Page 11 - The Indian EYE 020323

OPINION FEBRUARY 03, 2023 | The Indian Eye 11

listic missile operations, Bases 67–69 storage capacities and maintenance,
are meant for support operations. repair and overhaul (MRO) will be
While Base 67 is responsible for over- streamlined.
seeing the nuclear stockpile, Base 68 A clear segregation of assets
is charged with engineering and phys- between the IRF and SFC will also
ical infrastructure. Base 69, which is address the paranoia generated by
the latest, is concerned with personnel certain security studies scholars re-
training and missile tests. garding India’s “counterforce temp-
Out of the operational missile tations”. India’s stated policy is still
bases, most face eastwards and most of no-first-use (NFU) envisioning nu-
missiles are against Taiwan, with lon- clear weapons as political instruments
ger range missiles threatening Amer- and has steadfastly remained so. To
ican military bases in Guam. Base 64, preclude any actor from misidentify-
headquartered in the western Chinese ing any conventional strikes as nucle-
city of Lanzhou covers North West ar or ‘bolt-out-of-the-blue’, it is criti-
and North Central China. It consists cal that there is a marked and visible
of seven missile brigades, out of which segregation of delivery platforms. The
at least four are road-mobile nuclear conventional theory of deterrence in-
ICBM brigades, one a dual nucle- volves a judicious combination of the
ar-conventional intermediate range three Cs, i.e., capability, credibility
ballistic missile (IRBM) brigade and and communication.
two brigades of unknown missile type. Communication involves sig-
The brigades are based at Korla, A flight-test of indigenously developed Defense Research and Development nalling especially to the adversary.
Xining, Yinchuan, Hancheng, Han- conventional Surface-to-Surface missile Organization successfully flight tests New There should be no grey zone in dis-
zhong and Tianshui. The missiles tinguishing the missiles that are kept
possibly include DF-26 IRBM (range ‘Pralay’ off the coast of Odisha (ANI) Generation Agni P Ballistic Missile (ANI) for conventional strikes from the nu-
5000 km), DF-31 (range 7200–8000 clear-tipped ones. The creation of the
km), DF-31 AG (likely range 11200 strike damage assessment (PSDA). Artillery, the IRF can become India’s SFC was essentially for operational-
km), DF-41 (range 12000–13000 km) A similar use was made by the PLA answer to extend its conventional de- izing India’s ‘massive retaliation’ nu-
and some unknown missile types —all during its exercises around the Taiwan terrence posture beyond the conven- clear strategy. It is therefore essential
can cover the entire frontage of the strait. Artificial intelligence (AI) and tional range of its artillery. that the commissioning of Pralay coin-
LAC against India. machine learning (ML) based com- Apart from operational command cide with the creation of IRF separate
There are likely forms of com- mand and control (C2) systems can be and control, it is necessary that there from SFC, followed by shifting of the
mand and control of an emerging IRF used for effectively matching targets is a clear segregation between launch rocket assets into the IRF.
in the Indian context. The structure to delivery platforms. platforms for rockets and missile forc- The Chinese threat along the
of PLA RF can be considered as one The Corps of Artillery, which cur- es. Within the fourth vertical, while LAC necessitates a paradigm change
of the templates where all conven- rently handles most of India’s missile all ground-based launchers can be in the Indian defense posture. While
tional and nuclear missile forces are and rockets systems in terms of de- manned by Army units, air launched a start has been made with the deploy-
concentrated into a separate service. ployment and training, is well-poised vectors should be exclusively with the ment of unmanned systems and ad-
Another model is that of individual to act as the core group of the new Indian Air Force (IAF) while coastal vanced sensors, there exists the chal-
services having their respective mis- IRF. It has extensive training expe- defense and submarine launched mis- lenge of creating a deterrent threat
sile forces but this model may not be rience and has done countless firing siles will be with the Indian Navy. This with two aims: create a window of
viable when theatre commands are tests and deployment exercises with will accomplish two things: leverage opportunity for undertaking kinetic
created. The third model is the inte- these systems for a long time. With the operational competence of each actions without climbing the escala-
gration of the missile units within the cross-pollination of personnel from Service and ensure optimization of tion ladder and therefore putting the
theatre commands, with the rocket the SFC and steered by the Corps of operational logistics. Issues such as onus of escalation on the other side;
and missile forces clubbed together and creating an indigenous solution
under a fourth component. Here, the which can be scaled up rapidly with-
operational command and control out being limited to the foreign policy
will reside with the respective service constraints of any country. The induc-
component to facilitate planning for tion of Pralay may become the start of
joint operations within the theatre an Indian IRF which addresses both
command. these aims.
Depending on the composition Lt Col Akshat Upadhyay is Research
and tasks of the theatre commands, Fellow, Strategic Technologies Centre at
the respective platforms for launch- Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defense
ing the missiles may be decided. Per- Studies and Analyses, New Delhi
sonnel from the Corps of Artillery Views expressed are of the author and
can initially form the core group for do not necessarily reflect the views of
exercising initial command and con- the Manohar Parrikar IDSA or of the
trol, operational training and exercis- Government of India.
es which will be made realistic and go
a long way in inculcating long-range This is an abridged version of an
precision fires expertise within the article which of first appeared in the
remaining two services. Inclusion of Comments section of the website (www.
state-of-the-art UAVs in the form of Defense Research and Development Organization successfully flight tests New Generation idsa.in) of Manohar Parrikar Institute
micro and mini drones can serve as Agni P Ballistic Missile (ANI) for Defense Studies and Analyses, New
force multipliers for ISTAR and post- Delhi on January 24, 2022

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