Quote:By Gaurav Singh



Dec. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Larsen & Toubro Ltd., India’s largest engineering company, aims to win 60 billion rupees ($1.3 billion) of orders a year building nuclear reactors by 2015 as a global shift to cleaner energy spurs demand for atomic plants.



“The first orders for the foreign reactors will start coming in 2011,” M.V. Kotwal, Larsen’s senior vice president, said in an interview in New Delhi late yesterday. “We can cater to the needs for critical equipment for any of these technologies, whether Russian, French or American.”



Atomic energy companies led by Areva SA and GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy are flocking to India after a three-decade global ban on nuclear trade was lifted last year. Global spending on new reactors may reach as much as $1.05 trillion by 2030, according to management consultants Capgemini, as fossil-fuel generators are retired and governments seek carbon-emission cuts.



“Larsen is best prepared among Indian companies to take advantage of opportunities that will emerge in the nuclear space,” Abhineet Anand, an analyst at Antique Stock Broking Ltd., said by telephone today. “Nuclear power will play a very important role and Larsen is doing its homework before getting revenue by tying up with global nuclear equipment makers.”



Indian power equipment makers Larsen and state-run Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd. are seeking technology and manufacturing ventures with overseas companies as India increases nuclear power generation capacity.



Hitachi, Westinghouse



The engineering company signed preliminary agreements with Wilmington, North Carolina-based GE Hitachi, Monroeville, Pennsylvania-based Westinghouse Electric Co., a subsidiary of Tokyo’s Toshiba Corp., and Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., based in Mississauga, this year.



Larsen rose 1.9 percent to 1,687.65 rupees in Mumbai trading. The company’s share has more than doubled this year, outpacing a 78 percent increase in the benchmark Sensitive Index.



Mumbai-based Larsen has the capacity to build four nuclear reactors of about 1,000 megawatts each at a time and can increase capability as it secures orders, Kotwal said.



Larsen, which earned 37.9 billion rupees on sales of 401.9 billion rupees in the year ended March, formed a joint venture with state-owned Nuclear Power Corp. of India for a forging plant to produce components for energy projects, including atomic power plants.



India may produce 60,000 megawatts of nuclear energy by 2030, Shyam Saran, special envoy to the prime minister, said Jan. 8. The South Asian nation, which currently has 4,120 megawatts of atomic power capacity, has identified two sites for U.S. companies to build plants and one for Paris-based Areva, the world’s biggest maker of nuclear reactors.



The number of nuclear power reactors may potentially increase 30 percent by 2020, driven by India and China, the World Nuclear Association estimates. Fifty plants are being built worldwide, almost double the number under construction in 2004, according to the association in London.



To contact the reporter on this story: Gaurav Singh in New Delhi at gsingh31@bloomberg.net.

Quote:10 December 2009



New Delhi: A US nuclear trade mission of around 50 companies, currently doing the rounds in the Indian capital and dropping loud hints of sourcing nuclear engineering products from India, may be feeling the New Delhi chill a bit more harsher than others. With NPT zealots in the Obama administration ensuring that the 123 Agreement takes its time to materialise, New Delhi may have atlast decided to shed some of its forced cordiality to all things American and not rollout the red carpet.



Ostensibly, the delegation has made the trip to try and understand the ''policy challenges'' that stand between them and the Indian market. This would have involved meeting officials in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) and assorted ministers in the central government.



An Indian administration that has seen all the bonhomie between the respective governments gradually wither away, even as NPT-hawks and assorted cold war-era warriors begin to assert greater authority within the policy making confines of the US administration, may have decided to splash some cold water on the hype that Americans routinely generate with all their endeavours.



In this case, even as India was signing a path-breaking civil nuclear agreement with Russia, the American companies were painting rainbows in the sky as to how they would outsource a lot of nuclear engineering products from India once they had the contracts in their pockets.



So far, the American delegation has yet to receive appointments with any meaningful entity, either in the prime minister's office or elsewhere in the government. The ostensible reason being trotted out is that the delegation is composed of members who are too 'junior' to be received at higher levels of the government.



It is also being given to understand that the American companies may have landed in New Delhi without the permission of their own government.



[color="#800080"]So far, it's been the US that has been trying to convince India to sign on all the details that American domestic and national interests demand, and has been citing acceptances of such conditions by other countries. It may now well be India's turn to cite its agreement with Russia and see what the arm chair warriors at Foggy Bottoms make of it.[/color]



The [color="#800080"]Indo-Russian agreement moves quite a few policy steps beyond the 123 Agreement, in that Russia will neither stop supplying fuel to nuclear plants in India, and neither will it take back its equipment even if the pact falls through at any stage. India will also have nuclear fuel enrichment and reprocessing rights and shall also be allowed core technology transfer.[/color]



The negotiations with the United States on reprocessing were in the ''last stage'' when the summit meet Barack Obama and Manmohan Singh took place in Washington last month, and the impression created was that it was only the legal text that needed to be finalised. Close onto a month thereafter, no forward movement is yet in evidence.



Russia has already secured Indian acceptance to set up an additional 12-14 reactors in the country. French giant Areva also has approval to start operations in India and may be awaiting a state visit from French president Nicolas Sarkozy to secure a larger order.



The Canadians are also in the running, and a very warm visit to India by Canadian premier, Stephen Harper, has also put it firmly in the running to secure a large contract. Ironically, the people who have made it all possible, the Americans, are the ones who are now getting to feel the chill.

Quote: With NPT zealots in the Obama administration ensuring that the 123 Agreement takes its time to materialise, New Delhi may have atlast decided to shed some of its forced cordiality to all things American and not rollout the red carpet.

Quote:K Santhanam & Ashok Parthasarathi: Pokhran-II: an H-bomb disaster



The failure of India?s sole H-bomb is the latest in DAE and BARC?s long history of being economical with the truth.



K Santhanam & Ashok Parthasarathi / New Delhi December 11, 2009, 0:13 IST



The failure of India’s sole H-bomb is the latest in DAE and BARC’s long history of being economical with the truth.



Several articles have been written in recent weeks, on the Pokhran tests of 1998 and, in the wake of disclosures about the failure of the test of the thermo-nuclear (TN, or hydrogen bomb) device, the need for further testing. Some of these articles have argued that technical information published by the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) and the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) does not show that Pokhran-II (or P-2) was unsuccessful; and that there are compelling arguments against resuming H-bomb testing, even if the TN test was a failure.



BARC is quoted as saying that the TN device’s yield was “consistent with” its original estimate of 50 + 10 kilotons (kT) for the two main tests conducted on May 11, 1998, viz. a 45 kT (TN) device and a 15 kT A-bomb which were exploded simultaneously.



BARC has also argued that it employed different techniques to estimate the device yield (power output), and that the post-shot Radio-Chemical Method (RCM) used to arrive at the above figure was considered the most accurate for measuring device yields. However, according to the former director of BARC’s radio-chemistry division (RCD), he had measured the yield of India’s first nuclear device in 1974 (P1) using the Mass Spectrometry (MS) method, internationally accepted as even more accurate than the officially tom-tommed RCM. It is also far less sensitive to the major weakness of the RCM method: If a sample is taken even slightly off the geometric centre of the core cavity (the heart of the nuclear weapon), the yield estimate can be way out from correct value. That was the principal reason why Raja Ramanna, the “Father of our Nuclear Weapon Parogramme”, insisted on using the MS method for yield estimation in 1974. If the MS method was used in P-2 also, the results should be made public. If it was not used, why not?



