New Dehi: The Army's endeavour to induct the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile as "a precision-strike weapon" took a hit on Tuesday, with the
missile failing to achieve laid-down parameters in a test.
This comes at a time when the Pakistan Army is galloping ahead in inducting its nuclear-capable Babur land-attack cruise missile (LACM) - developed with China's help to have a strike range of over 500 km - in large numbers into its arsenal.
Initially, the BrahMos LACM test from the Pokhran field firing range at 10.23am on Tuesday was touted as "successful" by defence ministry officials. But later in the day, this newspaper learnt that it had been quite unsuccessful.
Top defence officials were, however, still reluctant to dub the test, which was witnessed by Army chief General Deepak Kapoor, as "a complete failure".
"BrahMos is a unique missile, which has been tested flawlessly almost 20 times till now. On Tuesday, we were test-firing it with a new guidance scheme...it was not successful. Further trials are required," said an official, reluctant to say anything more.
Sources said it was likely that the BrahMos missile, which flies at a speed of 2.8 Mach, tested on Tuesday had been configured to carry a nuclear warhead rather than a conventional one.
The Army already has missile groups to handle the 150-km Prithvi, 700-800-km Agni-I and 2000-km-plus Agni-II ballistic missiles, which are nuclear-capable.
On its part, Army has ordered two BrahMos regiments in the first phase at a cost of Rs 8,352 crore, with 134 missiles, 10 road-mobile autonomous launchers on 12x12 Tatra vehicles, four mobile command posts and the like, said sources.
The Navy, in turn, has ordered 49 BrahMos firing units at a cost of Rs 711 crore for now. All the tests of the BrahMos naval version, both anti-ship and land-attack ones, have been successful till now.
BrahMos was even fired successfully from a vertical launcher - the earlier tests were from "inclined" launchers - fitted on Rajput-class destroyer INS Ranvir in Bay of Bengal last month.
The "universal vertical launcher" is significant since it imparts the missile system with some stealth as well as the capability to be fired in any direction. It also paves the way for the integration of BrahMos missiles on submarines.
Even as India and Russia begin preliminary work on a "hypersonic" BrahMos-2 missile capable of flying at a speed between 5 and 7 Mach, two Indian Sukhoi-30MKI fighters have also been sent to Russia for integration with BrahMos' air-launched version.
The armed forces' eventual plan, of course, is to have nuclear-tipped LACMs, with strike ranges in excess of 1,500 km. Unlike ballistic missiles, cruise missiles do not leave the atmosphere and are powered and guided throughout their flight path.
Cruise missiles, which can evade enemy radars and air defence systems since they fly at low altitudes, are also much cheaper as well as more accurate and easier to operate.
BrahMos missile test fails after early 'success'-India-The Times of India
Sad! Good luck next time guys.
Or you can just ask Russians to sell you a couple. Why try to build your own? It's a waste of resources and man-power.
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