The Defence Research and Development Organisation’s (DRDO) successful anti-missile defence test conducted last week is a significant step in the country’s air defence system.

The DRDO conducted the test with two missiles – a modified Prithvi missile fired from Chandipur-on-Sea to simulate an incoming enemy missile and an advanced air defence interceptor missile fired from Wheeler Island in the Bay of Bengal to defend against and destroy the hostile missile.

Conducted at an altitude of 15 km, this test was an endo-atmospheric one. Earlier in November 2006, a missile was successfully intercepted in an exo-atmospheric test at an altitude of 60 km. The two tests are part of an effort to provide a two-layered anti-missile air defence capability to the armed forces.

The efficacy of an anti-missile defence system is usually restricted to a small geographic area and  therefore, the system has territorial limitations in terms of security of national airspace. The technical feasibility of Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) systems is yet to be credibly established even in the technologically advanced Western world.

The US and Russia, as the former Soviet Union, have worked for almost four and a half decades towards development of a national missile defence system – but have yet to accomplish their techno-military objectives. Even today, the US has not comprehensively secured its national airspace from missile strikes with a national missile defence system in place.

The latest Indian anti-missile system amounts to a second version of the indigenously designed and developed Akash missile. The anti-missile technology was based on the foundation technologies, manpower, expertise, experience and infrastructure developed during the surface-to-air missile Akash that formed part of the Integrated Guided Missile Development Program started in 1983.

The anti-missile defence system involves integration of long-range tracking radars, fire control radars, mobile communications terminals and mobile launcher-fired interceptor missiles, which make it technologically complex. Interception of an enemy missile demands high levels of precision and accuracy in terms of identification, tracking and point kill capabilities and several tests will be required to refine the system.

To that extent this test was a successful demonstration of technology. The test also assumes strategic significance because it signals to China and Pakistan the sophistication of Indian techno-military capabilities and thereby strengthens deterrence on the sub-continent.