cover
story
All At Sea
Despite their criticality, amphibious operations
remain a challenge for the Indian military
Mandeep Singh (retd)
The Indian Ocean
is the third-largest
body of water in the
world dominated
geographically by In-
dia. No other nation
dominates an ocean
in the way the great
Indian peninsula does, projecting over
2,400 kilometres ‘into’ the ocean. This
gives India the coastline of its 7,517 ki-
lometres and the ability to dominate not
only the Arabian Sea to the West and
Bay of Bengal to the East but the Indian
Ocean in the south as well.
India has over 1,000 islands and atolls
that along with its long coastline give her
a huge Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ)
of 2,305,143sqkm. Around 95 per cent of
India’s external trade passes through the
sea. It is not surprising that it is important
for India to dominate the seas around her
SEA LIFT INS Jalashwa has significantly enhanced navy’s capacity to transport troops, a useful capability for amphibious operations
20 FORCE | December 2021
and see it as ‘her’ Ocean. This view had
been propounded even before indepen-
dence when K.M. Panikkar had argued
in 1945 that ‘while to other countries, the
Indian Ocean is only one of the important
oceanic areas, to India it is the vital sea.
The Indian Ocean must therefore remain
truly Indian,’ i.e., India’s Ocean.
The view was echoed after indepen-
dence when Keshav Vaidya hoped in
1949 that ‘even if we do not rule the
waves of all the five oceans of the world,
we must at least rule the waves of the In-
dian Ocean.’
With such views it would have been ex-
pected of India to have focused on build-
ing its navy after 1947 to take its rightful
place as the dominant maritime force
in the Indian Ocean. And given the large
number of islands and their spread one
key component was to have a credible
capacity to undertake amphibious oper-
ations but the continental view inhibited
navy’s growth. The official view, as enunci-
ated by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru,
was that ‘we have to concentrate more on
the other defence arms. The navy should
be small but highly trained and capable
of expansion when the time comes for it.’
It was not that India was alone in ne-
glecting to build up its amphibious capa-
bilities in late 1940’s. Almost at the same
time, as United States armed forces was
still reorienting itself for its role and mis-
sions amidst large scale dismantling in
the new world order, United States Ma-
rine Corps found itself in the cross hairs
once again as it was singled out for be-
ing largely redundant. In October 1949,
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Omar Bradley, had famously said that
‘large-scale amphibious operations... will
never occur again.’
It is a different matter that United
States managed to turn the tide during
the Korean War only with a bold and bril-
liantly executed landing at Incheon. In
the years to follow United States carried
out amphibious operations successfully
to achieve significant objectives in Viet-
nam, Cambodia and Kuwait. Between
1991 and 2011, United States carried out
137 missions during 116 amphibious
operations ranging from amphibious
assault and air strikes to evacuation and
humanitarian missions.
What are Amphibious
Operations?
Amphibious operations are commonly
defined as ‘military operations charac-
terised by attacks launched from the sea
by naval and landing forces against hos-
tile shores’ while the Joint Operations
3-02 Amphibious Operations manual
issued by the Joint Chiefs of Staff defines
them as:
‘An amphibious operation is a mili-
tary operation launched from the sea
by an amphibious force (AF) to conduct
landing force (LF) operations within the
littorals. The littorals include those land
areas (and their adjacent sea and asso-
ciated air space) that are predominantly
susceptible to engagement and influ-
ence from the sea.’
While in Indian context, the Joint Op-
erations Doctrine issued by Integrated
Defence Staff defines it as:
‘Amphibious Operations are launched
from the sea by maritime forces for land-
ing troops against a hostile or potentially
hostile shore. Amphibious Operations
integrate virtually all types of ships, air-
craft, weapons, special operations forces
and combat forces in a concerted joint
military effort.’
Adding to the multitude of definitions,
the Indian Maritime Doctrine issued in
2016 mentions that ‘as a form of mar-
itime power projection, amphibious
operations are joint military operations
wherein land power is projected ashore
from the sea.’
There are four recognised types of am-
phibious operations:
Amphibious Demonstration: An am-
phibious operation conducted for the
purpose of deceiving the enemy by a
show of force with the expectation of
deluding the adversary into an unfavour-
able course of action.
Amphibious Raid: An amphibious op-
eration involving the swift incursion into
or temporary occupation of an objective
area followed by a planned withdrawal.
Amphibious Assault: The principal
type of amphibious operation, which in-
volves establishing a force on a hostile or
potentially hostile shore.
