India's Akash air defence system : The Indian Patriot

India's indegenous Akash air defence system is the reason India have rejected the US offer of the PAC-3, Israel's offer of the Arrow-2, Russia's offer of the latest S-300 and S-400 and the European MBDA offer of the Aster 30 air defence systems.

The Akash (Sanskrit for Sky) is a medium-range, theatre defence, surface-to-air missile. It operates in conjunction with the indegenous Rajendra surveillance & engagement radar. This system will replace the SA-6 / Straight Flush in Indian service and will provide air defence system to counter SRBM / IRBM threats in addition to airplane threats along the Pakistani and Chinese borders.

The Akash uses state of the art integral ramjet rocket propulsion system to give a low-volume, low-weight (700 kg launch weight) missile configuration, and has a low reaction time - from detection to missile launch - of 15 seconds allowing the missile to carry a heavier 60 kg fragmentation warhead triggered by proximity fuse.

It reaches a speed of Mach 1.5 in 4.5 seconds, Mach. 2.8-3.5 at 20g in 30 seconds after ramjet motor is ignited. Its range (for most effective performance) varies 27-30 kilometres.

The 5.6 m long sleek missile has a launch weight of 700 kg and can carry 60 kg of warhead and the radar is capable of tracking 64 targets and guide upto 12 missiles simultaneously in a fully autonomous mode of operation.

The Akash is to bepurchased by the Indian air defence command and is for sale to customers abroad.

Having successfully tested it more than 45 times, the DRDO is confident that Akash will be effective against low-flying missiles, aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles.

Unlike the Patriot, Akash can be launched from static or mobile platforms, including a battle tank.

What makes it superior to Patriot, apart from the mobility of its platform, is that it has thrust during the entire course of its 35-second flight. Patriot has thrust only for 12 seconds, after which the missile coasts, thus making it less accurate than Akash.

The Akash :

One Akash battery is composed of three tracked vehicles (tracks, like those on a battle tank), each of which would have four missiles, plus a vehicle carrying the Rajendra multifunction phased array radar. The Air Force version is on wheeled vehicles.

The missile can be deployed either in autonomous mode or group mode. In the autonomous mode, it will have a single battery functioning independently. For surveillance, it would need an additional two-dimensional radar. In this mode, it can be used for defending moving columns or singular installations. A single battery can simultaneously engage four targets, and against each target a maximum of three missiles can be fired, thus increasing the hit probability.

In group mode, there would be a number of batteries, deployed over a wide area. The batteries would be linked to a group control centre (GCC). The Rajendra three-dimensional radar, indegenously developed by the DRDO (defence Research & Development Organisation) would provide a single integrated air picture to the group control centre, telling it not only the distance at which the enemy plane has been located but also its altitude. One GCC can command and control a maximum of eight Akash batteries at the same time. One GCC can also receive radar surveillance information from other sources, and be linked to higher echelons of air defence. Once the target, either an enemy aircraft or a missile, is detected the missile would align to the radar beams and virtually travel on those beams (guided by onboard precision-homing system) towards the target at three-and-a-half times the speed of sound.

The DRDO is reportedly toying with the idea of developing an integrated missile shield, which would be able to cover an area of at least 200 sq. km in the next five to six years. Akash, or the technologies developed for Akash, would be at the heart of the system. Its radars could be placed on a civil aircraft, much like an AWACS system, to provide early warning of incoming missiles.Current development include a possible increase in speed, maximum altitude and range.

The Akash, at 0.26 million $, is cheaper than Patriot, and with Bharat Dynamics willing to manufacture it, there should not be a problem of service support, something which the Americans, given their history of imposing sanctions, may not be able to guarantee.

The DRDO is hopeful of orders of at least 1,350 missiles from the Army and another 3,000 from the Air Force.



View large picture of the Akash on display

The Airforce's truck mounted version of the Akash :

View a large image of the Airforce Akash

Compiled from the following sources :

www.the-week.com...
www.bharat-rakshak.com...
www.protonriver.com...
www.globalsecurity.org...
www.fas.org...
timesofindia.indiatimes.com...
www.hindu.com...
www.outlookindia.com...
www.indiafirstfoundation.org...&tnews_m.htm
www.acig.org...
Free Image Hosting : Free Image Hosting

India has declared a no-first-use of nuclear weapons policy, which means in the event of a nuclear attack, we have to defend ourselves from a first attack before retaliating...and the Akash ensures it. Bordored by two nuclear nations and one an Islamic one that nevers to threaten India with its nuclear weapons, the Akash provides the vital upgrade to India's otherwise mediocre missile defence capabilities

