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

Image credits- Wikimedia Commons Source- The National Interest Author- Harry J. Kazianis When Chinese officers go to bed at night, what do they fear most? Despite all the hard work, all the billions of dollars spent, no Chinese sailor wants to tangle with the U.S. Navy. As one retired Chinese senior defense official told me in late 2014: “The 3 A.M. crisis ‘call’ I feared the most is that we were at war with your navy.” While such a statement surely tickles the hearts of Pentagon officials, know this: Fear, when focused properly, can make the mind—and the collective power of nations—help craft solutions to complex military challenges that might at one time have seemed nearly impossible. For example, during the 1995-1996 Taiwan Crisis, Beijing’s ‘nightmares’ were nearly realized. When faced with a superior military power that could deploy massive amounts of advanced naval assets and project power from multiple domains like no other nation in history, China simp

USS Curtis Wilbur underway ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / US Navy) Source- The Diplomat Author- Ankit Panda On Saturday, a U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyer, the USS Curtis Wilbur, sailed within 12 nautical miles of Triton Island in the disputed Paracel Islands in the South China Sea. Triton Island is claimed by China, Taiwan, and Vietnam, and is administered by China. The Curtis Wilbur‘s passage near Triton Island marks the first freedom of navigation patrol in the South China Sea since the U.S. Navy sailed the USS Lassen within 12 nautical miles of Subi Reef in the Spratly Islands, marking 95 days between the two operations. Triton Island is not among the features where China has built artificial islands and constructed military and civilian features. According to Captain Jeff Davis, a spokesperson for the Pentagon, no Chinese People’s Liberation Army-Navy (PLAN) vessels attempted to inhibit the Curtis Wilbur‘s passage unlike during the October freedom of na

United States THAAD launcher ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / United States Army) Source- The Diplomat Author- Shannon Tiezzi A U.S. missile defense system would be helpful for South Korean security if deployed on the peninsula, a defense official from Seoul said on Friday. The comments are the latest sign that Seoul is again considering allowing the U.S.-made Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system to be deployed on its soil. Defense Ministry spokesperson Kim Min-seok said on Friday that the Korean government “will consider every measure to prepare against North Korea’s missile threats.” He added, “If U.S. Forces Korea deploys THAAD, it will help our national security and defense.” However, Kim also refuted media reports that South Korea and the United States had begun negotiations on the subject next week. He said that the “South Korean government has not been offered negotiations by the U.S. government,” meaning no decision on the issue should be

Japanese ATD-X ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons / Hunini) Source- The Diplomat Author- Franz Stefan-Gady This Thursday, Japan’s new Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Agency revealed the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Advanced Technology Demonstrator – Experimental (ATD-X) fifth-generation fighter technology demonstrator, now dubbed X-2 and unofficially named ‘ShinShin,’ to the media at a heavily guarded hangar at a regional airport near the city of Komaki, in Aichi Prefecture. It has previously been showcased once already in May 2014. The X-2 is the country’s first domestically produced full-scale test model—a technology demonstrator—of a new indigenous stealth fighter jet design, which has been under development at a Mitsubishi Heavy Industries plant in Toyoyama since 2009, with total program costs estimated at 39.4 billion yen (around $331 million). The aircraft—an “advanced technology demonstration unit,” according to the Defense Technical Research and Devel

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Indian navy western fleet ( Source- Wikimedia Commons / Indian navy) Source- Eurasia Review Author- Commdore RS Vasan IN (Retd) /SAAG The IFR 2016 will indeed be a grand spectacle as more than one hundred ships from the navies of over fifty countries will participate in this exercise that is carried out every five years. The event which in the initial years was mostly limited to the participation of ships from the Indian Navy, Indian Coast Guard and the merchant navy transformed in to an international event with a major maritime event conducted in 2001 under the initiative of then Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Susheel Kumar. The marching of the naval officers and sailors from ships around the world along the marine drive in Mumbai and the presence of many ships from around the world signaled a new era in maritime diplomacy. The intentions of a maritime India to occupy center stage in both regional and global missions by using the Indian Navy as an instrument of national po

Image credits- VOA Source- The Diplomat Author- Franz Stefan-Gady For five weeks, 270 Japanese soldiers from the Ground Self-Defense Force (GSDF) Western Infantry Regiment, along with other units, will participate in an annual, bilateral amphibious training exercise, codenamed Iron Fist, jointly held with the United States Marine Corps (USMC) at Camp Pendleton in southern California. The goal of the exercise, which will include combat marksmanship, military planning, and fire support operations, is to train the GSDF and USMC in combined amphibious operations, according to a U.S. Department of Defense press release. “Since 2006, Exercise Iron Fist has enabled Japanese soldiers to train with U.S. Marines on American soil to improve the planning, communications, and conducting of combined amphibious operations,” said USMC Colonel Clay C. Tipton, commanding officer of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit. “In the short span of a decade, this exercise has allowed our two ser