India’s ICBMs may fuel arms race with China

NEW DELHI: India’s development of inter-continental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) is likely to see China deploy its own MIRV missiles which can carry multiple warheads, leading to an intense arms race in the region, says a new report on global nuclear weapons by renowned US experts.

The report says that the decision by China and India to equip their ballistic missiles with multiple independently-targetable re-entry vehicles (MIRVs) will influence the global nuclear stockpile trends. Described by Indian scientists as an ICBM, Agni-V is not likely to carry multiple manoeuvrable warheads or MIRVS but its successors, including Agni-VI , are likely to have the technology.

“Indian officials have already said that a new ICBM their country is developing will be capable of carrying multiple warheads. This development , combined with increased US missile defence capabilities in the Pacific region, could motivate China to deploy MIRV-capable missiles as well,” says the report titled Global Nuclear Weapons Inventories, 1945-2013 . The report is authored by Federation of American Scientists’ Hans Kristensen and Robert Norris.

Kristensen told TOI that MIRVs are not in keeping with New Delhi’s policy of minimum deterrence and that Indian officials needed to explain why they want to develop the technology because it could lead to a buildup with China.

“MIRV is developed for a particular strategic objective , normally to quickly increase the number of warheads deployed on missiles or to be able to hit a lot of targets in a single attack. Both of those objectives are incompatible with India’s policy of minimum deterrence because they would significantly increase the size of the arsenal and signal a shift to a nuclear counterforce war-fighting doctrine,” Kristensen said.

The report says that such moves by India and China could set off an increased and more intense nuclear arms race in Asia. “The United States, Russia, and the international arms control community should discourage this competition by significantly curtailing their own MIRVed weapon systems and ballistic missile defense programs,” it says.

The report estimates that China has an arsenal of roughly 250 nuclear warheads and that it has produced approximately 610 nuclear warheads since becoming a nuclear power in 1964.



India can develop a 10,000-km nuclear missile but no need now: DRDO chief

India can develop a nuclear-capable missile with a strike range of 10,000 km, rivalling China’s DF-31 A missile that can hit targets 11,200 km away, but does not see the operational need for it given the “existing threat perceptions’’ . All gung-ho after the second test of the 5,000-km Agni-V on Sunday, the country’s first inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM), DRDO chief Avinash Chander asserts it would take just about “two-and-a-half years’’ to develop a 10,000-km missile if required. “Range is the least problematic area. We have the full capability to go to any range… it’s just a question of additional propellant and larger motors. But, as of now, we don’t see the need for a higher range,” he said.

Rajat Pandit