Both the A-bomb “trigger” and the main H-bomb produce neutrons. However, H-bombs produce more neutrons than A-bombs. This leads to considerably larger amounts of two artificially created radio-isotopes — Manganese 54 and Sodium 22 — being produced by the TN device than the A-bomb. This higher ratio of Manganese 54 to Sodium 22 in the H-bomb explosion gives an “idea” of the A- vs H-bomb/device yields (no numbers, only an “idea”), it has been argued. The absolute values of this higher ratio have been withheld for “obvious” sensitivity reasons, says BARC conveniently. However, a “fizzled” TN device also produces “copious amounts” of these isotopes. Moreover, the mere presence of these isotopes is not a quantitative yield measure; at best it is only a qualitative indicator.



The source of many of the assertions is an article in the July 1999 issue of BARC’s in-house newsletter — not a peer-reviewed scientific journal. How many people in India, let alone internationally, are even aware of such a newsletter, or read it, even sporadically?



But there are more serious problems with BARC’s assertions. Crucially, BARC claims the A-bomb yield was only 15 kT when its collaborator in P-2, the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), and leading nuclear weapons laboratories worldwide, have rated it at 20 – 25 kT. Moreover, the hi-tech ARC — which is totally independent of both BARC and DRDO — with its very large seismic array that is 10-15 per cent more sensitive and accurate than DRDO’s, (and far superior to the 30-year-old BARC array at Gauribidanur in Karnataka) measured all seismic signals from all P-2 tests. The highly sophisticated measurements and calculations of ARC scientists indicated a maximum TN device yield at only 20 kT. It is no wonder that the failed TN device has not been weaponised, 11 years after P-2, and India is absolutely naked today before China’s H-bombs!



A 15 kT device could not have produced a 25-metre diameter crater as had occurred. What’s more interesting is that, what BARC claims was a 45 kT H-bomb — that is supposedly thrice as powerful — produced no crater at all! Commonsensically, a genuine 45 kT TN device should have produced a gigantic crater. To get around this difficulty, BARC argues that if the shaft (in which the TN device is placed) is deep “enough”, there will only be upheaval within the shaft, but no crater will be created. However, the shaft containing the TN device was only 20 metres deeper than the shaft for the A-bomb. Such a small difference cannot “explain” the fact that there was no crater at all.



Had the TN test really worked, the 120-metre deep shaft at the bottom of which the TN device was placed would have been totally destroyed, and its deepest portions even vapourised. There would, in addition, have been enormous surface damage. Most tellingly, the massive two-tonne, eight-meter high tripod (“A-frame”) astride the shaft’s mouth with a complex set of winches and pullies connected to a lift-like container to lower and raise personnel, equipment and materials to and from the shaft’s bottom, would have been totally destroyed. But the A-frame was totally intact after the TN device test (see picture). How can this hard, visual evidence be ignored?



Some experts have argued that the damage that even a 25 kT A-bomb can cause to enemy city targets with large populations would be unacceptable to any adversary, and so, such A-bombs would be enough for us to deter even China, which has already deployed 200 H- bombs of 3.3-5 megaton yields each — 200 times more powerful than what we have. Around 50 of these are in Tibet targeting us. It is astonishing to see the same people who argued vociferously for decades that H-bombs were central to our Credible Minimum Deterrent, suddenly do a volte-face and say A-bombs (which, for technical reasons, cannot be made to have yields more than 80 kT) are enough! Why?



China would be undeterred by our A-bomb arsenal of the yields indicated above. So we reiterate our considered view — shared by the majority of our nuclear scientists, strategic analysts and, above all, our military — that a solely A-bomb arsenal is inadequate as a deterrent against China. Otherwise, why did four prime ministers want a TN device (H-bomb) and why did the then Prime Minister Vajpayee and his NSA Brajesh Mishra direct and insist with the BARC-DRDO leadership — Kalam, Chidambaram, Santhanam and Kakodkar — that at least one P-2 test must be of a TN device?



The current controversy over the failure of India’s sole H-bomb test of P-2 is only the latest case in a long history of DAE and BARC being “highly economical” with the truth, and using such “economy” to protect themselves from public criticism of major failures in large numbers of programmes and projects. Failures have been screened from the public gaze on unwarranted secrecy grounds; worse, DAE has made a huge effort to hide the facts from not only successive Parliaments and the people but even from successive governments, causing incalculable damage to our nuclear weapon and power programmes and to national security.



K Santhanam is a former chief adviser (Technologies), DRDO, and programme director, Pokhran II

Ashok Parthasarathi is a former S&T adviser to late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Secretary of several scientific departments

Quote:Karan Thapar / CNN-IBN



Sun, Dec 13, 2009 at 20:23,

After weeks of doubt, it is time to ask the question: how credible is India's thermonuclear deterrent? That is the key issue Karan Thapar discussed in this week's Devil's Advocate with the former chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, Dr Anil Kakodkar.



Karan Thapar: Dr Kakodkar, four leading scientists--Dr K Santhanam, Dr P K Iyengar, Dr H Sethna and Dr A N Prasad--have raised serious doubts about India's thermonuclear tests of 1998.



Dr Santhanam says we have hard evidence on a purely factual basis that not only was the yield of the thermonuclear device far below the design production, but that it actually failed. Do you have a problem on your hands?



Anil Kakodkar: No, I think this is a totally erroneous conclusion. The yield of thermonuclear tests was verified, not by one method but several redundant methods based on different principles, done by different groups. These have been reviewed in detail and in fact I had described the tests in 1998 as perfect and I stand by that.



Karan Thapar: I am glad that you began talking by the yield because both Dr Santhanam and Dr Iyenger have questioned the yield of the thermonuclear tests.



Dr Santhanam says that the DRDO seismic instruments measured the yield as something between 20-25 kilotonnes which is hugely different from the claim put out by the Atomic Energy Commission that it was 45 kilotonnes. How confident are you of the 45-kilotonne yield?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, let me first of all say that that DAE and DRDO we both work together as a team. DRDO did deploy some instruments for measurements but the fact is that the seismic instruments did not work. I myself had reviewed all the results immediately after the tests and we concluded that the instruments did not work.



Karan Thapar: Dr Santhanam says that the Bhabha Atomic Energy Center accepted the DRDO's instruments and their estimation for the yield of their fission bomb but not for the fusion or the thermonuclear. He says how can it be that the instruments worked in one case and not the others?



Anil Kakodkar: Well that's not true because the instrument measure and the ground motion at the place where the instrument is located - we had to separate out the information which was coming out from the thermonuclear and which was coming from the fission test. So the point that I am making is that the seismic instruments did not work.



So there is no question of the yield of the fission test being right and the thermonuclear test being wrong because no conclusion can be drawn from those instruments either ways.



Karan Thapar: But do you have proof that the yield of the thermonuclear test was 45 kilotonnes?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes. In fact we have within limits of what can be said and I must make it clear here that no country has given so much scientific details on their tests as we have given and this we have published with the maximum possible clarity.



Karan Thapar: The problem is that even in 1998, foreign monitors questioned the yield of the thermonuclear tests. At that time, Indian doubts were only expressed in private. Now, Indian doubts have burst out into the open and they are being heard in public.



