Amid escalating tensions between Ukraine and Russia, warships of Quad countries, France, Myanmar, South Korea and Vietnam and several others will join together at Visakhapatnam later this week for the largest multilateral exercise Milan, hosted by the Indian Navy. Russia, Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia among others are participating in the exercise without ships.
The exercise, scheduled from February 25 to March 4, will see participation of around 42 countries with ships from over 15 countries. The U.S. will be joining the exercise for the first time.
‘Camaraderie, Cohesion, Collaboration’
“The theme of the MILAN 2022 exercise is ‘Camaraderie - Cohesion – Collaboration’, which aims to project India as a responsible maritime power to the world at large,” the Navy said in a statement on Wednesday. “The aim of the exercise is to hone operational skills, imbibe best practices and procedures, and enable doctrinal learning in the maritime domain through professional interaction between friendly navies.”
The opening ceremony on February 26 will see the inauguration of the Milan village and an International City Parade is scheduled the next day with the participation of foreign contingents, the Navy said. Activities include an International Maritime Seminar, professional and subject matter expert exchanges and Deep Submergence Rescue Vessel (DSRV) demonstration among others, it added.
The invitees include all Indian Ocean littoral states and countries from south-east Asia among others. The harbour phase is scheduled from February 25 to 28 and the sea phase from March 1 to 4.
Shifted to Vizag
Starting with the participation of four countries — Indonesia, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Thailand — in 1995, the exercise has since transitioned in terms of number of participants and complexity of exercises. The participation increased from six regional countries to 18 countries in 2014 which included IOR littorals, the Navy said. It has so far been held at Port Blair in Andaman and Nicobar but is now being shifted to Visakhapatnam, which offers more infrastructure as well as sea space for the exercise.
With the Indian Navy’s engagement with friendly foreign countries expanding over the decades, a need was felt to further consolidate the naval cooperation by enhancing the scale and complexity of the Milan exercise and engaging both regional and extra regional navies of the world, the statement added.
