India-Pakistan rivalry have always been one of the deadly enmities history has seen and given the fact that both the countries are ‘nuclear superpowers’ – a tag only given to a select few, stakes always get high. Military comments and cross-comments, regular cross-border firings and ceasefire violations while both the countries are deep in their military footprint development, it won’t be an exception case if a war breaks out once again in this century given the history India and Pakistan have shared and bled. But a nuclear war! – That’s some deep problem the countries and the citizens will face if it ever happens. So let’s look at what Pakistan and India have in the name of nuclear weapon and warfare capability and how much one country can devastate the other if those ‘DO NOT TOUCH’ buttons of blood are pressed.
Pakistan’s Nuclear Origin
Pakistan’s nuclear journey began in the 1950s when the country’s leaders realized the importance of nuclear technology in terms of security and national defense. The Partition of India in 1947, the regular cross-border conflicts and uneasy relationships with India and Afghanistan etc. explains its motivation to become a nuclear power as part of its defence and energy strategies. Initially Pakistan followed a non-nuke weapon policy but favored the development of nuclear energy as a future prospect which helped in the establishment of Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) in 1956. Assured by the country’s policies, US agreed with Pakistan to help in their indigenous development by providing nuclear energy resources including a pool-type nuclear reactor worth $350,000. The scene was very peaceful with not very notable achievement until 1971 Bangladeshi Liberation War which proved a massive blow where they lost roughly 56,000 sq. miles to the newly state of Bangladesh and for a further setback, Pak failed to receive any materialistic support from the then allies, US and China. India’s ‘Smiling-Buddha’ test acted a wake-up call and using some 1967 gaseous centrifuge research, Pakistan dived in its nuclear weapon and pushed for the feasibility of highly enriched uranium (HEU) fissile material. On 11 March 1983 carried out its first subcritical testing of a working nuclear device – a cold test, codenamed Kirana-I. There were 24 more cold tests from 1983 to 1994. Finally on 28 May, 1998, Pakistan conducted its first nuclear test – a series of 5 simultaneous underground nuke test, each fission-boosted HEU device named ‘Chagai -I’.
India’s nuclear origin
The first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru pursued a policy of formally foregoing nuclear weapons while at the same time constructing a civilian nuclear energy program, and by extension the capability to make a nuclear bomb. India’s nuclear programme traces its origins to March 1944 and its three-stage efforts in technology were established by Homi Jehangir Bhabha when he founded the nuclear research centre, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research which works under the Department of Atomic Energy of Indian govt. India built its first research reactor in 1956 and its first plutonium reprocessing plant by 1964. With a further objective of deterring possible Chinese aggressions and keeping Pakistani conflicts in-line, India moved into a serious drive of nuclear research and development and finally in 1974, conducted the first nuclear test – codenamed ‘Smiling Buddha’ at Pokhran, Rajasthan using a Canadian-supplied CIRUS reactor. However, DRDO was denied for further development of active nuclear bombs but instead got the green-light for developing nuclear-warhead capable missiles. India deep-dived further after the next government shift and conducted ‘Operation Shakti’ – a series of nuclear tests in 1998 which resulted in unfortunate sanctions imposed by USA and Japan.
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A Comparison of India and Pakistan’s Nuclear Weapons
Ghaznavi vs Prithvi – The Ghaznavi is a short-range ballistic missile of Pakistan which has an operational range of 290-320km and is reportedly capable of carrying upto 700kg of conventional/nuclear warheads. It is an unguided missile and needs the aid of a Transporter Erector Launcher (TEL) for its launch. Some experts believe it too be highly influenced from the Chinese Dong-Feng 11 short-range ballistic missiles due to their very close features, specifications and design details. On the other hand, the Prithvi is a tactical surface-to-surface short range ballistic missile which has three variants – the Prithvi-I (Army version), Prithvi-II (Air Force version) and the Prithvi-III (Navy version). The Prithvi gets the setback at the fact that it is not able to carry a conventional warhead but a tactical nuke warhead, which have lesser yield and intensity than the generic ones. But it wins over in the features that it has inertial guidance navigation system in its flight path and has <50m CEP which proves its pretty good accuracy and precision. Prithvi-II is restricted to a 500kg payload while the other two variants can be equipped to a maximum of 1000kg.
