Malabar naval exercise begins tomorrow amid strained India-US trade ties

Despite India facing punitive tariffs imposed by the US, the annual multi-nation maritime exercise Malabar will begin on Monday, featuring the Navies of India, US, Japan and Australia.

The nine-day exercise (November 10-18) will be hosted by the US at Guam, one of its military bases in the western-part of the Pacific Ocean.  Guam, an island, lies about 2,500 km east of the Philippines.

Indian Navy warship INS Sahyadri has reached Guam, the Indian Navy said on Sunday.   

The drills will begin with a harbour phase that includes operational planning and discussions, alignment on communication protocols, familiarisation visits between participating nations, and sports fixtures.

Following the harbour phase, all participating units will proceed for a Sea Phase. The ships and aircraft will take part in naval drills, focusing on joint fleet operations, anti-submarine warfare, gun firing and flying operations.

The exercise gains significance as all the four-countries operate similar maritime surveillance planes capable of hunting submarines. Thee sensors and radars on these planes can generate a common ‘picture’ at sea.  The four nations also possess common platforms, enabling seamless communication with each other.

The four-nation ‘Malabar’ exercise is often described by Beijing as ‘anti-China’, largely because all its participants are also members of the Quad grouping.

This edition of Malabar will also mark the first military engagement between India and the US since the two sides signed a new ‘Framework for the US-India Major Defence Partnership’ last month.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and his US counterpart, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, met on the sidelines of the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ summit in Malaysia.

After signing the document, Rajnath Singh said, “Defence will remain as the major pillar of our bilateral relations.”

India-US ties have strained after President Donald Trump imposed 50 per cent tariff on India, one of the highest in the world. Half of this tariff is punitive in retaliation for buying Russian crude oil. The other half stems from the stalled trade negotiations.

Last year in October, India hosted the ‘Malabar’, beginning with the harbour phase in Visakhapatnam, followed by the Sea Phase. The Ministry of Defence had described Malabar 2024 as one of the most comprehensive editions yet, incorporating complex operational scenarios.

Exercise Malabar, which began in 1992 as a bilateral naval drill between the Indian and US Navies, has evolved into a key multilateral event aimed at enhancing interoperability to address shared maritime challenges in the Indian Ocean and Indo-Pacific region.