Pakistan Successfully Test Fires Upgraded Missile

Pakistan's military said it successfully test-fired an upgraded Shaheen-1 missile Wednesday. The Shaheen-1 is capable of hitting targets in India with a nuclear weapon, and this upgraded version is thought to have an even longer reach.

The missile test comes less than a week after India claimed it successfully test-fired a new missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead as far as Beijing. Indian officials said that test launch showed it had joined the ranks of the world's missile powers.

India's Agni-V has a range of 5,000 kilometers and had been described as a "quantum leap" in India's strategic capability - able to carry nuclear warheads as far as the Chinese capital as well as Shanghai.

China's communist party newspaper, the Global Times, responded to India's test launch with a warning of its own, saying for the foreseeable future "India would stand no chance in an overall arms race with China".

Indian defense analyst KapilKak said New Delhi appears increasingly worried about cooperation between China and Pakistan in possibly "targeting India, in which case India will well have to be prepared for a two-front war.''

The country has been testing its ballistic missile defense system since 2006. If it becomes viable, India would become one of the few nations with a working missile shield.


Pakistan has announced that it will conduct a long-range missile test over the Indian Ocean in the next five days.

In a statement on Tuesday, Islamabad said that all flights from India to the Gulf and Africa should be rescheduled or rerouted within the period prescribed.

Between April 24 and April 29, Pakistan is due to test fire its ‘Shaheen’ long-range missile with a range of up to 4,500 kilometers.

The move comes as apparent retaliation for India’s successfully test firing its ‘Agni’ V inter-continental ballistic missile on April 19.

India and Pakistan have fought three wars since gaining independence from Britain in 1947.


Source: TASS / Voice of America; issued April 25, 2012

Photo Story: (iranmilitaryforum.net)

A picture released by the Pakistani military shows the test-launch of a Shaheen-1A ballistic missile from an undisclosed location on Wednesday.

Less than one week after India successfully tested the nuclear-capable Agni-V missile, Pakistan has notified its neighbor that it too will conduct a “long-range missile test in the Indian Ocean” sometime between April 24 and April 29.

This military handout picture dated on April 21, 2008, shows Pakistani army officers and scientists standing alongside the long-range ballistic missile, Shaheen II, or Hatf VI, before the test flight at an undisclosed location.

(4/26/2012)