[edit on 14-7-2005 by Stealth Spy]

Rajendra is a 3D phased-array surveillance/engagement radar developed by the Electronic Research & Development Establishment (ERDE). It is mounted on a modified BMP-1 chassis, and is capable of tracking 64 targets, engage 4 simultaneously and guide up to 12 missiles. The system is reportedly similar to the 30N6 (Flap-Lid B) engagement radar. Has air surveillance, multiple target tracking and multiple missile guidance functions via multi-channel monopulse. Features fully digital signal processing system with adaptive moving target indicator, coherent signal processing, FFTs, and variable pulse repetition frequency.



Mounted on a turntable at the front of a raised platform behind the driver's station, the multi-element antenna arrangement folds flat when the vehicle is in motion. Radar comprises surveillance antenna array with 4000 elements operating in the G/H-Band (4-8 GHz), engagement antenna array with 1000 elements operating in the I/J-Band (8-20 GHz), a 16-element IFF array and steering units. The surveillance radar range is 60 km against aircraft targets. A longer range version is being developed. The Army intends to use the Rajendra radar in the artillery locating role as well. An Akash battery consists of three missile launch vehicles (triple launcher on a modified BMP-1 chassis), a Rajendra fire control radar vehicle, a long-range surveillance radar vehicle and an armoured command vehicle.

sources :
www.drdo.com...
www.bharat-rakshak.com...

Thanks to ImageShack for Free Image Hosting

Citing an announcement by defense officials at a press conference, India’s The Statesman reports that India could establish an air and missile defense shield for a 200 square kilometer area within five or six years, quoting defense scientists said. Such a system could reportedly be duplicated to protect “big cities and strategic facilities like nuclear reactors and space launching sites against incoming missiles.” The interceptor is said to be a surface-to-air missile with a range of 80-85 km, and another interceptor with a range of about 20 km. The Akash SAM is mentioned as a possible interceptor for such a system; “Meanwhile, the Akash will have some anti-missile system capabilities.”

As for the radars for such a system, Mr M. Natarajan, DRDO chief and scientific advisor to the defense minister, said they might include a phased-array radar placed on an executive jet, such as the Brazilian Embrear. India has already purchased from Israel the Phalcon aircraft-mounted radar system

link

India not impressed with the PAC-3 that it was offered

India is not impressed with the PAC-3 missile unit offered with the two-tier US anti-missile defence system, on the grounds that it is slow for the very low reaction period in the sub-continent, and therefore, the Pentagon will demonstrate more advanced technologies when defence minister Pranab Mukherjee visits the country.

Besides more advanced units than PAC-3, the US is offering mid-air jamming systems

link


India to outpace the rest of Asia in development and deployment of missiles and missile shields

India plans to outpace Asia and may be rest of the world in missile research and missile shield development and deployment. According to media sources in India, India will invest about Rs. 12,000 crore in the next eight years to produce world-class missiles. According to Prahlada, Director, Hyderabad-based Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL), besides this investment, which will go to industry, another Rs. 1000, crore will be spent on maintaining the missiles and upgrading their technology.

India’s strategic interest is in having a defense alliance with United States to protect India with a missile defense umbrella or shield. The strategic missile defense is considered by Indian defense establishments are most critical. The recent US-India ten-year defense alliance will help India to achieve its goal. India and the United States will sign an Overall Umbrella agreement on Science and Technology during the forthcoming US visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. This will further enhance the possibilities of achieving the Indian goals.

link

India rules out accepting US missile defence system

India on Tuesday ruled out accepting a missile defence system from the United States.
"There is no question of accepting (a) missile shield from anyone," Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee told a news conference in reply to a question.

"What we are interested in is developing our own missile programme and we are doing that."

The United States said last June that it was willing to talk to India about supplying missile defence systems.

"We are willing to talk to India about missile defence. Missile defence is very expensive. So it is not something that India will enter into lightly," US assistant secretary of state for arms control, Stephen Rademaker, had told reporters on a visit to New Delhi.

India and the United States last week signed a groundbreaking 10-year plan for military cooperation during a visit to Washington by Mukherjee.

