Global Security Newswire

India's first ballistic-missile submarine is slated to be ready for use by 2012, a development that would enable New Delhi for the first time to field land-, air- and sea-based nuclear weapons, Indian navy head Adm. Nirmal Verma said yesterday (see GSN, Feb. 17).

The INS Arihant, also the South Asian nation's first indigenously developed submarine, last year began three years of planned sea trials.

"We have a declared policy of no-first-use but we have Arihant. It is there. We have a triad in place now, but we have to use it as effectively as possible. We will have Arihant going within two years and there is progress in the project, despite some hiccups," the Press Trust of India quoted Verma as saying.

"When it (Arihant) is commissioned and goes to sea it will be on deterrent patrol. The triad would be there when Arihant is commissioned," he added.

Despite some difficulties acquiring components for the vessel, "I think we will be within time and commission the vessel by 2012," he said (Press Trust of India/Yahoo!News, Dec. 2).