India Joins Nuclear-sub Club

Prime Minister with officials attend the launch of India's first nuclear-powered submarine
(Photo: PTI)

BACKGROUND

India became the sixth country in the world to build a nuclear-powered submarine. The 367-foot long INS Arihant, which means "Destroyer of the Enemies" in Hindi according to the official news release. The name Arihant has its origins in the Jain religion. 

Besides the US, which has 74 nuclear submarines, Russia (45), UK (13), France (10) and China (10) also possess nuclear-powered submarines - the US has nearly as many nuclear submarines as all other countries combined. The last nation to enter the nuclear submarine club was China when it launched its Han class submarines in the early 1980s.

The INS Arihant, India’s first nuclear submarine, was till now known by the code name S 2. It was expected to be ready for induction into the Navy by 2011 after a series of exhaustive trials.

The launch ceremony was a simple one in the port town of Visakhapatnam [Vizac]. With sacred verses from the Atharva Veda in the background, Gursharan Kaur broke the auspicious coconut on the upper deck of the submarine, giving it its new name, Arihant (destroyer of enemies). 

Others in attendance were Defence Minister Shri.AK Antony, Chief minister of Andhra Pradesh Dr. YS Rajasekhar Reddy, Shri MM Pallam Raju, Minister of State for Human Resource Development, Smt. D Purandareswari, Chief of the Naval Staff Admiral Sureesh Mehta and high ranking officials from the Navy, Department of Atomic Energy, and Defence Research and Development Organisation. 

The entire Russian design team and the Russian Ambassador to India, V I Trubnikov, were present at the function.

Prime Minister and Defence Minister speak

On this occasion, the Prime Minister congratulated the Director General of the ATV (Advanced Technology vehicle) Program Vice Admiral DSP Verma (Retd) and all personnel associated with it for achieving this historic milestone in the country’s defence preparedness. He noted that they had overcome several hurdles and barriers to enable the country to acquire self reliance in the most advanced areas of defence technology. 

This is the first time that the Prime Minister has spoken on the project, which has been top secret since the late 1970s when it was cleared by Indira Gandhi.

The Prime Minister made a special mention of the cooperation extended by Russia. The Prime Minister stated that the Government is fully committed to ensuring the Defence of our national interests and the protection of our territorial integrity. The Government would render all support to the constant modernization of our defence forces and to ensuring that they remain at the cutting edge of technology.

“Our voluntary commitment to ‘no first use’ nuclear weapon policy also necessitated acquiring a credible second strike capability to safeguard our national interests,” said Defence Minister A K Antony.

Sub Specifications

The project director, Vice Admiral (retd) D S P Verma, said that the Arihant is a 6,000-tonne submarine with a length of 110 meters and a breadth of 11 meters. The length is about 10 percent longer than previously published estimates, while the 11 meter beam is much less than the 15 meters of previous un-offcial estimates. 

Built with the help of Russian consultants, Arihant will have nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles, apart from torpedoes and cruise missiles. Another advantage is that it can remain under water for three months at a stretch, unlike India’s existing diesel-electric submarines that have to surface frequently to recharge their batteries, and thus run the risk of detection. 

Defence Preparedness 

The launch came as India marked the tenth anniversary of the brief but bloody Kargil conflict with arch-rival Pakistan in the Kashmir region, where more than 1,100 people, mostly Indian and Pakistani soldiers, died in the high-altitude offensive in the spring and summer of 1999 when Pakistan-based infiltrators crossed the icy frontier that separates the two countries.

At a service earlier in New Delhi, Singh paid tribute to the Indian troops who died during the conflict. "They sacrificed their lives in defence of Indian unity and integrity," he said.

A year before Kargil, India conducted nuclear weapons tests and Pakistan responded with its own tests a few days later.

India already has fighter aircraft and missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads. If all goes well with the trials, the Arihant will give India an underwater ballistic missile capability after the tests are conducted, completing the triad of defence preparedness, the vital third leg of India’s nuclear policy that hinges around the “second strike” theory — which says that India will only use nuclear weapons as a retaliatory measure against a first strike by the enemy.

"Defence experts have estimated that India has between 50 and 100 nuclear warheads," writes Anjana Pasricha in VOA News.

