The Indian Navy fleet has started deploying its warships not only in the Indian Ocean but also in faraway seas. On October 1 four Indian warships set sail from Mumbai on a long overseas deployment to East Africa.

During the 50-day voyage, guided-missile destroyer INS Mumbai, stealth frigates INS Talwar and INS Teg, and tanker INS Deepak will establish "maritime bridges" with the littoral states of the Indian Ocean. They will make their first friendly visit to Antsiranana in Madagascar. Western Fleet chief Rear Admiral R Hari Kumar commands the squadron.

At its time, the Soviet Union started turning its fleet into a blue-water battle fleet in a similar way, says First vice-president of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems Konstantin Sivkov.

“This is a significant expedition. Such operative readiness expeditions are aimed at exploring important regions, studying hydrography and specifics of navigation and establishing contacts with the littoral states. From a military and strategic point of view, this concerns the organization of control over a group of ships during long-distance training voyages,” Sivkov said.

One of the ships of the group, INS Teg, will sail to the main base of the South African Navy fleet near Cape Town on October 20. It will participate in the IBSAMAR (India-Brazil-South Africa Maritime) joint exercises involving South Africa and Brazil, says Sivkov.

“Analysts have drawn attention to the fact that the exercises will be held with the participation of Brazil and South Africa. This move is aimed at establishing military and strategic cooperation with the other members of the BRICS group. During the drill, the navies will practice to perfect cooperation with friendly fleets and joint actions in the group of coalition forces,” Sivkov said.

Undoubtedly, the long-voyage of the Indian Navy ships also reflects the country’s growing competition with China, the fleet of which is actively operating in the Indian Ocean, says Sivkov.

“This is the demonstration of India’s flag and capabilities and decisiveness of the Indian fleet to operate in the faraway regions and defend the country’s national interests, of course. This is first and foremost directed against the US and Europe. This is also a signal to China that India intends to present where the Chinese fleet presents,” Sivkov said.

Delhi is worried by the growing activity of Chinese ships in the Indian Ocean. Early September, for the first time a Chinese Type 039 Song-class diesel-electric submarine anchored at Colombo in Sri Lanka. Earlier, guided-missile destroyer Changchun and guided-missile frigate Changzhou took part in joint exercises with the warships of the Iranian and Pakistani navies when they entered ports Bandar Abbas and Karachi.

Navy chief Admiral Robin Dhowan last week said “IOR is our area of operations and we see what is Chinese deployment in IOR and how it can create challenges for us and how we can face them....We are always ready,"
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