Indian warships to hold separate drills in Vietnam, Malaysia & Philippines

A flotilla of 4 Indian naval warships – INS Delhi, INS Satpura, INS Shakti and INS Kiltan – will conduct exercises with countries which are locked in a dispute with China.

Sources said these warships are scheduled to visit Sri Lanka, Singapore, Vietnam, Malaysia and The Philippines during the deployment that would last some six weeks. The warships arrived at Singapore last week.

There will be separate set of exercises with each of the countries. Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines, are among the five countries locked in a dispute with China and have overlapping claims in the hydrocarbon-rich South China Sea. Beijing refuses to accept a UN verdict on the extent of its maritime boundary. To reach these countries, the Navy warships will sail through the South China Sea.

The warships have specialised roles. The INS Kiltan is equipped with anti-submarine warfare capabilities. The INS Shakti is a fleet tanker and carries fuel, water, spare parts and ration supplies for the three ships. It means any of the three ships can be refuelled at mid-sea. INS Delhi and INS Satpura are classified in Naval parlance as a ‘Guided Missile Destroyer’ and a ‘Stealth Frigate’, respectively.

With all the three countries India has excellent ties. A land-based version of the BrahMos missile has been sold to the Philippines last year. With Vietnam, ties run deeper. In 2023, India gifted an operational warship INS Kirpan. A “Joint Vision Statement on India-Vietnam Defence Partnership towards 2030” broad-bases the “scope and scale” of defence ties. The two countries have a logistics support pact to allow militaries of the two sides to use each other’s bases for repair and replenishment of supplies.

India has given a $300 million credit line to Vietnam and provided support at Air Force Officers Training School. In past Indian Navy trained their Vietnamese counterparts in operating submarines.

With Malaysia, India has agreed to exchange expertise and best practices for maintaining the Malaysia’s fleet of Russian-origin Sukhoi-30 aircraft. Last week, the Indian Navy’s Survey Vessel Large (SVL) INS Sandhayak was at Port Klang, Malaysia, for hydrographic cooperation. The ship has full scale coastal and deep water surveying capacity, oceanographic data collection.

The Navy said: “The maiden visit of the ship to port Klang aims at facilitating technical exchanges and strengthening institutional ties via concerted cooperation like sharing of survey technologies and sustained hydrographic support engagements”.

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