India's Pursuit Of Ballistic Missile Defense

Abstract

This article analyzes India's efforts to deploy a Ballistic Missile Program (BMD). The article has three objectives. First, it argues that scientific-bureaucratic factors and India's incapacity to deter Pakistan's use of terrorist proxies have driven its quest for BMD. Second, the article also evaluates the current state of India's two-tiered missile defense shield. In spite of various claims on the part of India's defense science establishment, the paper estimates that India still lacks a deployable BMD system and is still far from developing an effective strategy of deterrence-through-denial. Third, the article analyzes the implications of the development of India's BMD system for nuclear stability in South Asia. The article shows how India's BMD capacities, however limited, have indirectly exacerbated the security concerns of India's regional rival, Pakistan.

KEYWORDS:

• India
• Pakistan
• South Asia
• missiles
• missile defense
• regional stability
• terrorism

Notes

1. For a thoughtful and thorough discussion of the origins and evolution of the program, see Gaurav Kampani, “Stakeholders in the Indian Strategic Missile Program,” Nonproliferation Review 10 (Fall/Winter 2003), pp. 48-69.

2. Eric Auner, “Indian Missile Defense Program Advances,” Arms Control Today, January/February 2013, <www.armscontrol.org/act/2013_01-02/Indian-Missile-Defense-Program-Advances> ; also see Avnish Patel, “The Challenges and Opportunities in Developing an Indian Ballistic Missile Defence System,” RUSI Defence Systems 15 (2013), pp. 73-74.

3. Ashok Sharma, India's Missile Defense Programme: Threat Perceptions and Technological Evolution, Manekshaw Paper, No. 15 (2009), Centre for Land Warfare Studies, New Delhi, <www.claws.in/images/publication_pdf/1262760881MP_15___111209.pdf>.

4. Yogesh Joshi, “Ballistic Missile Defense an Essential Element of India's Strategic Calculus,” World Politics Review, April 20, 2012, <www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/11868/ballistic-missile-defense-an-essential-element-of-indias-strategic-calculus>; Vivek Raghuvanshi, “India, Israel to Build Anti-Missile System,” Defense News, February 6, 2014, <www.defensenews.com/article/20140206/DEFREG03/302060025/India-Israel-Build-Anti-Missile-System>.

5. Manoj K. Das, “India to use geo-stationery satellites for missile defence,” Times of India, May 19, 2013, <http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/India-to-use-geo-stationery-satellites-for-missile-defence/articleshow/20130007.cms>.

6. Ashok Pradhan, “Country will test missile shield next week: DRDO,” Times of India, April 20, 2014, <http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Country-will-test-missile-shield-next-week-DRDO/articleshow/33991171.cms>.

7. For a detailed discussion, see Ashley J. Tellis, “The Evolution of US-Indian Ties: Missile Defense in an Emerging Strategic Relationship,” International Security 30 (Spring 2006), pp. 113-51.

8. Uttara Choudhury, “US: We’re Willing to Work with India on Missile Shield Systems,” Firstpost, January 19, 2012, <www.firstpost.com/world/us-says-its-willing-to-work-with-india-on-missile-shield-systems-187203.html>.

9. Pravin Sawhney, “India's Ballistic Missile Defence capability is grossly exaggerated,” Daily News and Analysis, April 4, 2011, <www.dnaindia.com/analysis/analysis-india-s-ballistic-missile-defence-capability-is-grossly-exaggerated-1527966>; see also Manoj Joshi, “Government baffled over DRDO's chief's claim on missile shield,” India Today, July 18, 2012, <http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/government-baffled-over-drdo-chief-claim-on-missile-shield/1/208850.html>.

10. Ajai Shukla, “Anti-Ballistic Missile Defence: Star Wars over India,” Business Standard, December 1, 2012, <http://ajaishukla.blogspot.com/2012/12/anti-ballistic-missile-defence-star.html>.

11. For some Indian assessments of the logic and capabilities of Pakistan's tactical nuclear weapons, see Gurmeet Kanwal and Monika Chansoria, eds., Pakistan's Tactical Nuclear Weapons: Conflict Redux (New Delhi: Knowledge World Publishers, 2014); for an especially thoughtful critique of Pakistan's growing reliance on theater nuclear weapons, see Shashank Joshi, “Pakistan's Tactical Nuclear Nightmare: Déjà Vu?,” Washington Quarterly 36 (Summer 2013), pp. 159-72; for a discussion of other drivers of Pakistan's nuclear capabilities, see Andrew Bast, “Pakistan's Nuclear Calculus,” Washington Quarterly 34 (Fall 2011), pp. 73-86.

12. Times News Network, “Cost, time overruns plague key DRDO projects,” Times of India, March 22, 2012, <http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Cost-time-overruns-plague-several-key-DRDO-projects/articleshow/12360817.cms>; see also Yatish Yadav and Nardeep Singh Dahiya, “The secret world of DRDO,” New Indian Express, September 2, 2012, <www.newindianexpress.com/magazine/article598145.ece>.

13. For evidence of Pakistan's involvement in the first Kashmir war and the use of irregular forces, see Muhammad Akbar Khan, Raiders in Kashmir (Lahore: Jang Publishers, 1992).

