India tests defence missile

India tested its fledgling ballistic missile defence (BMD) system once again taking another small step towards building a fully operational missile shield for vital areas and installations in the country. This was the fifth test of the two-tier BMD system, designed to track and destroy incoming hostile missiles both inside (endo) and outside (exo) the earth’s atmosphere. The test saw an “enemy’’ missile being “successfully neutralised’’ by an endo-atmospheric interceptor, or an antimissile missile, at a 15-km altitude over the Bay of Bengal off Orissa’s coast. But DRDO still has a long way to go. Before Monday, it had managed to conduct only four tests of the BMD system over the last four years. The first three tests in November 2006, December 2007 and March 2009 were dubbed successful, killing as they did “enemy’’ missiles at altitudes of 48 km, 15 km and 80 km. But the fourth, on March 15 this year, had to be aborted midway after technical glitches.For one, the BMD system will first have to be tested for a variety of flight envelopes. For another, it’s yet to be tested in an integrated mode, with both the two-stage exo and single-stage endo interceptors together. The aim, after all, is to obtain a kill probability of 99.8% by first intercepting the enemy missiles outside the atmosphere and then engaging the ‘leakers’ inside. But DRDO, as is its wont, proclaims Phase-I of the BMD system, with interceptors which can fly at 4.5 Mach highsupersonic speeds to intercept enemy missiles with a 2,000-km strike range, will be ready for deployment by 2012. DRDO says work on Phase-II has begun to develop capabilities to intercept even near-ICBMs (intercontinental ballistic missiles). As per plans, Phase-II will tackle 5,000-km range missiles with interceptors at hypersonic speeds of 6-7 Mach. The reality, however, is that it will take years for India to erect an effective missile defence shield. Even American, Russian and Israeli missile defence systems are not considered 100% foolproof as of now. But all this does not detract from the complex project undertaken by DRDO. With seamless networks of advanced early-warning and tracking radars, robust command and control posts, and land and sea-based interceptor batteries, BMD systems have to swiftly detect, track and destroy incoming missiles.