Amphibious Withdrawal: An amphib-
ious operation involving the extraction of
forces by sea in naval ships or craft from
a hostile or potentially hostile shore.
The Relevance
But what makes the amphibious opera-
tions so relevant and important is that
they are equally essential for deterrence,
building alliances, denying sanctuary,
projecting influence and, when required,
LAND TO SEA WhAP 8x8 is an indigenous amphibious wheeled armoured personnel carrier
projecting power against adversaries.
In the 2015 book Development of Allied
Amphibious Capability and the Policy of
Rebalance, Lt Colonel James Brandon
Conway writes that amphibious forces
provide the following advantages:
n Freedom of action as amphibious forc-
es have the ability to use the maritime
domain as a base from which to con-
duct operations, loiter prolonged pe-
riod in international waters, and ma-
noeuvre ashore at the time and place
of their choosing,
n Defence of Island territories by the
ability to rapidly insert credible com-
bat power as ‘boots on the ground’,
n Assured access. Amphibious forces
contribute unique and essential ca-
pabilities toward the nation’s ability
to take advantage of the freedom of
the seas to enter a region without
regard to access constraints and to
sustain sea-based operations almost
indefinitely without need for in-the-
atre host-government support,
n A Threat in Being. A credible amphib-
ious capability compels potential ad-
versaries to invest in a broad range
of systems and spread their defences
over larger areas of concern.
Another important aspect of amphib-
ious capability is its increasing use in
recent years to support other operations
i.e., which contribute to conflict preven-
tion or crisis mitigation such as security
cooperation, foreign humanitarian as-
sistance, civil support, non-combatant
evacuation operations, peace opera-
tions, recovery operations, disaster re-
lief etc. More often than not, access to
coastal populations struck by natural
disasters, and the follow-on provision
of humanitarian assistance, has largely
come from naval and amphibious forces.
The projection of soft power during hu-
manitarian assistance and disaster relief
(HADR) operations is an important facet
of amphibious operations.
The Indian Experience
Indian Navy had carried out a successful
amphibious operation as early as Octo-
ber 1947 when the (then) Royal Indian
Navy carried out its first operation af-
ter independence code named Exercise
Peace. The main phase was launched on
October 5. It landed 14 army officers, 251
Other Ranks, three tanks and 13 vehicles
at Porbandar. The naval force for the op-
eration consisted of two frigates, HMIS
Kistna (Commander R.D. Katari, RIN,
Senior Officer) and Cauvery; two mine-
sweepers HMIS Konkan and Madras;
three Landing Craft (Tanks), LCTs 1310,
1358 and 1360; and one motor launch
ML 420. This was followed by landings at
Jaffarabad on October 17 and Magnrol
on 1 November 1947.
Exercise Peace was not only the first
major naval operation undertaken by in-
dependent India’s navy but also the first
amphibious operation post-indepen-
dence. Admiring the navy’s performance,
an army officer had said “The navy had
everything buttoned up to a fine edge
and one got the impression that their
officers were an efficient, well-tempered
and honed bunch.” This was however not
the first amphibious operation under-
taken by the (then) Royal Indian Navy
as it had earlier carried out a joint oper-
ation in May 1941 during the reoccupa-
tion of Berbera in the Gulf of Aden.
Years of neglect with a dismal share of
the defence budget followed, blunting
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JOINT OPERATION Amphibious landing during Exercise Tropex
the edge and loss of any real amphibious
capabilities. The 1950’s and 60’s saw the
navy manage with less than 10 per cent
of the defence budget as its share, partly
because of the land-centric strategic vi-
sion of the establishment and the fault
was partly of senior army officers who
believed that navy expansion and projec-
tion into the Indian Ocean was an ‘out-
moded Imperial concept’. Maj. Gen. D.
Palit wrote this in the Hindustan Times
newspaper on 29 December 1969.
The long period of neglect meant that
Indian Navy did not play any meaning-
ful role during the India Pakistan War of
1965. It was only during the Bangladesh
War of 1971 that the navy played an im-
portant role with successful blockades
and bombardments carried out on both
flanks and the sea lines of communica-
tion between the two wings of Pakistan
being cut. While India’s naval missile
attacks on Karachi were spectacularly
successful, Operation Beaver, the am-
phibious operation carried out in East
Pakistan ‘got into serious trouble’ as the
official history of the India Pakistan War
of 1971 puts it rather mildly.
