A Chinese naval fleet set off on Nov. 8 from the Zhanjiang Port for a visit to Pakistan, India and Thailand. The fleet, formed by the Shenzhen missile destroyer and Weishanhu depot ship, will hold a joint military exercise focusing on marine search and rescue with the navies of the three countries.

The visit will take about one month. It will be the first time for the Chinese navy to conduct joint military exercise with visited countries' navies in sea area under the countries' jurisdiction.

On the day of departure the half official Press Trust of India sent back news from China on the Chinese naval fleet, which was widely cited and republished by Indian media. Moreover, India's another influential press agency Indo-Asian News Service even conducted an interview with Chinese Ambassador to India Sun Yuxi. In addition to introduction about the background information and situation, it comments that although exchange between the two militaries was frigid, India now needs to have more and frequent joint exercises with the Chinese navy.

Since India is not the first stop of the Chinese naval fleet, the Indian Defense Ministry has not officially announced information on the ships and forces of the Indian navy to take part in the exercise. According to local media the location of the China-India would be near the Cochin military port on the western coast of southern India.

Joint military exercise needs approval from the highest level

Marine search and rescue by warships is military action of the nontraditional security area. It is of strong humanitarian tone both in peace times and war times and part of navy's function.

Naval experts told the reporter that compared with substantive joint combat exercise many of the military skills and tactics used in search and rescue such as searching, communications and command are also needed in actual combat. Therefore, without considerable political and military trust on both sides China wouldn't be able to launch joint marine search and rescue in these countries.

As early as 2003 Pakistani and Indian naval fleets visited China and conducted joint marine search and rescue exercises with Chinese navy in the East China Sea. This kind of exercise normally includes joint formation of ships from both sides, marine communications operation, sea-air three-dimensional search of ships in distress, ship formation arriving at the scene after receiving order, fire fighting, rescue and transportation of personnel in distress etc.

The abovementioned exchange between two militaries involves foreign military ships entering a country's maritime space and launching military action, which must be approved by the highest state leaders and commanders of both militaries and later decided through consultations between highest levels of both sides. From this it can be seen that the Indian Ocean countries welcome military exchange and cooperation with the Chinese navy. In fact, the first countries Chinese naval fleets visited in mid-1980s also included the Indian Ocean countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

Among the several oceans, the Indian Ocean is of unique strategic status. On the one hand, the Indian Ocean countries are not traditionally maritime powers. On the other, the Indian Ocean is the most important strategic channel for transporting resources like oil.

Strategy researchers point out that in the current oceanic order based on freedom of the seas securing this strategic sea-route of global importance does not rely on a few maritime powers, nor on the maritime military power of a single power. Therefore, to establish friendly political and military ties with the Indian Ocean countries and ensure the security and stability of the Indian Ocean through broad and in-depth international security cooperation is the general trend. The joint military exercises between China and Pakistan, India and Thailand are just the reflection of this security concept of "seeking security through cooperation".

Joint marine search and rescue are rather normal

According to international practice, the navy is the only military service that can conduct military actions beyond national borders in times of peace and "shake hands across the ocean" according to the need of national diplomacy. Due to various reasons, China has not sent ships on a visit abroad for a long time. Since 1985, however, when Chinese naval fleet for the first time traveled abroad, exchanges between Chinese and foreign militaries have become increasingly frequent, at ever higher levels and in growing scale.

Joint combat exercises of traditional security area often occur among military allies or at least among quasi-allies. Since China does not believe in military alliance this form of military exercise is not considered. Maritime joint anti-terrorist or anti-piracy exercises, though belongs to nontraditional security area, involves actual use of weapons in other country's sea area. The involved two countries need to give it careful thought and the exercise itself is especially sensitive to outsiders. For this reason China does not choose this form very often as well.

While marine joint search and rescue is generally practiced internationally it almost has no implication of military confrontation, but can still deliver the effect of enacting common action regulations and uniting maritime military action based on consensus of different countries. It, to a considerable degree, satisfies the post-Cold War demand by countries of different social system and ideology to achieve common security through improving cooperation.

By People's Daily Online