The BrahMos missile, jointly developed by India and Russia, is one of the world’s fastest and most precise cruise missiles, and India is among the few nations to have mastered this level of missile technology. In an interview with CNN-News18, Dr Sudhir Mishra, former Director General of BrahMos Aerospace, explained how the missile works, what makes it hard to intercept, and how much damage it can cause.“BrahMos is a cruise missile. Cruise missile means it can take a trajectory like an aircraft,” said Dr Mishra. Unlike ballistic missiles, which follow a fixed arc, BrahMos can be programmed to fly in various paths, such as low-high-low or low-low-low. At its lowest, it can skim just 5 to 10 metres above sea level, making it almost invisible to ship-based radar. “Enemy ships can see the BrahMos only 2-3 kilometres away, and it gives them about 12-15 seconds to react,” he added.
The missile travels at Mach 2.8 —just under three times the speed of sound. Its typical range starts at 300 kilometres, but when launched from a Sukhoi-30 MKI aircraft, the missile’s reach depends on the aircraft’s range, which can be extended to 5,500 kilometres with mid-air refuelling.
BrahMos is not a nuclear missile. It carries a conventional warhead, but has a devastating impact. “We had taken a discarded ship of the Indian Navy while testing our missile… about 4,500 tonnes of steel… on impact, the ship was broken into two pieces and sank in two and a half minutes,” Dr Mishra recalled. In a strike scenario, the missile can destroy airbase runways, command centres, radars, and aircraft shelters.
Another major advantage is its versatility. It can be launched from land, sea, and air. While it weighs about 2,800 kilograms in general, the version fitted for the Sukhoi fighter jet weighs around 2,200 kilograms. Loading it onto a fighter jet is a quick operation. “It doesn’t take more than 10-12 minutes to load a Sukhoi with a fresh missile,” Dr. Mishra said.According to him, BrahMos cannot be intercepted by any existing air defence systems in countries like Pakistan or China. “We are still 10-15 years away from that,” he said about the possibility of radar systems being able to counter it.Dr Mishra also emphasised India’s technological edge. “Cruise missile follows a very difficult technology. I think India is the first in the world to master this technology.” While the United States once tried to develop similar liquid-fuel supersonic cruise missiles, they abandoned the effort due to high cost and complexity. Today, only India and Russia have them.And the entire missile system is made in India. “We produce BrahMos Aerospace in India and it is headquartered at New Delhi with production units in Hyderabad, Nagpur, Pilani and Thiruvananthapuram,” Dr Mishra said.Catch all the updates from the India-Pakistan ceasefire here
