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Hobart Class destroyer HMAS Brisbane has led warships from India, Japan, and the United States into Sydney Harbour for Exercise Malabar, with the harbour phase of the exercise including cultural exchanges and an Australia-India cricket match.
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This year’s Exercise Malabar marks the first occasion the exercise has been held in Australia, with elements from the four nations taking part in air defence and anti-submarine warfare drills.
The occasion is the 27th iteration of the exercise and is being held between 11 and 21 August.
Throughout the exercise, the Royal Australian Navy is projected to use the MH-60R helicopter, RAAF F-35A Lightning II JSF, Hawk 127, and P-8A Poseidon, with aviation, communications, and replenishment at sea taskings also scheduled for the week.
The exercise is designed to improve the warfighting capability of the Royal Australian Navy and key regional partners, HMAS Brisbane Commanding Officer Commander Kingsley Scarce told Defence News.
“It’s my personal responsibility to maximise the combat capability of this ship and I use exercises like Malabar to make sure we are ready to do whatever the government needs us to,” CMDR Scarce said.
Able Seaman Jedd Bushnell explained that such exercises were essential for maintaining Navy readiness, with Malabar scheduled to include engagement of surface targets using an array of weapons systems and even boarding operations.
“It’s always been fascinating seeing other nation’s navies and how they like to do things, we always learn a lot,” AB Bushell said.
“It’s all about working together with our allied partners and performing serials to see how well we work together as a team.”
Malabar is important in ensuring that the Navies are able to understand one another in contingencies, CMDR Scarce added.
“We might speak English, but we might not speak the same English and it’s very important we understand the human side of being interoperable with each other.
“We’ll really test each other out and make sure we know exactly how we each work and how to work together more effectively,” CMDR Scarce said.
