Protecting the seas

A Multinational naval exercise off the Pakistani coast attracts participants from six continents

UNIPATH STAFF

Chopper blades whipped the waves. Destroyers and corvettes cut the blue waters of the Arabian Sea. Commandoes slipped down ropes and stormed beachheads while naval gunners picked off floating targets. In contrast to this display of military muscle on the seas, the talk on land centered on peace, partnerships and shared sacrifice.

The scene was the fourth iteration of the AMAN multinational exercises, a gathering of naval forces from dozens of countries hosted biennially since 2007 by Pakistan, a nation whose window on the world is the Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean.

The vital shipping lanes that brush Pakistan’s coast are stalking grounds for pirates, arms and drug traffickers, terrorists, and smugglers, a threat not lost upon the countries that supplied 18 ships for the five-day exercise held in March 2013 near Karachi. Joining Pakistani vessels were ships and personnel from Australia, Bangladesh, China, Italy, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom and the United States. Twenty-four additional countries participated as observers. These included Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkmenistan.

Common objective
“The slogan for the exercise is ‘Together for Peace,’ and all nations participating in the AMAN-13 share a common objective of ensuring peace and stability in the maritime arena,” said Rear Adm. Khan Hasham bin Saddique, commander of the Pakistan fleet. Aman is an Urdu word that means “peace.”

“AMAN-13 will be instrumental in enhancing tactical and operational readiness amongst its participating navies,” he told The Express Tribune.

Pakistan has been a major contributor to the Combined Maritime Forces (CMF), a coalition of 25 navies that have patrolled 2.4 million square miles of the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, Indian Ocean and Gulf of Oman for most of the past 10 years. Pakistani commanders have led the CMF’s Combined Task Force 150 five times; the group conducts counterterrorism and maritime security operations from South Asia to the Horn of Africa. Pakistani ships patrol critical waterways such as the Strait of Hormuz. Nearly a third of the world’s petroleum crosses the strait daily, so securing the route for tankers and cargo ships is vital not only for Middle Eastern oil producers, but South and East Asia as well.

Pakistan has also played a leading role in Combined Task Force 151. Two of its senior officers — an admiral and a commodore — have served as rotational commanders of the naval squadron, which has been tasked with combating piracy in the Gulf of Aden since 2009.

That experience commanding Sailors from dozens of nations proved useful in coordinating the multinational demonstrations that constituted much of AMAN-13, said Tariq Osman Hyder, a retired senior Pakistani diplomat who helped negotiate the country’s initial involvement in the naval task forces. “The navy’s initiation of the AMAN exercises in 2007 was a natural progression of this more activist external involvement,” he told Pakistan’s The Nation newspaper in March 2013.

The 2013 AMAN exercises, which ran from March 4 to 8, attracted ships from a larger number of navies than had any of the previous exercises. Scenarios included boarding drills, night-encounter exercises, maritime interdiction, anti-submarine warfare, free-fall water jumps from helicopters, underwater demolition, and search-and-rescue operations. The first two days focused on coastal and port security. The next phase took place 30 kilometers (19 miles) out to sea near Manora Island. One anti-piracy exercise involved special forces troops descending by helicopter and wresting control of a boat from pirates.
Those displays of military proficiency were counterbalanced on shore by conferences held at the National Centre of Maritime Policy Research in Karachi, where security economic cooperation, regional integration and the environment were on the agenda.

Contributions
The United Arab Emirates sent a ship to the exercises, part of the country’s stated ambition to build a “blue water” navy that can project beyond its coastal waters. U.A.E. Rear Adm. Ibrahim al-Musharrakh called upon his Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) partners to supply more ships and material to protect the region.

“Naval assets from around the world are providing a necessary contribution from which Arab countries cannot be absent,” Musharrakh wrote in an appeal for greater GCC naval cooperation he presented at a 2012 international counterpiracy conference in Dubai.

The Turkish frigate TCG Gokova attended with an underwater assault team and two staff officers in tow. Also present was the British Royal Navy’s HMS Northumberland, whose commander, Paddy Dowsett, is a veteran of the CMF. “The opportunity to exchange ideas with Chinese, American, Australian, Emirati and Italian sailors — all in the same forum — was a fascinating experience,” he said.

Although Saudi Arabia sent only observers to Pakistan for AMAN-13, it participated in force during joint Pakistani-Saudi naval exercises dubbed Naseem al Bahr in January 2013. Bahrain, another observer, has been the long-time base for the Combined Maritime Forces and hosted the 41-nation International Mine Countermeasures Exercise (IMCMEX) 13 in May 2013.

Concerted action
The arrival in Pakistan of ships and naval observers from six continents for concerted action at sea and collegial conferences on land suggests how much the world has adopted the common goal of eradicating crime in and around the Indian Ocean, maintaining unimpeded sea lines of communication for peaceful and critical commerce. And Pakistan’s consecutive hosting of AMAN suggests nations of the region are serious about securing strategic waterways that in many cases extend well beyond home waters.

“It is my earnest belief that harmonious maritime action to combat threats such as piracy, terrorism, narcotics, arms and human trafficking is the key that can collectively benefit all countries,” Saddique said.

Sources: Central Asia Online; “Constructing a Robust GCC Response at Sea: Reviving the Arab Counter-Piracy Force,” by Rear Adm. Ibrahim al-Musharrakh, presented at the Second International Counter Piracy Conference, Dubai, U.A.E., 2012; Daily Times (Pakistan); Dawn (Pakistan); The Express Tribune (Pakistan); The Nation (Pakistan); The National (U.A.E.); Naval Technology; Opinion Maker Center for Policy Studies; Royal Australian Navy; Royal Navy (U.K.); SES Türkiye; Sri Lanka Navy; Terminal X Media