13 May 2008, - NEW DELHI: By 2010-2011, India hopes to gatecrash into a very exclusive club of countries, which have both ICBMs (intercontinental ballistic missiles) and SLBMs (submarine-launched ballistic missiles) as well as BMD (ballistic missile defence) capabilities.Only the US and Russia strictly qualify for this club as of now, if all the three capabilities — ICBM, SLBM and BMD — are taken together, with countries like China not too far behind.
Top defence scientists, on the sidelines of the annual DRDO awards on Monday, told TOI they were quite confident India would have ICBMs and SLBMs, even though their strike ranges would be much lesser than American, Russian or Chinese missiles, as also a functional BMD system soon after the turn of this decade.
DRDO, of course, often promises much more than it delivers. But this time, it's ready to walk its talk, emboldened by the successful test of the 3,500-km range Agni-III missile last week.
Take ICBMs first. "We have already started the design work for Agni-V, with a range of over 5,000-km. It basically involves development of a third composite stage for the two-stage Agni-III," said Agni programme director Avinash Chander. More >>>
