Indonesia Navy

STANLEY A. WEISS writes a nice op-ed piece in NYT highlighting the shortage of Indonesia navy and it’s overburden tasks. This should tell us why arm trafficking happen and why Malaysia keep teasing us with many claims: the lack of our military (navy) power. The rule of thumb is you gotta be strong in order to be respected. In a country’s term, strong means having good military power. Better still, if you got a nuclear power.

Locals here quip that while Indonesia is the world’s largest archipelago nation — by definition, a nation of islands — it is not a maritime nation. Imagine, they say, a stretch of land covering the distance from Seattle to New York, or Lisbon to Moscow. And then imagine having fewer than 100 police cars responsible for patrolling that entire area — to respond to emergencies and protect national borders.

It seems inconceivable. And yet, that is the equivalent mission that weighs on the Indonesian Navy today. Its fleet of ships reportedly numbers around 120. If you discount the vessels in dry dock due to funding shortfalls, far fewer than 100 patrol at any given time. And with those vessels, the navy is expected to protect a nation with more than 17,000 islands, covering five million square kilometers.

When the navy appeals to the air force for help, the situation is equally dire. The air force has about 220 aircraft and helicopters, a number of which are unserviceable. Among its fleet of C-130 Hercules aircraft are some that first flew in the 1960s. Planes have been known to simply fall out of the sky.