According to the ministry, the two sides carried out harbour manoeuvres and sea exercises, and the captain of the Indian frigate visited senior South Korean naval officers and local dignitaries.

On October 9, Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh visited Canberra for the inaugural Australia–India Defence Ministers’ Dialogue with his counterpart, Richard Marles.

Both sides affirmed the importance of boosting cooperation with regional partners to help maintain a free, open, peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific, according to a statement released by Canberra.

Analysts have suggested that India’s growing defence cooperation with South Korea and Australia is aimed at China.

She said the developments in their defence ties would be seen in Beijing as “strengthening containment of China in the Indo-Pacific”, which would increase tensions in the Indian Ocean.

Those areas could become “more contested” as India and Australia boosted joint capabilities to monitor and counter Chinese naval operations, she added.

“The submarine rescue and logistics support agreements strengthen India’s ability to sustain operations in the Indian Ocean, challenging China’s ability to project naval power and maintain influence across both the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean as part of its efforts to become a global maritime power,” Odgaard said.

Drills between India and South Korea, which involved the deployment of an Indian stealth frigate in the Indo-Pacific, signalled India’s active presence in contested waters, she added.

“The drill strengthens India’s position as a ‘preferred security partner’ and adds to India’s growing network of naval partnerships in East Asia, which also encompasses Japan and Vietnam [and] which also try to balance China’s maritime assertiveness.”

“India is engaging defence-wise minilateral groupings to counterbalance China while avoiding direct confrontation, expanding its defence footprint through joint exercises, logistics agreements and technology partnerships, and it is signalling to China that it is actively engaged in shaping the Indo-Pacific’s security architecture,” Odgaard added.

Should China be concerned about the latest Japan-Philippines security pact?

China would interpret India’s moves as part of a “broader encirclement strategy” led by the US and supported by regional countries, she said.

According to Odgaard, Beijing might respond by increasing its naval deployments in the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea, while exercising pressure on South Korea and Australia to moderate their defence ties with India.

A Chinese government-backed foreign policy think tank, meanwhile, has warned about potential risks to regional peace from closer cooperation between India and Australia.

In an article published on October 16, the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations said that increased defence collaboration between the two countries had become “a new variable that cannot be ignored amid shifting geopolitical dynamics”.

The article warned that such collaboration could “threaten regional peace” and urged both countries to “exercise careful balancing to prevent exacerbating regional divisions and confrontation”.

However, two Chinese analysts argued that India’s actions were not entirely directed against China.

Lin Minwang, vice-dean at the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai, said that defence cooperation among Asia-Pacific nations reflected concerns over the possible absence of a counterweight to China should the US withdraw from the region under Trump.

He added that India’s collaboration with South Korea and Australia “appears to be cooperation in a broad sense”, and that “the influence of India’s defence cooperation should not be overestimated”.

The target of such exercises must be judged by their content, Lin said. He cited India’s joint anti-submarine exercises with the US and Japan in previous years, which were widely perceived as being directed against Beijing.

Song Zhongping, a mainland military commentator and former PLA instructor, said that India’s engagements with Australia and South Korea showed a pursuit of “multilateral diplomacy aligned with its strategic imperatives”.

“The Sino-Indian issue pertains to border disputes, which require bilateral resolution without third-party intervention,” he said. “Nor does India need to leverage America’s Indo-Pacific strategy to manage its bilateral relations with China.”

As a traditional US ally, Australia has maintained a strong military presence in the Pacific region.

Jagannath Panda, head of the Stockholm Centre for South Asian and Indo-Pacific Affairs at the Institute for Security and Development Policy in Sweden, said that Australia had “moved well beyond” being an elementary defence partner for India and was now a “preferred and strategic defence partner in the Indo-Pacific”.

“While the partnership remains less dense than India’s ties with the US or France, it has acquired strategic depth centred on maritime domain awareness, defence technology and regional stability,” Panda said.

Referring to India’s bilateral drills with South Korea, Panda said Seoul was willing to diversify its defence partnerships beyond its traditional security alliances.

“The drill sets the foundation for broader cooperation in maritime security, defence industry collaboration – for example, tech transfer, shipbuilding – and possibly future joint logistics or supply chain arrangements,” he said.