Intercontinental SLBM for India

[Nirvana]

Need of A Submarine Launched Intercontinental Ballistic Missile for India ?

Long Range SLBM - an Ultimate Deterrent


The Indian Strategic force's as of Now do not Possess an Active SLBM.The K-15 SLBM with a range of Over 800 Km is under Production.With Induction of INS Arihant - the Lone SSBN that India Possess as of now and the K-15 Missile's,India will complete it's Nuclear Triad with Ability of Launching a Nuclear Warhead from Land,Air,Sea.But How Effective will this Triad be ? the K-15 with such a short range will it Contribute to the Triad when it come's to Maintaining deterrent against Arch-Rival China ?

Let Alone China,The K-15 Lack's the punch even when it come's to Pakistan.Thus,the development of K-4 SLBM with a range of 3,500 km and another Rumoured development of A-6 SLBM with a Range of over 6,000 Km.

India is currently Working on 2 more Arihant class SSBN's and will have an Option to build more.Nuclear Submarine's are more safer Basing option for Nuclear Missile's because of it's ability to Move and stay submerged for long duration of time when Compared to land Based Missiles.Another advantage of SLBM's is Difficulty it present to enemy surveillance, detection, and defensive systems.The soon to be tested A-5 ICBM will Cover the distant Chinese Cities If fired from North India.So it doesn't make sense to work on Further development of Long range Land based Missile's rather than Submarine Launched one's.

Along it's Advantage's there are Some Disadvantage's of SLBM.The main Advantage of such Submarine lies in it's ability to hide,But in case a "Boomer" is detected,It's effectiveness in Launching a Missile fade's away until it evades enemy Surveillance system again.Another advantage is to carry out Quieter operation while submerged under Water.

Consider a Situation where a Long range SLBM with over 10,000 Km Range deployed on a Arihant class "Boomer" submerged Somewhere Near African coast in the Indian ocean or Somewhere near South of Indonesia in the Indian ocean can Target Distant Chinese Cities like Shanghai.
To met the goal of an "Ultimate Deterrent Force", the Indian strategic force's need to Possess a "Long Range Intercontinental Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile" with 3-10 MIRV/MARV Warhead's.

Discuss if India should develop an SLBM with Range over 10,000 km on Par with Modern SLBM's like Trident II and Bulava ?

 

[Federer]

A6 will be Operational by 2017. And also S1 is a Tech Demonstrator. The Navy is not lending any Submarine because of lack of the Submarines.

And INS Arihant will be used by the DRDO to test the SLBMs. So We can expect a true Nuclear Triad only sometime after 2015.

Your thoughts?

 

[pmukherjee]

Yes, the K-15 is not adequate at all. The range is too short. The K-4 is under development. It has been successfully test fired. I don't know the latest status of the K-4. To my mind, the K-4 with a range of 3500 KNs is absolutely adequate. If launched from the vicinity of the Malacca Strait, the K-4 is well within range of China's industrial hub of Shanghai, Zhejiang, Jaingsu/Nanjing, Hangzhou etc. If launched from the Bay of Bengal, the K-4 can comfortably reach Beijing. This is OK, I think. We do not need anything more than this for a credible deterrence against China which is an existential threat.

Since we are working on a 6000 KM Agni -V, it makes sense to adapt this missile for submarine use at a later stage, say by 2015. Or else deploy the Agni-6 SLBM which is under development. Our SSBNs can carry a mix of K-4 and Agni-6 till the K-4s are all replaced by Agni-6 with MIRVs till, say 2022/2025. Five SSBNs of Arihant/Aridhaman class fielded by 2025 will give us the desired deterrece value we seek. Of these five, at any time, three will be available for deterrence patrol. Likely deployment areas of these boomers would be the Indian Ocean and the Western Pacific.

I do not see any logic for going for the 10,000/12,000 KM class of SLBMs.

 

[Alchemy]

We dont have any enemies in the west ,a 6000 km max limit is enough for Indian needs!

 

[Splurgenxs]

^^ i think if one use Google maps and scales the radius of a 3.5k to 4k missile ...its already more than adequate.(and diplomatically sound)

Given we have ample presence right across the sez of Vietnam etc etc a ++.

What India needs is better Delivery systems; one of which is the MIRV with individual maneuverable warheads(already in development).

 

[Nirvana]

Yes, the K-15 is not adequate at all. The range is too short. The K-4 is under development. It has been successfully test fired. I don't know the latest status of the K-4. To my mind, the K-4 with a range of 3500 KNs is absolutely adequate. If launched from the vicinity of the Malacca Strait, the K-4 is well within range of China's industrial hub of Shanghai, Zhejiang, Jaingsu/Nanjing, Hangzhou etc. If launched from the Bay of Bengal, the K-4 can comfortably reach Beijing. This is OK, I think. We do not need anything more than this for a credible deterrence against China which is an existential threat.

