The Deterrent
SENIOR MEMBER
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- Jan 7, 2011
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I strongly believe that India has changed its nuclear posture, and is a couple years down the line already. Reason to do so is unclear to me, it could be either Mumbai or Pakistan's own rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal, or both. Somehow it seems that the Indian military thinkers are now open to the idea of risking a nuclear war, in an attempt to ''win'' it. The probably proposed solution is something similar to the US's Skyfall/Snapcount, i.e. upon escalation of tensions beyond a certain level, initiate a massive pre-emptive CF strike against Pakistani first strike elements while bracing for retaliation and taking out as many birds as the BMD can.
The related developments are as follows:
1. Open suggestions of abandoning NFC by ex-SFC and ex-NCA leadership, sometimes even hinting that India is ready for a pre-emptive counter-force nuclear strike. These statements should not be taken lightly, as they represent the current policy of India's nuclear doctrine.
2. Increase of underground tunneled nuclear weapons storages from 2x (pre-2010) to 9x (post-2010), discovered so far. To put things into perspective, 6x are lined up against Pakistan, 1x is deep in central India and 2x are on the eastern coast.
3. Build-up of hardened nuclear weapons shelters in 17x IAF bases since 2010. 10x against Pakistan, 6x against China, 1x in southern India. Post-2013, IAF has started building additional extremely hardened aircraft shelters in the same bases to house aircrafts designated for nuclear weapons delivery. This will allow IAF to mate nuclear weapons with aircrafts secretly and have them on standby for imminent strikes, giving no room for any third party to intervene.
4. Recent SFC exercises for Agni-IV & Agni-V, both at 2000km. This should not be surprising, however Agni-IV has been already trialed at this range before. The coincidence of aiming both exercises at the same range could hint towards a possible operational scenario, where the SFC might have to launch IRBMs from eastern India towards Pakistan, in case the forward missile bases of Agni-I & II have been taken out.
5. Build-up of 8x BrahMos garrisons, 7x against Pakistan, 1x against China.
6. Finalizing purchase of S-400 System, along with bringing up homegrown BMD solutions. Although the potentially included ABM is not extraordinary (60km range, 30km ceiling, 4800m/s target velocity...basically low-MRBM class targets), it does destabilize the strategic balance and gives confidence to the first-strike doctrine.
I strongly believe that India has changed its nuclear posture, and is a couple years down the line already. Reason to do so is unclear to me, it could be either Mumbai or Pakistan's own rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal, or both. Somehow it seems that the Indian military thinkers are now open to the idea of risking a nuclear war, in an attempt to ''win'' it. The probably proposed solution is something similar to the US's Skyfall/Snapcount, i.e. upon escalation of tensions beyond a certain level, initiate a massive pre-emptive CF strike against Pakistani first strike elements while bracing for retaliation and taking out as many birds as the BMD can.
The related developments are as follows:
1. Open suggestions of abandoning NFC by ex-SFC and ex-NCA leadership, sometimes even hinting that India is ready for a pre-emptive counter-force nuclear strike. These statements should not be taken lightly, as they represent the current policy of India's nuclear doctrine.
2. Increase of underground tunneled nuclear weapons storages from 2x (pre-2010) to 9x (post-2010), discovered so far. To put things into perspective, 6x are lined up against Pakistan, 1x is deep in central India and 2x are on the eastern coast.
3. Build-up of hardened nuclear weapons shelters in 17x IAF bases since 2010. 10x against Pakistan, 6x against China, 1x in southern India. Post-2013, IAF has started building additional extremely hardened aircraft shelters in the same bases to house aircrafts designated for nuclear weapons delivery. This will allow IAF to mate nuclear weapons with aircrafts secretly and have them on standby for imminent strikes, giving no room for any third party to intervene.
4. Recent SFC exercises for Agni-IV & Agni-V, both at 2000km. This should not be surprising, however Agni-IV has been already trialed at this range before. The coincidence of aiming both exercises at the same range could hint towards a possible operational scenario, where the SFC might have to launch IRBMs from eastern India towards Pakistan, in case the forward missile bases of Agni-I & II have been taken out.
5. Build-up of 8x BrahMos garrisons, 7x against Pakistan, 1x against China.
6. Finalizing purchase of S-400 System, along with bringing up homegrown BMD solutions. Although the potentially included ABM is not extraordinary (60km range, 30km ceiling, 4800m/s target velocity...basically low-MRBM class targets), it does destabilize the strategic balance and gives confidence to the first-strike doctrine.
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