What do naval warships do during peacetime? Here's the example of INS Tabar

 

What do Indian Navy warships do when they sail out of their home bases for what is called “mission deployment”?

 

Let’s look at the recent example of Indian Naval Ship (INS) Tabar, a stealth frigate with a crew of about 300 sailors, which has just completed a voyage of three months at sea, under the command of Captain Mahesh Mangipudi.

 

INS Tabar, was mission-deployed for over three months from 13^th June 21. One of her tasks was related to naval diplomacy, which means enhancing military cooperation with the navies of friendly foreign nations.

 

Towards this end, the warship made 11 port calls in nine countries of Europe and Africa, traversing nearly 20,000 nautical miles. According to the navy, “In all ports, the ship received a warm reception from local officials and was visited by several local dignitaries.”

 

A warship that is being visited by foreign officers or officials is aware that the visitors are carefully assessing the battle-readiness of that warship and the discipline of its crew. Everything is required to be spick and span at all times.

 

During these visits, INS Tabar also conducted professional interactions with the host countries. This took the form of twelve “maritime partnership exercises” with foreign navies at sea. These included longstanding bilateral exercises such as Exercise Konkan 2021 with the Royal Navy, and Exercise Indra-Navy 21 with the Russian Navy. 

 

These exercises involved wide ranging and multi-dimensional evolutions covering a diverse range of naval operations. In the view of the Indian Navy, these exercises “are deemed to have enhanced interoperability among participating navies and increased the ease with which they can operate together to address shared maritime concerns and threats, if required.”

 

Underscoring the expanding influence of the Indian Navy, these exercises included several maiden engagements, such as that with the Royal Norwegian Navy, the Algerian Navy and the Sudanese Navy.

 

Servicing an old and trusted relationship with the Russian Navy, INS Tabar stopped over at St Petersburg to participated in the 325th anniversary celebrations of the Russian Navy. Admiral Karambir Singh, Chief of the Naval Staff, flew across to Russia to attend the event.

 

The successful completion of this operational deployment does not mean that INS Tabar’s crew can slack off now. The frigate is now engaged in anti-piracy operations, patrolling the Gulf of Aden and the Persian Gulf.