Deployment of India’s K 4 SLBM Missile With Range of 5000 km
There is no picture of K-4 SLBM available in public domain yet. Even the details of various trails held of this missile are very sketchy, if at all available. Nearly all activities related to this missile have been kept under wraps.
Things have been so secret that even the news of INS ARIHANT completing its first official operational deployment was only confirmed when PMO informed the press with PM welcoming and addressing the returning crew.
Now according to news reports certain officials have confirmed this K4 missile with official range of 5000km has gone through several rounds of secret underwater trials and now is operational onboard INS ARIHANT, India’s first nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine.
The recent test of Anti-satellite weapons (ASAT) Missile by India, for the first time, has also revealed India’s Secret K Missile Family associated with the development of India’s Underwater Submarine-launched ballistic missile.
It is now confirmed that Stage I and Stage II of the ASAT Missile have been borrowed from India’s longest ranged Submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM).
In 2012, DRDO had proposed using two solid rocket boosters from Agni-III/V for the development of a three-stage anti-satellite interceptor missile since only Agni ballistic missile series were proven and reliable and available at the disposal at that time.
However the project was not given clearance from than UPA government thus it led to utilization of more modern and advanced missile technology developed for the SLBM program when the ASAT project was finally given clearance nearly two years ago.
Use of two solid rocket boosters from K-4 has allowed defense analysts to study the missile for the first time. K-4 SLBM dimensions confirm that missile will have a range of over 5000 km with a lighter payload, K-4 will have a range of 3500 with a 2.5-tonne warhead. Next should be K5 with 10000 km SLBM and finally 15000 km SL ICBM.