14. Russell Brines, The Indo-Pakistani Conflict (New York: Pall Mall, 1968).

15. S. Paul Kapur and Sumit Ganguly, “The Jihad Paradox: Pakistan and Islamist Militancy in South Asia,” International Security 37 (July 2012), pp. 111-41.

16. Hamish Telford, “Counter-Insurgency in India: Observations from Punjab and Kashmir,” Journal of Conflict Studies 21 (Spring 2001), < http://journals.hil.unb.ca/index.php/JCS/article/view/4293/4888>.

17. Sumit Ganguly and David P. Fidler, eds., India and Counterinsurgency: Lessons Learned (London: Routledge, 2007).

18. Sumit Ganguly, The Crisis in Kashmir: Portents of War, Hopes of Peace (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

19. Sumit Ganguly and S. Paul Kapur, India, Pakistan, and the Bomb: Debating Nuclear Stability in South Asia (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010).

20. On the origins and evolution of the Indian nuclear weapon program, see Sumit Ganguly, “India's Pathway to Pokhran II: The Prospects and Sources of India's Nuclear Weapons Program,” International Security, 23 (Spring 1999), pp. 148-77.

21. Ashok Kapur, Pakistan's Nuclear Development (London: Routledge, Kegan Paul, 1987).

22. Operation Brasstacks was the code name for an Indian military exercise that constituted the largest troop mobilization ever on the subcontinent, involving air, land, and sea divisions, with a view, in part, to determine a nuclear war strategy. See, for instance, Kanti Bajpai, P.R. Chari, Pervaiz Iqbal Cheema, Stephen P. Cohen, and Sumit Ganguly, Brasstacks and Beyond: Perception and the Management of Crisis in South Asia (New Delhi: Manohar, 1992).

23. On Pakistan's clandestine efforts to acquire nuclear weapons, see Gordon Corera, Shopping for Bombs: Nuclear Proliferation, Global Insecurity, and the Rise and Fall of A.Q. Khan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009).

24. This is one of the key conclusions of the Indian government's Kargil Committee report. For details, see From Surprise to Reckoning: The Kargil Review Committee Report (New Delhi: Sage, 2000). On the concept of a “limited probe,” see Alexander George and Richard Smoke, Deterrence in American Foreign Policy: Theory and Policy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1975).

25. Major-General Ashok Kalyan Verma, Kargil: Blood on the Snow? Tactical Victory, Strategic Failure (New Delhi: Manohar, 2002).

26. Sumit Ganguly and Michael R. Kraig, “The 2001-2002 Indo-Pakistani Crisis: Exposing the Limits of Coercive Diplomacy,” Security Studies 14 (Winter 2004-05), pp. 290-324.

27. For an evaluation of this doctrine, see Walter Ladwig III, “A Cold Start to Hot Wars? The Indian Army's New Limited War Doctrine,” International Security 32 (Winter 2007/08), pp. 158-90.

28. For details pertaining to the terrorist strike, see Catherine Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy, The Siege: Three Days of Terror Inside the Taj (New Delhi: Viking, 2013).

29. For a thoughtful statement of this dilemma, see R. Rajaraman, “Battlefield weapons and missile defense: Worrisome developments in nuclear South Asia,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 70 (March 2014), pp. 68-74.

30. See, for example, Rajesh M. Basrur, Minimum Deterrence and India's Nuclear Security (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2006).

31. Shiping Tang, A Theory of Security Strategy for Our Time: Defensive Realism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010).

32. Joshi, “Pakistan's Tactical Nuclear Nightmare: Déjà Vu?.”

33. Vipin Narang, “Five Myths about India's Nuclear Posture,” Washington Quarterly 36 (Summer 2013), pp. 143-57.

34. Abhijit Singh, “Ballistic Missiles, BMD Fuel India-Pakistan Tensions,” World Politics Review, July 5, 2011, <www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/9364/ballistic-missiles-bmd-fuel-india-pakistan-tensions>.

35. Happymon Jacob, “Deterrence Debates and Defence,” The Hindu, April 21, 2014, <www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/deterrence-debates-and-defence/article5931349.ece>.

36. I am grateful to my former doctoral student, Nicolas Blarel, for highlighting this issue.

37. On this subject, see Evan Braden Montgomery and Eric Edelman, “Rethinking Stability in South Asia: India, Pakistan, and the Competition for Escalation Dominance,” Journal of Strategic Studies 38 (2015), pp. 159-82.

38. Indo-Asian News Service, “India's coastal security better after 26/11 but chinks remain,” Business Standard, November 25, 2013, <http://www.business-standard.com/article/news-ians/india-s-coastal-security-better-post-26-11-but-chinks-remain-five-years-after-26-11-113112500541_1.html>.

39. Sameer Arshad, “Wounds fester in Kashmir, democracy has not proven to be a balm,” Times of India, April 30, 2014, <http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/gray-areas/entry/wounds-fester-in-kashmir-democracy-has-proved-no-balm>.

40. On the Pakistani security establishment's quest to ensure the presence of a pliant regime in Afghanistan, see Carlotta Gall, The Wrong Enemy: America in Afghanistan, 2001-2014, (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2014).

41. Sumit Ganguly, “Delhi's Three Fatal Flaws,” Newsweek, December 8, 2008, p. 13.