BackSpace cracker
India is now on par with other powers in a futuristic theatre of war.
PremiumWith its successful test of an anti-satellite missile, India, once a critic of America’s Strategic Defense Initiative, has joined a club of four countries that can accurately hit moving targets in space. Under Mission Shakti, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared, India has shot down a defunct low-earth orbit micro satellite of its own. Recall that in 2007, China had downed its FengYun orbiter in a strike whose accuracy was touted as that of “a bullet shot by a bullet". Exaggeration apart, as that technology could potentially knock out nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles, it was interpreted as Beijing’s shield against long-range nukes.
While the Indian Prime Minister has said that Wednesday’s test was a breakthrough aimed at no other country, defence analysts are hailing it as a space-combat deterrent. To be sure, it does serve as a stiff warning to enemy spy satellites. Whether it helps secure the country against a nuclear attack, however, is far less certain. India’s adversaries are within relatively close range, after all. Their nukes need not gain any altitude to hit targets here. India, thus, still has no “iron dome". But the country is now on par with other powers in a futuristic theatre of war.
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