Recently Pakistan successfully tested the “Hatf-VII-Babur†cruise missile. The story has been covered by the international press everywhere because of it’s geo-political implications. There are very little details about the technology behind the missile. Here are the breadcrumbs I’ve found by groveling the net:
An unknown army official says:
“It is a terrain hugging missile, which has the most advanced and modern navigation and guidance and a high degree of maneuverability and its technology enables it to avoid radar detection and penetrate undetected through any hostile defence system”
PakistaniDefence.com has videos and a few more details about what the missile is capable of:
The military said the launch of the missile, which has a range of 500 kilometers (310 miles), meant that Pakistan had “joined a select group of countries which have the capability to design and develop cruise missiles”.
….
Babur was launched vertically with the solid booster motor. Immediately after the launch its guidance and control system takes over and it gains speed and after a few seconds its rocket booster motor is separated. Then the missile automatically opens its wing as a jet plane, and moves towards its target. Special cameras installed in the missile, control and manage its height by minutely monitoring ups and downs of land.
The News is reporting that National Engineering and Scientific Commission (NESCOM) claims that the missile will be in full production sometime next month (their ‘coming soon’ website here).
That’s about all I could find relating to the technology behind the missile. I have a few more questions I would like answered about the missile: Which institution is responsible for creating and putting together the missile prototype? Is it produced indigenously? Who wrote the software for the guidance system? And how does NESCOM fit into the picture?