India test fired Agni-V missile some months back and its next test is slated for this month sometimes as per news reports.
Given my interest in Defence I write on defence and strategic issues regularly and sometimes some of these gets published online as well.
Please see my articles on
Indian Defence Review
So my article on Agni-5 or Agni-V missile was published on 3rd Feb 2016 -
Agni-5 : A True Game Changer I got my usual comments from my regular friends on Facebook and over email.
But couple of days later a friend of mine on Facebook posted
The Importance Of Agni-V To India’s Security
I was obviously curious to know as it was very close to my article. Lo and behold it was exactly the same article. However, here the shares statistics were very different - It was saying almost 1000 likes and 50 shares on facebook. I was shocked. Two reasons - the online mag never bothered to ask me about this direct lifting of my article from Indian Defence Review and secondly there are people who visit this magazine and actually are writing comments and sharing it at a rapid pace.
By Sunday night the likes on facebook and shares had reached a mind boggling 11600+ and 800+ shares.
Whats more - it was picked up by other online defence portals as well such as
defence updates
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Key lessons
If you want to write a domain specific articles get it published in domain specific portals (e.g., Indian Defence Review). But if you want wide reach - get it published to a portal where wide variety of people come. The number of likes and shares can increase exponentially.
But in my opinion - what type of people are reading it and their understanding (as reflected in their comments) will not be to the level of the domain and field readers that you hope will read.
So in effect - you hope more people in your field and domain read it - but you are also likely to get lot of random readers who are driven by totally tangential motives to the field and domain that you are addressing.
For those who want to read the article completely - you can read it here as well.
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The Importance Of Agni-V To India’s Security
The fourth Agni-V test is scheduled to be conducted during the month
of February 2016. This will be the second canister launch. Agni-V will
be ready for induction after few more tests – especially the test of its
multiple independent targeting re-entry vehicles (MIRV) capability.
Although its induction and deployment is some years ahead, it has
already produced interesting reactions. The key discussion has been
about its range – whether it is 5000 km or 8000 km and above, and
whether it should be truly called an ICBM. There has also been some buzz
about the multiple independent targeting re-entry vehicles (MIRV)
capability and their ability to carry 3-10 different warheads in a
single missile. Indeed, it is a major feature and technology that will
catapult India to a very small set of nations with this capability.
The ability to carry 1-1.5 tons warhead over 5,000+ kilometers range
is definitely another feature of the missile that puts it in a different
category than whatever missiles India has. A 500 Kg payload can give
the earlier missiles ability to carry nuclear warheads with 20KT yield,
or something similar to what was exploded above Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
With three times the payload, India now has the capability, in theory,
at least, to carry higher yield, say 150KT to 1 MT yield nuclear
warheads to distances more than 5000 km away. This gives India a real
counterforce capability if our doctrine and strategy warrants that
option.
Counter-Force versus Counter-Value nuclear strategies
If a country has the capability to strike population centers of the
adversary with nuclear weapons, it is considered to have counter value
capability in nuclear strategy terminology. These targets include
population centers including big cities, large industrial complexes,
power centers, dams, oil refineries etc. The counter value targets
typically are “non-military targets” of the adversary, mostly population
centers. As these are mostly larger spread and “soft” targets, the
lower yield nuclear weapons, say with a yield of 20 Kilo Tons (KT) of
TNT or so, are considered sufficient to pronounce this capability.
Further, for counter value nuclear forces, one need a delivery weapon
– can be a ballistic missile – which need not have a very high
accuracy. One can understand, that if a nuclear bomb explodes above the
center of the city or few kilometers away, the devastation of the city
will be immense, and in the long term there will not be much qualitative
difference in terms of impact on the city – say killing 1 million
people immediately or 500,000 people immediately – which one will you
take? The obvious answer is none.
The counter value nuclear forces are giving this message to the
adversary – we will take a couple of your cities – whether our missile
takes 1 million or 0.5 million people of your city is not important – we
can destroy a couple of your main cities if you attack or threaten us
with a nuclear weapons strike. The counter value nuclear weapons are the
forces to deter the adversary. These are indeed deterrence forces.
On the other hand, counter force nuclear forces are meant to destroy
adversary’s nuclear delivery capability. The counter force nuclear
weapons need to deliver high KT or even Mega Ton (MT) of TNT equivalent
nuclear yield to the enemy nuclear weapons housed inside the hardened,
underground, nuclear shielded sites. Besides, high yield and very high
accuracy (typically a Circular Error Probability of 0.01% of the range),
the nuclear explosion has to be a surface burst rather than an air
burst as in the case of counter value weapons.
The surface burst will create large ground craters and take the earth
along with adversary’s missiles in the protected silos – to the
atmosphere – thereby destroying enemy’s nuclear missiles and also
creating the dreaded nuclear fallout and radioactive rains that may
continue for many months in future. These are truly horrendous nuclear
weapons – not only in the capabilities but also the intentions of their
possessors.
India’s Nuclear Doctrine and Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD)
India conducted its first peaceful nuclear test in 1974. In 1998,
India was forced to conduct nuclear tests so that Pakistan could come
out as an overt nuclear weapons state. India should be given due credit
for speaking the language of a nuclear weapons free world and acting on
it till 1998. Only because one-sided treaties such as NPT, CTBT, and
FMCT, were coming to force, India conducted its nuclear tests. Also,
within a couple of years, it published its draft nuclear doctrine, which
clearly termed the policy of No First Use (NFU) of nuclear weapons.
This is a very consistent communication and definitely a responsible
behavior, that none can dispute.
With the NFU doctrine, India does not need counterforce capabilities.
This is true, against any adversary or potential adversary. The
counterforce nuclear weapons developed during the cold war period into
what in the nuclear parlance is called the Mutually Assured Destruction
(MAD) doctrine. It is clear that MAD is the doctrine of a country that
will take the nuclear attack as the first option in the escalatory
spiral of any conflict. However, India has very clearly stated it is not
following the MAD line and is therefore not developing any first strike
capability against any adversary at any range.
However, given the proliferation of nuclear weapons around the world
and pressure by the world powers that are increasingly developing more
and more powers, India needs to develop a second strike capability, that
remains potent after a first strike by the adversary and is capable of
delivering counter value punches at any range across the world.
Why ‘at any range’? The world is definitely becoming multi-polar and
also the threat of force as a coercive influence to shape the future is
pursued by different power centers in multiple ways. Further, a nation
in the globalizing world has to identify its national interests and
safeguard these globally. Hence, India needs a potent second-strike
ICBM-range capability for counter value nuclear strikes as a deterrence
to any potential adversary that may have designs to either threaten or
actually think about taking out Indian nuclear missiles in the first
strike. It is in this context that Agni-V MIRV ICBM should be viewed and
considered.
Agni-V can be a second strike counter force capability – A game changer
Agni-V with its higher payload and MIRV capability – with high
accuracies – does give India a counterforce capability. This is
definitely a higher order message to potential adversaries. With Agni-V,
India says to the world that although we stick to a no first use
policy we now have a counter-force capability to strike at the nuclear
strike forces of the adversary. Also, with MIRVs even if one Agni-V
survives a first strike by the enemy and reaches the adversary’s capital
city it will unleash complete devastation. This should make an
adversary see the futility of striking against India.
Agni-5: A True Game Changer
Agni-5: A True Game Changer
Agni-5: A True Game Changer
