India's Submarine Launched Cruise Missile Programme

India Has Begun Cruise-Missile Project

India, looking to join the elite ranks of nations building land-attack cruise missiles, has commenced work on one and wants to test it by 2003, a top official in India’s Ministry of Defense said in a recent interview.

The go-ahead was given in December for the roughly $500 million project to develop a medium-range cruise missile that can deliver a 500-pound warhead between 500 and 700 nautical miles,said the official, with India’s Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO).

“In the kind of hostile environment that India is in, a cruise missile is a strategic imperative,” said the official, requesting anonymity.

The emergence of a cruise missile in South Asia could further escalate tensions in the region. If India succeeds in developing its cruise missile, Pakistan may not be far behind.

The U.S. Air Force National Air Intelligence Center’s 1999 report on missile
proliferation does not list India among the countries able to build cruise missiles by 2009. By that date, the current producers-the United States, Russia and France-will be joined by the United Kingdom, China, Israel, South Africa, Germany, Sweden and Italy, the June report says.

The success of U.S. cruise missile attacks-in the 1991 Gulf War, against purported terrorist targets in Sudan and Afghanistan last year and in the Kosovo war this spring-has made the project No. 1 on the Indian army’s wish list, the New Delhi official said. Since India’s undeclared June war against Pakistan in Kashmir, defense planners in India have argued that a cruise-missile capability would have enabled India to more easily dislodge Pakistan-backed Islamic militants who had occupied mountain positions in Indian-administered Kashmir. Instead, India attempted to drive away the militants using infantry and lost an estimated 500 soldiers in hand-to-hand combat.

The developmental cruise missile would carry conventional warheads, though the official said eventual long-range versions could be nuclear-capable.The missile’s test version will be land-launched and would be followed by a ship-launched type. India has ship-launching capability for its Prithvi short-range ballistic missile.

Swagath Ghosh, a spokesman with the Indian Ministry of Defense, said: “We do not comment of defense projects.” However, when reporters are pursuing
incorrect information, the ministry is known to deny it. The Indian government is evaluating the necessary technologies- those already available and those that need to be developed, the official said. Work on some of the missile’s subsystems has already commenced.

Turbo-fan engine needed

The Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore is believed to have started
working on wind-tunnel testing of scale models and has recently acquired a
high-powered supercomputer called Param 10000 from another Indian company, the Center for the Development of Advanced Computing, for the purpose, officials said.

Of the various technologies required, India has stealth-design capability, ballistic-missile capability and precision guidance. What it lacks, officials say, is an appropriate turbo-fan engine and the so-called switchover mechanism, which enables a missile to settle into a cruise phase after takeoff with a solid-fuel booster. India has developed a turbojet engine for its long-delayed “Light Combat” aircraft. The engine, built by a Bangalore-based facility called the Gas Turbine Research Establishment (GTRE), is undergoing testing in Russia. Sources said the GTRE would be tooled for a missile-specific turbofan engine project.

Another Bangalore-based DRDO laboratory is working on terrain-contour-matching (TERCOM) and digital scene-matching area-correlation(DSMAC) missile-guidance systems with powerful software tools integrated with satellite data.

Acceleration expected

The cruise missile, though shorter in range than the roughly 1,000-mile U.S. Tomahawk, would have most of the features of the Block III Tomahawk, such as TERCOM, DSMAC and Global Positioning System guidance capability. And the project profile includes some of the features of the Block IV Tomahawk, such as in-flight re-targeting and mission planning from the launch platform.

The official said it was possible that all the features planned in the project profile may not be ready by the tentative launch time. But a working prototype of a basic cruise missile with a solid-fuel booster, a turbofan engine and precision guidance might soon be developed.

“There is considerable pressure from the defense forces to have a cruise missile,” the official said. “And in the next few months you can expect activity in this sphere to accelerate.”

Although Indian defense projects are notorious for delays, the short-range Prithvi and the intermediate-range Agni ballistic missiles were fielded relatively rapidly when DRDO chief Abdul Kalam’s farmed out subsystem development to public and private companies that have specific expertise. A similar approach is being taken to expedite the cruise missile project.

Skepticism

At least one expert is skeptical that India will develop and deploy the cruise missile soon. According to Sreedhar, a senior research associate at the Institute of Defense Studies and Analysis, a New Delhi think tank: “A cruise missile is a necessity for India …. But the indigenous project may take a long time to fructify. India does not have easy access to the required technologies, and given the pace of indigenous development, a protracted timeframe is likely. One has been hearing about an Indian cruise missile project for some time now, but nothing concrete on its sub-systems and launch timeframe.”

“India’s adversaries [read Pakistan, China] most likely have their own programs to develop cruise missiles,” said Sreedhar, who goes by one name. “You are looking at a timeframe of 10 to 20 years when several Asian coun-tries will have this type of weapon.”

My Comments…
>>>> As Its stands today India has four Sea Based Cruise Missile /Ballistic Missile underdevelopment , The one mentioned above call it Sagarika , The Surface Warship Launched Liquid Fuelled Prithivi-3, The Just recently tested Solid Fuel Dhanush( SLBM ) and the Brahmos( SLCM ).