The second Task Force 74 was assembled from the U.S. Navy's Seventh Fleet that was deployed to the Bay of Bengal by the Nixon administration in December 1971 during the Indo-Pakistani War.
[1][2] The Soviet Union, which was actively backing Indian actions both politically and militarily during the war responded by deploying two groups of cruisers and destroyers as well as a submarine armed with nuclear warheads in response to the American military presence in the area.
[5] Staging out of Leyte, where they had conducted rehearsal landings two days earlier, a large flotilla of cruisers and destroyers from the United States Seventh Fleet's Task Force 74 escorted the Cebu Attack Group to the island.
[7] While meeting no Japanese opposition, American forces nevertheless suffered heavy casualties from land mines and booby traps as they crossed the beach.
[8][9] The Indian Ocean had, in the post-colonial cold-war situation in the 1960s, a strong British Royal Navy presence which projected Western interests in the region, and carried out security operations, as well as a deterrence against Soviet overtures in this area.
India had obtained substantial military and economic assistance from the United States towards the end of the conflict, but remained committed to the Non-Aligned Movement.
However, since this was within a year of the end of the Sino-Indian conflict, where the US and Britain had offered substantial help to India, this was not interpreted as a diplomatic pressure or a show-of-force, and was in all probability training exercises to familiarise the navy with the Indian Ocean area.
The crisis precipitated in March 1971 when rising political discontent and cultural nationalism in East Pakistan was met by Yahya Khan launching Operation Searchlight,[13][14][15] which resulted in the 1971 Bangladesh genocide.
The majority of East Pakistan's political leadership, including Mujibur Rahman, were arrested and, following brief confrontations and bloody battles between Bengali nationalists and some 40,000 strong Pakistani military, political order was forcibly and temporarily reimposed by the end of April amidst strong protests from India, the Soviet Union and other countries against the atrocities against the Bengali civilian population.
[16] The massive and disproportionate crackdown by Pakistan Army forces[17] engendered a sea of refugees (estimated at the time to be about 10 million, 13% of the entire East Pakistani population)[14][18][19] who came flooding to the eastern provinces of India.
On 9 August 1971, India signed a twenty-year co-operation treaty with the Soviet Union,[14] followed by a six-nation tour of Europe and USA by Indira Gandhi in October.
[20] Pakistan came under increasing criticism[21] from India, the Soviet Union, Japan, and Europe as the plight of the refugees and their impact on the Indian economy were highlighted by Indira Gandhi in the UN and on a number of global tours.
With intelligence reports indicating the Indian cabinet was discussing the scopes of offensive into West Pakistan, on 10 December, the decision was taken by US to assemble a task force at Malacca strait, spearheaded by USS Enterprise.
The smaller Soviet presence had in fact been already enhanced to match a British contingent in the area and consisted of both surface vessels and at least one nuclear submarine.