's biggest defense
partner, with deals worth more than $1.5 billion
every year, because of the deeply entrenched
relations between the two countries that hark back
to the 1960s. Its position, however, is under
severe threat. The US is the latest challenge
(after the easing of sanctions) impressing the
Indian establishment with its defense wares.
The Pentagon expects India to start
purchasing as much as $5 billion worth of
conventional military equipment, in exchange for
Washington's support in matters such as supply of
nuclear technology for civilian use that could
open up business opportunities to the tune of $100
billion.
Siddharth Srivastava is
a New Delhi-based journalist.
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