Click to play videoNew Delhi: India on Friday conducted a successful ballistic missile defence test. The third success in-a-row puts India on course to putting up a missile shield by 2015.
The hat-trick of successful tests indicated that India is well on its way to developing a two-tier missile shield.
In the test on Friday a Dhanush ballistic missile fired from the sea to simulate a nuclear attack on India was successfully intercepted 75 km above the Bay of Bengal.
After two earlier successes in 2006 and 2007, when India intercepted incoming missiles at heights of 48 km and 15 km above the surface, Friday's accomplishment expanded the envelope for protecting India from a missile attack.
"Once it is intercepted at higher altitude, debris don't reach the land. So this is a very important accomplishment," Chief Controller, DRDO, Dr W Selvamurthy says.
The shield aims at intercepting an enemy missile in space with a variant of the Prithvi missile. Should that attempt fail, the last line of defence is the new Advanced Air Defence Missile that is designed to block enemy missiles within the atmosphere at heights of about 20 km from the earth's surface.
It seems it is a specific counter to Pakistan's Hatf and Ghauri missiles.
India plans to have its missile defence shield up by 2015. If that happens, it will be a shot in the arm for India's deterrence posture.
It will also be the principal prop for its Nuclear Weapons Doctrine of No First Use. But will this lead to a new arms race? Will China and Pakistan deploy more missiles to overwhelm India's missile defences?
Now the next priority in India's missile defence programme is to counter enemy missile salvos in concentrated attacks.
"We need to move towards multiple target interception," says Dr Selvamurthy.
It is clear that the missile race is getting more complex.
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