The Indian Navy Completed Its First Command of a Combined Maritime Forces Task Force on 14 October 2026, After More Than 7,800 Training Hours for Personnel From 39 Countries

On 14 October 2026, at a ceremony in Manama, Bahrain, the Indian Navy gave up command of Combined Task Force 154 (CTF 154) after eight months, the first time it had led any task force of the Combined Maritime Forces (CMF). CTF 154 is the training task force of the CMF, a 47-nation naval partnership. Under Commodore Milind Mokashi it delivered more than 7,800 hours of training to personnel from 39 countries, according to the Ministry of Defence and the CMF, whose figures agree.

The Navy took over on 11 February 2026. Between those two dates the task force ran 20 staff training engagements, an all-online exercise, a 27-nation exercise at the Southern Naval Command in Kochi and a two-day symposium on piracy. The same months saw the Navy commission nine ships built in India. All figures below are as of 2 November 2026.

What CTF 154 is

The CMF is headquartered in Bahrain with the US Naval Forces Central Command and US 5th Fleet. Its own website lists 47 member nations, India among them, and describes the partnership as a “coalition of the willing” in which each country contributes what it can. It runs five task forces. Four do operational work: CTF 150 on maritime security in the Gulf of Oman and Indian Ocean, CTF 151 on counter-piracy, CTF 152 in the Arabian Gulf and CTF 153 in the Red Sea.

CTF 154, set up on 22 May 2023, is the one that teaches. The CMF says it trains partner navies at locations across the Middle East so that more of them can take part without sending ships or aircraft, and that its events are built around five areas: maritime awareness, maritime law, maritime interdiction, maritime rescue and assistance, and leadership development.

India joined the CMF as an associate partner in 2022 and as a full member in 2023, the Ministry of Defence said. The Navy’s earlier operations in the region include Operation Cactus in the Maldives in 1988. The CMF’s command history for CTF 154 lists six commands, by the United States, Jordan, Egypt, Sri Lanka, Italy and India, in that order. India’s, from 11 February 2026, is the sixth. The Press Information Bureau (PIB) release of 12 February, issued by the Ministry of Defence, called it the Navy’s first-ever command of the task force and said Mokashi, a recipient of the Shaurya Chakra, took over from the outgoing Italian commander.

February: staff training on INS Surat

The CMF reports that the Indian-led task force held its first Staff Enhancement Training aboard the Indian Navy ship INS Surat on 12 February, the day after taking command. Twenty-three participants from ten countries toured the ship and watched a visit, board, search and seizure demonstration, and the ship’s aviation team showed helicopter firefighting, casualty rescue and oil spill response. The group also met personnel of Task Force 59, who showed emerging concepts for unmanned systems and AI-enabled maritime operations.

The Ministry of Defence says the tenure included 20 Staff Enhancement Training engagements in all. The Navy’s account of the tenure lists their subjects as maritime domain awareness, maritime law and law enforcement, information sharing, counter-piracy, maritime crime investigation, cyber resilience, emerging technologies, multinational operational planning, leadership and personnel resilience.

April: Compass Rose 26-1 goes online

Operation Compass Rose is the task force’s signature exercise. The 26-1 edition ran from 20 to 22 April and, the CMF says, was held entirely online for the first time, with 137 participants, 11 observers and 21 facilitators from 25 partner nations and 13 organisations. The Navy’s account says the format was adapted because of the prevailing regional security environment.

The CMF’s commander, US Navy Vice Admiral Curt Renshaw, said in the CMF’s handover release that Mokashi’s team took command during a challenging period and raised the pace of training above the usual level. Mokashi said the circumstances around the task force changed but the responsibility to keep people connected and learning did not.

July: 276 personnel in Kochi

Operation Southern Readiness 26-2 ran from 20 to 23 July at the Southern Naval Command in Kochi, and both the Navy and the CMF describe it as the first major CMF training exercise hosted by India. PTI, quoting the Defence spokesperson on 23 July, reported 276 personnel from 27 countries, supported by 76 facilitators and subject-matter experts and four international organisations. The exercise generated about 3,800 training hours, which is just under half of the tenure’s 7,800. The Navy’s account and the CMF both call it the largest engagement of its type that CTF 154 has run since the task force was formed.

Onmanorama’s preview listed the syllabus: maritime law, maritime domain awareness and information sharing, counter-narcotics, force protection, asymmetric threats and maritime uncrewed systems, plus damage control, firefighting, survival at sea, boarding procedures and time aboard an Indian naval ship. The Navy said the exercise would use the Southern Naval Command’s simulators. Teaching came from the Navy’s Information Fusion Centre for the Indian Ocean Region, the CMF’s Joint Maritime Information Centre, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the IMO International Maritime Law Institute, the Defence spokesperson said.

The previous record had been set in Kenya. The CMF reported that the Italian-led task force’s Southern Readiness event in Mombasa, which ended on 29 January 2026, drew more than 160 personnel and was the largest turnout for a single CTF 154 activity to that date. The two releases count participants differently, so the Kochi figure is not a like-for-like comparison, but the Navy and the CMF both call Kochi the largest. The Navy’s wider ports, exercises and partnerships in the region are covered in the Indian Ocean and Navy security article.

October: SPAR 2026 and the handover

The last major event was the first Subject Matter Expert Exchange on Piracy and Armed Robbery (SPAR), held on 5 and 6 October. The CMF counted 135 participants from 25 countries and 19 organisations, drawn from navies, law enforcement, international bodies, legal specialists, technology firms and the shipping industry. Sessions covered recent counter-piracy operations, boarding, regional law enforcement, information sharing, prosecution and evidence rules, port responses and surveillance technology. Current and former CTF 151 staff gave operational accounts.

Mokashi said SPAR showed that counter-piracy “depends on a coordinated multinational and multi-agency effort”. The CMF calls SPAR the first event in a new Tailored Series and says feedback will shape future CTF 154 training.

On 14 October, with Renshaw presiding, command passed from Mokashi to the CMF. According to the Navy’s account, reproduced by idrw.org, the Deputy Commander of CTF 154, Commander Melissa Desjardins, received it on behalf of CMF Headquarters. The CMF’s task-force page lists CMF Headquarters as the current commander as of 2 November 2026.

What else the tenure left behind

Beyond the events, the CMF’s release says the task force approved new training planning guidelines, compiled a directory of training partners for future commands and held its first exchange dedicated to training instructors, which the Navy’s account calls a Training of Trainers engagement. New CMF training partners include the International Maritime Law Institute, Australian Maritime Border Command, the World Maritime University and the Baltic and International Maritime Council.

Where the figures differ

The Ministry of Defence and the CMF agree on 7,800 hours and 39 countries. They describe the people count differently. The CMF says the task force oversaw the training of more than 1,100 people from 39 countries, while the Navy’s account says the staff courses and SPAR alone recorded over 1,100 participant attendances. The Ministry of Defence’s statement gives 20 staff courses, and the CMF says “more than 20” specialist exchanges and engagements. None of the releases break the 7,800 hours down by event beyond the 3,800 at Kochi.