Does it not worry you that these doubts continue--now both abroad and at home--and that they have continued for 11 years?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, it's unfortunate but it doesn't worry me because facts are facts and there is no question of getting worried about this. The point is that the measurements which have been done, they have been done--as I mentioned earlier--by different groups.



People who carry out the measurements on seismic instruments is a different group. People who carry out the measurements on radiochemical instruments are a different group. There are other methods that you can use, for example the simulation of ground motion. That's another group and all these groups have come to their own conclusions which match with each other.



Karan Thapar: And all these five or six different ways of measuring the yield have come to the conclusion that the yield was 45 kilotonnes for the thermonuclear device?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right.



Karan Thapar: So in your mind there is no doubt about it whatsoever?



Anil Kakodkar: Absolutely not.



Karan Thapar: Now, Dr Santhanam, in addition to disputing the yield, has other reasons to believe that the thermonuclear device failed. He said that given that the fission device, which produced a yield of around 25 kilotonnes, created a crater of 25 metres in diameter then the fusion bomb which produced a yield of 45 kilotonnes should have created a crater of around 70 metres in diameter. He says that that didn't happen and there was in fact no crater at all.



Anil Kakodkar: That's a layman’s way of looking at it. The fact of the matter is the fission device yield was 15 kilotonnes, not 25 kilotonnes.



Karan Thapar: So he's wrong in saying that it was 25 kilotonnes?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right and secondly although the two devices were about 1.5 kilometers apart, the geology within that distance has changed quite a bit partly because of the layers that exist and their slopes but more importantly because their depths have been different.



So the placement of the device of the fission kind is in one kind of medium and the placement of the device of the thermonuclear kind is in another medium.



Karan Thapar: So in fact what you are saying is that Dr Santhanam is making two mistakes and possibly making them deliberately.



First of all he's exaggerating the yield of the fission device and secondly he is completely ignoring the fact that the geology of the placement of the fusion was very different.



Anil Kakodkar: That's right



Karan Thapar: And both of those have led him to an erroneous conclusion?



Anil Kakodkar: And in fact we have gone through detailed simulation. For example in simulation you can locate the thermonuclear device where the fission device was placed and you can locate the fission device where the thermonuclear device was placed. And you get a much bigger crater now because the yield is higher.



Karan Thapar: This is a very important point that you are making.



Anil Kakodkar: Yes. And the fission device which is now placed in the thermo-heat pit now produces much less ground displacement.



Karan Thapar: So if in simulation you place the thermonuclear device where the fission device was placed, you would get a much bigger crater--much closer to the 70 meters in diameter that Dr Santhanam would like to see.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, I don't remember how much it was but this is actually true. This has been verified by calculations



Karan Thapar: Dr Santhanam has yet one more reason for believing that the thermonuclear device failed. He says if it had succeeded, both the shaft and the a-frame would have been totally destroyed. Instead, writing in ‘The Hindu’, he says the shaft remained totally undamaged and as for the a-frame, he says, it remained completely intact.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, I think you must understand the phenomena of ground motion when a nuclear test takes place. Depending on the depth of burial and of course the medium in which it is buried, you could get several manifestations on the surface.



You could get a crater and there are different kinds of craters that one could see. You can just get a mound - the ground rises and remains there and on the other extreme it can vent out. So in case of the thermonuclear device, the placement was in hard rock—granite--and with the depth and the yield for 45 kilotonnes, one expects only a mound to rise, which is what happened.



Karan Thapar: And not a crater?



Anil Kakodkar: And not a crater.



Karan Thapar: What about the shaft and the a-frame?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, if the ground simply rises - and in fact you can see a lot of fracture on the ground around that for a fairly large distance so it's clear that there was a cracking of the ground for a fairly large distance, but the phenomena was that it rises as a mound, then comes down slightly but it still remains a mound. So there is no question of damage to the a-frame.



Karan Thapar: So in fact the fact that the shaft and the a-frame survived intact can be quite easily explained. It's not proof that the thermonuclear device failed?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes, yes, it has been seen in detailed simulations and by the way I must tell you that this simulation, which I am telling you about, is done on codes which have been actually verified in 3-D situations on the test data available from abroad and validated and these have been published in international journals.



Karan Thapar: So you have had multiple validations of these.



Anil Kakodkar: That's right.



Karan Thapar: Clearly you are dismissive of Dr Santhanam's doubts. Now let me quote to you what one of your predecessors, former chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission Dr P K Iyenger, said in a statement he issued on September 24, 2009. He says: "The recent revelations by Dr Santhanam are the clincher. He was one of the four leaders associated with Pokhran II, the team leader from the DRDO side, and he must certainly have known many of the details, particularly with regard to the seismic measurements. If he says that the yield was much lower than projected, that there was virtually no crater formed, then there is considerable justification for reasonable doubt regarding the credibility of the thermonuclear test."



Does it worry you that your predecessors seem to disagree with you but agree with Dr Santhanam?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, first of all I respect everybody. I respect Dr Iyenger, I respect Dr Santhanam, but the fact is that Dr Iyenger was nowhere involved in the 1998 tests. He was of course a key figure in the 1974 tests. Also, the fact is that before the 1990 and 1998 tests, all work was done under cover - we were not in the open - and we required a lot of logistical support and all and that all was being provided by DRDO.



But things were still being done on a need to know basis. So to assume that Dr Santhanam knew everything is not true.



Karan Thapar: You are making two important points. One you are saying that the DRDO and Dr Santhanam did not know everything - the fact that he was DRDO team leader does not mean that he knew everything that was happening.



Anil Kakodkar: He knew everything within his realm of responsibility.



Karan Thapar: Everything that he needed to know but not more?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right.



Karan Thapar: You are also saying that Dr Iyenger isn't fully in the picture and therefore his opinion is not necessarily valid.



Anil Kakodkar: He is not in the picture as far as the 1998 tests are concerned.



Karan Thapar: So he doesn't really know about the 1998 tests.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, he knows only as much as has been published and nothing more.



Karan Thapar: His comment therefore is not backed by knowledge and insight.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, that's for you to judge.



Karan Thapar: Let's purse the credibility and the doubts surrounding India's thermonuclear deterrent in a somewhat different way.



Dr Santhanam says that these doubts were formally raised by the DRDO with the Government as far back as in 1998 itself. And in a meeting arranged by the then National Security Advisor Brajesh Mishra, they were brushed aside in a manner which Dr Santhanam compares to a sort of frivolous voice vote.



Anil Kakodkar: Immediately after the tests, we carried out a review with both teams present: BARC team as well as the DRDO team.



We looked at the measurements done by the BARC team and we looked at the measurements done by the DRDO team and I told you the conclusions and on the basis of that review, it was clear that what basis we could go by and what conclusions we could draw.



Now, the question is that if the instruments didn't work, where is the question of going by any assertions which are based on ... what is the basis of any assertions?



Karan Thapar: So when Dr Santhanam says that the DRDO's doubts were brushed aside lightly, then that is wrong. They were considered and they were evaluated?



Anil Kakodkar: I think yes. I think they were evaluated, that's right.



Karan Thapar: And they were dismissed because they were found to be faulty. They were not just brushed aside.



Anil Kakodkar: No, they were not brushed aside.



Karan Thapar: In an article that Dr Santhanam has written recently on November 15, 2009 for ‘The Tribune’, he says: The Department of Atomic Energy--the department to which you were ex-officio secretary--is in fact hiding facts from successive Indian governments, from Parliament and from Indian people. How do you respond to that accusation?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, as I said earlier, we are perhaps unique in giving out the maximum information and that too very promptly - immediately after the tests.



