RIP Dr. Kalam

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015. MILTECHSTRATAN IS FILLING STEAM IN ITS BOILERS. WILL BE BACK THUNDERING SOON

Wishing a Happy New Year

REST IN PEACE GENERAL KALASHNIKOV!

General!

You may have left to the heavenly abode for your service to your Motherland.

But your name and design principle will be eternal.

Rest In Peace Sir!

BELATED BIRTHDAY GREETINGS GENERAL KALASHNIKOV!

Photograph Courtesy:  www.kremlin.ru.

Lieutenant General Mikhail Timofeyevich Kalashnikov – ‘father of the famous assault rifle AK-47’ – has celebrated his 94^th birthday (born in 1919) on 10^th November. miltechstratan conveys heartiest but terribly belated birthday greetings to Gen Kalashnikov.

If we ask a soldier from anywhere in this world, “In the battlefield which of yours you want to be trustworthy?” then he will say, “My Rifle!”

For a soldier who faces death at each second, his first and foremost concern is that his rifle should fire when he wants it to. A battle will not be fought in arenas or stadiums. It may be fought in dust, dirt, desert, snow, mud, swamps, ravines and what not? – Just name it!    

Photograph Courtesy: http://www.dodmedia.osd.mil/

General Kalashnikov’s AK-47 will work in all of the terrains mentioned above - That too without malfunction! Gen. Kalashnikov was a tank commander during ‘The Great Patriotic War (World War – II).’ Before becoming a tank commander he was a tank mechanic. Being injured in the battle, he had to be hospitalized for almost six months. There he determined to develop a firearm for the Soviet Union.

He developed a submachine gun with his local resources. Though that submachine gun was not accepted, it should have taken aback the Soviet authorities as, “A submachine gun from a tank mechanic!” His so far latent talent in designing firearms should have impressed them. Resultant of this, Kalashnikov was assigned to the Central Scientific-developmental Firing Range for Rifle Firearms of the Chief Artillery Directorate of the Red Army.

His tireless efforts resulted in the one of the greatest weapon that mankind ever developed – the Avtomat Kalashnikova – 47 (Automatic Kalashnikov rifle -1947) or simply AK-47. The design’s simplicity and ruggedness helps soldiers and terrorists fight with equal fervour in difficult terrains. There are records that even American soldiers throwing their new M-16 assault rifles and using the AK-47 grabbed from the dead Vietnamese soldiers. 

AK-47 is a benchmark for a weapon system or any system. It is a lesson for the scientists and designers all over the world - “If the system is capable to be used effectively by a lay man, then that designed system will remain in one form or the other for eternity.” Though AK-47 gave way to AKM and AK-74 (Kalashnikov’s own designs), the essence of AK-47 – its simplicity – was not compromised.

Later firearms AK-101 / AK-102, AK-103 / AK-104, AK-105, AK-12, RPK / RPK-74, PK / PKM / PKP, Saiga semi-automatic rifle (all had Kalashnikov’s inputs) have the Kalashnikov imprint on it. Especially the ‘Saiga-12’ - a 12-gauge shotgun - is an example that even a shotgun can have the design of an assault rifle.

Not only Russian firearms followed AK-47 design, many have followed. Wikipedia gives an elaborate list here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_weapons_influenced_by_the_Kalashnikov_design (I am not sure of correctness of the list!).

General Kalashnikov blames the Nazis for having forced him to enter rifle designing profession and for having designed the most proliferated rifle numbering to around 100 million copies worldwide. Many of these have been produced in local factories illicitly. Gen Kalashnikov saying, “I would have preferred to design agricultural machines rather than rifles,” shows the greatness of man who also writes poems and having written books for the Russian youth.

Gen Kalashnikov is an inspiration that “GREAT TALENTS CAN EMERGE FROM ANYWHERE.” Indian policy makers and authorities must also keep this in mind and look for talents with a broad mind.   