Agni I vs Shaheen I – The Shaheen-I is a supersonic, land-based, short-medium range ballistic missile designed and developed by NESCOM and NDC of Pakistan while the Agni-I is a supersonic, land-based medium-range ballistic missile designed and developed by DRDO and BDL of India. Agni reigns supreme over the other by shadowing in its mass, size, and speed. The Agni-I has an oeprational range of 700-1200m and can carry a conventional/nuclear warheads of 1000-2500kg while the Shaheen-I gets dwarfed at a maximum range of 750km and a maximum warhead capcity of 1000kg. Agni-I has a mid-course Ring-Laser Gyro Inertial Navigation System augmented by GPS/satellite guidance and a terminal guidance system aided by Radar Scene Correlation, while the Shaheen-I is known to be asingle-shifted satellite navigated missile although the minute details are classified to the public. But the real deal comes at hitting the target as Agni-I has an accuracy of 25m CEP while sources say that Shaheen-I has a CEP of 200m, which means that the Agni-I can strike with that added lethality, accuracy and precision at the desired location.
Agni-II vs Shaheen IA – Agni-II is a land-based, mdeium-range ballistic missile and is the mainstay of the Indian missile-based strategic nuclear deterrence while the Shaheen-IA is an upgraded version of the Shaheen-I. Pakistan claims the IA to be of much more accurate weapon that its predecessor with scramjet speed capability and twice the range but experts believe its effective range to be not more than 1000km. But the Agni-II absolutely demolishes the Shaheen statistics with its staggering 2000-3500 km range and 30-40m CEP. It can reach all of Pakistan and even most parts of south-eastern China. The Agni-II features the same mid and terminal course guidance mechanism as the Agni-I but the Shahhen-IA sets itself apart at the part that it can deploy decoy warheads.
Agni-III vs Shaheen-II – The Shaheen-II is a Pakistani land-based, supersonic, medium-range ballistic missile while the Agni-II is an Indian intermediate-range ballistic missile. The Shaheen-II works on a two-stage solid-fuel rocket motor and is aided by GPS guided/Inertial Navigation System with a maximum range of 2500km and a conventional/nuclear warhead payload capacity of 1250kg (although no confirmation, it is certainly to be more than Shaheen-IA). The Shaheen also claims itself to be a potent threat for currently active anti-ballistic missile measures due to its evasive capabilities, and has better precision, accuracy and a CEP of <350m. The Agni-III on the other hand once again demolishes the stats by boasting a range of 3500-5500km, a maximum conventional/thermobaric/nuclear warhead payload capacity of 2500kg and a staggering 40m CEP accuracy. Forget Pakistan, this missile can reach deep into central China.
Shaheen-III vs Agni-IV/Agni-V – The Shaheen-III is currently the most advanced ballistic missile currently in active service with Pakistan. It is a land-based medium-range ballistic missile which has a range of 2750km which means it is capable of striking any location of mainland India. Its accuracy data, design details and guidance system specifications are all confidential and the Shaheen-III currently stands out as the single largest ballistic threat from Pakistan to India. Now retired senior commander of Pakistan Air Force, Air Marshal Shahid Latif even commented that India has lost its safe havens and Pak is not going to let go if they are hurt somehow.
Not going into the information war and sticking true to our military prowess, the Shaheen-III’s no match for our Agni-IV, a 4000km ranged intermediate ranged-ballistic missile and our Agni-V, the true to its word 8000km ballistic behemoth. These nuclear capable hellfires are capable of decoy warhead engagement, evasive manoeuvres and multiple warhead capacity. The Agni-IV features a <100m CEP while the Agni-V has an exceptional accuracy of <10m CEP – which means that once enemy SAM systems are dealt with, there’s no force which could stop these big bad boys to strike the desired target with absolutely monstrous accuracy and devastation.
