Indonesia Indonesian Army,Tentara Nasional Indonesia-Angkatan Darat (TNI-AD)

[JATOSINT]

I actually wanna see Japan to send their new ARDB here. That's a new approach of defense by Japan, they also wanna get offensive (Amphibious Landing) eventhough without amended Article 9 of 1947 constitution, they just see that with different interpretation. Really would be one of the thing that never be forgotten if Japan send that unit here for GS22.

Well they did that in 1940s

Just saying~

 

[schuimpjes]

Well they did that in 1940s

Just saying~

"Please, don't talk about that anymore. We already repented through our '47 constitution", said some honorable Japanese lol

 

[Umigami]

Czech Republic sends tanks, infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine

The Czech Republic has sent T-72 tanks and BVP-1 infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine, a Czech defence source told Reuters on Tuesday, confirming a local media report.

www.reuters.com

Remember about gossip CZG try to kick Harimau for TNI's amx 13 replacement with their T72? We'll see their performance now. I bet it isn't much different thou.

 

[Madokafc]

What do you think of Russian army regular soldiers capabilities compared to TNI AD regular soldiers?

Does TNI AD regular soldier have better capabilities than their Russian counterpart or worse?

Logistic wise we are better equipped, organized and prepared. Firepower wise and distribution we are much much more worse. Training wise, there is no direct comparison, but looking at how we have routine training schedule with partner such as the US, Australia and Singapore in which units received the joint exercise is distributed evenly accross the board, i don't think we are lagging in this area

 

[Madokafc]

Czech Republic sends tanks, infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine

The Czech Republic has sent T-72 tanks and BVP-1 infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine, a Czech defence source told Reuters on Tuesday, confirming a local media report.

www.reuters.com

Remember about gossip CZG try to kick Harimau for TNI's amx 13 replacement with their T72? We'll see their performance now. I bet it isn't much different thou.

Performance wise is part of it depends on the deployment wise and how the crew received their training, as doctrine is matter. The Indian Army would do thing much better compared to their Russian counterpart even when pitted with Pakistan which is armed with US Made weaponry, as history prove it just as example.

 

[Kafkaesque]

It's been awhile since I visit this forum..

What do you think of Russian army regular soldiers capabilities compared to TNI AD regular soldiers?

Does TNI AD regular soldier have better capabilities than their Russian counterpart or worse?

If you are asking because of the recent Russia's performance then I think you PROBABLY got the wrong impression. Again, probably. Ukraine is definitely not an easy target, they have home and defender advantage (they know the terrain etc, and in most cases defending is easier than attacking), they have every kind of weapon you can think of that is suitable for defensive warfare (all kind of ATGM and MANPADS), they are battle hardened after 8 years of war with Donbass (to some extent, Russia), trained by all kind of NATO troops and the US share real time intelligence with them (from Russia's position to incoming air attack).

We've seen the US fought in Iraq and Afghanistan and some even try to make comparison ("Russia lost more than the US lost in 20 years" etc), but the reality is, it is not a fair comparison. Russia made mistakes, some, many even "rookie mistakes", but if you put any army in the world on their position, I am pretty sure it will suffer more or less the same fate.

I mean.. anti radiation missile may work against the like of BUK, but how do you fight MANPADS? It means your helos are almost useless and you have to use smart munition all the time because your airplane must fly higher. How effective your smart bomb will be if the enemy know everytime your airplane take off? How to secure your troops when your enemy know exactly where you are and the path you are taking (and your enemy have ATGMs, artillery and months of preparation - on their home turf) ?

The only army (armed force) in the world that can reasonably fare well in such situation is probably the US because their unlimited aircrafts and smart munitions, but even then eventually they will have problems with the things I listed above.

=========

That being said, I say TNI is still below Russia. NOT because of bad training etc, but because TNI lack of the experience of maneuvering troops in large scale and long period. Not to mention operating of all those modern gadgets.. While I believe Russia is still below western technology, compare to us they are still 1-2 steps higher, perhaps even 3 if we are talking about the quantity.

