Malabar 2020: There will be no contact between the military due to COVID-19.
New Delhi:
A sequence of gun fire was fired on Day 3 of the four-nation naval war games “Malabar 2020” in the Bay of Bengal, off Visakhapatnam.
India, the United States, Japan and Australia began their biggest joint naval exercises in more than a decade on Tuesday, seen as part of efforts to balance China’s military and economic reach in the region.
A video of the sequence of gun fire from the first phase of today’s naval exercises shows shells fired from an Indian and an Australian frigate. The first of the two-phase drills is November 3-6.
This is the first time that the four partners of the Quadrilateral or Quad alliance (India, the United States, Australia and Japan) participate together in a naval exercise of this scale.
Look | Phase 1 of the 24th edition of # NavalExerciseMalabar2020 ongoing in the Bay of Bengal.
The Indian Navy, the United States Navy, the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force and the Royal Australian Navy are participating in the exercise that began on November 3. pic.twitter.com/G8x8Plz9uH
– NDTV (@ndtv) November 6, 2020
The first phase, which ends today, focuses on complex and advanced naval exercises that include surface, anti-submarine and anti-aircraft warfare operations, flight between decks, nautical evolutions and weapons firing exercises.
Five Indian Navy ships, including a submarine, were deployed in the exercise along with the US Navy’s John S McCain missile destroyer, Australia’s Ballarat frigate and a Japanese destroyer, the Defense Ministry said.
There will be no contact between military personnel from the four nations due to COVID-19 restrictions during the first phase of the drills until Nov. 6, the Defense Ministry said.
This year, the “Malabar” war games were expanded to include all members of the Quad.
The second phase of the exercise will take place in mid-November in the Arabian Sea.
The exercises come at a time when India is in a military stalemate along the Royal Line of Control with China.
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