Ra-ad I/Ra’ad II – The Ra’ad I is a Pakistani air-launched nuclear-capable cruise missile deployable from active Pakistani jets. This turbojet-powered subsonic missile can be used at an operational range of 350-500km with a warhead capacity of 450kg. The Ra’ad II is the improvised variant of its predecessor with a reported maximum range of 600km and is supposedly more precise and accurate. In this scenario, India has some impressive medium range and beyond-visual-range firepower in the name of the Israeli Python, the MBDA Meteor and the indigenous Astra but they lack the capability of carrying nuclear warheads.
Nuke Deployable Platforms –
The ground-based road-mobile ballistic missiles of both India and Pakistan need the aid of Transporter Erector Launcher (TEL) but apart from these, India’s Agnis have the additional advantage of being transported by Rail Mobile Launchers. On the aerial scene, the Mirage 2000 of Indian Air Force acts in the nuclear strike role. India had already maintained three-four nuclear strike squadrons of the Cold-War vintage, French-made Mirage 2000H and Jaguar IS/IB fighters. To tackle the old-age, India now has the 4+ generation, all-weather, ‘Omnirole’ Dassault Rafale – which possesses an exceptional capability of performing nuclear deterrence missions. Pakistan on the other hand is still heavily depended on its old Mirage-III nuclear squadrons. Pakistan’s original nuclear weapon carrying-capable F-16 fleet is of the older A and B variants and although US has helped Pakistan in the latest $450 million deal for the F-16 Block-52 upgrades, the country won’t risk using it for nuclear advantage. Despite the US always having a neutral helping hand towards both the countries in the military market, considering India’s position with the US and their strict stance against terrorism, Pakistan would face immediate backslash with major sanctions if those F-16s are used as nuclear deterrents against us. Experts say that although current fleet of Pakistan’s J-10C are not nuclear-capable, they maybe modified according to the govt’s needs to make them as nuclear deterrent fighters.
Pakistan is also on the weaker side in terms of naval possession as they neither have surface-ship launched nuke development nor they have completely indigenous destroyers/frigates with the capability of firing nukes and avoid foreign affairs. However in 2017, Pakistan released a limited-access video where they announced the first test of their nuclear-capable Babur-3 submarine-launched cruise missile (SLCM) from a submerged platform and what sources say is that the Babur-3 SLCM is being designed to be deployed on their Agosta 90B diesel-electric submarines which reportedly have been modified for SLCM launches. On the other hand, India stands tall with the INS Arihant (SSBN 80), the 6000 tonne lead ship of the nuclear-powered ballistic missile Arihant class submarines. India holds another advantage due to the possession of the nuclear-capable Sagarika (K-15), infact the K Missile Family, a family of submarine-launched ballistic missile to be fired from INS Arihant. So considering all these mobility scenarios, the current stage of deployment and the deployable platforms, the age-cutting and modernization issues and the multirole strengthening factors, India holds a consolidating upper hand over our neighbours.
Future Firepower of India’s nuclear fleet
India’s DRDO and BDL is currently in development of the Agni-VI, another nuclear warhead capable ICBM which is supposed to have an astounding range of 10000-12000km, a 3tonne warhead capacity and the ability to carry 10-11 Multiple Independently Targetable Re-entry Vehicle (MIRV). The project still awaits the Govt. green light for approval but DRDO has done a good half of the work on the most advanced upcoming missile of India. Nirbhay is a long-range, all-weather subsonic cruise missile which is able to carry nuclear warheads of 200-300kg at a range of upto 1500kg –currently in limited deployment but to be maximized in near future. India is also yet to get 2 remaining nuclear-powered ballistic missile Arihant class submarines while its successor is already in planning, codenamed the S5, Arihant’s successor and yet another nuclear powered ballistic missile submarines. The K4 SLBM is also undergoing testing which will be deployed in the Arihant and S5 submarines and is supposedly an equivalent counterpart to Agni-III. The in-development hypersonic Brahmos-II on whether it will be able to carry nuclear warheads is still unclear, but if yes, then it would be an insane leap in the nuclear warfare capabilities.
