The Hindu : Front Page : Army acquires BrahMos missile

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Friday, Jun 22, 2007
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Army acquires BrahMos missile

T.S. Subramanian

Time to work on Mark-II version to maintain market leader status, says Kalam

Kalam’s vision of long-range hypersonic cruise missiles
Calls for aggressive marketing of the world class product

PHOTO COURTESY: DPR,MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

INDUCTION BEGINS: President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam handing over a replica of the BrahMos missile system to Army Chief General J.J. Singh at a function marking the commencement of delivery of the missile to the Army in New Delhi on Thursday. Defence Minister A.K. Antony (right) and CEO of BrahMos Aerospace A. Sivathanu Pillai look on.

New Delhi: President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam said on Thursday that the time has come for BrahMos Aerospace Limited to work on the Mark-II version of the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile so that we could still be the market leader in hypersonic cruise missiles. In the emerging network-centric warfare scenario, the fast deployment of hypersonic missile systems will be necessary to maintain our force-level supremacy, he said.

Mr. Kalam made these remarks at a function at the BrahMos Aerospace Complex here when he handed over a replica of the mobile autonomous launcher (MAL) of the missile to the Chief of the Army Staff Gen. J.J. Singh, symbolising the commencement of the delivery of the missile’s land version to the Army. BrahMos is a product of India-Russia cooperation.

Mr. Kalam said: I visualise long-range hypersonic cruise missiles not only delivering payloads but also returning to the base after the mission, leading to the reusable class of cruise missiles within the next decade. It is time that the three Services worked with the team of BrahMos Aerospace to evolve the QR (qualitative requirements) for such a system in a time-bound manner.

The President wanted BrahMos Aerospace to aggressively market this world-class product which would have a shelf-life of five years. The BrahMos programme had demonstrated a new way of thinking and action for a joint venture between the Indian and Russian defence organisations. It was not a soft programme where the MoUs got signed and activities took place at a natural pace but a hard programme for mutual benefit, where $250 million was invested equally by India and Russia, and today, we have an order book worth $ 2 billion and business interest exists for orders of an equal amount, Mr. Kalam said.

Mr. Kalam congratulated Dr. A. Sivathanu Pillai, CEO and Managing Director, BrahMos Aerospace, and Dr. Herbert A. Yefremov, Director-General, NPO Mashinostroyenia (NPO-M), Russia, and the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) on realising the missile. The NPO-M is the Russian partner of the joint venture.

(The seeds of this joint venture were sown on February 12, 1998 when Mr. Kalam, then Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister, and N.V. Mikhailov, first Deputy Defence Minister, Russia, signed an Inter-Governmental Agreement. There have been 14 launches of BrahMos from India from June 2001 to April 2007 and four of these were Army versions. The missile has already been inducted into the Navy).

Defence Minister A.K. Antony said the induction of BrahMos into the Navy was progressing well. The missile would be the preferred systems for future ships. BrahMos induction into the Army would be a major force-multiplier. Production activities had been geared up to meet the growing demand for the missile, Mr. Antony said.

Accuracy

Gen. Singh called it one of the most potent missiles in the Army’s inventory. He had witnessed two launches of BrahMos and he had marvelled at its pin-point accuracy. It could reach the bed-room of a medium-sized house. Gen. Singh praised the Army core-team which tested, evaluated and operationalised the missile system. He congratulated the regiment led Col. P. Vidyarthi, which would be the first to be equipped with the missile. The Army Chief was sure that BrahMos would set a precedent for joint-ventures.

Vyacheslav I. Trubnikov, Russian Federation Ambassador, said the missile would be exported to common friendly countries.

M. Natarajan, Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister, said the missiles delivery to the Army was on time and the DRDO would do its utmost to maintain this schedule. The Army’s exclusive requirements had been met in a single vehicle-configuration. According to Mr. Natarajan, the DRDO and NPO-M had worked together in designing, developing and operationalising this weapon system.

Dr. Pillai said the Army version of BrahMos had been realised within a short time of three years and it was the first supersonic cruise missile to have a land-attack version. He praised the contribution of Mr. Kalam and Dr. Yefremov for the success of the venture. Dr. Pillai paid tributes to the public and private industries which had realised the missiles systems.

Minister of State for Defence Pallam Raju and Chairman, BrahMos Aerospace, Alexandre Dergachev, took part in the function.

Mr. Kalam went round the Mobile Command Post and the MAL of the BrahMos system and the Army personnel explained the sequence of the launch system to him. BrahMos can fly at a velocity of one km a second and its range is 290 km. It can carry conventional warheads weighing 300 kg, and is nine metres long and has two stages.

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