Since we are working on a 6000 KM Agni -V, it makes sense to adapt this missile for submarine use at a later stage, say by 2015. Or else deploy the Agni-6 SLBM which is under development. Our SSBNs can carry a mix of K-4 and Agni-6 till the K-4s are all replaced by Agni-6 with MIRVs till, say 2022/2025. Five SSBNs of Arihant/Aridhaman class fielded by 2025 will give us the desired deterrece value we seek. Of these five, at any time, three will be available for deterrence patrol. Likely deployment areas of these boomers would be the Indian Ocean and the Western Pacific.

I do not see any logic for going for the 10,000/12,000 KM class of SLBMs.

Between the range of 8K to 10k is something I am talking about here which can cover Entire chinese Land Mass from as Long as Southern Tip of Indian Ocean, from where The SSBN can stay Submerged w/o being detected

Also development of MARV Warhead's along MIRV

 

[Nirvana]

Yes, the K-15 is not adequate at all. The range is too short. The K-4 is under development. It has been successfully test fired. I don't know the latest status of the K-4. To my mind, the K-4 with a range of 3500 KNs is absolutely adequate. If launched from the vicinity of the Malacca Strait, the K-4 is well within range of China's industrial hub of Shanghai, Zhejiang, Jaingsu/Nanjing, Hangzhou etc. If launched from the Bay of Bengal, the K-4 can comfortably reach Beijing. This is OK, I think. We do not need anything more than this for a credible deterrence against China which is an existential threat.

Since we are working on a 6000 KM Agni -V, it makes sense to adapt this missile for submarine use at a later stage, say by 2015. Or else deploy the Agni-6 SLBM which is under development. Our SSBNs can carry a mix of K-4 and Agni-6 till the K-4s are all replaced by Agni-6 with MIRVs till, say 2022/2025. Five SSBNs of Arihant/Aridhaman class fielded by 2025 will give us the desired deterrece value we seek. Of these five, at any time, three will be available for deterrence patrol. Likely deployment areas of these boomers would be the Indian Ocean and the Western Pacific.

I do not see any logic for going for the 10,000/12,000 KM class of SLBMs.

Between the range of 8K to 10k is something I am talking about here which can cover Entire chinese Land Mass from as Long as Southern Tip of Indian Ocean, from where The SSBN can stay Submerged w/o being detected

Also development of MARV Warhead's along MIRV

 

[Rocky25]

After successful testing of Agni -5, India should develop some heavy missile with higher weapon load.... We should have ICBM which can reach northern most China by firing it from Kanyakumari!

We should keep on working till we can hit any part of the world... US wont like it... But who know they may turn against us after some 10-15 years!

 

[Rocky25]

After successful testing of Agni -5, India should develop some heavy missile with higher weapon load.... We should have ICBM which can reach northern most China by firing it from Kanyakumari!

We should keep on working till we can hit any part of the world... US wont like it... But who know they may turn against us after some 10-15 years!

 

[Nirvana]

. We have no territorial designs on any country, but India needs the capability to match its sphere of influence.

By P.V Naik

There's no point capping the missile programme at 5,000 km. If we have the technical capability, we should build on it.

 

[Nirvana]

. We have no territorial designs on any country, but India needs the capability to match its sphere of influence.

By P.V Naik

There's no point capping the missile programme at 5,000 km. If we have the technical capability, we should build on it.

 

[Rocky25]

After successful testing of Agni -5, India should develop some heavy missile with higher weapon load.... We should have ICBM which can reach northern most China by firing it from Kanyakumari!

We should keep on working till we can hit any part of the world... US wont like it... But who know they may turn against us after some 10-15 years!

 

[Rocky25]

Double post

 

[Alchemy]

After successful testing of Agni -5, India should develop some heavy missile with higher weapon load.... We should have ICBM which can reach northern most China by firing it from Kanyakumari!

We should keep on working till we can hit any part of the world... US wont like it... But who know they may turn against us after some 10-15 years!

India is a mature democracy and will deal with US through diplomacy over any trivial issues,

We may not like them but our relations will never deteriotate to the extent that we may need to hit US through ICBMs for sure ..... and by the way our relations can deteriorate to that extent only if we intend to hit them by developing a 10k range missile

 

[Rocky25]

India is a mature democracy and will deal with US through diplomacy over any trivial issues,

We may not like them but our relations will never deteriotate to the extent that we may need to hit US through ICBMs for sure ..... and by the way our relations can deteriorate to that extent only if we intend to hit them by developing a 10k range missile

It is always GOOD to develop SLBM which has all range... We should have capability to fire missile from Atlantic an Pacific into our enemy.