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Termination of Incoming Nukes
Pakistan may lose in terms of firepower, payload delivery and range but regardless of any factors, India is still the neighbouring country of India. With the constant threat looming over our nation, a major part of India is and will be still under desperate concern in case of a potential nuclear war. Pakistan isn’t likely to successfully hit the far eastern and southern regions but the instant neighbourhood of the Eastern and Northern regions are in no way safe hands. Infact, New Delhi being the administrative centre of this massive country lies in the range of every nuclear capable missile Pakistan holds. So are we prepared in destroying those incoming death bringers?
It comes with an astounding positive answer as we have some of the very best ballistic missile defense systems. The two-stage, exo-atmospheric anti-ballistic missile, Prithvi by BDL is capable of intercepting medium-range ballistic missiles and intermediate-range ballistic missiles and has the ability to track 200 targets at a range of 1500km and Mach 5 speed. The Advanced Air Defense (AAD) or better known as the Ashwin Ballistic Missile Interceptor, is an endo-atmospheric anti-ballistic missile which is currently in the induction phase, is capable of neutralizing incoming short-range ballistic missiles at a range of 200km, having a maximum speed of Mach 4.5. The currently-in-development Prthivi Defence Vehicle (PDV) is another big projects aimed at terminating bigger threats and is stated to replace the Prthivis. The Phase-2 Prithvi interceptor is targeting to neutralize 5000km ICBMs and has already undergone three successful tests till 2019. According to a report in DRDO website, the Prithvi Defense Vehicles Mark 2 can reportedly shoot down targets moving at 10km/s in orbits as high as 1200km. India also has the highly commended Barak-8, the jointly developed Indo-Israeli SAM. The Barak ER (Extended Range) variant is capable of intercepting ballistic missiles at a range of 150km and altitude of 30km. Along with the privilege of the ship-launched variants what our current Kolkata-class and Vishakhapatnam-class destroyers laud, this missile has been also integrated with the Medium Range Surface-to-Air Missile System (MRSAM), the land-configuration for Indian Army having a range of 70km and a maximum speed of Mach 3. India entered an elite club of nations with the capability to fire a Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) interceptor from a naval platform as the DRDO and Indian Navy successfully conducted a maiden flight of sea-based atmospheric interceptor missile off the coast of Odisha in the Bay of Bengal on April 21, 2023. Then there is the Akash SAM system which can be configured to intercept ballistic missiles. Finally comes the Russian S400 Triumf which is arguably one of the best surface-to-air interceptor missile systems and has been a consistent name alongside the Lockheed Martin MIM-104 Patriot and BAE THAAD. This expensive but competent system has an operational range of 400km and can single-handedly protect its airspace from rockets, cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and aircrafts. The DRDO is also in development of the XR-SAM, a long-range mobile ballistic missiles defense system which is supposed to bridge the gap between the MRSAM (70km) and the S-400 (400km).
India have this superior level of capable ballistic missile interceptor systems but it isn’t similar for Pakistan. Our neighbouring is void of any capable such interceptor systems. Instead the debate has led to lip-wars where Pakistan either comments of having “cost-effective solutions” for the nuke defense against us or “it is India’s goal of pushing forward the region into an arms race which will have long-lasting consequences” while tackling the questions of no missile defense systems development into replies that it is merely their “contribution of peace”. So all things taken care of, India has always got this headstart of winning the war as lack of any neutralizing systems will only result in Pakistan’s demolition if first blood is drawn by them.