India is upgrading its armed forces as part of efforts to match its military strength with its growing economic and political clout. The plans include a proposed $9 billion purchase of 126 new fighter jets.

The submarine, the first of five planned, underlines the military advances made by the rapidly developing nation. It is powered by an 85-megawatt nuclear reactor and can reach 44 kilometres an hour (24 knots) underwater, with a crew of 95 men, according to defence officials. 

However, before India gets its own nuclear submarine fleet, the Navy will train its personnel on a Russian Akula class nuclear submarine that India is getting on a 10-year lease towards the end of this year.

The country currently has 16 aging non-nuclear submarines, all purchased from other countries.

Analysts' View

New Delhi-based National Maritime Foundation director and a former naval commander, Uday Bhaskar says, the launch is an important technological step for India, "What is significant about the launch is that India now has publicly acknowledged its quest to acquire a nuclear submarine and has shown it has the ability to design and build such a platform."

There was no immediate comment from Pakistan, India’s neighbor and longtime rival. The submarine’s development is likely to rattle Islamabad. 

But India is looking beyond the old rivalry, asserting itself as a power on the Asian and international stage, says Uday Bhaskar.

The U.S., in particular, has encouraged India’s role as a possible counter to China, stepping up exercises with the Indian navy and selling the South Asian nation an American warship for the first time in 2007.

“If the U.S. companies are willing or able to share their technology with India in nuclear propulsion, that would give a very significant boost to India’s long-term plan,” Bhaskar said.

Still, it could take three to five years for India’s submarine to become operational, after undergoing sea trials of its nuclear reactor, surveillance equipment and ordnance, Bhaskar said.

India’s state-run Defense Research and Development Organization could take two to three years to develop cruise and ballistic missiles that can be fired from the submarine, said Rahul Bedi of Jane’s Defence Weekly.

“India can’t buy them from the international market as these are prohibited weapons,” Bedi told The Associated Press.

"Analysts stress that the sea-based deterrent is critical for India because of its policy of no-first use of nuclear weapons. Should the country's land- and air-based weapons be wiped out by an enemy first-strike, it would require submarines to launch the retaliatory second-strike", writes Ravi Velloor in the Straits Times.

The Arihant will probably be equipped with India's Sagarika series of missiles, which can deliver a 500kg nuclear payload to distances of between 750km and 1,000km. That would put most of Pakistan within range of submarines based in the Arabian Sea. Likewise, Indian submarines in the South China Sea will have some of China's most prosperous regions in range.

Some observers also see it as an attempt to counter the strategic interest of China in the region. 'A nuclear submarine is the ultimate weapon in the hands of the government,' said strategic analyst A. K. Singh, a retired vice-admiral. 'We are catching up with China very quickly and as for Pakistan, this puts us way ahead in the game.'

With files from Agencies

BACKGROUND

India is a nation that struggled to enter the select group of countries that build nuclear powered submarines. Its program ATV, or Advanced Technology Vessel to provide nuclear propulsion for Indian submarines, was initiated in 1974. 

India has been working actively since 1985 to develop an indigenously constructed nuclear-powered submarine, one that was possibly based on elements of the Soviet Charlie II-class design, detailed drawings of which are said to have been obtained from the Soviet Union in 1989. 

Although India has the capability of building the hull and developing or acquiring the necessary sensors, its industry had been stymied by several system integration and fabrication problems in trying to downsize a 190 MW pressurized water reactor (PWR) to fit into the space available within the submarine's hull. The Proto-type Testing Centre (PTC) at the Indira Gandhi Centre For Atomic Research, Kalpakkam, was used to test the submarine's turbines and propellers. A similar facility is operational at Vishakapatnam to test the main turbines and gear box.

In 1998, L&T began fabricating the hull of ATV but the struggle with the reactor continued. After BARC designs failed, India bought reactor designs from Russia. By 2004 the reactor had been built, tested on land at the IGCAR and had gone critical. Its modest size, around 6,000 tons (the Ohio class SSBN in the movie Crimson Tide weighs over 14,000 tons), led experts to call it a “baby boomer”.

