Pokhran-II

Operation Shakti
Active	1998
Country	India
Allegiance	India
Branch	Indian Army
Nickname(s)	Pokhran-II
Commanders
Notable commanders	Atal Bihari Vajpayee

Pokharan-II refers to test explosions of five nuclear devices, three on 11 May and two on 13 May 1998, conducted by India at the Pokhran test range. These nuclear tests resulted in a variety of sanctions against India by a number of major states, and were followed by nuclear testing by arch-rival Pakistan.

On 18 May 1974 India exploded its first nuclear device code named Smiling Buddha. After about a quarter century, on Buddha Jayanti, 11 May 1998, Operation Shakti was carried out. Shakti (शक्ति in Sanskrit meaning 'Strength'), is also the name of the Hindu Goddess of strength. Shakti was the codename for Pokhran-II.

Birth of India's nuclear weapons program

The Indian nuclear weapons program was started in the year 1964. The 1962 Sino-Indian war was an unforgettable lesson to the Indian establishment. It underscored the need to have a strong military with a comprehensive capability to deter enemy forces. The Chinese Nuclear Test at Lop Nur in 1964 goaded the Indian government into action to kickstart India's indigenous program to develop nuclear weapons. Preliminary studies were carried out at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre and plans were developed to produce plutonium and other bomb components. The program was shelved after Prime Minister Jawahar Lal Nehru's death. It was revived in the year 1968 by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. The program culminated in the nuclear test of 1974 at Pokhran codenamed Smiling Buddha.

After the 1974 test India decided to stop testing as a temporary measure. Successive governments in India decided to observe this temporary moratorium for fear of inviting international criticism. In 1995, Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao decided to carry out further tests. But the plans were halted after American satellites picked up signs of preparations for testing at Pokhran. The Americans under President Bill Clinton exerted enormous pressure on Rao to stop the preparations. Finally, on 11 and 13 of May 1998, under prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, India conducted its second group of nuclear tests.

Preparations for the test

After the detection of the test preparations by American satellites in 1995, it was decided that preparations for the May 1998 tests should be undertaken under a blanket of secrecy so that foreign countries will not be able to detect the preparations. Extensive planning was drawn out and executed in order to deceive intelligence agencies around the world. Even the senior most cabinet members of the Government of India did not have slightest hint of these elaborate preparations. The preparations were managed by a closed group of scientists, military officers and politicians.

Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, the Scientific Adviser to the Prime Minister, and Dr. R. Chidambaram, the head of the Department of Atomic Energy, were the chief coordinators for the operation. They were assisted by the 58th Regiment of the Army Engineering Corps in preparing the test site. Scientists from the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) and the Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) were involved in assembling the weapons, moving them to Pokhran, placing them into shafts in the ground and laying a network of sensors to gather data during the explosions.

The Regiment 58 Engineers had learned much since the aborted 1995 test preparations about avoiding detection by American satellites. Much work was done at night, and heavy equipment was always returned to the same parking spot at dawn so that satellite image analysts would conclude that the equipment was never moved. Piles of dug-out sand were shaped to mimic the wind shaped dune forms in the desert area. The shafts were dug under camouflage netting. When cables for sensors were laid they were carefully covered with sand, and native vegetation was replaced to conceal the digging.

The scientists involved in the operation took care to ensure that even their close friends and colleagues would not detect the work being undertaken at Pokhran. All scientists involved in the operation did not depart for Pokhran simultaneously, but left in groups of two or three. One group would use the pretext of attending a seminar or a conference, and would tell their wives that they could not be contacted while they were away. Tickets were bought for a destination other than Pokhran (or cities nearby) under pseudonyms, and after arriving at their destination, the group would secretly leave for the military base in Jaisalmer from where they would be taken by the army to Pokhran. After finishing their work the group would return, retracing their path. Then another group would leave for the range employing similar means to do their work. In this way, information about the test was kept tightly under wraps. All technical staff at the range wore military fatigues, so that in satellite images they would appear to be military personnel maintaining the test range.

