Here are some important details on Agni 5 which is an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM). India is a rising superpower, and in order to protect oneself, there is a strong need for establishing oneself as a global soft power. But in some cases, use of force becomes imperative, like in the case of India.
India to protect oneself has an exemplary army but with technology use of missiles, aircraft etc. has become more pronounced in the era of modern warfare. India has kept its pace and has developed its missile arsenal which is nuclear capable. One such missile is Agni 5, which is an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile.
Let’s read more about this missile.
Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile: Agni 5 What is Agni 5?
Agni 5 is an Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile developed by DRDO (Defence Research & Development Organization) and manufactured by Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL).
A Ballistic Missile is a missile that follows a trajectory and delivers warheads at a predefined target. Most of its trajectory is unpowered and governed by gravity.
Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile is missiles that have a range of 5500 km. It is a part of Agni Series.
Agni Series:
Agni series of missiles were conceptualized keeping in view the rising threat from neighbors in 1980s itself. Agni missiles are a product of the Integrated Guided Missile Development Project (IGMDP) launched in 1982 by the Ministry of Defence (MOD).
Agni 5 marks the entry of Indian capability in the Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile Range. Agni 5 is the most advanced in terms of navigation, guidance, engine, and warhead.
Many indigenously developed technologies were also tested in the Agni V trial. This variant of Agni I.e. Agni 5 is having advantages of higher reliability, longer shelf-life, less maintenance, and enhanced mobility.
Testing:
The testing of Missiles is carried out from Abdul Kalam Island earlier known as Wheeler Island, Odisha. The Missile has been tested 7 times, the last one being in Dec 2018 which completed the pre-induction trials. The missile was launched from canister integrated mobile launcher.
Why India needs Agni 5?
India has adopted a nuclear doctrine of minimal credible deterrence and ‘no first use’ policy. On the other hand, when you look at China, then you may find that China’s ‘no first use’ policy only holds true if the territory does not belong to them. This means that if they consider any territory as theirs, they can use nuclear weapons in that territory. Observing this case, India needs a weapon like Agni to protect its Northeastern states like Arunachal Pradesh. Features of Agni 5 Missile:
Agni V can be launched at a short notice from any location. It is canister based.
Can be launched with a single digit accuracy
Strike range of Agni 5 is more than 5000 km
It can carry a nuclear warhead of about 1500 kg.
Agni 5 is equipped with a high-speed onboard computer and fault-tolerant software,
It is 17m in length and 2 m wide.
It also has the MIRV (Multiple Independently Targetable Reentry Vehicle) techniques that can carry 2-10 nuclear warheads.
Brahmos
Supersonic Cruise Missile: Brahmos
The Brahmos Missile is a result of Joint Venture between Russia’s NPO Mashinostroyeniya and India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). The Brahmos name has been derived from two rivers Brahmaputra and Moskva.
The need for Brahmos
India had already developed ballistic missiles like Agni, Prithvi etc. These missiles have good range but the thing is they follow a trajectory by going outside the atmosphere and then using gravitation force to hit its target.
Due to this the ballistic missile could be easily traced and destroyed by enemy’s anti- ballistic missile system.
Cruise missile on the other hand use terrain hugging path, which means that they generally fly at an altitude that is much closer to the ground and hence are not easily detected.
Hence there was a severe need for a cruise missile. Hence a deal was struck between India and Russia in 1998 to develop a supersonic cruise missile.
Development of Brahmos
Brahmos was developed on similar ideas as that of Russian P-800 Oniks cruise missile. The first successful test fire was conducted on 21 June 2001 from Integrated Test Firing Range off Chandipur coast in Odisha. Besides this, the missile is highly versatile and can be used from land, sea, air and even underwater.
Following are the variants of Brahmos:
1. Surface to Surface Variant: To be used by Indian Army (mobile canister based); to be used by Indian Navy (from warships - INS Rajput, INS Teg etc.) 2. Submarine Variant: To be used by Indian Navy 3. Air Variant: To be used by Indian Air Force (Sukhoi Su-30 MKI)
Features of Brahmos
The missile had an initial range of 290 kilometers which has been recently upgraded to 450 Km for land and sea variant while the air variant has a max range of 400 Km.