India had ample experience building Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors (PHWRs) using natural un-enriched uranium as fuel, and heavy water as moderator and coolant. But this was the first time that India has built a PWR that used enriched uranium as fuel, and light water as both coolant and moderator. The electrical power reactors that India would be importing (potentially from Russia, France, and the US) would also be PWRs with enriched uranium as fuel, and light water as both coolant and moderator. Naval nuclear reactors typically use uranium that is enriched to much higher levels than is the case with shore-based power reactors.

While the present project reportedly ends at three units, defence officials have not ruled out building larger submarines on the basis of national strategic imperatives. These have changed since the conception of the project. By the time the first unit was launched in July 2009, the construction of the hull for the next one was reportedly already underway at the Larson and Toubro (L&T) facility at Hazira where the first hull was built. 

The cost of the three submarines was reported at over Rs 3,000 crore (over US$623,104,807.77 the day INS Arihant was launched]. Another report said that the first submarine alone had cost Rs. 14,000 Crore [$US2.9 billion]. In April 2006, the larger American Virginia-class subs were priced at $2.4 billion apiece, at which time the goal was to cut the program's cost to about $2 billion per sub. The $2 billion figure is a baseline expressed in fiscal 2005 dollars. As of late 2008 the Procurement Cost for the first three units of the British Astute class SSN was forecast at £3,806 M (outturn prices) [US$6,275 B at 2009 conversion rates], for a unit cost of about US$2.1 billion.

The three submarines would be based at a facility being developed at Rambilli close to Vishakpatnam, where hundreds of acres of land had already been acquired. The Indian Navy hoped to commission the base by 2011 in time for INS Arihant's commissioning, and two of these submarines would be at sea at any given time while the third would be in maintenance at the base. Other reports claim that India plans to build a fleet of five nuclear-powered submarines. On report in 2009 stated that the government had given clearance for the construction of much bigger SSBNs, nuclear-powered submarines capable of launching ballistic missiles, each of them costing about $2 billion (approximately Rs 10,000 crore each). This would take off once the three Arihant class submarines were ready.

By 2004 it was reported that the first ATV would be launched by 2007. At that time it was reported that it would be an SSGN and displacing some 6,500 tons, with a design derivative of Russia's Project 885 Severodvinsk-class (Yasen) SSN. The ATV multirole platform would be employed for carrying out long-distance interdiction and surveillance of both submerged targets as well as principal surface combatants. It would also facilitate Special Forces operations by covertly landing such forces ashore. The ATV pressure hull will be fabricated with the HY-80 steel obtained from Russia.

This would have the possibility of multiple performance: it could use missiles of cruise of average reach (1,000 km), ballistic missiles of short reach (300 km), torpedoes and mines, besides participating of operations special.

The ATV is said to be a modified Akula-I class submarine. The Russian Akula-2 and Yasen are also modified Akula-1. By this line of reasoning the ATV would be in league of Yasen, so the ATV would be 6500 tons light, 8500 tons armed and surfaced and 10000 tons submerged. It would be the biggest and heaviest combat naval vessel built in India to date.

The 100-member crew, which will man the submarine, was trained at an indigenously-developed simulator in the School for Advanced Underwater Warfare (SAUW) at the naval base in Vizag. Hands-on training will be done on the INS Chakra, a 12,000-tonne Akula-II class nuclear-powered attack submarine being taken on a 10-year lease from Russia. SBC in Vizag is to become the assembly line for three ATVs, costing a little over Rs 3,000 crore each or the cost of a 37,000 ton indigenous aircraft carrier built at the Cochin Shipyard. Larsen and Toubro (L&T) has begun building the hull of the second ATV at its facility in Hazira, to be inducted into the navy by 2012.

As of 2007 the first of the five long-delayed ATVs was scheduled to be fully-ready by 2010 or so. In August 2008 it was reported that on January 26, 2009, the sluice gates of an enclosed dry-dock in Visakhapatnam were to be opened and the world was to take its first look at India's first nuclear-powered submarine, the Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV), as it entered the waters.

In February 2009 defence minister A K Antony confirmed that India's nuclear-powered submarine is in the final stages. “The Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV) project is in the final stage. We had some problems with the raw material in the initial phase. But now the project is in its final stage,” he said at the ongoing Aero-India show. This was a rare admission by the defence minister - not only on the existence of the secretive project to build an indigenous nuclear submarine, but also on its developmental status. 

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