Karan Thapar: There is no hiding?



Anil Kakodkar: There is no hiding. There are limits to what can be revealed. These have been discussed in the Atomic Energy Commission in not one but four meetings after the 1998 tests. And there are people who are knowledgeable. Dr Ramanna was a member of the commission at that time. So where is the hiding?



Karan Thapar: Let me put it like this: you may not be hiding facts as Dr Santhanam alleges but a controversy has arisen and it grows and it won't disappear. Many people believe that the only way to resolve this issue is to now organise a peer group of scientists to review the results of the 1998 thermonuclear tests. Would you agree?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, let me first repeat what I said earlier. There are methods through which one has assessed the test results. Each one of them is a specialisation in itself and there are different groups, not just individuals but groups, which have looked at these. The fact is that this is also on a need-to-know basis. Now, if all of them come to conclusions which are by and large similar, what other things can you do in terms of forming a peer group of scientists?



Karan Thapar: So there is no need for a peer group review yet again?



Anil Kakodkar: That's what I would say.



Karan Thapar: The matter is conclusively sorted out?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right. And this has been after this controversy has been raised and it was again reviewed by the Atomic Energy Commission, we had gone through the records and the commission has come out with an authoritative statement.



Karan Thapar: Let me put to you two or three critical issues. Given the fact that you have concluded several reviews, including one recently after the doubts were raised, the doubts continue. And given that there are doubts about India's one and only thermonuclear test do we need more tests?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, I would say no because the important point to note is that the thermo nuclear test, the fission test and the sub-kilotonne test all worked as designed. They are diverse.



In terms of detailed design, their content is quite different. And so we think that the design which has been done is validated and within this configuration which has been tested one can build devices ranging from low kilotonne all the way to 200 kilotonnes. And that kind of fully assures the deterrence.



Karan Thapar: You are saying that India doesn't need more thermonuclear tests but the truth is that all the established thermonuclear powers needed more than one test. Can India be the exception?



Anil Kakodkar: Well if you go by Dil Maange More, that's another story. But we are talking about a time where the knowledge base has expanded, the capability has expanded and you carry out a design and prove you are confident that on the basis of that design and that test, one can build a range of systems right up to 200 kilotonnes.



Karan Thapar: I want to pick up on that last point that you have just made. Given that doubts continue and given that there are going to be no further tests and you are not saying that there is any need for further tests - can you say India has a credible thermonuclear bomb?



Anil Kakodkar: Of course.



Karan Thapar: We have a credible thermonuclear bomb?



Anil Kakodkar: Why are you using singular? Make that plural.



Karan Thapar: The reason I ask is because Dr Santhanam writing in ‘The Hindu’ says that the thermonuclear device has not been weaponsied even 11 years after the tests.



Anil Kakodkar: How does he know? He is not involved.



Karan Thapar: So you are saying to me that we have thermonuclear bombs--in the plural?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes.



Karan Thapar: With a yield of at least 45 kilotonnes each.



Anil Kakodkar: Much more than that.



Karan Thapar: Much more than that?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes. I told you we have the possibility of a deterrence of low kilotonne to 200 kilotonnes.



Karan Thapar: So when people like former Army chief, General Malik say, that because of the doubts in the public arena, the Army wants assurance of the yield and the efficacy of India's thermonuclear bomb, what is your answer to them?



Anil Kakodkar: I think that is guaranteed. The Army should be fully confident and defend the country. There is no issue about the arsenal at their command.



Karan Thapar: Dr Kakodkar, a pleasure talking to you.



Anil Kakodkar: Thank you.

Quote:" Yes. I told you we have the possibility of a deterrence of low kilotonne to 200 kilotonnes."

Quote:Karan Thapar / CNN-IBN



Sun, Dec 13, 2009 at 20:23,

After weeks of doubt, it is time to ask the question: how credible is India's thermonuclear deterrent? That is the key issue Karan Thapar discussed in this week's Devil's Advocate with the former chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, Dr Anil Kakodkar.



Karan Thapar: Dr Kakodkar, four leading scientists--Dr K Santhanam, Dr P K Iyengar, Dr H Sethna and Dr A N Prasad--have raised serious doubts about India's thermonuclear tests of 1998.



Dr Santhanam says we have hard evidence on a purely factual basis that not only was the yield of the thermonuclear device far below the design production, but that it actually failed. Do you have a problem on your hands?



Anil Kakodkar: No, I think this is a totally erroneous conclusion. The yield of thermonuclear tests was verified, not by one method but several redundant methods based on different principles, done by different groups. These have been reviewed in detail and in fact I had described the tests in 1998 as perfect and I stand by that.



Karan Thapar: I am glad that you began talking by the yield because both Dr Santhanam and Dr Iyenger have questioned the yield of the thermonuclear tests.



Dr Santhanam says that the DRDO seismic instruments measured the yield as something between 20-25 kilotonnes which is hugely different from the claim put out by the Atomic Energy Commission that it was 45 kilotonnes. How confident are you of the 45-kilotonne yield?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, let me first of all say that that DAE and DRDO we both work together as a team. DRDO did deploy some instruments for measurements but the fact is that the seismic instruments did not work. I myself had reviewed all the results immediately after the tests and we concluded that the instruments did not work.



Karan Thapar: Dr Santhanam says that the Bhabha Atomic Energy Center accepted the DRDO's instruments and their estimation for the yield of their fission bomb but not for the fusion or the thermonuclear. He says how can it be that the instruments worked in one case and not the others?



Anil Kakodkar: Well that's not true because the instrument measure and the ground motion at the place where the instrument is located - we had to separate out the information which was coming out from the thermonuclear and which was coming from the fission test. So the point that I am making is that the seismic instruments did not work.



So there is no question of the yield of the fission test being right and the thermonuclear test being wrong because no conclusion can be drawn from those instruments either ways.



Karan Thapar: But do you have proof that the yield of the thermonuclear test was 45 kilotonnes?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes. In fact we have within limits of what can be said and I must make it clear here that no country has given so much scientific details on their tests as we have given and this we have published with the maximum possible clarity.



Karan Thapar: The problem is that even in 1998, foreign monitors questioned the yield of the thermonuclear tests. At that time, Indian doubts were only expressed in private. Now, Indian doubts have burst out into the open and they are being heard in public.



Does it not worry you that these doubts continue--now both abroad and at home--and that they have continued for 11 years?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, it's unfortunate but it doesn't worry me because facts are facts and there is no question of getting worried about this. The point is that the measurements which have been done, they have been done--as I mentioned earlier--by different groups.



People who carry out the measurements on seismic instruments is a different group. People who carry out the measurements on radiochemical instruments are a different group. There are other methods that you can use, for example the simulation of ground motion. That's another group and all these groups have come to their own conclusions which match with each other.



Karan Thapar: And all these five or six different ways of measuring the yield have come to the conclusion that the yield was 45 kilotonnes for the thermonuclear device?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right.



Karan Thapar: So in your mind there is no doubt about it whatsoever?



Anil Kakodkar: Absolutely not.



Karan Thapar: Now, Dr Santhanam, in addition to disputing the yield, has other reasons to believe that the thermonuclear device failed. He said that given that the fission device, which produced a yield of around 25 kilotonnes, created a crater of 25 metres in diameter then the fusion bomb which produced a yield of 45 kilotonnes should have created a crater of around 70 metres in diameter. He says that that didn't happen and there was in fact no crater at all.