Features Specifications Mass 3000 Kg (Land & Sea); 2500 Km (Air) Max Speed Mach 2.8 to Mach 3.0 Warhead 200 Kg conventional & 300 Kg Nuclear
Further Development
The cruise missile is undergoing various upgrade such as increasing its range to 800 Km and also increasing its speed to Mach 4.0, also an Unmanned Combat aerial vehicle version is also being developed by DRDO. Brahmos NG:
It is a next-generation model of Brahmos which would be smaller up to 1.5 tons which would make it much harder to be detected by a Radar.
Brahmos II:
India in 2016 became a part of Missile Technology Control Regime due to which both Russia & India are planning on an upgraded version of Brahmos which will be hypersonic i.e would be 7 times the speed of sound and a range of 600 Km.
Production of Brahmos
Both India and Russia have planned to develop 2000 Brahmos missile over the next 10 years out of which 50% of these will be exported to friendly countries. The production center is in Thiruvananthapuram. Many countries such as the Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, Chile, Egypt, Venezuela etc. have expressed their interest in purchasing the missile.
Conclusion
With the advent of Brahmos, the Indian defence forces are becoming much more self- reliant and with its state of the art technology, it will surely act as a deterrent which India needs.
Importance:
India joined the club of countries like USA, China, France, Russia, and Britain which have intercontinental ballistic missile capabilities.
Induction of Agni 5 will add more teeth to India’s deterrence against India’s adversaries.
Future Upgrades:
India is working on Agni-6 which will be capable of being launched from submarines as well as from land and will have a strike-range of 8,000–10,000 km.
Nirbhay
Long-Range Subsonic Cruise Missile: Nirbhay
What is Cruise Missile?
A cruise missile is guided missile, that is used against terrestrial targets that remain in the atmosphere and flies at a constant speed.
Modern cruise missiles are capable of travelling at supersonic or subsonic speeds. They are self-navigating and can fly on an extremely low-altitude,non-ballistic trajectory.
They are classified as:
Supersonic cruise missile:
Supersonic Cruise missiles are those which travel faster than the speed of sound. The combination of supersonic speed and warhead mass provides tremendous lethal effect with high kinetic energy. For eg - BrahMos
Hypersonic cruise missile:
Hypersonic cruise missile travels at a speed of more than 5 Mach. Brahmos-II is a cruise missile of hypersonic nature.
Subsonic cruise missile:
It flies at a velocity lower than the sound. It travels at about 0.8 Mach speed. The recently tested Nirbhay is the well-known subsonic missile. Nirbhay Missile
Nirbhay was designed and developed by the Defense Research and Development Organization in India as a multitude of subsonic cruise missiles.
The missile can be launched from several platforms and can transport conventional and nuclear weapons. It is being developed and flight tests are underway.
The indigenously developed missile was test-fired from the ITR, Chandipur, off the Odisha coast.
The Nirbhay missile has a range between 700 and 1,000 km.
The missile's guidance, control and navigation systems are configured around the inertial navigation system based on the indigenously designed Ring Laser Gyroscope and MEMS.
India’s Cruise missiles:
1. Nirbhay 2. Brahmos 3. Brahmos-II
NOTE: 1Mach = 1234.8 km/h
Let us now have a closer look at what differentiates the three.
Nirbhay Brahmos Brahmos-II Origin India India and Russia India Speed(Mach) 0.8 2.8-3 7 Type Subsonic Supersonic Hypersonic Range(km) 1000-1500 290 300 Warhead 300kg 300 kg 300kg Per Unit cost 6.7 million USD 2.73 million USD 2.73 million USD
Now that we have understood how Nirbhay stands out from the league of other Indian Cruise Missiles, below table lists the features in comparison to Babur (Pakistan) and Tomahawk (USA)
Nirbhay Babur Tomahawk Launch from Possible(increases Not possible Not possible. fighter range) aircrafts In -Service Yet to start Since 2005 Since 1983 Range(km) 1500 700 2000 Speed(mach) 0.8 0.7 0.7 Warhead Nuclear and Supports few Supports MAjorty Conventional including Bunker Busting (Capable of delivering Warheads 24 different types of Warheads) Propulsion - Gas turbine Solid Fuel(Booster - TH-Dimer Fuel, and Engine Rocket, Liquid Solid Fuel Rocket Booster Navigation - Internal - Fuel(Jet Engine) - GPS, INS, Terrain Navigation Systems - INS, Contour (INS IRNSS_ TERCOM/DSMAC, Matching(TERCOM), GPS, GLONASS Digital Scene Matchin and Area Co-relation(DSMAC)