India conducts successful test of anti-tank laser-guided missile -

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By Our Correspondent

New Delhi, June 28: Tanks win wars. The 1965 Indo-Pak war and subsequently in 1971 were won by the tanks. The 1999 Kargil war too saw the firepower of tanks. To gain superiority over tanks is what the nations are striving, and the ant-tank missiles supplied by the US to Ukraine have reportedly bled the Russian most in the ongoing war.

On Tuesday, India’s indigenously-developed Laser-Guided Anti-Tank Guided Missile (ATGM) was successfully test-fired from Main Battle Tank (MBT) Arjun by Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Indian Army at KK Ranges with support of armoured Corps Centre & School (ACC&S) Ahmednagar.

“In the test, the ATGM hit the bull’s eye with textbook precision and successfully defeated the target at minimum ranges. Telemetry systems recorded the satisfactory flight performance of the missile,” said the government in an official statement late on Tuesday evening.

The all-indigenous ATGM employs a tandem High Explosive Anti-Tank (HEAT) warhead to defeat Explosive Reactive Armour (ERA) protected armoured vehicles.

“The ATGM has been developed with multi-platform launch capability and is currently undergoing technical evaluation trials from 120 mm rifled gun of MBT Arjun,” added the government in the statement.

It further stated that engaging the targets at lower ranges is a challenge due to the dimensional constraints of tank launched ATGMs, which has been successfully accomplished by the ATGM for MBT Arjun.

“With the trial, the ATGM’s capability to engage targets from minimum to maximum range has been established. Earlier the trials have been successful for maximum range,” said the government in the statement.

Union Minister for Defence Rajnath Singh while lauding DRDO and Indian Army for the successful trial of the Laser Guided ATGM said that development of this system is an important step towards realising Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of ‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat’.