Thaindian News

Bangalore, June 17 (IANS) India is building a credible minimal deterrence to pre-empt any attack from adversaries as part of its nuclear doctrine based on no-first-use with a second strike capability, a top defence official said Friday.

“There is a huge amount of work going on towards creating a credible minimal deterrence to ensure our adversaries don’t take us by surprise. We are way up and ahead of what we need to do in protecting the country,” Air Vice Marshal K.J. Mathews, commander-in-chief of the Strategic Forces Command, said at a function in this aerospace hub.

Operating independently, the command is responsible for nuclear arsenal from preparation to delivery to the armed forces.

“As an independent agency, fortunately, we have greater amount of operational freedom and we report to the prime minister directly on strategic issues,” Mathews said.

Mathews, who assumed the command post in January, made the remark during his address at the golden jubilee celebrations of the maiden flight of the first indigenous fighter bomber Marut (HF-24), designed and developed by the state-run defence behemoth Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) here Friday.

Exhorting HAL to leverage its expertise to meet the emerging needs of the country, Mathews said the aerospace and defence communities should introspect on what they can do to strengthen national security.

“We need to focus on our future requirements by making best use of our resources that were built over the last five-six decades. Increasing self-reliance and innovation will help face security challenges,” Mathews asserted.

Set up in 2003 by the then National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government under former prime minister A.B. Vajpayee, the Strategic Command is tasked with the use of nuclear weapons under the eight-point nuclear doctrine, which is committed to no-first strike or use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear nations.