Anil Kakodkar: That's a layman’s way of looking at it. The fact of the matter is the fission device yield was 15 kilotonnes, not 25 kilotonnes.



Karan Thapar: So he's wrong in saying that it was 25 kilotonnes?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right and secondly although the two devices were about 1.5 kilometers apart, the geology within that distance has changed quite a bit partly because of the layers that exist and their slopes but more importantly because their depths have been different.



So the placement of the device of the fission kind is in one kind of medium and the placement of the device of the thermonuclear kind is in another medium.



Karan Thapar: So in fact what you are saying is that Dr Santhanam is making two mistakes and possibly making them deliberately.



First of all he's exaggerating the yield of the fission device and secondly he is completely ignoring the fact that the geology of the placement of the fusion was very different.



Anil Kakodkar: That's right



Karan Thapar: And both of those have led him to an erroneous conclusion?



Anil Kakodkar: And in fact we have gone through detailed simulation. For example in simulation you can locate the thermonuclear device where the fission device was placed and you can locate the fission device where the thermonuclear device was placed. And you get a much bigger crater now because the yield is higher.



Karan Thapar: This is a very important point that you are making.



Anil Kakodkar: Yes. And the fission device which is now placed in the thermo-heat pit now produces much less ground displacement.



Karan Thapar: So if in simulation you place the thermonuclear device where the fission device was placed, you would get a much bigger crater--much closer to the 70 meters in diameter that Dr Santhanam would like to see.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, I don't remember how much it was but this is actually true. This has been verified by calculations



Karan Thapar: Dr Santhanam has yet one more reason for believing that the thermonuclear device failed. He says if it had succeeded, both the shaft and the a-frame would have been totally destroyed. Instead, writing in ‘The Hindu’, he says the shaft remained totally undamaged and as for the a-frame, he says, it remained completely intact.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, I think you must understand the phenomena of ground motion when a nuclear test takes place. Depending on the depth of burial and of course the medium in which it is buried, you could get several manifestations on the surface.



You could get a crater and there are different kinds of craters that one could see. You can just get a mound - the ground rises and remains there and on the other extreme it can vent out. So in case of the thermonuclear device, the placement was in hard rock—granite--and with the depth and the yield for 45 kilotonnes, one expects only a mound to rise, which is what happened.



Karan Thapar: And not a crater?



Anil Kakodkar: And not a crater.



Karan Thapar: What about the shaft and the a-frame?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, if the ground simply rises - and in fact you can see a lot of fracture on the ground around that for a fairly large distance so it's clear that there was a cracking of the ground for a fairly large distance, but the phenomena was that it rises as a mound, then comes down slightly but it still remains a mound. So there is no question of damage to the a-frame.



Karan Thapar: So in fact the fact that the shaft and the a-frame survived intact can be quite easily explained. It's not proof that the thermonuclear device failed?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes, yes, it has been seen in detailed simulations and by the way I must tell you that this simulation, which I am telling you about, is done on codes which have been actually verified in 3-D situations on the test data available from abroad and validated and these have been published in international journals.



Karan Thapar: So you have had multiple validations of these.



Anil Kakodkar: That's right.



Karan Thapar: Clearly you are dismissive of Dr Santhanam's doubts. Now let me quote to you what one of your predecessors, former chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission Dr P K Iyenger, said in a statement he issued on September 24, 2009. He says: "The recent revelations by Dr Santhanam are the clincher. He was one of the four leaders associated with Pokhran II, the team leader from the DRDO side, and he must certainly have known many of the details, particularly with regard to the seismic measurements. If he says that the yield was much lower than projected, that there was virtually no crater formed, then there is considerable justification for reasonable doubt regarding the credibility of the thermonuclear test."



Does it worry you that your predecessors seem to disagree with you but agree with Dr Santhanam?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, first of all I respect everybody. I respect Dr Iyenger, I respect Dr Santhanam, but the fact is that Dr Iyenger was nowhere involved in the 1998 tests. He was of course a key figure in the 1974 tests. Also, the fact is that before the 1990 and 1998 tests, all work was done under cover - we were not in the open - and we required a lot of logistical support and all and that all was being provided by DRDO.



But things were still being done on a need to know basis. So to assume that Dr Santhanam knew everything is not true.



Karan Thapar: You are making two important points. One you are saying that the DRDO and Dr Santhanam did not know everything - the fact that he was DRDO team leader does not mean that he knew everything that was happening.



Anil Kakodkar: He knew everything within his realm of responsibility.



Karan Thapar: Everything that he needed to know but not more?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right.



Karan Thapar: You are also saying that Dr Iyenger isn't fully in the picture and therefore his opinion is not necessarily valid.



Anil Kakodkar: He is not in the picture as far as the 1998 tests are concerned.



Karan Thapar: So he doesn't really know about the 1998 tests.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, he knows only as much as has been published and nothing more.



Karan Thapar: His comment therefore is not backed by knowledge and insight.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, that's for you to judge.



Karan Thapar: Let's purse the credibility and the doubts surrounding India's thermonuclear deterrent in a somewhat different way.



Dr Santhanam says that these doubts were formally raised by the DRDO with the Government as far back as in 1998 itself. And in a meeting arranged by the then National Security Advisor Brajesh Mishra, they were brushed aside in a manner which Dr Santhanam compares to a sort of frivolous voice vote.



Anil Kakodkar: Immediately after the tests, we carried out a review with both teams present: BARC team as well as the DRDO team.



We looked at the measurements done by the BARC team and we looked at the measurements done by the DRDO team and I told you the conclusions and on the basis of that review, it was clear that what basis we could go by and what conclusions we could draw.



Now, the question is that if the instruments didn't work, where is the question of going by any assertions which are based on ... what is the basis of any assertions?



Karan Thapar: So when Dr Santhanam says that the DRDO's doubts were brushed aside lightly, then that is wrong. They were considered and they were evaluated?



Anil Kakodkar: I think yes. I think they were evaluated, that's right.



Karan Thapar: And they were dismissed because they were found to be faulty. They were not just brushed aside.



Anil Kakodkar: No, they were not brushed aside.



Karan Thapar: In an article that Dr Santhanam has written recently on November 15, 2009 for ‘The Tribune’, he says: The Department of Atomic Energy--the department to which you were ex-officio secretary--is in fact hiding facts from successive Indian governments, from Parliament and from Indian people. How do you respond to that accusation?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, as I said earlier, we are perhaps unique in giving out the maximum information and that too very promptly - immediately after the tests.



Karan Thapar: There is no hiding?



Anil Kakodkar: There is no hiding. There are limits to what can be revealed. These have been discussed in the Atomic Energy Commission in not one but four meetings after the 1998 tests. And there are people who are knowledgeable. Dr Ramanna was a member of the commission at that time. So where is the hiding?



Karan Thapar: Let me put it like this: you may not be hiding facts as Dr Santhanam alleges but a controversy has arisen and it grows and it won't disappear. Many people believe that the only way to resolve this issue is to now organise a peer group of scientists to review the results of the 1998 thermonuclear tests. Would you agree?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, let me first repeat what I said earlier. There are methods through which one has assessed the test results. Each one of them is a specialisation in itself and there are different groups, not just individuals but groups, which have looked at these. The fact is that this is also on a need-to-know basis. Now, if all of them come to conclusions which are by and large similar, what other things can you do in terms of forming a peer group of scientists?