On the diplomatic front, India adopted a policy of ambiguity about deciding to go nuclear. Statements by Indian politicians and diplomats gave an impression to the world that India was not yet decided about its nuclear status. Deliberate steps were taken to ensure that the world community would not take the BJP's campaign promises seriously. In separate meetings with American officials, then Foreign secretary K.Raghunath and Defence Minister George Fernandes stated that India had not yet decided about going nuclear and they also conveyed to the officials that the National Security Council would be meeting soon to discuss the matter and decide about the nuclear option. The council was to meet on the 26th of May. Both the Indian officials had categorically told the Americans that "there would be no surprise testings". All this led the Americans and the world community to believe that India was not going to pursue the nuclear option in the near future. They did not take the BJP's campaign promises seriously and hence did not expect an Indian nuclear test so soon.

Development and test teams

The main technical personnel involved in the operation were:

Project Chief Coordinators

• Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam (later, President of India), Scientific Adviser to the Prime Minister and Head of the DRDO.
• Dr. R. Chidambaram, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission and the Department of Atomic energy.

Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC)

• Dr. Anil Kakodkar, Director of BARC.
• Dr. Satinder Kumar Sikka, Director; Thermonuclear Weapon Development.
• Dr. M.S. Ramkumar, Director of Nuclear Fuel and Automation Manufacturing Group; Director, Nuclear Component Manufacture.
• Dr. D.D. Sood, Director of Radiochemistry and Isotope Group; Director, Nuclear Materials Acquisition.
• Dr. S.K. Gupta, Solid State Physics and Spectroscopy Group; Director, Device Design & Assessment.
• Dr. G. Govindraj, Associate Director of Electronic and Instrumentation Group; Director, Field Instrumentation.

Defence Research & Development Organization (DRDO)

• Dr. K. Santhanam; Director, Test Site Preparations.
• Dr. M.Vasudev; Range Safety Officer.

Devices

A total of five nuclear weapons were detonated at Pokhran during Operation Shakti. They were:

Shakti I

A two stage thermonuclear device with a boosted fission primary, its yield was downgraded from 200 KT (theoretical) to 40 KT for test purposes.

Shakti II

A pure fission device using the Plutonium implosion design with a yield of 15 KT. The device tested was an actual nuclear warhead that can be delivered by bombers or fighters and also mounted on a missile. The warhead was an improved, lightweight and miniaturized version of the device tested in 1974. Scientists at BARC had been working to improve the 1974 design for many years. Data from the 1974 test was used to carry out computer simulations using the indigenous Param supercomputer to improve the design. The 1998 test was intended to prove the validity of the improved designs.

Shakti III

An experimental boosted fission device that used reactor grade Plutonium for its primary with a yield of 0.3 KT. This test device was used to test only the primary stage. It did not contain any tritium required to boost the fission. This test was designed to study the possibility of using reactor grade plutonium in warheads and also to prove India's expertise in controlling and damping a nuclear explosion in order to achieve a low (sub-kiloton) yield.

Shakti IV

A 0.5 KT experimental device. The test's only purpose was to collect data about the explosion process and to study the performance of various bomb components.

Shakti V

A 0.2 KT experimental device that used U-233, an isotope of uranium not found in nature and produced in India's fast breeder reactors that consume Thorium. This device too was used to collect data.

Production and preparation of devices

Three laboratories of the DRDO were involved in designing, testing and producing components like advanced detonators, the implosion systems, high-voltage trigger systems. They were also responsible for weaponization, systems engineering, aerodynamics, safety interlocks and flight trials. The nuclear devices were moved from their vaults at the BARC complex in the early hours of 1 May, around 3 a.m., by four Indian Army trucks under the command of Col. Umang Kapur. They were transported to Mumbai airport and flown at dawn in an Indian Air Force AN-32 transport plane to the Jaisalmer military base. An Army convoy of four trucks transported the explosive devices to Pokhran. Three trips were required to complete the delivery of the devices and associated equipment. The devices were delivered directly to the device preparation building in the range which was designated as the 'Prayer Hall'.

