China`s anti-ship missile not a threat: Admiral Verma

New Delhi, Feb 10 (PTI) Dismissing China's anti-ship
missile programme as a threat to Indian warships, Navy chief
Admiral Nirmal Verma on Wednesday said it would be a difficult
task to even spot the vessels in the vast expanse of high
seas.
"Targeting ships at high seas is not an easy task or as
simple as land warfare," Admiral Verma told reporters here on
the sidelines of a seminar on aircraft carriers organised by
the National Maritime Foundation.
"There are hundreds and thousands of ships in the sea at
any given time. It is extremely important to spot the ship
before targeting it. There are limitations in terms of
maritime reconnaissance and long-range searches," Verma said
when asked about the threat posed by Chinese Anti-ship
Ballistic Missile Programme.
He said it was "a complex problem" to use a conventional
missile against a moving target at high seas.
Earlier, addressing the seminar, the Navy chief said
aircraft carriers were expensive and there were questions on
their affordability and survivability due to their large size
while at sea.
"Some event talk about carrying out land-based missile
attacks against an aircraft carrier. We must weigh this
against the difficulties of targeting a mobile target out at
sea," he said, noting that carriers can move 600 nautical
miles a day, which translates into one million square nautical
miles of ocean area which an adversary has to search.(MORE)
PTI