WILL RUSSIA ABANDON INDIA - BECAUSE OF PAKISTAN - THE ANSWER IS NO

RUSSIA - PAKISTAN MILITARY DRILL AND SUSPICIONS ON INDIAN SIDE

• Actually, there are absolutely no grounds for suspicion, whoever might harbour it, that Russia might be abandoning it's privileged and strategic relationship with India. 

• Nor is there any sign that Moscow attempts to take an equidistant approach to the unfortunate rivalry in the turbulent region. 

• The one-dimensional assumption that the ‘Friendship-2016’ drills could tilt the balance of sympathy and affect the geopolitical leaning of Moscow toward Islamabad is unworthy of any serious analysis.

• There is also no proof that Moscow might put on par its long-standing dialogue with New Delhi and its only recently activated interaction with Islamabad. 

RUSSIA CAN NOT FORGET AFGHAN WOUNDS

• After all, Pakistan used to be a close ally of Soviet Union’s formidable Cold war foe and sponsored the Afghan Islamist mujahideen, who were responsible for the deaths of many Russian soldiers in the country known as the “burial ground of empires.”

• Even if simply counted in the number of servicemen deployed at the concurrent drills, the ‘zero sum’ game cannot be replayed. 

• There is no sense in echoing the observation from the Duchess in Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland: “The more there is of mine, the less there is of yours.”

REASONS BEHIND THE DRILL WITH PAKISTAN

• After all, Moscow has been conspicuously calm since 1992, when the Malabar exercises between the United States and India were launched. It is the sovereign right of any nation to choose allies of various grades, provided their military cooperation is not aimed at threatening time-honored friends.

-Vladimir Mikheev

WEAPONRY USED IN INDRA AND FRIENDSHIP 2016

INDIAN SIDE

• During the drills, units of the Eastern Military District and Indian Armed Forces, with the help of Russian Orlan-10 unmanned aerial vehicles, trained together to find conditional groups of illegal armed groupings,

• ”Matveyev said. “With use is UAVs, the servicemen of the two countries also practised laying routes to transport tactical groups to the areas with illegal armed groupings in order to block and conditionally destroy them.”

RUSSIAN SIDE

• On the Russian side, among participants in the drills are two mechanised infantry companies, a tank company, howitzer, self-propelled artillery and rocket batteries and a flamethrower squad. A motorised battalion of 250 people is participating in the military exercise from the Indian side.

• In total, over 500 servicemen and up to 50 units of equipment are taking part in the drills, along with a group of UAVs, and assault and army aviation of the Eastern Military District.