India offers Maldives $1bn for permanent Indian military deployment

Butter Chicken

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NEW DELHI -- India is considering providing up to $1 billion in loans to the Maldives to help it pay down its debt to China, but only if the island nation agrees to distance itself from Beijing, Indian government sources said.

India is in talks with the Maldives, offering low-interest loans over several installments in exchange for stronger security ties, including the permanent deployment of Indian military personnel in the island nation, according to the sources.

The countries are expected to iron out the details before Maldivian President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, who took office on Nov. 17, visits India in December.

https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/In...aldives-1bn-in-loans-to-help-repay-China-debt
 

Kshatriya87

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We need to move quickly Eliminate China out of the equation and set up a permanent naval base there.
 

Tshering22

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We need to move quickly Eliminate China out of the equation and set up a permanent naval base there.
Maldives is really not that significant any more. Until they can pay the Chinese loans back, China won't spare them. We could always ask them a guarantee that there won't be any military activities on any of their atolls against us.
Seriously, investing on bases in Maldives is useless.

They don't even have land to stand up, except for 20+ of their barely surfaced atolls. Most of them are just sand barges.
 

Kshatriya87

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Maldives is really not that significant any more. Until they can pay the Chinese loans back, China won't spare them. We could always ask them a guarantee that there won't be any military activities on any of their atolls against us.
Seriously, investing on bases in Maldives is useless.

They don't even have land to stand up, except for 20+ of their barely surfaced atolls. Most of them are just sand barges.
But if the chinese get access to their ports, they can deploy their warships fairly quickly against IN.
 

BoseRaoModi

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Getting cooperation agreements from Maldives would be worth much more than 1 bil for India in the long term...what's the status on this
 

Tshering22

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But if the chinese get access to their ports, they can deploy their warships fairly quickly against IN.
One of the key criteria to deploy warships is to have favourable water levels near the land.

Maldives has no land - literally, to host any form of heavy military presence.

It is a set of atolls with coral reefs, that's all. The few habitable islands that they have are packed chock-a-block with people. The other islands host their resorts for tourists to idle away on sand barges.

That kind of "land" is about as useful to PLAN for basing its warships as a sack of garlic for vampires.

On the other hand, any special forces deployment of PLAN units from Maldives would mean that IAF and IN will have full reasons to target entire Maldives. As such there is nothing to bomb there.

Do you really think that Maldives would want to get into a conflict with us?

China is thousands of kilometers away and their closest military facility is in Eritrea where they maintain a joint military base.

It would take Tejas fighters less than 15 minutes at top speed, to reach Maldives from Sulur air base in Coimbatore.

IAF wouldn't even need to target the cities (if you call them that) - just destroy the concrete barriers that keep the ocean waters out of Male. The rest, nature will take care.
 

jackprince

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One of the key criteria to deploy warships is to have favourable water levels near the land.

Maldives has no land - literally, to host any form of heavy military presence.

It is a set of atolls with coral reefs, that's all. The few habitable islands that they have are packed chock-a-block with people. The other islands host their resorts for tourists to idle away on sand barges.

That kind of "land" is about as useful to PLAN for basing its warships as a sack of garlic for vampires.

On the other hand, any special forces deployment of PLAN units from Maldives would mean that IAF and IN will have full reasons to target entire Maldives. As such there is nothing to bomb there.

Do you really think that Maldives would want to get into a conflict with us?

China is thousands of kilometers away and their closest military facility is in Eritrea where they maintain a joint military base.

It would take Tejas fighters less than 15 minutes at top speed, to reach Maldives from Sulur air base in Coimbatore.

IAF wouldn't even need to target the cities (if you call them that) - just destroy the concrete barriers that keep the ocean waters out of Male. The rest, nature will take care.
An official Indian military base would mean a significant Indian military presence on the island which would be good enough to counter any future Chinese adventurism in that island. In fact, if the deal specifically prevents Chinese or any other military presence in the islands, $1 billion would be little price to pay. Don't forget that Maldives may be small in its landmass, but the exclusive maritime economical zone is significant. Nobody will ever launch any full scale military operation from Maldives bases, but even a minimum presence of army units supported by may be 2 helos and couple of OPVs can not only retain the interest of India visible in Maldives, but also an existing support structure can deter adventurism in part of others.
 

