Today the Times of India reports that the Indian military will conduct the third flight test of their Agni-III intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) on Wednesday. The first test was evidently botched when high temperature gases damaged some of the missile’s wiring, but this was corrected for the second trial and India hopes for another success today. The new missile is spec’d with a range of about 3500 kilometers.

What’s interesting about the piece is that it states directly in the title that the new IRBM is “China-specific.” Of course, realistically, China is the only country of strategic significance that falls within the Agni-III’s range (aside from Pakistan, but 3500 km would be overkill for that target). There really isn’t another reason to build such a weapon, but the way it’s discussed is just so…blunt.

But then, India has used the Chinese threat as the rationale for its nuclear arsenal from its inception and that threat has only grown since India’s first, “peaceful” atomic detonation in 1974. India feels outmatched by Chinese DF-21 and DF-31 missiles and believes it must field a modern IRBM of its own to feel secure in its second strike capability. If all goes as planned today, New Dehli should be one step closer to that sense of security that only comes with capability to incinerate any of your rival’s major population centers…

UPDATE: Today’s test of the Angi-III IRBM was conducted successfully and the Indian Defense Research and Development Organization is reporting the missile ready to enter service with the Indian military.  The Agni-III will bolster India’s nuclear deterrent against its Chinese neighbor by being able to carry a 200 kiloton thermonuclear warhead as far as Beijing and Shanghai.  Reports also indicate it will benefit from the improved accuracy once the joint Indian-Russian version of the GLONASS satellite navigation system goes online in 2010, allowing an upgrade from its present inertial guidance system.

The New York Times published a disturbing article about the online backlash faced by a Chinese student at Duke University who tried to mediate between pro-China and pro-Tibet demonstrators. The student, Grace Wang, reportedly tired without success to start talks between rival protest groups on the day the Olympic Torch passed through San Francisco. Afterwards, things turned ugly:

The next day, a photo appeared on an Internet forum for Chinese students with a photo of Ms. Wang and the words “traitor to your country” emblazoned in Chinese across her forehead. Ms. Wang’s Chinese name, identification number and contact information were posted, along with directions to her parents’ apartment in Qingdao, a Chinese port city.

Salted with ugly rumors and manipulated photographs, the story of the young woman who was said to have taken sides with Tibet spread through China’s most popular Web sites, at each stop generating hundreds or thousands of raging, derogatory posts, some even suggesting that Ms. Wang — a slight, rosy 20-year-old — be burned in oil. Someone posted a photo of what was purported to be a bucket of feces emptied on the doorstep of her parents, who had gone into hiding.

This sort of “Internet vigilantism” is a piece of China’s emergent online culture and has made headlines before; most famously when, in 2006, outraged Chinese citizens reacted to an anonymous blog by a British expatriate recounting the latter’s sexual conquest of Chinese women. While the anonymity afforded by the net has long fostered nasty comments on forums and in chat rooms, the vitriol of the attacks in this and other cases from China along with the posting of specific information about the target make the phenomenon particularly troubling. High technology, nationalism, and the cloak of a random username make for a dangerous cocktail, it would seem.