Karan Thapar: So there is no need for a peer group review yet again?



Anil Kakodkar: That's what I would say.



Karan Thapar: The matter is conclusively sorted out?



Anil Kakodkar: That's right. And this has been after this controversy has been raised and it was again reviewed by the Atomic Energy Commission, we had gone through the records and the commission has come out with an authoritative statement.



Karan Thapar: Let me put to you two or three critical issues. Given the fact that you have concluded several reviews, including one recently after the doubts were raised, the doubts continue. And given that there are doubts about India's one and only thermonuclear test do we need more tests?



Anil Kakodkar: Well, I would say no because the important point to note is that the thermo nuclear test, the fission test and the sub-kilotonne test all worked as designed. They are diverse.



In terms of detailed design, their content is quite different. And so we think that the design which has been done is validated and within this configuration which has been tested one can build devices ranging from low kilotonne all the way to 200 kilotonnes. And that kind of fully assures the deterrence.



Karan Thapar: You are saying that India doesn't need more thermonuclear tests but the truth is that all the established thermonuclear powers needed more than one test. Can India be the exception?



Anil Kakodkar: Well if you go by Dil Maange More, that's another story. But we are talking about a time where the knowledge base has expanded, the capability has expanded and you carry out a design and prove you are confident that on the basis of that design and that test, one can build a range of systems right up to 200 kilotonnes.



Karan Thapar: I want to pick up on that last point that you have just made. Given that doubts continue and given that there are going to be no further tests and you are not saying that there is any need for further tests - can you say India has a credible thermonuclear bomb?



Anil Kakodkar: Of course.



Karan Thapar: We have a credible thermonuclear bomb?



Anil Kakodkar: Why are you using singular? Make that plural.



Karan Thapar: The reason I ask is because Dr Santhanam writing in ‘The Hindu’ says that the thermonuclear device has not been weaponsied even 11 years after the tests.



Anil Kakodkar: How does he know? He is not involved.



Karan Thapar: So you are saying to me that we have thermonuclear bombs--in the plural?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes.



Karan Thapar: With a yield of at least 45 kilotonnes each.



Anil Kakodkar: Much more than that.



Karan Thapar: Much more than that?



Anil Kakodkar: Yes. I told you we have the possibility of a deterrence of low kilotonne to 200 kilotonnes.



Karan Thapar: So when people like former Army chief, General Malik say, that because of the doubts in the public arena, the Army wants assurance of the yield and the efficacy of India's thermonuclear bomb, what is your answer to them?



Anil Kakodkar: I think that is guaranteed. The Army should be fully confident and defend the country. There is no issue about the arsenal at their command.



Karan Thapar: Dr Kakodkar, a pleasure talking to you.



Anil Kakodkar: Thank you.

Quote:" Yes. I told you we have the possibility of a deterrence of low kilotonne to 200 kilotonnes."

Quote:Sachin Parashar, TNN 14 December 2009, 02:19am IST

NEW DELHI: One of the key figures in India's 1998 thermonuclear test, scientist K Santhanam, has accused former Atomic Energy Commission chairman Anil Kakodkar of bluffing the armed forces for stating that the country has a credible hydrogen bomb deterrent. Santhanam made the remarks in a conversation with TOI after Kakodkar assured the armed forces that “there is no issue about the arsenal at their command” when it came to thermonuclear deterrent.



In a TV interview, Kakodkar also said that Santhanam did not know because he was not involved. Kakodkar’s assertion is strange because Santhanam, as the project director, was responsible for test site preparations. “I can only describe what he is saying as an absolute lie. As the programme coordinator, I was responsible for not just the entire management but also site instrumentation meant to measure the yields,” the former DRDO scientist told TOI.



As for Kakodkar’s assertion that India had more than one thermonuclear bomb, Santhanam said the scientific truth would not change. Kakodkar also said in the interview that because of the expansion of knowledge base and capabilities, one could carry out a design and on the basis of that design and test, build a range of systems right up to 200 kilotonnes. Santhanam responded by stating India was far behind the claims being made officially.



“There is a difference between confidence in a design and assured performance of the design to meet the services’ requirements. These are just airy-fairy claims. The services were initially kept in the dark, maybe for valid reasons. It is great to know that they are now waking up to the need for proven designs,” said Santhanam. Taking a dig at BARC, the scientist said that it wouldn’t be possible for “the Bombaywallahs to pull the wool over the eyes of the armed forces, government and people for long”.



In his TV interview, Kakodkar also said that Dr P K Iyengar, eminent scientist who has supported Santhanam all along, had no idea about the 1998 tests and that DRDO was responsible for only logistical support, another assertion which was described as a lie by Santhanam. Kakodkar described as erroneous Santhanam’s conclusion that the yield for the thermonuclear device was much lower than claimed.



“The yield of thermonuclear tests was verified, not by one method but several methods based on different principles, done by different groups. These have been reviewed in detail and, in fact, I had described the tests in 1998 as perfect and I stand by that,” said Kakodkar.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: No, I think this is a totally erroneous conclusion. The yield of thermonuclear tests was verified, not by one method but several redundant methods based on different principles, done by different groups. These have been reviewed in detail and in fact I had described the tests in 1998 as perfect and I stand by that.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Well, let me first of all say that that DAE and DRDO we both work together as a team. DRDO did deploy some instruments for measurements but the fact is that the seismic instruments did not work. I myself had reviewed all the results immediately after the tests and we concluded that the instruments did not work.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Well that's not true because the instrument measure and the ground motion at the place where the instrument is located - we had to separate out the information which was coming out from the thermonuclear and which was coming from the fission test. So the point that I am making is that the seismic instruments did not work.



So there is no question of the yield of the fission test being right and the thermonuclear test being wrong because no conclusion can be drawn from those instruments either ways.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Well, it's unfortunate but it doesn't worry me because facts are facts and there is no question of getting worried about this. The point is that the measurements which have been done, they have been done--as I mentioned earlier--by different groups.



People who carry out the measurements on seismic instruments is a different group. People who carry out the measurements on radiochemical instruments are a different group. There are other methods that you can use, for example the simulation of ground motion. That's another group and all these groups have come to their own conclusions which match with each other.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: That's a layman’s way of looking at it. The fact of the matter is the fission device yield was 15 kilotonnes, not 25 kilotonnes.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Well, I think you must understand the phenomena of ground motion when a nuclear test takes place. Depending on the depth of burial and of course the medium in which it is buried, you could get several manifestations on the surface.



You could get a crater and there are different kinds of craters that one could see. You can just get a mound - the ground rises and remains there and on the other extreme it can vent out. So in case of the thermonuclear device, the placement was in hard rock—granite--and with the depth and the yield for 45 kilotonnes, one expects only a mound to rise, which is what happened.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Yes, yes, it has been seen in detailed simulations and by the way I must tell you that this simulation, which I am telling you about, is done on codes which have been actually verified in 3-D situations on the test data available from abroad and validated and these have been published in international journals.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Well, first of all I respect everybody. I respect Dr Iyenger, I respect Dr Santhanam, but the fact is that Dr Iyenger was nowhere involved in the 1998 tests. He was of course a key figure in the 1974 tests. Also, the fact is that before the 1990 and 1998 tests, all work was done under cover - we were not in the open - and we required a lot of logistical support and all and that all was being provided by DRDO.



