The Quadrilateral partnership of Australia, India, Japan and the United States completed Exercise Malabar in mid-November 2025 after nine days of maritime training in and around Guam to advance collective planning, integration and warfare tactics ensuring a Free and Open Indo-Pacific.
“Through Exercise Malabar … partner nations are strengthening Indo-Pacific security by tackling shared challenges, coordinating collective strength and closing gaps in global engagement,” said Royal Australian Navy (RAN) Vice Adm. Justin Jones, the Australian Defence Force’s joint operations chief.
It marked the 29th iteration of Malabar, which began in 1992 as a bilateral exercise between India and the U.S. Drills have evolved in scope and complexity, and this was the sixth time the four nations participated.
Participating assets included the RAN frigate HMAS Ballarat, the Indian Navy stealth frigate INS Sahyadri, the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force helicopter destroyer JS Hyuga and the U.S. Navy Aegis guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald. A Royal Australian Air Force P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft flew missions from Andersen Air Force Base in the U.S. territory of Guam, according to the Australian Defence Department.
U.S. assets included a P-8A Poseidon, a submarine and an explosive ordnance disposal mobile unit. The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command’s Pacific Multi-Domain Training and Experimentation Capability Forward Guam supported the forces as they coordinated warfare tactics.
The Indian Navy’s participation reaffirms the nation’s “enduring partnership and its commitment to strengthening coordination, enhancing interoperability, and demonstrating a collective resolve to safeguard regional security,” India’s Defence Ministry stated.
Evolving security challenges make partnerships and joint drills increasingly important, analysts say.
“The exercises are a sign of the convergence of perceptions and views among the four countries of the rapidly changing strategic threats in the Indo-Pacific as well as their shared commitment to an open, inclusive, and prosperous Indo-Pacific and a rules-based international order,” Dr. Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan, a resident senior fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in Canberra, wrote in The Diplomat magazine.
Malabar’s harbor phase featured operational planning and communication protocols, while the sea phase included joint fleet operations, advanced maneuvering, anti-submarine and anti-surface warfare, gunnery training, and flight operations.
“Through complex drills in anti-submarine warfare, air defense and replenishment at sea, participating nations build the trust, interoperability and readiness needed to respond to our collective security challenges,” Jones said.
The Malabar planning, exercise lead and location rotates annually to demonstrate the partnership’s ability to conduct drills across the Western Pacific and Indian oceans.
“Over the past week, I have seen tremendous growth from our combined forces as they’ve been working side-by-side, learning from one another, and developing those person-to-person relationships,” said Capt. Dave Huljack, commodore of Destroyer Squadron 15, the principal surface force of the U.S. Navy’s 7th Fleet.