Brief III: Ballistic Missile Defence in South Asia

There are at present no systems operational in South Asia for intercepting ballistic missiles after launch (BMD).  It seems most unlikely that Pakistan would choose to initiate the deployment of such systems.  In practice, any introduction of BMD into the region will be decided by India.

 

There has been much speculation that India might deploy BMD, for example by acquiring versions of the Israeli Arrow 2 or Russian S-300 anti-missile missiles.  The BJP government voiced understanding of the United States decision in 2001 to abrogate the 1972 ABM Treaty and deploy BMD, and since then there has been considerable technical dialogue on BMD between Indian and both US and Israeli staffs.  There has however been no definite decision or firm public statement by either the Congress government or its BJP predecessor about BMD deployment by India.

 

India has acquired from Israel the Green Pine mobile ground-based radar system for early warning and fire control, and has ordered three Phalcon airborne radars to be fitted in Israel into IL-76 aircraft bought from Russia.  These systems in combination could play a part in BMD, but they can contribute valuably in other roles.   Their acquisition therefore does not necessarily imply full commitment to BMD deployment.

 

It is believed that some time ago US officials indicated willingness to help if India decided to proceed to a full BMD system.  The Green Pine radar incorporates some US technology, and its sale will therefore have needed and received US agreement.  The Arrow 2 missile also incorporates US technology, and transfer of that or any comparable missile would be likely to require consideration in relation to commitments under the Missile Technology Control Regime (to which both the US and Russia are party).  Anti-missile missiles could be ranked in MTCR terms as “Category I” material. The MTCR guidelines speak of “a strong presumption to deny such [Category I] transfers”, but there is no absolute prohibition.

 

Indian decision-making on BMD deployment would need to consider

 

 

Ballistic-missile threats might be postulated from China; from Pakistan; from “rogue state” or terrorist action; or from accidental or unauthorised launch.  It would be for consideration how likely each of these threats might be, and what BMD provision would be needed to ward it off.  Appraisal of the threat’s gravity would need also to weigh probabilities about the type and activation status of warheads that might be carried.

 

If terrorist, accidental or unauthorised attack were judged a serious danger, strategic warning could not be counted upon.  Permanent BMD system activation and some degree of delegated authority to fire might have to be considered, especially as South Asian geography might entail shorter missile flight times than US homeland defence can expect, and false-alarm risks would then need to be weighed.

 

 

The wider the protection required, the more difficult the BMD task becomes.  No single BMD complex could defend all major Indian cities or military bases, especially given the short flight times if missiles were launched from neighbouring territory.  Shielding a National Command Authority in the Delhi area would be a less intractable but still severe task.  BMD for this would need to be evaluated alongside alternative protective options such as dispersal, redundancy or underground hardening.

 

 

Empirical evidence on BMD efficacy is limited, and tests so far have a mixed record.  On the assumption that the performance of systems now existing or under development would in operational conditions come up to design intentions, options likely to be considered by an adversary state wishing to maintain a capability to defeat them could include

 

-  saturation, by launching more missiles (armed or not) than the defence could engage;

 

-  deception, by making it difficult for the defence to target re-entry vehicles accurately (the approach that was taken by the United Kingdom's Chevaline system for maintaining the penetrative capability of its Polaris submarine-launched ballistic missiles);

 

-  circumvention, by using non-ballistic delivery systems such as cruise missiles.

 

Each of these options could in principle be countered by defence provision, but in the South Asian setting the resource-cost advantage in an offence/defence arms race might well lie with offence.

 

 

Costs cannot be estimated, even in order-of-magnitude terms, without knowing the scale, character and purpose of the BMD capability to be provided.  It seems likely however that any system effective against a determined state adversary would have costs measured in billions of US dollars.

 

 

Appraisal of Indian BMD options would need to consider potential counter-action by other countries.  There would probably be little logic for such countries in matching deployment of BMD; any response in military provision in order to maintain confidence in deterrent options would be likely to take the form of strengthening offensive capability in one way or another. 

 

China has not seemed much concerned with strategic deterrence vis-à-vis India, and in any event the weight of her nuclear armoury could still provide this unless a prospective Indian BMD deployment were much denser and wider-reaching than is at all to be expected.  It seems unlikely therefore that China would think it necessary to take special military steps in response.  Pakistan however might well take a “worst-case” view of the objectives and eventual scope of a deployment, and might fear that the aim was to deprive Pakistan of dependable deterrent capability, for example by creating an Indian option of pre-emptive attack (whatever might have been said in peacetime by way of declaratory policy on “first use”) coupled with ability to ward off retaliation from any Pakistani systems that survived.  Indian decision-makers would no doubt need to consider whether the possibility of such an inference – which might, apart from any effects on political relations, lead Pakistan to contemplate an extra build-up of offensive capability, the maintenance of forces at higher readiness, the adoption of launch-on-warning policies, or a combination of these - would damage the agreed search for low-friction strategic stability in the Sub-Continent, and whether it might initiate an offence/defence competition that could impose heavy costs on both sides without in the end much improving overall Indian security.