India proudly showcases its anti-satellite weapon at an arms bazaar

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  Welcome to Defexpo 2020, where a Mission Shakti missile is poking up from the X. [credit: Cli(C)ment Cangelosi ]

This week, India's Ministry of Defense is holding Defexpo 2020 in the northern part of the country. The event seeks to promote India as a "defense manufacturing hub." In other words, it is essentially an arms bazaar.

One of the main exhibits of this week's show is a large display showing off a copy of the hardware used during Mission Shakti, the successful anti-satellite test conducted by India in March, 2019. During this test the country successfully fired a missile from the ground to shoot down a satellite at an altitude of 300km.

The country's prime minister, Narendra Modi, characterized the test as a critical one for his nation, saying, "It shows the remarkable dexterity of India's outstanding scientists and the success of our space program." Effectively, Modi was saying that India had arrived as a global space power. After the United States, Russia, and China, India became only the fourth nation to shoot down a satellite

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