India's Nuclear Weapons Take to the Skies | TakePart - Inspiration to Action
India's Nuclear Weapons Take to the Skies
With most of the Armageddon-fearing planet apparently losing its taste for nuclear weapons, India's upped its investment in the end of civilization with the planned purchase of 40 nuclear-capable fighter jets.
The official administrator of India's nuclear arsenal, Strategic Forces Command (SFC), has requested two squadrons of modern aerial assets, with room on the wings for the world's most dangerous weapon.
The response to the news was positive from hawks in India's parliament and from cockroaches worldwide looking to rule the planet after man's wholesale destruction.
India's conventional air force is currently tasked with delivering atomic goods to whosoever has it coming; but if the purchase order goes through, SFC will finally get its own dedicated fighting force.
For those handicapping at home, the most likely candidates to unleash an atomic holocaust are rivals India and Pakistan, who share a border, a legacy of war, and a tendency to test nuclear weapons.
Neither country is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), so both are free to expand their nuclear programs beyond the burden of international law. Curbing both nations' nuclear ambitions tops most non-proliferationists' to-do list.
India entered the nuclear club with an atomic test on May 18, 1974.
Dubbed "Smiling Buddha," the eight kiloton blast was touted as a "peaceful nuclear explosion," despite the fact that it shepherded years of weapons proliferation.
Pakistan responded with its own nuclear test in 1998, brought about in large part by reigning atomic miscreant Abdul Qadeer Khan.
Khan gained his nuclear know-how while working the centrifuge shift at a Netherlands research site. He brought his boosted intel home to Pakistan, then sold nuclear secrets to North Korea, Libya and Iran.
If India rings up the register for the 40 new fighters, it will add to a growing miscellany of nuclear technology on the subcontinent.
With a submarine in the works for 2012, India is gunning for the nuclear triad of air, land, and underwater atomic delivery systems. It is fast becoming the world's biggest buyer in weapons and delivery systems.
The second-most populous nation on Earth is expected to spend $80 billion over the next five years for arms contracts from the United States—which, incidentally, also sells weapons to neighboring Pakistan.
