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U.S., Indian and Japanese ships during joint exercise in 2009. (Department of Defense photo) |
WASHINGTON – India is developing nuclear torpedoes at a deep-water lake in land-locked Kyrgyzstan and intends to equip its navy with them because of the threat posed by Chinese warships in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea, informed regional sources have told Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.
That region is where India has a number of maritime drilling operations under way in cooperation with the Vietnamese – to Beijing's consternation, the sources confirm.
The informed sources say that India plans to use a torpedo testing center at Lake Issyk-Kul in Kara Kol province, some 160 miles southeast of Kyrgyzstan's capital, Bishkek. During the Soviet era, the Russian military used the 700-meter, or almost half-mile, deep Lake Issyk-Kul as a highly secret site to test torpedoes and their guidance systems.
"India is willing to develop the center to test all kinds of torpedoes such as heavy weight torpedoes and those having thermal navigation system," said William Selvamurthy, chief controller of India's Defense Research & Development Organization.
The lake facility was used during the communist era to test torpedoes of "highly sensitive prototype designs." This includes the Russian VA-111 Shkval, a supercavitating torpedo that is capable of speeds of more than 200 knots, or 230 miles per hour.
The VA-111 Shkval is rocket-propelled and is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, according to Russian sources.
The U.S. Navy is not known to have any defense to repel this type of torpedo, which is viewed as a relatively inexpensive option to countering U.S. superiority in aircraft carriers.
The VA-111 Shkval is produced at the Kyrgyz military plant at Dastan, a facility that sources say will enable India to equip its navy with nuclear torpedoes.
China is not known to have a similar nuclear-capable Shkval, although it has acquired a Russian export version of the missile.
The Shkval can be launched from torpedo tubes on the existing Chinese Shang class submarines which were first launched in 2002 with Russian development assistance.
In working with Kyrgyzstan, sources say that New Delhi is attempting to increase its influence throughout Central Asia through the various training programs and military production efforts which analysts say are indicative of an "alarming trend of the militarization of Central Asia."
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