Manoj Ambat's Blog dealing with Defence, Foreign Affairs, Strategic Affairs and Politics

Malabar Naval Exercises ( Image Credits- Wikimedia Commons/United States Navy) India, the United States, and Japan are gearing up for the next iteration of the  Malabar series of naval exercises . The exercise this year will take place in the northern Pacific and will involve naval assets from all three countries. The exercise is seen as a symbol of growing trilateral security cooperation between these three democracies. The Malabar exercise will precede India’s “Yudh Abhyas” counter-terror exercise in Uttarakhand, which is scheduled to take place in September with U.S. forces, according to a  Times of India  report . Both Malabar and Yudh Abhyas represent the two most significant military exercises that the Indian armed forces have been involved in since Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) electoral victory. According to the  Times of India , the Indian navy will be sending four to five ships, including a  Rajput -class destroyer and a  Shivalik -class s

Image credits-AFP/East News During the election campaign in India, there were active debates about the country’s future foreign policy strategy. From the perspective of an international observer, there was a lack of certainty about what was meant in these debates, and for good reason. For starters, there were the blurred lines between the ideological platforms of the respective parties. Moreover, candidates turned to populism and slogans throughout the campaign to make their point. As a result, there were the obvious questions after the victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its frontrunner, Narendra Modi. What position will the new prime minister take toward the U.S. – the same country that rejected a visa to him? What policy will come from the BJP government that has reliable ties with the U.S.? Should we expect any changes in India-Russia relations? Will the recent news about Moscow-Beijing bilateral contracts and  Russia’s decision to sell weapons to Islamabad  

INS Satpura ( Image Credits- Wikimedia commons/United States Navy) India is gearing up for the next round of military exercises with the US, with the top-notch "Malabar" naval war games in the Pacific and the intensive "Yudh Abhyas" counter-terror drills in Uttarakhand, in the first such maneuvres after the Modi government came to power last month.  Just before Prime Minister Narendra Modi leaves for Japan to meet his counterpart Shinzo Abe on July 3 and 4, India will dispatch four to five warships, including a Rajput-class destroyer and a Shivalik-class stealth frigate, on the long-range overseas deployment.  "The warships will first head for the 'Indra' exercise with Russia off Vladivostok and then reach the North Pacific towards end-July for the Malabar exercises, which apart from India and US will include Japan," said an official.  India had invited Japan to participate in this year's Malabar war games, which have ruffled the feathers

Vietnamese soldiers ( Image credits-Wikimedia commons/Author)  “We are enraged. We are very angry.” With words as firm as these, the  ‪#‎ Vietnamese‬  ambassador denounced China's “dream” of a 9-dash line, the demarcation mark that  ‪#‎ China‬  uses to claim virtually the entire  ‪#‎ South‬  #China  ‪#‎ Sea‬ . “We don't fear anything,” Vietnamese Ambassador to the #Philippines Truong Trieu Duong told Rappler. ‪#‎ Vietnam‬ , after all, has a long tradition of ejecting its conquerors – including #China, in 938 AD – throughout its 2,000-year history. Duong sat down for a wide-ranging interview on May 29, which covered Vietnam's thoughts on #China as well as the United States, their country's next possible moves, and its views on the #Philippines in the South China Sea dispute. The following stories on Rappler covered two main points from the interview: #Vietnam to #Philippines: United, we will win Philippines, Vietnam can share disputed sea – envoy Be

Yasin class Submarine ( Image credits- Wikimedia commons/Kremlin) On June 17, the new Project-885 Yasen-class multi-purpose nuclear submarine joined the ranks of the Russian Navy’s fleet. The creation of this nuclear submarine should have become a revolution for the Soviet submarine fleet. The key feature of the Yasen-class submarine, which still remains one of the Russian defense industry’s most closely guarded projects, is its universality, previously unachievable either by its Russian predecessors or their foreign equivalents. The Severodvinsk, the lead Yasen-class submarine, was launched on June 17. By the time design work on it was finished in 1991, the submarine marked a new era in Russian submarine construction. Unlike in the U.S., where from the moment its nuclear submarine fleet came into being there was a drive towards uniformity, in the USSR there were many submarines created under different projects, which were difficult to unify and whose functions often ove