But things were still being done on a need to know basis. So to assume that Dr Santhanam knew everything is not true.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: He knew everything within his realm of responsibility.

Quote:Karan Thapar: You are also saying that Dr Iyenger isn't fully in the picture and therefore his opinion is not necessarily valid.



Anil Kakodkar: He is not in the picture as far as the 1998 tests are concerned.



Karan Thapar: So he doesn't really know about the 1998 tests.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, he knows only as much as has been published and nothing more.



Karan Thapar: His comment therefore is not backed by knowledge and insight.



Anil Kakodkar: Well, that's for you to judge.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Immediately after the tests, we carried out a review with both teams present: BARC team as well as the DRDO team.



We looked at the measurements done by the BARC team and we looked at the measurements done by the DRDO team and I told you the conclusions and on the basis of that review, it was clear that what basis we could go by and what conclusions we could draw.



Now, the question is that if the instruments didn't work, where is the question of going by any assertions which are based on ... what is the basis of any assertions?

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: No, they were not brushed aside.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: There is no hiding. There are limits to what can be revealed. These have been discussed in the Atomic Energy Commission in not one but four meetings after the 1998 tests. And there are people who are knowledgeable. Dr Ramanna was a member of the commission at that time. So where is the hiding?

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Well, let me first repeat what I said earlier. There are methods through which one has assessed the test results. Each one of them is a specialisation in itself and there are different groups, not just individuals but groups, which have looked at these. The fact is that this is also on a need-to-know basis. Now, if all of them come to conclusions which are by and large similar, what other things can you do in terms of forming a peer group of scientists?

Quote:Karan Thapar: So there is no need for a peer group review yet again?



Anil Kakodkar: That's what I would say.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Well, I would say no because the important point to note is that the thermo nuclear test, the fission test and the sub-kilotonne test all worked as designed. They are diverse.



In terms of detailed design, their content is quite different. And so we think that the design which has been done is validated and within this configuration which has been tested one can build devices ranging from low kilotonne all the way to 200 kilotonnes. And that kind of fully assures the deterrence.

….

Anil Kakodkar: Well if you go by Dil Maange More, that's another story. But we are talking about a time where the knowledge base has expanded, the capability has expanded and you carry out a design and prove you are confident that on the basis of that design and that test, one can build a range of systems right up to 200 kilotonnes.

Quote:Karan Thapar: I want to pick up on that last point that you have just made. Given that doubts continue and given that there are going to be no further tests and you are not saying that there is any need for further tests - can you say India has a credible thermonuclear bomb?



Anil Kakodkar: Of course.



Karan Thapar: We have a credible thermonuclear bomb?



Anil Kakodkar: Why are you using singular? Make that plural.

Quote:Karan Thapar: The reason I ask is because Dr Santhanam writing in ‘The Hindu’ says that the thermonuclear device has not been weaponsied even 11 years after the tests.



Anil Kakodkar: How does he know? He is not involved.

Quote:Anil Kakodkar: Yes. I told you we have the possibility of a deterrence of low kilotonne to 200 kilotonnes.

Quote:Karan Thapar: So when people like former Army chief, General Malik say, that because of the doubts in the public arena, the Army wants assurance of the yield and the efficacy of India's thermonuclear bomb, what is your answer to them?



Anil Kakodkar: I think that is guaranteed. The Army should be fully confident and defend the country. There is no issue about the arsenal at their command.

Quote:V Sudarshan





The former chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission Anil Kakodkar appeared in a television channel on September 13 and preposterously assured our military forces that they had an arsenal of ready-to-use nuclear bombs from the low kilotonnes all the way up to 200 kilotonnes and that arsenal is “guaranteed” to work. In a confidence boosting soundbyte he said: “I think that is guaranteed. The army should be fully confident and defend the country.” The timing is most curious. There is usually no shortage of speaking opportunities to make such points when a person like Kakodkar is still in service and it is not as if the Department of Atomic Energy has not had the occasion to take the floor in continuing attempts to defend the underperforming thermonuclear device that was exploded in May 1998. From the way the former chairman was going about handing out certificates to himself and the makers of the partially successful thermonuclear bomb it almost appeared that he was jockeying to become the next science adviser to the prime minister while at the same time placing the ISI (Indian Standards Institution) imprimatur on a weapon the armed forces are being forced to live with without proper user trials.





Kakodkar implies that the army must accept the word of the bomb designers in good faith and leave it at that. As one scientist pointed out to this writer: “Why is it that there are so many flight trials for Agni to verify the various parameters while the thermonuclear weapon must make do with only computer simulations and that too with data from a partially successful experiment?” He has a point of course. It is like putting pilots in charge of a high capacity passenger aircraft based solely on experience of flight simulators. If you knew that the pilot going to fly you had no actual aircraft flying hours to his/her credit, would you still want him or her fly you?



There are a number of points that Kakodkar makes that invite scrutiny. He says that the one thermonuclear test is enough because the knowledge base had expanded and the capabilities had also expanded. And that Dr P K Iyengar knows only what has been published and does not know about the 1998 tests first hand. Taken together, this is glib postulation. A design of the boosted fission trigger was worked out in the Eighties when Dr Iyengar was the chairman. That design was scalable to 45 kt. If the tests had occurred in 1995 when Narasimha Rao backed out at the last moment, that device would probably have been tested. It is not as if the BARC crowd in May 1998 reinvented the wheel so far as thermonuclear weapon was concerned. It cannot be that the team which designed the weapon alone can be the custodians of information. From the general working principles experts are well within their rights to ask legitimate questions.



Kakodkar, a mechanical engineer by training, also shockingly asserts that the DRDO instruments that measured the seismic values did not work. Measuring instruments are central to any nuclear test. These, I am told, are tested again and again to ensure there is no failure. It cannot be that before the tests the instruments were found to be in perfect working condition and when they gave out their results it is deemed that they were not working. And it certainly cannot be that the DRDO embarked on a five month process of analysing the data and wrote a 50-page report and sent it to the office of the then National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra formally through the office of Abdul Kalam based on malfunctioning seismic instruments. The fact of the matter is simple: the tests were conducted simultaneously because the weapons team wanted to be in a position to fudge the readings in case the thermonuclear test went awry, which in fact seems to have patently happened.



It is therefore understandable that Kakodkar is reluctant to have the data from the thermonuclear test peer reviewed. He does not wish a veritable Pandora’s box to be opened. What is out in the public is embarrassing enough. But that there is a case for a review is clearly underlined by the comments of two national security advisers. Bharat Karnad in his book India’s Nuclear Policy (Praeger Security, 2008; pages 69-70) quotes Brajesh Mishra as saying: Who am I to go and say (these tests did not work)” says Mishra, “and...I will appoint a commission to enquire into whether the scientists are telling the truth or not?” Many years later the current national security adviser M K Narayanan also echoes a similar sentiment: He rejected the suggestion that a panel of scientists could review the Pokhran test results, not because it would be superfluous or unnecessary, but because it would be difficult to get neutral, independent scientists who could investigate the matter. “Which peer scientists are we going to bring in (for a panel)? All those peer scientists are part of the establishment or are sceptics,” he said, appearing (on September 20) in the same television show as Kakodkar. Both Mishra and Narayanan implicitly concede that they are not the best judges of the issue and that it would be wonderful if the claims of their scientists could be verified independently and non-controversially. The dilemma: how do you bell this cat? This dilemma persists.