India, a Cold War ally of the Soviet Union, has recently moved closer to the United States.

link


India pursuing manipulation of ionosphere to fry electronics of incoming warheads

India’s Missile experts realized very well that Ballistic missiles are useless since most countries can manipulate the ionosphere to destroy the missile.........focused on frying all the electronics of any incoming ballistic missile that leave the earth’s atmosphere and then reenter the same on the other side of the world.........use electromagnetic waves, laser and low frequency arrays to create billions of watts on of energy in the ionosphere to fry all the electronics of an incoming missile.

link

India's Phalcon system to “Neutralize” Pakistani Missiles

Israel’s Phalcon system, previously sold to India, is capable of “neutralizing” Pakistan’s Shaheen II ballisic missile, according to a news report, which came just after Pakistan’s test of the Shaheen II on March 16.

link

US mum on THAAD

There was no word on whether the Israeli-American Arrow THAAD missile defense system, which India has previously sought, would also be approved, though Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee did express India's position that all technology restrictions should be dropped.

link

All that the US said on the request for the THAAD

We are willing to talk to India about missile defence. Missile defence is very expensive. So, it is not something that India will enter into lightly," visiting US assistant secretary of state for arms control, Stephen Rademaker, told reporters.

link

BTW : All these developments have alredy been covered in my other thread :
US offers Patriot(PAC-3) missiles to India Go check it out right away.

[edit on 14-7-2005 by Stealth Spy]

Thales offers latest missile detecting radars to India

French defence major, Thales has offered an across the board technology transfer to India in state-of-art radar knowhow to help New Delhi move speedily towards bridging the gaps in its air space coverage, specially in detecting low flying intrusions.

Undettered by the recent US efforts at political level to muscle into the lucrative Indian market, Thales with an almost 50 year presence in India has set up an Indian subsidiary and is also offering to set up joint ventures in the country.

Jean Paul Perrier, Chief Executive of the 13 billion Euro multi-European company, Thales said his company was now offering to India its latest three dimension Herakles multi- function radars for the Indian Navy's latest range of lethal indigenous P15 and P17 type frigates.

"The radars have the capability to detect incoming missiles, aircraft, helicopters as well as low-flying Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV'S) as well as guide missiles and other weapons to deal with these threats," Perrier told visiting Indian newsmen as the company unveiled the latest range of radars at Lnemore facility in the city suburbs.

The Herakles MFR-30 can perform in any weather conditions and have back scanning capability enabling it to release missiles to intercept incoming missiles threats, a capability which Indian armed forces lack so far.

Though US efforts at political level have caused some ripples in the French Defence industry, which is India's third largest arms trading partner, Perrier told PTI that Thales was not unduly worried over the American onslaught.

"French companies will not shy away from competition. All we want is a level playing field to let our weapons platform and systems speak for themseleves," he said.

"We were pitted against the Israelis, who could not match our systems and we are confident that we can outmatch any new bidders" Perrier said.

India was to procure 19 LLTR's under the deal with the rest to be manufactured by BEL under full technology transfer. Though there is no no official word from the Defence Ministry, high-level defence officials said the Israeli bid was rejected as it did not not meet Indian qualitative standards.

full...


India's Green pine radars

India has alredy bought the Green Pine radar form Israel :


The Elta Green Pine early warning and fire control radar for the Arrow system can detect targets at ranges up to about 500km and is able to track targets at speeds over 3,000m/s. The radar illuminates the target and guides the interceptor missile to within 4m of the target.

The Arrow Weapon System features a state-of-the-art EL/M2080 L-band radar, Green Pine, based on the decades of experience in developing technological solutions for early warning and fire control defense systems.
The Elta Electronic Industries subsidiary of IAI Electronic Group developed the Green Pine early warning and fire control radar for the Arrow system. The radar carries the designation EL/M-2090 and includes the trailer mounted radar and antenna array, the power generator, a cooling system and a radar control centre.

Green Pine is an electronically scanned, solid state, phased array radar operating at L-band in the range 500MHz to 1,000MHz, and was developed from the Elta Music phased array radar. The radar operates in search, detection, tracking and missile guidance modes simultaneously.

The radar has the following features:

Phased array L-band radar
Dual mode operation - early warning and fire control
Long range acquisition capability - several hundred kilometers
Simultaneous tracking of dozens of Tactical Ballistic Missiles (TBM)
Clear discrimination between TBMs, aircraft and other missiles
ECCM capability
Transportability

India has placed an order for the supply of two Elta Green Pine for use with India's air defence system against ballistic missiles. The first was delivered in 2001. The Green Pine Radar system is already deployed in India. The radar system, developed for Israel's Arrow anti-missile missile, is a transportable ground-based multimode solid-state phased array radar, capable of predicting impact points of incoming tactical ballistic missiles.

