Numerous tributes in India after the death this Friday January 4 of the architect of the country’s nuclear program. Aged 88, he notably led the country’s atomic weapons tests in secret and in the context of the “Cold War”. And acquired an iconic status while India has since joined the very exclusive club of essential military and nuclear powers.
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With our correspondent in India, Como Bastin
The operation was called “Smiling Buddha”, but it was very serious. In 1974, India secretly transported plutonium to Rajasthan where it was going to detonate its first nuclear bomb. The mastermind of these essays which surprised the world was Rajagopala Chidambaram. He will be deprived of a visa by the United States, which will launch sanctions against India, worried about its proximity to the USSR.
Strategic independence
In 1998, India carried out five more nuclear tests under his direction and joined the club of atomic powers. Chidambaram finishes engraving his legend, that of the man who allowed India to gain its strategic independence. “ A veteran, a visionary, an irreplaceable scientist », the Indian political class today unanimously pays tribute to him.
150 nuclear warheads
Because the era of American sanctions is long gone today, while India has more than 150 nuclear warheads and the world is fighting to sell it weapons. Or to build nuclear power plants there, an energy whose control also owes a lot to the determination of Chidambaram.
Also readIndia: the emergence of a nuclear power