Ultimately the armed forces need to be satisfied for themselves that the deterrence at their command is fail-safe. But does the army have sufficient expertise in nuclear weapon engineering to assess the spiel given to them by the Bombay nuclear crowd? You cannot have a publicly haemorrhaging debate and still pretend that you have a credible deterrence. If it is not credible to your key scientific community, how credible is it going to look to our potential adversaries? The armed forces need to do their own calculations on the matter. It is army engineers who sank the shaft for the thermonuclear bomb. So they know the depth of the shaft. The claim of the 45-kilotonne yield made by the DAE is also known. The geology of Pokhran and in particular the shaft that had the thermonuclear device placed can also be determined. The relevant seismological details flowing from the device yield can also be factored in. If the DAE can do simulations so should the army do its own calculations to find out if the claims made by Anil Kakodkar and R Chidambaram have any merit.



Once this is worked out our armed forces should have a good idea of where and how robust our thermonuclear deterrence is. Whether it is only in the mind of the bomb makers? Or in the perception of our potential adversaries as well? Ultimately, deterrence, like beauty, lies in the eyes of the beholder.



sudarshan@expressbuzz.com

Quote:In the clearest enunciation of the government’s position on what it intends to do with the fast breeder reactor programme, National Security Advisor M K Narayanan told a conference of security experts in Bahrain last Saturday that India’s fast breeder reactors are not for “military purposes” and the government had “no intention” to place it in the “military realm”.

...

...

“The 2006 separation plan between India and the US, which has since been embedded in the IAEA safeguards agreement, refers to those items that are to be kept in the safeguarded category and a few in the non-safeguarded category. We had a long debate about our position on the fast-breeder reactor, and the Indian and US negotiators reached the point that the fast-breeder reactor was still in a very experimental stage. Therefore, it was not yet time to decide whether it should or should not go under safeguards. I want to underline the point that the fast-breeder reactor is not meant for military purposes. I think there was a reference to that. We have no intention for the fast-breeder reactor to be put into the military realm.”

...

...

“We have already passed many milestones on the way to this target. We have identified many of them and achieved several benchmarks. Our 500 MW prototype fast breeder reactor is today in an advanced stage of construction...India’s experiment with fast breeder reactors and the use of the thorium cycle could prove extremely useful to ensure energy security in the future,” said Narayanan.



The NSA went on to elaborate on India’s plans in the Q&A session, making it clear that FBRs will not be used for making nuclear weapons. “We see the three-stage, close-fuel cycle of the pressurised heavy water reactor, the fast breeder and the thorium fuel as the hope of the future. Anybody who has some understanding of nuclear weapons would realise that you do not require the fast breeder to produce nuclear weapons.”

...

...

Quote:Sources said that at his meeting with Chaturvedi, [color="#0000FF"]Kakodkar explained his side of the story[/color], indicating that he went public with his views partly because he was under constant pressure to explain the kind of separation plan (of civilian and military nuclear reactors) that would be credible for the US.



Kakodkar, sources said, emphasised the need for a credible minimum nuclear deterrent, keeping in view the Asian security scenario. He also quantified the sort of deterrent India needs to maintain for the future, explaining that in less than a decade the country’s stockpile will begin to feel the impact of uranium’s half-life decay cycle.



The nature of separation, he’s learnt to have said, will have to take this into consideration to ensure that it does not negatively impact the credible minimum nuclear deterrent.



[color="#0000FF"]On the fast breeder reactor programme, Kakodkar again made it clear that India could not afford to put it on the civil list as it would not be in its strategic interests.[/color]



Highlighting the dual purposes of the FBR programme, Kakodkar, sources said, did agree that India needed the latest technology in this field and for that the Indo-US nuclear agreement was vital. In fact, both officials agreed that the quest should be to get better technology into India to power the atomic energy programme as a whole.

Quote:On March 7, 2006, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh presented the details of India’s “Separation Plan.” Singh stated that 14 of India’s 22 conventional nuclear power plants, now operating or under construction, would be placed on the civilian, IAEA-inspected list. [color="#0000FF"]He then gave particular emphasis to the fact that India would keep its fast breeder reactors, now operating or under construction, off the civilian list.[/color] (Breeder reactors are reactors that can create more fissile material than they consume.) On this subject, Singh declared:



[color="#0000FF"]We have conveyed that India will not accept safeguards on the Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor [now under construction] and the Fast Breeder Test Reactor [operating since 1985], both located at Kalpakkam. The Fast Breeder Program is at the R&D stage. This technology will take time to mature and reach an advanced stage of development. We do not wish to place any encumbrances on our Fast Breeder program, and this has been fully ensured in the Separation Plan. [/color][1]



During my Suo Motu Statements on this subject made on July 29, 2005, and on February 27, 2006, I had given a solemn assurance to this august House and through the Honorable members to the country, that the Separation Plan will not adversely affect our country’s national security. I am in a position to assure the Members that this is indeed the case. I might mention:



i) that the separation plan will not adversely affect our strategic program. There will be no capping of our strategic program, and the separation plan ensures adequacy of fissile material and other inputs to meet the current and future requirements of our strategic program, based on our assessment of the threat scenarios. No constraint has been placed on our right to construct new facilities for strategic purposes. The integrity of our Nuclear Doctrine and our ability to sustain a Minimum Credible Nuclear Deterrent is adequately protected.



ii) The Separation Plan does not come in the way of the integrity of our three stage nuclear program, including the future use of our thorium reserves. The autonomy of our Research and Development activities in the nuclear field will remain unaffected. The Fast Breeder Test Reactor and the Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor remain outside safeguards. We have agreed, however, that future civilian Thermal power reactors and civilian Fast Breeder Reactors would be placed under safeguards, but the determination of what is civilian is solely an Indian decision. [2]



Singh’s comments suggested that India’s national security in the nuclear arena has two dimensions: sustaining a minimum credible deterrent; and implementing India’s “three stage nuclear program,” aimed at exploiting the country’s vast thorium reserves for energy purposes.



In an interview given on February 7, 2006, to the Indian Express roughly a month prior to the signing of the U.S.-India nuclear agreement, Dr. Anil Kakodkar, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) and Secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), made clear that India’s breeder reactor program does, indeed, have close links to the country’s nuclear weapons program:



[color="#0000FF"] Express: So categorically the breeder will not go under safeguards?



Kakodkar: No way because it hurts our strategic interest. You follow, no? There’s no way.[/color]



Express: The strategic interest of security or strategic interest of energy security?



Kakodkar: Both. It is linked through the fuel cycle.



Express: So will placing the fast breeder reactor program on the civilian list and hence under safeguards hurt India’s efforts at maintaining in perpetuity the “minimum credible deterrent” while hurting its need for long-term energy security?



Kakodkar: Yes, there can be no doubts on that. Both, from the point of view of maintaining long-term energy security [color="#FF0000"]and for maintaining the “minimum credible deterrent,” the Fast Breeder Program just cannot be put on the civilian list.[/color] This would amount to getting shackled and India certainly cannot compromise one [type of security] for the other. [3]



India’s breeder reactors were reportedly a contentious issue during the negotiations with the United States over the agreement. Ultimately New Delhi prevailed on this matter. [4] The prominent role of India’s breeder reactors in the consideration of the separation of Indian civilian and military nuclear facilities raises the question of what specific contributions these reactors, long justified as important to the future of the Indian nuclear energy sector, might make to its military capabilities.