Last update:
Pakistan continues to see India as an existential threat and expands its nuclear arsenal, as well as deepening its military relations with China.
Some of India’s major systems include Agni-V ICBM, BrahMos supersonic cruise missile, earth chain ballistic missiles and Barak 8 Air Defense System. (PTI)
When the waves of Pakistan’s missiles and drones crashed against India’s multi -layered air defense systems during those important nights in May, they got with India’s air defense network, which widely neutralized the goals. With its excellent success, India not only demonstrated our strategic skills to the world, but the change in the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Pakistan’s drones and missiles shattered against a vision, which again defined how India rapidly arrives in a unstable neighborhood for national security. Operation marked a watershed moment: a successful testing of an indigenous ballistic missile defense ecosystem that has taken India a more secure and responsible future consequences to the old Cold War of Destruction (MAD) beyond the atomic principles.
Nuclear shadow in South Asia
For decades, strategic thinking about nuclear weapons and use dominated the argument of the Cold War of Crazy. A first use as a nation committed to nuclear policy, India, according to the definition, should be prepared to absorb the first strike before taking retaliation. However, the hostile environment facing India today is more complex and dangerous than any point since independence. Pakistan continues to see India as an existential threat and expands its nuclear arsenal, as well as deepening its military relations with China.
The 2025 assessment of the United States Defense Intelligence Agency suggests that Pakistan is modernizing its nuclear capabilities with adequate Chinese assistance, especially focusing on the battlefield atomic weapons designed to offset India’s traditional military superiority.
During the recent crisis, Pakistan’s ambassador to Russia clearly threatened the use of both the “traditional and nuclear” power of power, in response to any Indian military action. Such atomic blackmails represent exactly the same tremendous diplomacy designed to neutralize ballistic missile defense systems. Pakistan felt forced to call its National Command Authority – which oversees the country’s nuclear arsenal – during the crisis shows how nuclear weapons remain central for the strategic stones of Islamabad.
China’s role as the primary enabler of weapons of Pakistan’s mass destruction programs connects another layer of complexity. Foreign materials and technology supporting Pakistan’s WMD capabilities are mainly obtained from Chinese suppliers, often transmitted through intermediaries. This creates a dangerous convergence where the strategic nuclear weapons of Pakistan, capable of Chinese technology, pose an immediate threat to India’s security infrastructure.
China factor
The relationship between China and India has developed only from border disputes to a comprehensive rivalry, including nuclear capabilities. China’s nuclear modernization program, while instability in the United States, is a direct threat to India, given the geographical intimacy of the subcontinent. Most Chinese atomic-capable missiles cannot reach the US mainland, but they can easily attack Indian population centers.
China’s ballistic missile defense capabilities add urgency to India’s program. The People’s Republic of China has developed advanced systems including headquarters -19 and headquarters -29, which significantly enhances the capabilities of the People’s Liberation Army to protect the significant infrastructure. China’s BMD capabilities serve as a strong defensive shield against the nuclear-skill missile attacks, potentially neutralizing India’s preventive capacity.
This creates a dangerous imbalance, which gives China a significant damage-limit capacity and reduces the threshold for nuclear courageous. In the 21st century, the true preventer not only requires the promise of punishment, but also has the ability to exist.
There is a more serious threat to nuclear conflict than any other regional system globally dynamic between China, India and Pakistan. South Asia remains the only place in the world where the three nuclear-world nations sit in such closeness and are violently bound by the borders contesting elections.
Operation Sindoor: Where Atmmarbhar India won
Operation Sindoor served as a comprehensive recognition of India’s defense indigenization policies under the self -sufficient Bharat Vision. Operation demonstrated how indigenous systems performed in real fighter conditions, providing evidence of the real world of concept for India’s ballistic missile defense ecosystem. During the crisis, many indigenous components were included in the multi -level air defense system protecting India.
