India, Japan, Australia, US kick off annual maritime Exercise Malabar

The four countries that have formed the Quadrilateral grouping (The Quad) — the US, India, Japan and Australia — began the annual maritime Exercise Malabar in the Philippine Sea on Thursday. The sea phase of the exercise will run till August 29.

This is the 25th edition of Exercise Malabar, which began in 1992 as a bilateral exercise, featuring the maritime forces of the US and India. In 2015, the entry of the Japanese navy made it a trilateral exercise. Last year, Aus­tralia also joined Malabar, making it a quadrilateral exercise. 

Malabar is viewed by Beijing as an anti-China grouping by a