INDIA could test-fire its first intercontinental ballistic missile as early as today, a 50-tonne, 20-metre rocket that has the potential to reach all of Asia and large parts of Europe.
The Agni V - named for the Hindu god of fire, but tagged ''the China Killer'' by the more sensationalist sections of the local press - has a range of more than 5000 kilometres and has been slated for a 1000-second test flight some time between today and Friday.
The rocket is likely to be fired from Wheeler Island, off the eastern state of Odisha (formerly known as Orissa), this morning, India's Defence Research and Development Organisation said.'Agni V is a 5000-plus-kilometre-range missile and it is to meet our present-day threat perceptions, which are determined by our defence forces and other agencies,'' defence spokesman Ravi Gupta said from the test site.
A successful test would make India the sixth country known to deploy intercontinental ballistic missiles. Only the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council have that capability.
Agni V's launch comes just four months after the country tested the Agni IV rocket. The first four series of the Agni were developed over a period of nine years.
While Indian officials are at pains to reiterate the country's ''no-first-strike'' policy, India's armoury, and the hastening pace of its development, is feeding anxieties about a regional arms race.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute recently declared India the biggest arms importer in the world, spending $US12.7 billion over the past five years buying hardware and weapons from overseas, about 10 per cent of the global total.
In its recent national budget, India will increase its total defence spending by 17 per cent this year, to $US38.6 billion ($A37.3 billion) - more than four times the government's spending on healthcare for its 1.2 billion citizens.
The earlier, shorter-range Agni series missiles were designed to fortify the country's border and to reach every corner of Pakistan. But the series IV and V have been built with China in mind.
''This missile is about neutralising the threat coming from China,'' said Uday Bhaskar, a former commodore in the Indian navy and now an analyst at the Delhi-based National Maritime Foundation.
China's nuclear arsenal still dwarfs India's by about 410 nuclear warheads to 70.
India's missile test has garnered neither the international attention nor the opprobrium of North Korea's failed test last week.
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