India has reaped the first benefit of being in the MTCR club, as scientists successfully tested a Brahmos cruise missile with an extended range of 450 km.
Because of the restrictive missile technology control regime (MTCR), the cruise missile that was developed with Russian collaboration had a maximum range of 290 km, as export of missiles having a range of more than 300 km was prohibited under MTCR rules. In June 2016, Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar signed the instrument of accession to the 34-member MTCR, which is the first multilateral export control regime that opens its door for New Delhi.
The Brahmos missile was successfully tested on Saturday, within nine months of the accession being inked, from the Integrated Test Range at Chandipur Odisha.
“The formidable missile system once again proved its mettle to precisely hit enemy targets at much higher range than the current range of 290 km with the supersonic speed of 2.8 Mach. The land attack version of the missile met its mission parameters,” Brahmos Aerospace said in a statement. Senior Army officials witnessed the launch.
“With the successful test firing of Brahmos Extended Range (Brahmos-ER), Indian armed forces will be empowered to knock down enemy targets far beyond 400 km,” said Sudhir Mishra, chief executive officer and managing director of Brahmos Aerospace.
The first announcement on the new Brahmos was made by the DRDO Director General S Christopher at the Aero India 2017 last month.
Russia and India are also developing a new version of the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile that could be launched from submarines and the Sukhoi T-50 PAK-FA fifth-generation stealth fighter.
The new variant—which is considerably smaller than the original BrahMos—would be light enough to be carried even on relatively diminutive Mikoyan MiG-35 Fulcrum-F.
“We are working on the missile’s light version. It should fit the size of a torpedo tube and be almost 1.5 times smaller by its weight. It will be possible to mount our airborne missile on a wide range [of aircraft],” *
“Of course, we’ll be developing it, first of all, for the fifth-generation plane but, possibly, it will be mounted on the MiG-35 fighter, although we have not carried out such developments.”
The original BrahMos was a Russian-Indian joint development version of the P-800 Oniks anti-ship cruise missile. The original weapon—though capable of speeds nearing Mach 3.0 at ranges of roughly 186 miles—is enormous with a weight of roughly 5,000lbs for the air-launched version. Thus, only the largest fighters such as the Sukhoi Su-30MKI are able to carry it aloft.
Source:- Deccan chronicle
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