Miltechstran belatedly (terribly belated of course!) wishes Gen Kalashnikov – a man who loves machines - “A Happy Birthday General!”

     

MOURNING THE DEATH OF GENERAL VO NGUYEN GIAP…

At the time when we mourn the death of the Vietnamese general Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap - the greatest general of our times – we must not fail to learn the lesson from his life. What is that? It is the value of history. We disregard history as a boring subject to learn. But we don’t realize that history has tons of valuable lessons for us to learn.

What is the relation between History and General Vo Nguyen Giap? It is surprising to know that Vo Nguyen Giap was a history teacher. He proved to the world that military education is not a must for being a great general. Simply he had learnt the art of soldiering from history books. From being a history teacher, he transformed himself to a greatest general of our times. His tactics and strategies were not new, but which had been already followed by some of the great generals that mankind had ever seen.

Along with Ho Chin Minh, Gen. Giap raised an Army from the peasants. From Guerrilla warfare to conventional warfare, that army excelled. The army he raised and commanded has defeated France, USA and China. The respect that even Americans show towards Gen. Giap shows their high regard for him.

But do we Indians have learnt anything from history? The answer is a painful no. We are not learning from history and we are committing the same mistake again and again. Be it is China or Pakistan or the colonisation, we are not learning from history. In spite of many personal tragedies that Gen. Giap endured in his life, his life stands a lesson for us. If he was able to learn soldiering from history and if he was able to defeat armies that were superior to his army, then why can’t we.

The only issue is that we have to learn that how invaders and aggressors defeated and enslaved us. It is high time that we study, debate and learn that how the Chinese humiliated us in the 1962 war. Not only the 1962 debacle, we have an enviable history. Great strategists and tacticians like Chanakya, Chandragupta Maurya, Rajaraja Chola and Rajendra Chola have lived in our land. We have to religiously learn what they did.

Perhaps the problems we may face may be of a new type. But it does not mean that known solutions could not be applied for our problems.

Thank you for the invaluable lesson General!

Rest In Peace Sir!

THE SUCCESS STORY OF A NATION: AGNI-V AND BEYOND…

A nation with no effective defensive capability is a weak nation. In the age of nuclear warfare, not possessing a nuclear missile capability is a sin. It is equivalent to having no armed force for the defence of nation. Folks, who oppose Indian nuclear weapons and development programs, please back off. Read the following paragraph, which will be a learning for you… (Others also can read…) 

You can ask an individual to be a saint and practice peace among barbarians. But you cannot ask a nation to practice peace while we are living amidst nuclear armed barbaric and near barbaric nations. The nuclear weapons what we are seeing in our vicinity have the capability to even wipe out entire India off the world along with our culture, heritage and history. The only factor that deters a barbarian is his fear – a barbarian only respects what creates fear inside him. The Indian nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles are just deterrent weapons – a sort of fear factor for the enemy that he will also be wiped off if he tries to wipe India out. Why?

No nation in the world can envy of India’s geo-political situation. We have two neighbours China and Pakistan, both inimical in attitude towards India and have waged war against India. And like the icing of a cake, both, China and Pakistan are ‘nuclear weapons and nuclear weapon carrying delivery systems (missile)’ capable. Back in the sixties,

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army, having fought with the US troops in the Korean War fetched rich combat experience. 

China had a vast Soviet assistance program in terms of weapon technology and indigenous weapon design and production. 

The People’s Liberation Army became stronger and stronger. 

With the Cold War between USA and USSR in full swing, rounds and rounds of bouts were fought in the Indian subcontinent. 

As a result, Pakistan became an ally – a sort of blue eyed baby - for USA and hence became a member of SEATO and CENTO pacts. 

Pakistan had an active US support in terms of weapon systems sold at cheap prices (to an extent can be called as donation!).

China became nuclear capable in the year 1964 and given a chance Pakistan was also ready to attain nuclear capability.

·      So as there was no other option, India seen by the world as a peace pigeon was forced to arm with a thunder bolt – the nuclear weapon.

