The Commodore Commanding Submarines (West) is an operational appointment in the

Indian Navy The Indian Navy is the maritime branch of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Supreme Commander of the Indian Navy. The Chief of Naval Staff, a four-star admiral, commands the navy. As a blue-water navy, it operates sig ...

. The COMCOS (W) is the commander of the all submarines and allied units of

Western Naval Command The Western Naval Command is one of the three command–level formations of the Indian Navy. It is headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. As the senior–most of the three formations, the command is responsible for the all naval forces in the A ...

. Based in

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second- ...

Maharashtra Maharashtra (; , abbr. MH or Maha) is a states and union territories of India, state in the western India, western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. Maharashtra is the List of states and union te ...

, the COMCOS is also the

Commanding Officer The commanding officer (CO) or sometimes, if the incumbent is a general officer, commanding general (CG), is the officer in command of a military unit. The commanding officer has ultimate authority over the unit, and is usually given wide latitu ...

of the

submarine base A submarine base is a military base that shelters submarines and their personnel. Examples of present-day submarine bases include HMNB Clyde, Île Longue (the base for France's Force océanique stratégique), Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay, Na ...

INS Vajrabahu. Currently, there are two COMCOS in the Indian Navy, COMCOS (East) and COMCOS (West). The COMCOS (W) is a one star officer holding the rank of

Commodore Commodore may refer to: Ranks * Commodore (rank), a naval rank ** Commodore (Royal Navy), in the United Kingdom ** Commodore (United States) ** Commodore (Canada) ** Commodore (Finland) ** Commodore (Germany) or ''Kommodore'' * Air commodore ...

. The current COMCOS (W) is Commodore R. K. Dhingra.

History

The submarine arm of the

was formed with the commissioning of in December 1967. Three other submarines – , and were acquired from the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

and the 8th Submarine squadron was formed. The

INS Virbahu was commissioned on 19 May 1971 as the shore support base for submarines. The Commanding Officer of ''Virbahu'' functioned as the Captain of the submarine squadron and the class Authority for all submarines. In the early 1970s, four Vela-class submarines were acquired. The submarines, , , and were commissioned between 1973 and 1974. With this, the 9th submarine squadron was formed and was based on the west coast, in

. In the 1980s, the Sindhughosh-class submarines - , , and were commissioned. They constituted the 11th submarine squadron. In 1986, two

Shishumar-class submarine The ''Shishumar''-class submarines are diesel-electric attack submarines, currently in active service with the Indian Navy. These submarines are an Indian variant of the Type 209 submarines developed by the German yard Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Wer ...

s and were inducted, forming the 10th submarine squadron. Four more Sindhughosh-class submarines were to be commissioned constituting the 12th submarine squadron. Since multiple submarine squadrons (SS) had been formed - the 8th and 11th SS in Visakhapatnam and 9th, 10th and 12th SS in Mumbai, the need to group them on each coast was felt. In April 1987, the post of Commodore Submarines West (COMSUB (W)) was created. On 1 February 1996, the submarine base on the west coast, INS Vajrabahu was commissioned in Mumbai. Later that year, the appointment of COMSUB was re-designated Commodore Commanding Submarines (COMCOS).

Organisation

Today, INS Vajrabahu, the 10th submarine squadron and the 11th submarine squadron come under the COMCOS(W). The COMCOS (W) is also the

commanding officer The commanding officer (CO) or sometimes, if the incumbent is a general officer, commanding general (CG), is the officer in command of a military unit. The commanding officer has ultimate authority over the unit, and is usually given wide latitu ...

of INS Vajrabahu.

References

Bibliography

* * * *{{citation, first1=Anup, last1=Singh, title=Blue Waters Ahoy!: The Indian Navy 2001-2010 , year=2018, isbn=978-9353025526, publisher= HarperCollins Publishers India Indian Navy Indian military appointments Indian Navy appointments

History

Organisation

See also

References

Bibliography