The tests were organized into two groups that were fired separately, with all devices in a group fired at the same time. The first group consisted of the thermonuclear device (Shakti I), the fission device (Shakti II), and a sub-kiloton device (Shakti III). The remaining two sub-kiloton devices made up the second group (Shakti IV & V). It was decided that the first group consisting of three devices would be tested on 11 of May and the second group on 13 May. The thermonuclear device was placed in a shaft code named 'White House' (over 200 m deep), while the 'Taj Mahal' shaft (over 150 m deep) was assigned to the fission bomb, and 'Kumbhkaran' to the first sub-kiloton shot. The other two shafts for the second test series were designated NT 1 & NT 2.The first three devices were placed in their respective shafts on 10 May, the day before the tests. The shafts were L-shaped, with a horizontal chamber for the test device. The first device to be placed was the sub-kiloton device in the 'Kumbhkaran' shaft. The Army engineers sealed the shaft at around 8:30 PM. Then the thermonuclear device was lowered into the 'White House' shaft and sealing this shaft took until 4 a.m. the next morning. By then the fission device was being placed in the 'Taj Mahal' shaft. It was sealed at 7:30 a.m., just 90 minutes from the planned test time.

The actual timing of the tests depended on the local weather conditions. It was hot in the Pokhran desert in early May, it reached 43°C on the day of the test. But the critical factor was the wind. Although the tests were underground, they were shallow tests and the sealing of the shaft could not be guaranteed to be leak-proof (a number of shaft seal failures had occurred during tests by USA, USSR and UK despite the shafts being much deeper). Winds blowing toward inhabited areas, as occurred on the morning on 11 May were not acceptable. But by early afternoon the winds had died down and the scientists decided to go ahead with the tests. Dr. K. Santhanam of the DRDO, who was in charge of the test site preparations, gave the two keys that activated the test countdown to Dr. M. Vasudev, the range safety officer, who was responsible for verifying that all test indicators were normal. After checking the indicators, Vasudev handed one key each to a representative of BARC and the DRDO, who together unlocked the countdown system. At 3:45 p.m. the three devices were detonated.

Detonations

The three devices (Shakti I,II & III) were detonated simultaneously at 10:13:44.2 UCT (+/-0.32 sec; 6:13:44.2 a.m. EDT; 3:43:44.2 p.m. local) as measured by international seismic monitors. Seismic data collected by stations outside India have placed the total magnitude of the first event at 5.3 (+/- 0.4), making it one of the largest seismic events in the world during the 24 hr period during which it occurred. The measured seismic center of the triple event was located at 27.0716 deg N latitude, and 71.7612 deg E longitude, which places it only 2.8 km from the 1974 test site (which was at 27.095 deg N, 71.752 deg E). The combined force of the three blasts lifted an area about the size of a cricket ground to a few metres above the earth kicking up dust and sand into the air. Three craters were sunk on the desert surface.

Just two days later on 13 May, at 6:51 UCT (2:51 a.m. EST, 12.21 p.m. local), the two sub-kiloton devices were detonated underground. This event was not detected by any seismic stations as they were of very low yield.

With the five explosions, India declared the series of tests to be over.

Reactions to the tests

Reactions in India

Shortly after the tests, a press meet was convened at the Prime Minister's residence in New Delhi. Prime Minister Vajpayee appeared before the press corps and made the following short statement:

Today, at 1545 hours, India conducted three underground nuclear tests in the Pokhran range. The tests conducted today were with a fission device, a low yield device and a thermonuclear device. The measured yields are in line with expected values. Measurements have also confirmed that there was no release of radioactivity into the atmosphere. These were contained explosions like the experiment conducted in May 1974. I warmly congratulate the scientists and engineers who have carried out these successful tests.

News of the tests were greeted with jubilation and large-scale approval by the society in India. The Bombay Stock Exchange registered significant gains. Newspapers and television channels praised the government for its bold decision; editorials were full of praise for the country's leadership and advocated the development of an operational nuclear arsenal for the country's armed forces. The scientific establishment was thankful to the government for having been given the opportunity to prove their capabilities. More significantly, all doubts were erased from the minds of people who questioned India's nuclear capability after the testing in 1974.