Thanks to our nuclear scientists, the nuclear bomb programme was kept (to an extent secretly) alive. The result of this bomb program was the first nuclear weapon test - called as Peaceful Nuclear Explosion (PNE) – a nuclear bomb exploded under the deserts of Rajasthan, in the year 1974. 

Now the Indian capability was just a nuclear weapon that could be dropped by an aircraft. But it was only in the 80s that India had a true air dropped nuclear weapon capability.

By this time, China was already with proven nuclear missile capability and was building missiles to hit Continental United States. Regarding India, Chinese missiles were capable to reach populations hubs of India had they been launched from Tibet.

The missile equation was still not in favour of India. If China had struck India with ballistic missile carrying nuclear weapons, our aircraft that were capable to drop nuclear bomb would have been destroyed in their bases due to the Chinese first strike. It would have been a knockout blow. There would have been no means to retaliate with nuclear weapons. So a means was required that can deliver retaliatory nuclear strikes. Such a means could only be a ballistic missile.

So a ballistic missile capability was an obvious requirement. How to develop a ballistic missile out from the sky?

India had an ace to play. It was the Indian Space Research Organisation – the organisation that had been nurtured by Dr. Vikram Sarabhai and later by Prof. Satish Dhawan.

Resultant of their visionary leaderships ISRO had already flown its first indigenous satellite launch vehicle called as SLV-3.

Flying the SLV-3 was a small step for the Indian space and missile adventures but it was a firm step for the nation (then an impoverished nation).

There is an interesting story for the name SLV-3. It is said that three or four designs for the satellite launch vehicle were made readied and sent for the approval of Prof. Dhawan. He selected the third design and hence SLV-3. The man behind the steering wheel of the SLV-3 project was our beloved former president Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam.

A ballistic missile is different from a satellite launch vehicle in only few aspects. A ballistic missile throws its payload – a nuclear weapon back to the earth but right on top of the enemy’s head. A satellite launch vehicle precisely throws the payload into the space so that it reaches a particular position.

Dr. Kalam was asked to take up the missile program at DRDO. Dr. Kalam brought his team from ISRO. In a westerner’s view the legendary team members can be called as henchmen and Dr. Kalam their boss. They ransacked DRDO’s functioning methodologies. They used their launch vehicle technologies & experiences and further built on the expertise that DRDO had developed already.

Phew! Two ballistic missiles were designed and successfully test flown. One was the Agni and the other was Prithvi. But the effort that went behind this process is not super human effort but an inhuman effort. Because, the effort that was put in by Dr. Kalam  and his team at DRDO is indescribable in words. Hearing their experiences about these efforts would automatically release tears – some because of the sympathy towards them and some because of the pride we get. 

[If you don’t shed tears while hearing this either you should be the enemy of India or a stone statue. This author was privileged to hear some of those experiences and needless to say has shed tears... a lot of them.]

In a sense Agni was not flown as a complete missile. It was a project taken as a technology demonstrator, whereas Prithvi was a deployable missile.

If it is so, will India launch a nuclear strike? Yes, India will. But India will not be the initiator. India has a clear cut nuclear weapon usage policy called as ‘No First Use.’

1. In the event of a nuclear war, India will not be the first nation to launch a nuclear strike. But when a nuclear strike is launched against India, India with nuclear weapons will retaliate in a very large scale.
2. India will hold only the required number of nuclear weapons for the punishment strike and will not paranoically stockpile nuclear weapons.
3. India will never launch a nuclear strike against a country that does not possess a nuclear weapon.

And let’s pray God that for India, such a situation will not arise to launch a nuclear strike. Suppose if God turns a deaf ear towards us or our prayers being masked by some louder noise, we may be requiring a weapon. And that weapon is Agni – V. Is Agni – V that ultimate weapon? No. Agni-V is surely not that ultimate weapon, but it is a first step in the path towards that weapon.

  

 How Agni-V will pave for that ultimate weapon? We will see shortly..