Tshering22

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An official Indian military base would mean a significant Indian military presence on the island which would be good enough to counter any future Chinese adventurism in that island. In fact, if the deal specifically prevents Chinese or any other military presence in the islands, $1 billion would be little price to pay.

Don't forget that Maldives may be small in its landmass, but the exclusive maritime economical zone is significant. Nobody will ever launch any full scale military operation from Maldives bases, but even a minimum presence of army units supported by may be 2 helos and couple of OPVs can not only retain the interest of India visible in Maldives, but also an existing support structure can deter adventurism in part of others.
Our EEZ covers that through Lakshadweep islands as well.

Again, a small presence and an offensive PLAN launch from Maldives would simply mean that Maldives is also a target for our forces.

How long do you think it would take any branch of our military to obliterate Maldives to oblivion in a war? We may not target the civilian areas but the mere news alone would mean that all tourists would run away from there and that would reduce their country to nothing.

Maldives, would prefer to toe the neutral line.

Yameen is no more the president. The current one is wise enough to keep it neutral.

As for our base, I really think if we can make Minicoy Island into a naval fortress, it should cover most of our area of interest.
 

jackprince

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Our EEZ covers that through Lakshadweep islands as well.

Again, a small presence and an offensive PLAN launch from Maldives would simply mean that Maldives is also a target for our forces.

How long do you think it would take any branch of our military to obliterate Maldives to oblivion in a war? We may not target the civilian areas but the mere news alone would mean that all tourists would run away from there and that would reduce their country to nothing.

Maldives, would prefer to toe the neutral line.

Yameen is no more the president. The current one is wise enough to keep it neutral.

As for our base, I really think if we can make Minicoy Island into a naval fortress, it should cover most of our area of interest.
Current one may be pro-India, but you'd not know what kind of animal the next one would be. Diplomacy and power-projection is a longterm game where no player is small or big unless otherwise proven. Maldives do have an important geo-strategic location and can give India a coverage over Indian ocean stretching directly to Seychelles where our base has been planned to be put up. It would our chain of pearls. With our bases at Maldives, Seychelles and Oman, we can effectively block activities of China basing out of Djibouti.
 

Kshatriya87

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One of the key criteria to deploy warships is to have favourable water levels near the land.

Maldives has no land - literally, to host any form of heavy military presence.

It is a set of atolls with coral reefs, that's all. The few habitable islands that they have are packed chock-a-block with people. The other islands host their resorts for tourists to idle away on sand barges.

That kind of "land" is about as useful to PLAN for basing its warships as a sack of garlic for vampires.

On the other hand, any special forces deployment of PLAN units from Maldives would mean that IAF and IN will have full reasons to target entire Maldives. As such there is nothing to bomb there.

Do you really think that Maldives would want to get into a conflict with us?

China is thousands of kilometers away and their closest military facility is in Eritrea where they maintain a joint military base.

It would take Tejas fighters less than 15 minutes at top speed, to reach Maldives from Sulur air base in Coimbatore.

IAF wouldn't even need to target the cities (if you call them that) - just destroy the concrete barriers that keep the ocean waters out of Male. The rest, nature will take care.
How about blockade of trade traffic? Chinese can still do that from Maldives.
 

tamilandhindu

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It would be interesting if Sri Lanka agrees to something similar. A joint defense policy in return for absorbing the debts.
 

Tshering22

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How about blockade of trade traffic? Chinese can still do that from Maldives.
And all we can do is use Nirbhays and BrahMos to flatten the so-called 'lands' that they have, reducing the PLAN ships to floating targets with nowhere close to berth and resupply weapons.
 

Tshering22

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It would be interesting if Sri Lanka agrees to something similar. A joint defense policy in return for absorbing the debts.
Lankan debts are too high. Also, there is no point as we have Arakkonam base in Chennai, from where some of our most powerful ships can be launched.
 

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