China on mind, Thailand wary of new trilateral

Smita Sharma

 

New Delhi

 

September 18 
 

After saying no to the BIMSTEC military exercise, Thailand has indicated to India that it will be unwilling to join a new trilateral exercise proposed along with Singapore. The debut trilateral naval exercise with ‘Singapore and another ASEAN country’ was announced by PM Modi during the Shangri La Dialogue in June. Subsequently Ministry of Defence officials pointed to Thailand as the third partner for staging the exercise in the seas. However Thai sources have told The Tribune that while the BIMSTEC withdrawal was because of ‘budgetary considerations and not political reasons, China is a concern as far as the trilateral exercise decision is concerned’. “We would not like to upset the balance of powers between major countries in the region,” said a source.

It is also learnt that Thailand communicated to visiting Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in August that there was no budgetary provision for a military exercise overseas. But just after three days PM still went ahead with the military exercise announcement at the BIMSTEC plenary which according to sources caught not just Thailand but also Nepal by surprise. Nepalese officials say that the announcement was unilateral and was not mentioned anywhere in a joint communique or flagged for consultations with the grouping.

Meanwhile Thailand officials feel that it has substantive military component ongoing with India including annual army exercise Maitree, coordinated navy patrol Corpat twice a year, a table top exercise with the Indian Air Force without equipments as well as the multilateral naval exercise Milan conducted since 1995 every two years. Keeping in mind ‘its close ties with Beijing’, Thailand at the moment feels another trilateral exercise in the waters with India could be seen adversely .

 

While sources suggest India could look at Indonesia or Malaysia as options, Jakarta too is not keen for another expanded maritime exercise at this stage. India is lining up a first bilateral naval and Air Force exercise with Indonesia later this year, “Planning for any multilateral project needs to be well ahead of time including for budgetary reason. There is disposable budget to deploy at any time,” said an Indonesian official. India has recently also started its own Malacca  deployment after it was refused a green signal to join hands for the coordinated Malacca Strait Patrol conducted by Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.

.