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| India-Pakistan |
| India Preparing Second Ballistic-Missile Sub |
| 2009-08-20 |
| India is completing work on a second home-built submarine intended to carry nuclear-armed ballistic missiles, the Indo-Asian News Service reported yesterday (see GSN, Aug. 14). "The second one will be ready and will take lesser time" to place into service, said retired Vice Adm. Mihir Roy, a former Indian navy officer once involved with the submarine project. The INS Arihant, India's first indigenously developed submarine, formally began three years of planned sea trials late last month |
| Posted by:john frum |
| #1 Roy, who is now 84, was the first head of the Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV) that was launched in 1984 and guided it during its first four years. "I said that I wanted to report directly to the defence minister, with no interference from secretaries and bureaucrats. It worked. Decisions were made across the table," said Roy, a submariner and former chief of the Eastern Naval Command. He noted that extra security precautions had to be taken to maintain the secrecy of the project to prevent triggering an arms race on the subcontinent. "We did not even have a name plate (outside the office). Nobody in my family, not even my wife, was aware what I was doing. On July 26 (when INS Arihant was launched) my grandchildren said: 'You never told us!' " Roy said. |
| Posted by: john frum 2009-08-20 09:29 |