The Green Pine radar's strategic value along the Indian-Pakistani border is reportedly inestimable. "It covers all of Pakistan's military command centers and bases between Islamabad, the capital, and the Indian frontier. The system reportedly provides India with surveillance of Pakistan's nuclear centers and missile sites.

link

And India's 6 PHALCON systems which they will recieve in 2007 from Israel (read US tech) is said to have the ability to detect a golf ball in any part of Pakistani airspace and its range extends well into Afghastan too.

is it for sale for other friendly countries like the brahmos?

Originally posted by siddarthpanditv
is it for sale for other friendly countries like the brahmos?

The Akash is ‘for sale’—not only to the Indian armed forces but also to customers from abroad. Akash is the poor man’s Patriot.

This has been covered in my first post and also in this article : www.the-week.com...

At 0.2 million $, it has great bang for the buck and i hope it sells well

here is another look at the Akash Self Propelled Launcher System :
external image

[edit on 15-7-2005 by Stealth Spy]

Here's something to add :

A nuclear warhead could potentially give the missile the capability to destroy warheads from more potent ballistic missiles like ICBM's. The missile is described as being able to strike several targets simultaneously, which could mean either separate, independently targetable warheads, or a sufficient blast to destroy a number of them.

link
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View large picture of the missile
The Akash medium range air defence system consists of a 3D Central Acquisition Radar (CAR) for high resolution surveillance upto 180 km in range and 18 km in height, battery level Rajendra phased array radars to carry out target tracking, missile acquisition, guidance and launcher control, and mobile multirole launchers configured on either wheeled or tracked vehicles.


View large picture of the 3D Central Acquisition Radar (CAR) model

The pictured model is of the Radar Sensor Vehicle (RSV) of the 3D-CAR. The S-band radar is a multi-beam planar array which forms a Cosecant square beam in transmit and 6 stacked pencil beams in receive modes. The second TATRA vehicle of the system acts as the Data Center and houses two radar consoles, an IFF control panel, communication equipment and a rest room. A third TATRA vehicle acts as the power unit, with two 25 KVA, 3 phase 50 Hz, Diesel Gensets. The signal processor and data extractor are mounted with the RSV itself. The whole system takes less than 20 minutes to deploy and can be operated at high altitude regions of upto 4000 m above sea-level and temperatures between -20° to +55° C. Designed to operate in an ECM-intensive environment, the system also presents jamming analysis using omni channel and clutter/weather/ECM video maps.

credit to : www.acig.org...

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Check out these huge diagramatic representations :

The Army's Akash combat battery (showing the Battery Surveillance Radar (BSR) )

The Airforce's Akash weapon system . Note the wheeled schematics of the missiles and the Rajendra Phased Array Radar (PAR).

Operational Configuration of the Akash system. Note the Army configuration is based on tracked vehicles while the Air Force system will be based on wheeled vehicles.

Support Vehicles of the Akash weapon system



[edit on 15-7-2005 by Stealth Spy]

informative post.. good

related article : India’s case for a Limited Missile Defence >> www.ipcs.org...


another comprehensive timeline of Indian missile developments : www.nti.org...

[edit on 15-7-2005 by Stealth Spy]

good post

much better pace

and cheap

AKASH test fired 3 times in 17 minutes

Awesome post Stealth Spy! India is proving itself in becoming a true Superpower. Soon with the ICBM's expected within a few years, no one will dare touch her again.

It looks like a SA-6

Originally posted by chinawhite
It looks like a SA-6

That's because, it is based on the SA-6. I thought that was publically known???

publically known.?

read the one whole page posted by SS there is not one mention of the SA-6.

Find a article about the Akash and see if it even mentions the sa-6

Then its not based on the SA-6..
But it is probably based on something and not some "revolutionary" new tech..

The layout may be similar to the SA-6 because both launchers are mounted on modified BMP chassis. It is not developed from the SA-6.

The Airforce version is mounted on a more mobile TATA truck for local integrated air defense, which would take advantage of roads and infrastructure. The army BMP version would provide mobile SAM coverage for armored columns, battlefields, etc. necessating a more rugged, versatile tracked version.

Good post looks like a good weapon system and 200k Man thats a good price.

Is it just me or is Pakistan really lagging behind India in conventional weapons?

Pakistan doesn't have any indigenous conventional weapons industry..
That cruise missile of theirs is definitely not indigenous..

Originally posted by rajkhalsa2004
The layout may be similar to the SA-6 because both launchers are mounted on modified BMP chassis. It is not developed from the SA-6.

Not what its mounted on.

The missles.

It is clearly based on it.