A look at the supersonic cruise missile, the significance of its land, sea, and air-launched versions and the strategic posturing behind the ongoing series of tests in the light situation with China and of competition in the strategically important Indian Ocean Region.
India’s Armed forces – Army, Navy, and the Air Force – are conducting back-to-back tests of various versions of BrahMos missile. A look at the supersonic cruise missile, the significance of its land, sea, and air-launched versions and the strategic posturing behind the ongoing series of tests in the light situation with China and of competition in the strategically important Indian Ocean Region.
What is the BrahMos missile which the tri-services are testing?
A combination of the names of Brahmaputra and Moskva rivers, BrahMos missiles are designed, developed and produced by BrahMos Aerospace, a joint venture company set up by Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Mashinostroyenia of Russia. Various versions of the BrahMos, including those which can be fired from land, warships, submarines and Sukhoi-30 fighter jets have already been developed and successfully tested in the past. The earliest versions of the ship launched BrahMos and land-based system are in service of the Indian Navy and the Indian Army since 2005 and 2007 respectively.
BrahMos is a two-stage missile with solid propellant booster as first stage and liquid ramjet as the second stage. The cruise missiles like BrahMos are a type of systems known as the ‘standoff range weapons’ which are fired from a range sufficient to allow the attacker to evade defensive fire from the adversary. These weapons are in the arsenal of most major militaries in the world. The versions of the BrahMos that are being tested have an extended range of around 400 kilometers, as compared to its initial range of 290 kilometers, with more versions of higher ranges currently under development.
What is the significance of having land, sea and air-launched BrahMos?
The land-based system: The land-based Brahmos Complex has four to six mobile autonomous launchers, with each having three missiles on board that can be fired almost simultaneously. Batteries of the BrahMos missile land based systems have been deployed along India’s land borders in various theatres.
The land attack version of BrahMos has the capability of cruising at 2.8 Mach speed and with the upgraded capability, the missile can hit targets at a range of upto 400 kilometers with precision. Advanced versions of range above 1,000 kilometers and speed upto 5 Mach are said to be under development.
Ship-based system: The Indian Navy began inducting BrahMos on its frontline warships from 2005, and has capability to hit sea-based targets beyond radar horizon. The Naval version has been successful time and again in sea-to-sea and sea-to-land modes. The BrahMos from ship can be launched as a single unit or in a salvo upto eight in numbers separated by 2.5 seconds intervals. These salvos can hit and destroy a group of frigates having modern missile defence systems. BrahMos as a ‘prime strike weapon’ for the ships significantly increases their capability of engaging naval surface targets at long ranges.
The Air launched version: On November 22, 2017, Brahmos was successfully flight-tested for the first time from the IAF frontline fighter aircraft Sukhoi-30MKI against a sea-based target in the Bay of Bengal and has since been successfully tested multiple times.
BrahMos equipped Sukhoi-30s – which have a range of 1,500 kilometers at a stretch without mid-air refuelling – are considered as key strategic deterrence for the adversaries both along the land borders and in the strategically important Indian Ocean Region. IAF is said to be integrating BrahMos with 40 Sukhoi-30 fighter jets across the various bases.
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