During the attack, an integrated grid directed a tier defense: inner layer, which includes the counter-anmand aerial system (C-UAS) and the Man-Portable Air Defense System (Manpads), neutralized a low-rose drone. The next layer of short-range missiles such as Spider and Pichora provided point defense for significant property, while medium-range, indigenously developed sky and Indo-Israel MRSAM system formed the spine of defense of the region. The outer layer, which consisting of the formidable S-400 ‘Sudarshan’ system and fights air patrolling by fighter jets, increases threats over long distances.
Operation demonstrated the maturity of India’s indigenous defense ecosystem. Developed by Bharat Electronics Limited and integrated with IACCs, the Integrated Anthemical Air Defense System provided accessible and integrated air status awareness for the lowest units of the army’s air defense.
The successful deployment of literature mutation and accurate strike capabilities demonstrated India’s progress in aggressive systems. Indigenous platforms carried out the strike without loss of Indian assets, underlining the monitoring, plan and effectiveness of distribution systems developed under Make in India Initiative.
DRDO’s ballistic missile defense program:
India’s ballistic missile defense program represents one of the most ambitious technical undertakings in the defense history of the country. The approved program in 2000 after the Kargil conflict has developed through systematic stages designed to address rapidly sophisticated hazards.
Phase I of BMD program is now completed and has been successfully deployed. This phase includes the Earth Air Defense (PAD) missile and advanced air defense (AAD) missile for the Earth Air Defense (PAD) for exo-vymandal interception. The system displays the ability to disrupt ballistic missiles with boundaries up to 2,000 kilometers, providing strong protection against medium-line hazards.
Phase II represents a quantum leap in recent successful testing capabilities. On July 24, 2024, DRDO successfully tested the Phase-II ballistic missile defense system, performing indigenous capacity to protect against 5,000 km square ballistic missiles.
This achievement keeps India in a special club of nations with advanced BMD capabilities. The two-phase solid-propeled ground-lounged systems include state-of-the-art indigenous technologies developed by DRDO.
Revolution in defense production
The change of defense sector of India under the self -reliant India initiative is nothing short of a revolutionary. Since 2014, defense production has increased by 174%, which has reached Rs 1.27 lakh crore in 2023-24. Defense export provides compelling evidence of this change. In 2014-15, from Rs 1,940 crore, exports increased to Rs 23,622 crore in 2024-25. The country now exports defense equipment to more than 85 countries, including sophisticated markets like the United States and France.
The establishment of defense industrial corridors in Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu has created centers of excellence for defense construction. The implementation of positive indigenization lists has provided guaranteed markets for domestic manufacturers, encouraging investment in research and development. More than 14,000 items have been indigenous under the Srijan initiative, including additional 3,000 items covered under positive indigenization lists. The defense production and export promotion policy aims to obtain Rs 1.75 lakh crore in defense construction by 2025, which demonstrates the government’s commitment to increase indigenous capabilities.
In addition, the success of self -reliant India in developing important defense technologies recognizes the ability of technical sovereignty in a rapid multiplener world. This achievement encourages investing in indigenous abilities rather than acknowledging permanent dependence on foreign suppliers, especially in other developing countries, especially in the global south.
Detention through defense
As Prime Minister Modi announced after Operation Sindoor, “India will not be afraid of nuclear threats”. And under his leadership, the development and progress of India’s defense system shows that India is ready to give it on it. The psychological impact of effective missile defense is clear. When India is entitled to reliable defensive abilities, Pakistan’s dependence on nuclear blackmail as a statecraft tool becomes very less effective. The knowledge that India can neutralize an important part of the dangers to come, changes strategic stones that should consider Pakistan or even China.
As India moves to complete defense autonomy by 2047, the ballistic missile defense program stands as a will, when the visionary leadership, technical ability and national will be converge in a safe and prosperous future service. Today, Iron Shield citizens protecting Bharat are delivered to Modi’s promise and it is the foundation of India’s emergence as a responsible global power.
Sohil Sinha is a deputy editor in News18. He writes on domestic policy and infrastructure projects as well as foreign affairs, geopolitics.
Sohil Sinha is a deputy editor in News18. He writes on domestic policy and infrastructure projects as well as foreign affairs, geopolitics.
See comments
- first published:
