Aussie Digger said:
.
Indonesia may have more ships on paper than RAN, but little of non of them are a significant threat. Indonesia cannot afford to fly it's 4x SU-30's it bought several years ago and any "missile boats" would be of dubious utility due to heavy sanctions over the years for repeated human rights violations. More evidence of the lack of capability of the Indonesian Navy, comes in the form of repeated requests for Australia to "donate" our "clapped out" Fremantle Class Patrol boats which are armed with a WW2 vintage 40mm Bofors gun and 0.50cal HMG's.
These vessels are in such poor condition that it's doubtful a scrap yard would even want them, yet Indonesia does...
While on holidays in bali the argument of Indonesia as a threat to aus came up,and many aussie expats as well as locals laughed at this idea as much of their military is inept, corrupt and poorly trained, i was also told that the latest ship the Indo navy operates is a former RN frigate that was decommisioned in the late 80s, and its there flagship, this sound right?
The Indo army is quite large, and sees much action in the north in Aceh province, but its training is quite poor, and equipment is to be desired. The Kopassus (special forces) have a history of Human rights violations and were reported in east timor in early 1999 supplying pro-indonesia militias with weapons. They now conduct a once a year counter terrorism excercise with aussie SAS.
The immediate time frame for deployment has been used by ADF in recent times, when an aussie protective services officer was shot in the solomon islands, the cairns based immediate response force deployed within 3-4 days with full support, as well as a second time during the rioting the IRF was on the ground within 48hrs. The first deployment was sudden and showed that the ADF could make an immediate impact as per your scenario Todjaeger. The 2nd time round navy as well as army assets were sent in with only 2 days of rising tension, although the results of the election were probabley considered and contingencies created.
The ADF also has deployed to East Timor with nearly 1000 personel in less then 2 weeks with a total of 2200 current, although they will start returning within next few weeks. The RAN ship HMAS Kanimbla was returning from excercises and was re-routed to the ET coast on standby after rioting started. from then, northern forces went on alert and IRF as well as other units were on standby orders. 4 battalion had commandos on the ground from the word "go" and had the airport as well as surrounding areas secure within the next 24hrs, before several more companies of troops flew in. APCs were in dili the following day.
With the new C-17s, with the first to be delievered by December, the ADF will have a better lift capacity to deploy beyond oceania. The LHDs will also increase the number of forces able to deploy in a short time.
The rapidness with which we can deploy within the region can expand to the world, with troops being able to deploy within 4 days. The moving of 3RAR to Adelaide, and to become a mechanized battalion, will create a direct rail corridor to Darwin, enabling the 3rd a faster route to ships in the north.
The ADF future outlook statergy is for small, mobile well equiped units able to deploy at short notice anywhere, anytime. With the world requiring this, the ADF is gearing up to be ready for any challenge when and if needed.
