January 30 2012, Jakarta: Indonesian military has attempted to modernize its weaponry that will put it a par with neighboring countries and boosted skills of personal as the challenges to be faced in the future.
Indonesia has had ten Sukhoi jet fighters and aimed to receive two others each year by 2014 and several F16 war planes, but many others weaponry had been aging. The government had added the task of the military to deter terrorism along with police. Besides, transnational crimes and separatism in Papua still threatened the country.
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has said that the government sought to purchase military equipment from European countries suffering from the economic crisis and may want to trim their weaponry, from which the president expected Indonesia could buy them cheaper.
Negotiations had been done and as many as to the countries by the army for the purchase, Army Chief of Staff General Pramono Edhie Wibowo has said. The army chief of staff said that about 14 trillion rupiah (some 1.54 billion U.S. dollars) had been allocated for the plan for 2011 and 2012.
Among the equipment to be bought were tanks, helicopters for combat and transport, anti-war plane equipment and others, said Wibowo.
"We have made a priority. We will buy the weaponry simultaneously, and we expect that all the equipment that we need can be purchased by 2014," he said.
The general said that Indonesian army's equipment were outdated and their quality was behind neighboring countries over the last two decades.
The country also wanted to buy 100 Germany-made Leopard 26-A tanks from Dutch as the negotiation had been completed by both sides, but it was still opposed by both parliaments, Indonesian Military Commander Admiral Agus Suhartono said.
But, the admiral said that there were many other options should the plan was failure, one of them was the Russian-made T-90 tank.
T-90 tank has been developed from T-72 tank which is the most modern tank at the Russian navy and army. The tank is classified to equal with the Germany-made Leaopard 2A6 tank and 2A7 tank. "In purchasing weaponry, we will see which is the best among the option we have," said Suhartono.
On personal skill, Indonesian army aimed at boosted intelligence capability and professionalism through education and training. "We aim to increase the capability of intelligent unit in a bid to boost supervision, particularly on terrorism across the nation, " the army chief of staff said.
Indonesian security authority have taken prevention effort against the militants in the country after it had been hit by a series of major suicide bombings since 2000, including the Bali in 2002 and 2005, Australian embassy blast in 2004, JW. Marriot Hotel explosion in 2003 and the twin luxurious hotel blast in Jakarta in 2009.
Recently, the militants had turn to small-scale strikes that killed dozens of people and divided the jihad movement into many smaller cells.
On Monday, Indonesian military, conducted an integrated anti terror drill in Jakarta and Bandung of West Java for three days.
The drill was aimed at synchronizing the command between anti terror squads operated by Indonesian army, navy and air forces in case a terror attack takes place, the TNI Commander Admiral Agus Suhartono said. "We have seen arms conflicts deemed to astray the security in Papua and Aceh. Besides that, there were also moves from certain groups aimed at inviting restless among the public," he said.
Source: XINHUA