The war of 1971 did not result in any
immediate expansion of the navy that
had to wait for the 1980’s when the In-
dian Navy saw a modest expansion in-
cluding the second aircraft carrier join-
ing the Indian Navy in 1987. The mid
1980’s also saw the Polish Landing Ship
Tank (LST) joining the fleet and LST
(Large) being built in India giving India
a limited capability to carry out am-
phibious operations and power projec-
tion. Operation Pawan in 1987 and Op-
22 FORCE | December 2021
eration Cactus in 1988 saw an assertive
use of maritime power as a result. An all
too familiar neglect followed though in
the early 1990’s the naval commanders
had started flagging this state of affairs
asking for a ‘clear-cut and assertive
maritime policy’ as S. Chopra wrote in
Naval Strategy in the Indian Ocean and
the Laws of the Sea. The new govern-
ment in 1998 gave a push to naval ex-
pansion that was continued even after
the change of government in 2004. As
navy expanded, an important step to
lay down the broad framework for the
fundamental concepts to guide the ap-
plication of emerging maritime power
was the release of Indian Maritime Doc-
trine in 2004.
In 2005 as the tsunami affected eleven
Indian Ocean littoral countries, Indian
Navy resources were pressed into hu-
manitarian assistance and disaster relief
(HADR) operations earning kudos for
its relief work. Indian Navy deployed 32
ships in all during the five rescue, relief
and reconstruction missions making it
the second largest deployment of naval
forces in the Indian Ocean, after United
States, but was needed most was major
amphibious ships to transport men and
relief material to the spread-out islands.
As a logical corollary to the experi-
ence gained was the procurement of INS
Jalashwa, the former US amphibious as-
sault ship USS Trenton in 2005 that gave
India a modest amphibious operations
and power-projection capability. As Ad-
miral Arun Prakash, the then Chief of Na-
val Staff believed that “as the pre-eminent
maritime power in the Indian Ocean, we
must possess and maintain a capability
for sustained operations in our area of
interest, including power projection”.
With INS Jalashwa, three Shardul class
and the eight Kumbhir-class medium
landing ships India now seemed to be
on the path of acquiring a capability to
match its doctrine. In recent years Indi-
an Navy has been carrying out regular
amphibious exercises to hone its combat
capabilities. The Amphex series of exer-
cises to hone the amphibious assault ca-
pabilities started in 2001 while ‘Exercise
Tropex-2009’ at Madhavpur beach in
Gujarat in February 2009 was the largest
ever such exercise and the first after the
joint doctrine on amphibious warfare
had been put into practice with its full
scope. Tanks, armoured personnel car-
riers and Infantry troops of 91 Infantry
Brigade of the Sudarshan Chakra Corps
participated in both stand-off and hard
beaching modes.
The amphibious vessels of Indian
Navy have carried out humanitarian
assistance and disaster relief opera-
tions in the Indian Ocean region, one
of the latest being Operation Samudra
Setu—the repatriation of 3,992 Indi-
ans. India’s vision in deepening eco-
nomic and security cooperation in the
littorals, enhancing capacities to safe-
guard land and maritime territories,
working towards sustainable regional
development, Blue Economy, and pro-
moting collective action to deal with
non-traditional threats like natural
disasters, piracy, terrorism etc. is now
formally laid out as SAGAR (Security
and Growth for All in the Region). Am-
phibious forces are a key element for
meeting these goals.
The China Factor
The United States Department of De-
fence in its annual report on China Mil-
itary Power for 2020 acknowledged that
the Chinese People’s Liberation Army
Navy (PLAN) is now the world’s largest
navy and is ‘developing the capabilities
and operational concepts to conduct
offensive operations within the Second
Island Chain, in the Pacific and Indian
Oceans, and in some cases, globally.’ In
recent years, one of the areas of increased
interest for China and its navy has been
the Indian Ocean region with specula-
tion that China may even have an Indian
Ocean fleet in the not so distant future.
China already has a military base at the
facility in Djibouti which has a small but
constant presence of the PLAN. There
have been regular intrusion of Indian Ex-
clusive Economic Zone (EEZ) by Chinese
vessels including its submarine and re-
search vessels. China and Pakistan carry
out joint naval exercises ‘Sea Guardians’.
The Red Flag is now a regular presence
in the Indian Ocean region and it is only
going to grow in the coming years.
The primary focus of Chinese Navy
however remains Taiwan and the South
China Sea for now. The build-up of its am-
phibious forces has been impressive as it
has added the first of multiple 40,000-ton
Type 075 landing helicopter dock (LHD)
ships that was commissioned on 23 April
2021, with a second due to enter service
imminently and a third under construc-
tion. The Type 075 is a flat-top vessel able
to carry between 20 and 30 helicopters of
undisclosed types, although naval vari-
ants of the new Z-20 are possible. It also
has a well deck that can be flooded to
allow landing craft, hovercraft and am-
phibious assault vehicles to disembark.