Reactions from abroad

The reactions from abroad started immediately after the tests were advertised. On June 6 the United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 1172 condemning the test and that of Pakistan's. The United States issued a strong statement condemning India and promised that sanctions would follow. The American establishment was embarrassed as there had been a serious intelligence failure in detecting the preparations for the test. The UN also issued a statement expressing its disappointment. Canada, which had earlier supplied the CIRUS nuclear reactor to India which was the source of plutonium for the 1974 tests, reassured the world that the CIRUS reactor was not in any way connected to the 1998 tests. China issued a vociferous condemnation calling upon the international community to exert pressure on India to sign the NPT and eliminate its nuclear arsenal. With India joining the group of countries possessing nuclear weapons, a new strategic dimension had emerged in Asia, particularly South Asia.

However, other nations, such as Israel, France and Russia, did not condemn India's tests. Israel issued a statement praising India's tests and declaring that India's reasons for carrying out nuclear tests were the same as Israel's.

The most vehement reaction to India's nuclear test was Pakistan's. Great ire was raised in Pakistan, which issued a severe statement blaming India for instigating a nuclear arms race in the region. Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed that his country would give a suitable reply to the Indians. The Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) carried out five underground nuclear tests at the Chagai test site at 3:16 p.m. (PST) on the afternoon of May 28, 1998, just fifteen days after India's last test. The yield of the tests were reported to be 40 kt.

Pakistan's subsequent tests invited similar condemnations from multiple nations ranging from Argentina to Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.[1] The US president Bill Clinton was quoted as saying "Two wrongs don't make a right", criticizing Pakistan's tests as reactionary to India's Pokhran-II.[2] India's decision to detonate nuclear devices (Pokhran-II) resulted in severe and comprehensive economic and technology related sanctions by a number of states. Over a period of time, these sanctions proved to have exerted only marginal effects on India’s economy and technological progress, and most of the sanctions were lifted within five years of their enactment.

Test yields

The yields from the three tests on the 11th of May 1998 were put at 58 kilotons by the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre based on seismic data obtained at the test site 3 kilometres from the test shafts. The tests were defined as a complete success, and it was determined that all the devices and their components had performed flawlessly. To remove all doubts, the senior scientists involved in the Pokhran operations addressed the press on the 17th of May. In this press meet the scientists claimed that the fission device produced a yield of 15 KT and .3 KT was obtained from the low yield device. They also claimed that the thermonuclear device gave a total yield of 45 KT, 15 KT from the fission trigger and 30 KT from the fusion process and that the theoretical yield of the device (200 KT) was reduced to 45 KT in order to minimize seismic damage to villages near the test range. The village closest to the test range, Khetolai, was a mere 5 kilometres away.

Recent allegations
In 2009 it was widely reported that a retired atomic scientist, K. Santhanam who was closely associated with the tests, claims that the 1998 tests were not as successful as the then BJP government had claimed they were. These claims were widely dismissed in India, including a specific dismissal by former Indian President and Nuclear Physicist A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, who cited evidence and data to prove his point.

Legacy

May 11 has been officially declared as National Technology Day in India to commemorate the first of the five tests that were carried out on May 11, 1998. The day was officially signed by the then Prime Minister of India. The day is celebrated by giving awards to various individuals and industries in the field of science and industry.

Images

• Shaft I named White House
  Shaft I named White House
• Shaft II named Taj Mahal
  Shaft II named Taj Mahal
• Shaft III named Shakti
  Shaft III named Shakti

References

External links

• Nuclear Weapons Archive: Operation Shakti
• 'India aborted nuclear bomb plans in 1994'

Books

• How the CIA was Fooled written by Raj Chengappa

See also

• A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, the Scientific Adviser to the Prime Minister.
• R. Chidambaram,
• Anil Kakodkar
• India and weapons of mass destruction
• Pokhran-I - First nuclear test explosion by India on May 18, 1974
• Chagai-I - Pakistan's nuclear test on May 28, 1998
• Chagai-II - Pakistan's second nuclear test on May 30, 1998