Image credits-Reuters/Kevin Lamarque On May 28, President Barack Obama delivered a commencement speech at the graduation ceremony of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. This has traditionally been the preferred venue for U.S. national leaders seeking to acknowledge their foreign and security policy accomplishments and articulate their visions for the role of the United States in future international affairs. This year was no exception. However, while Obama highlighted his work toward the conclusion of the U.S. military engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan and reminded Americans that the United States is still the indispensable leader in international affairs, his vision for future U.S. foreign and security policy  fell short of expectations . Perhaps the most noticeable omission was that of the President’s keystone foreign policy undertaking: the  U.S. strategic rebalance toward the Asia-Pacific . Was this just sloppy speech writing, or was it a subtle in

Iraqi insurgents ( Image credits-Wikimedia commons/Author) In late 2010, Iraq was mired in a political stalemate after ambiguous parliamentary elections left the country without a government for ten months. At the same time, the U.S. was negotiating with the country's leadership to figure out the levels and legal status of U.S. troops that would remain in Iraq after combat operations ended the next year. These twin impasses were solved through a behind-the-scenes deal brokered by the head of Iran's covert foreign operations that was readily accepted by the U.S. The agreement, which the New Yorker's Dexter Filkins  described in detail  in a September 2013 piece in the magazine, left Nouri al-Maliki, a pro-Iranian Shi'ite with despotic and sectarian tendencies, in charge of the country. It deepened Iran's meddling with the fragile politics of its western neighbor, and sent Iraq on the path to state failure. As Filkins explained, Qassem Suleimani, the head

Japanese Soryu Class submarine ( Image credits-Wikimedia commons/United States Navy) Japan and Australia agreed Wednesday to jointly develop stealth submarine technology, as Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe pushes his country toward a more assertive global military role. The submarine technology was a top item at talks among the nations’ foreign and defense ministers in Tokyo and was included in an agreement to step up cooperation in defense equipment and technology. Defense minister Itsunori Onodera told a joint news conference after the talks that the ministers agreed to begin the research next year. It will focus on technology that is applicable to any vessel including submarines, he said, but declined to give further details. “I have high expectations for successful results,” he said. Onodera said the research and possible technology transfer would not violate Japan’s pacifist constitution. Australian Defence Minister David Johnston, left, and Australian Foreign M

Liaoning ( Image credits- In the pic) China is expanding its "three warfares" policy in dealing with Taiwan to its territorial disputes in the South China Sea, reports our Chinese-language sister paper Want Daily. Richard Hu, deputy executive director of the Center for Security Studies at Taipei's National Chengchi University, told the paper that the People's Liberation Army first officially coined the political warfare concept of the "three warfares" back in 2003, the three being public opinion warfare, psychological warfare and legal warfare. The strategy has long been adopted by Beijing for cross-strait affairs, but now the battlefield has been extended from the Taiwan Strait to the South China Sea, Hu said. According to Hu, China has already begun adopting the strategy against the Philippines, which filed a 4,000-page arbitration case at The Hague under the United Nations Law of the Sea against Beijing's territorial claims to the disputed

Tupolev Tu-95 (Image courtesy- Wikimedia Commons/ Author) Four Russian strategic bombers triggered U.S. air-defense systems while conducting practice bombing runs near Alaska this week, with two of the Tu-95 Bear H aircraft coming within 50 miles of the California coast, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (Norad) confirmed Wednesday. “The last time we saw anything similar was two years ago on the Fourth of July,” Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Norad spokesman, told The Washington Free Beacon. Davis said the latest Bear H incursions began Monday about 4:30 p.m. Pacific time when radar detected the four turbo-prop powered bombers approaching the U.S. air-defense zone near the far western Aleutian Islands. Two U.S. Air Force F-22 jets were scrambled and intercepted the bombers over the Aleutians. After tracking the bombers as they flew eastward, two of the four Bears turned around and headed west toward the Russian Far East. The bombers are believed to be based at the