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A Hypothetical Nuke War and Other Factors in Consideration
Active numbers – Both countries possess a comparable nuclear arsenal while keeping in mind that exact number of these weapons are never shown to public. However, it is a confirmed information that India (90-110) has lesser nuclear weapons than Pakistan (110-120). But Pak wins at what cost? The fearsome statistics of India’s nuclear capable missiles absolutely demolish our neighbour’s numbers.
The Fear of the Behemoths – India’s capability of deploying sheer numbers of SLBMs, the insane development Arihant programme has seen and the numbers Agni missiles show some of the horrifying statistics Pakistan fear to interfere with. Whatever their political experts/military generals might comment, the numbers don’t lie. Moreover being such a small country, India doesn’t even have to go to Agni IV/V to scare them off as our nuclear capable ballistic missiles gobbles up the entire area of Pakistan.
The Agni-V Standout – India has shown with its repetitive tests that the Agni-V, being a true-to-its-name ICBM is no joke and will continue to further strengthen the military capabilities. The 5500-8000km range is not be messed with and our neighbour knows that very well that it is to be left with as it is. With the Agni-V, India put itself into the elite club of USA, Russia, China, North Korea to portray some truly monstrous intercontinental warfare capabilities.
Doctrine – India is committed to a nuclear doctrine of ‘no first use’ of nuclear weapon usage but maintains the ‘credible minimum deterrence’ to use the same with total retaliation keeping national defence in interest once an enemy has acted first upon India. India also maintains the pledge of not-using nuke against a non-nuke state. But Pakistan’s stance and policies about ‘no-first use’ still lies very vague.
A Supposed War? – Starting from the Agni-II, all of India’s missiles can gobble up the entirety of Pakistan and their weak SAM systems won’t be able to intercept much. Pak’s HQ SAMs are just not enough to intercept the powerful missiles India possess. On the air, Rafales can penetrate their aerospace while our nuclear submarines will corner them from the Arabian Sea. From their side, apart from the Shaheen-III, Pak missiles cover up a a maximum of north and central India. Even if the Shaheen-III is deployed, our S400s, Baraks, S125s, Akash etc. are sure to be the one of the many capable interceptor systems to keep as low casualties as low. Although Pakistan would have received extensive damage throughout, an Indo-Pak nuclear fallout will also create a great deal of mishap among the general citizens of India including some unfortunate, widespread causalities likely in northern and western parts of India.
Weapons Usage – Even if a war between India and Pakistan extends towards nuclear weapons deployment, regardless of the factor that Pakistan has a greater stockpile of nukes according to official sources, the war will be over even before the effect of a dozen weapons. The devastating effect that on society, finance, infrastructure, jobs, politics and geopolitics etc. that will occur will be beyond repairs for the one to strike first.
Foreign support – In a case of Indo-Pak nuclear fallout, considering the situation where India maintained the ‘no-first use’ policy and Pakistan strikes first, India is supposed to get more foreign aid and support than Pakistan because of the extensive good relations India has built with most notable superpowers of India. Not denying the fact that all of them will try to talk it out in a peaceful manner, India will get monetary/military/humanitarian support from most of them in those trying times where India became a victim first. In the neighbouring states, only China might side with Pakistan while Afghanistan is likely to back India. Firstly, Pakistan will be imposed of all forms of sanctions and would be totally cornered. Israel, France, Japan, Australia etc. are likely to side with India while US and Russia, although enemies, do see India as a friend in them, so they are likely to tread cautiously depending on how the other one acts or supports. But whatever might be the cases of support and backlash both the sides, one thing is for sure that no category of foreign support would be able to lift up the absolute financial breakdown India and Pakistan would face – a nuclear fallout in times like these would result in a breakdown far worse than US’s Great Depression of 1929.
So it lies in the best of interests of all that India keeps on increasing its nuclear capability but never gets into this hellish bloodbath in the name of a nuclear war.