China already has six Type 071 Land-
ing Platform Dock (LPD), 49 landing
craft to include 28 LST and 21 LSM with
55 Landing craft of various designations
in service. Even with such a line-up, ac-
cording to some defence analysts China
does not have the capability to mount
a major amphibious operation and will
take some time to mature this capability.
The role and missions of its amphibious
forces would principally remain defend-
ing PLA bases in the South China Sea
and abroad, conducting amphibious op-
erations to seize and defend small reef
and island outposts, and conducting
non-war military activities (NWMA). The
PLAN Marine Corps has only recently
started focussing on expeditionary op-
erations as it was confined traditionally
on its task to assault and defence of small
islands in the South China Sea.
Areas of Concern
Comparably, India has one LPD (INS
Jalashwa), eight Landing Ships (three
LSM and five LST) with 11 landing
crafts. The Indian capabilities to carry
out amphibious operations are accord-
ingly much limited as compared to that
of China though they are adequate to
meet its existing needs of defending the
island territories.
The real challenge though lies in build-
ing up its capabilities to meet the future
roles and missions as the proposed ac-
quisition of four LPD approved in 2010
fell through after a decade as the Request
for Proposal was withdrawn as the Navy
wanted the equipment with new specifi-
cations. A new Request for Information
(RFI) has again been issued for four LPDs
with the anticipated delivery timeline
for the first vessel of a maximum of 60
months, followed by delivery of one ves-
sel every 12 months.
India has an infantry brigade ear-
marked for amphibious operations but
has vessels only for a battalion plus. The
capability will build up only as and when
the new LPDs enter service. Till such
time the capability void will remain and
a mismatch between intentions and ca-
pability exist. This is an obvious area of
concern, though more critical is the land
centric vision of the establishment as the
With INS Jalashwa, three
Shardul class and the
eight Kumbhir-class
medium landing ships
India now seemed to be
on the path of acquiring
a capability to match its
doctrine. In recent years
Indian Navy has been
carrying out regular
amphibious exercises
to hone its combat
capabilities. The Amphex
series of exercises to
hone the amphibious
assault capabilities
started in 2001 while
‘Exercise Tropex-2009’
at Madhavpur beach in
Gujarat was the largest
ever such exercise
Joint Doctrine for Indian Armed Forces
JDIAF-2017 notes that, ‘India’s threats
primarily emanate from the disputed
land borders with our neighbours.’
As Abhijen Rej and Shashank Joshi
observed in their paper ‘India’s Joint
Doctrine: A Lost Opportunity’, it is ‘an ar-
my-centric joint doctrine that fails to pay
sufficient attention to the role of the oth-
er two services… there is near-absence
of force-projection and other issues in
the joint doctrine.’ It is important that
these doctrinal issues are resolved and
the doctrine is revised to incorporate the
actual potential of the Navy.
The Road Ahead
The threat to amphibious forces today
is no longer from state actors and the
adversary navies only but from terror-
ist groups and non-state actors as well.
In October 2016 the US guided-missile
destroyer USS Mason was attacked by
Houthi rebels using anti-ship cruise
missiles (ASCMs). Earlier the same
rebel group had attacked a former U.S.
high-speed vessel, burning it to the wa-
terline.
These incidents may seem far removed
geographically to Indian context but
highlight the emerging threat of non-
state actors and the ease with which
capable long-range weapons can be
obtained and used against navies. The
amphibious forces operating in hostile
waters need to be well configured to face
such threats and be capable of fulfilling
the mission requirements.
The advances in precision long range
weapons was one reason that in June
2020, the Commandant of the U.S.
Marine Corps, General David Berger,
pinpointed the obsolescence of large-
scale amphibious assault as the ‘focus
on a pacing threat that is both a mari-
time power and a nuclear power elimi-
nates entirely the salience of large-scale
forcible entry operations followed by
sustained operations ashore.’ As India
builds up its maritime capabilities, the
transformation of maritime operations
and the new emerging security scenar-
io wherein largescale amphibious op-
erations may become redundant is an
area that needs to be kept under a close
watch and our maritime doctrines and
forces to enforce them need to be con-
figured accordingly.
There is large scope of exploiting the
capabilities of amphibious forces, both
during war and peace but they can only
deliver if India remains ahead of the
curve as military technologies and prac-
tices transform, the world over.;
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