Being road-mobile (easily transportable by road), Agni-V has an invaluable stealth capability which makes it extremely difficult for satellites to identify its launcher. The missile’s road mobility owes to its canisterisation developed by the Advanced Systems Laboratory (ASL) in Hyderabad. In India, canisterisation technology was originally developed for the country’s nuclear powered submarine INS Arihant, and the technology was subsequently adapted for ballistic missiles. A canister is essentially a hermetically sealed ‘envelope’ in which a missile could nestle for a very long time. When the missile is fired, the canister absorbs the enormous stresses engendered by the hundreds of tons of thrust that eject the 50-tonne missile. Agni V’s successful flight shows canisterisation technology has certainly come of age in India, which would enable canisterisation of all future land-based strategic missiles in the country, giving a huge boost to the capabilities of the Strategic Forces Command.

As Agni V can be launched from effectively anywhere in India, it gives the country the ability to hit back and maintain a second-strike capability even after facing a nuclear strike. Having rightly scorned chemical and biological weapons, it did not take New Delhi long to acknowledge that India's security imperatives call for nothing short of powerful long-range missiles. It must be one of the worst kept secrets that the three-stage solid fueled Agni V has been exclusively developed for an eastward launch rather than a westward one. Agni I (700 km) and Agni II (2000 km) were developed with a Pakistan-focus, while Agni III and IV were meant for neighbours like China, but their 3000 km range was not enough to reach several strategic sites in China. Agni V rectifies this. With an effective range of over 5000 km, Agni V brings all of China and parts of Europe within its strategic reach and forms a key component of India's nuclear deterrence capability.

The strategic value of such missiles in shielding the country from external pressures and coercive diplomacy cannot be overstated. With some not-so-friendly neighbours actively pursuing nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons development programmes, it is crucial for India to have a proven, deployable nuclear-capable missile of immense deterrence value like the Agni V. In international relations, ICBMs spell the currency of power. Nations try to acquire hard power as much as they strive for economic strength in their bid to build up national deterrence and project it effectively on the international stage. India, unfortunately, has been sluggish on this issue.

For an inordinately long time, there was confusion among policymakers about the country’s security imperatives which should define a minimum credible nuclear deterrence. In fact, in hindsight, building a nuclear arsenal seems to have been the easier part for New Delhi after India tested nuclear weapons in May 1998. The country urgently needed a delivery capability to bolster its doctrine of minimum but credible nuclear deterrence, and only a powerful long range missile like Agni V could lend credibility to India’s deterrence posture. Any deterrence posture which is not underlined by ICBMs merely burnishes India’s credentials as a wannabe regional power with sub-strategic deterrent capability.

As the country's first long range missile with Multiple Independently-Targeted Re-entry Vehicles (MIRV) capability, Agni V is a true game-changer, so to speak. The missile can carry several nuclear warheads simultaneously. MIRVed missile systems are remarkable since each warhead is ‘earmarked’ for a separate target and air defence systems would find shooting down MIRV targets much more difficult than intercepting single missiles. Decoy re-entry vehicles, used alongside actual MIRV warheads, further minimize the chances of their being intercepted before reaching their targets. MIRVs form a key dimension of India's declared 'no first use' (NFU) nuclear policy that anticipates a full-fledged nuclear strike by an enemy, which destroys most of the country’s nuclear arsenal. The assumption is that in the event of a first strike on India’s arsenals, the surviving missiles would retaliate with enough force to inflict unacceptable damage on the enemy. Given the logic that even a few MIRV-ed Agni Vs would be enough to define such a capability, it is plausible that New Delhi may move quickly to induct the fully developed Agni V into the Strategic Forces Command.

Although operationalising Agni V would have a huge impact on India’s security calculus, it need not disturb the singular premise on which India’s deterrence rests: atomic weapons are essentially political weapons for dissuading the country’s adversaries. The Narendra Modi government’s focus is evidently to project India’s image as a strong emerging player on the world scene. This can be seen from the openly proactive foreign policy that New Delhi has adopted. India’s efforts to strengthen bilateral ties with countries like the US and Israel are major examples of this new stance. However, New Delhi does not seem to have any intention either of moving away from its traditional stance of non-aggression. In other words, India wants to retain its NFU doctrine while augmenting its nuclear arsenal—a yellow brick road which will not disturb the contours of overall regional stability in south Asia. (IPA Service)