The drills are part of ongoing exercises aimed at promoting interoperability especially in the subsurface domain

The Australian Air Force’s long-range maritime patrol aircraft P-8A landed at INS Rajali Naval air station in Tamil Nadu for the Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) exercise with Indian Navy P-8I aircraft which is being held from June 30-July 6. The drills are part of ongoing exercises aimed at promoting interoperability especially in the subsurface domain.

Maritime Domain Awareness, Subsurface Domain Awareness and ASW have been major focus areas for the Quad group of countries comprising India, Australia, Japan and the U.S. in the backdrop of rapid expansion of Chinese naval presence in the Indian Ocean Region.

“Touchdown! An Australian Air Force P-8A Poseidon will conduct joint maritime surveillance patrols this week with our Indian Navy mates. As top-tier security partners, India and Australia will continue to work together to enhance our maritime capabilities and build maritime domain awareness,” the Australian High Commission in India said on Twitter Sunday evening.

The focus of the exercise is on maritime surveillance operations, enhancing interoperability and information-sharing exchanges, an diplomatic source said. “We have also had P8 missions where Indian Navy personnel air-ride on our P-8A and Royal Australian Air Force personnel air-ride on the Indian P-8I. This grows the interoperability of crews and enhances professional military links,” the source added.

This is the fourth iteration of the exercise between Boeing P-8 aircraft of the two navies. The first iteration was hosted by Australia at Darwin in April 2022, followed by India hosting the exercise at Goa in April 2022. The third iteration happened at Darwin in April this year. Indian Navy operates 12 P-8I aircraft procured in two batches.

In March, Indian Navy deployed a P-8I for ‘Exercise Sea Dragon 23’, the third edition of the coordinated multilateral ASW exercise for long-range ASW aircraft, conducted by the U.S. Navy at Guam which also saw participation of Canada, Japan, South Korea.

This August, Australia is set to host the Malabar multilateral naval exercise for the first time this year, consisting of India, Australia, Japan and the U.S., in Sydney which has significantly grown in scope and complexity with particular emphasis on ASW drills. Australia was included as a permanent member of Ex. Malabar in 2020 amid the stand-off with China in Eastern Ladakh. Japan hosted the last edition of Malabar which was held in November 2022. This also marked 30 years of the exercise which began as a bilateral exercise between India and the U.S. in 1992.

India acquiring more and more military hardware from the U.S. has added to the commonality of platforms and in turn interoperability among militaries of the Quad countries.