Photos of advance air operations with MiG 29Ks of Indian Navy and F-18s of the US Navy. ANI
By Rajat Pandit | TNN
NEW DELHI, India, 20 November 2020
The power-packed second phase of the top-notch Malabar naval exercise, with two aircraft carriers, fighter jets and ten other warships from India, the US, Japan and Australia, came to an end in the Arabian Sea on Friday.
With an eye firmly on an expansionist and aggressive China, the 24th edition of the Malabar exercise underlined the “commitment” of the participating “Quad” countries to “support a free, open, inclusive Indo-Pacific as well as a rules-based international order”, said officials.
India deployed its solitary carrier, the 44,500-tonne INS Vikramaditya with its MiG-29K fighter jets, while US fielded its mammoth over 100,000-tonne nuclear-powered USS Nimitz with its F/A-18 fighters and E-2C Hawkeye early-warning aircraft for the Phase-II of Malabar.
The two carriers, along with other warships and aircraft of the participating navies, engaged in high-intensity naval operations including cross-deck flying operations and advanced air defence exercises.
“In addition to the ‘dual carrier’ operations, advanced surface and anti-submarine warfare exercises, seamanship evolutions and weapon firings were also undertaken during both phases of Malabar, demonstrating the synergy, coordination and interoperability between the four friendly navies,” said Indian Navy spokesperson Commander Vivek Madhwal.
The Phase-I of Malabar was held in the first week of November in the Bay of Bengal, with the four “Quad” countries coming together after a gap of 13 years in a strategic show of intent to China.
India’s military confrontation with China in eastern Ladakh is into its seventh month now. Though military and diplomatic talks are underway between the two countries to defuse the troop standoff, the exact modalities and sequencing of the proposed disengagement are yet to be finalised.
This is the first time the four democracies have come together to conduct war games. Australia was not invited by India until this time because India lives in the shadow of communist China.
Australian leaders have come to the conclusion that China is already in a “grey zone” conflict where it is deploying coercion short of outright military conflict. We can clearly see this in Eastern Ladakh. As a result regional military modernization is occurring at an unprecedented rate.
China’s muscle flexing has alarmed all its neighbours and virtually forced the Quad to come together to present a unified force against the back drop of Chinese aggression. The new doctrine is to have the capacity to deter the enemy at a much greater distance in order to prevent war.
This requires long range strike missiles and offensive cyber capabilities and area denial. The four nation military exercise is precisely to send a message to China that it shouldn’t entertain military adventurism in the Indo-Pacific neighbourhood. These nations are bound by the values of democracy, freedom and rule of law.
The disruption of peace and stability around the world by communist China will pull other nations together to protect the values they espouse. The security pact between Australia and Japan signed recently is a clear indication of regional discomfort of communist China’s militaristic expansionism.
Australia is a middle power yet it stands up to China and speaks about the suppression of democracy in Hong Kong while India is rated as the fifth most powerful nation and has the largest standing army in the world but fearful of saying a word of support for the democratic aspirations of the HK people.
India should sign a defence pact with the US in order to protect its interests.