 

[RajaSultanKing]

What do you think of Russian army regular soldiers capabilities compared to TNI AD regular soldiers?

Does TNI AD regular soldier have better capabilities than their Russian counterpart or worse?

i think it depends on the training level and frequency of each Battalion though we do a lot of trainings but most of it are small scale and large scale integrated wargames are done with the battalions which are more well equipped rather than those which are located in the regions outside of Jawa and Sumatera

some Battalions may be better but in a whole i think we are on par if not a bit worse than with Russia in terms strategic maneuvering, logistic readiness and preparedness

we do have experience but most of it were unconventional warfare (OPM, Extremist in Sulawesi. GAM) rather than large scale all-out warfare

 

[HellFireIndo]

What do you think of Russian army regular soldiers capabilities compared to TNI AD regular soldiers?

Does TNI AD regular soldier have better capabilities than their Russian counterpart or worse?

The difference is the conscription system vs the volunteer system.

Russia uses a conscription system, males aged 18-27 are up for the draft. The thing is this range is pretty wide that they have 9 years range of age for conscription and serve for 1 year. That means Russia actually have a shortage of men that they require such a law to fill the ranks (well consider that they lost millions of men in wars). Not only the conscription is universally enforced, but the training and on-the-job time are short, bullying is commonplace and living condition is poor.

Indonesia uses a voluntary lifelong service system. So males aged 17 and above are eligible to enter military services. The thing is they have a strict age limit on recruitment, many service branches only admit private level students aged 21 at the eldest, while officer level 30-32 years old. So Indonesia limits the number of people eligible for military service. That means the personnel is regarded as an expensive asset rather than "cheap resources". After being admitted, military personnel is expected to serve until retirement, but considering many see the military as a prestigious institution most are OK with it.

Both poses different advantage and disadvantages.

Advantages of the Russian system:

- Better management of manpower reserves
- Larger manpower reserve
- Cheaper cost in the long run
- Steady stream of troops suited for wartime replenishment
- Predictable recruitment system

Disadvantages of the Russian system:

- Poor morale
- Inadequate training due to short service time
- Conscripts don't have any idea why they are there
- Very inconsistent troops quality, tended to be poor fighting spirit if maintained incorrectly
- Requires tremendous investment in maintaining the system

Advantages of the Indonesian system:

- Personnel are voluntary and therefore morale can be better maintained
- Can select the best candidates
- Better for personnel career and education advancement
- Longer training time = more indidivual capability
- Longer tour of duty time = more peacetime experience

Disadvantages of the Indonesian system:

- Costly
- Smaller force potential in a large war
- Reserve management is negligible, personnel hard to replace in event of massive losses
- Military being prestigious and lucrative job makes the soldier tend to be corrupt and self-serving
- Bureaucratic and aristocratic, often become detached from reality by serving outdated doctrines and interests

 

[FPXAllen]

- Reserve management is negligible, personnel hard to replace in event of massive losses

Interesting.

We can still boast about the large number of our potential reserve, i.e. men and women within a certain age range that can be mobilized if the situation calls for it, but then they will likely have many disadvantages of conscription system.

In a way, I guess that Komcad is an attempt to mitigate this to a certain degree although their standard is still below regular and professional troops but will still remains higher than emergency conscripts.

- Military being prestigious and lucrative job makes the soldier tend to be corrupt and self-serving

- Bureaucratic and aristocratic, often become detached from reality by serving outdated doctrines and interests

Aren't these two points also the same with conscription system? If anything, what we're seeing in Ukraine regarding the result of corruption in the Russian armed forces can and, God forbid, will also happen here. In fact, I feared that in case of war, while I still think that - on average - our regular troops still posses a higher morale compared to conscript soldiers somewhat, but many other supporting factors still need to be addressed to make sure that it will remains high.

Take the average pay of a common private, for starter. For the lowest rank it's between 1.6 to 2.5 mil IDR - still below the minimum regional wage standard for most, if not all, provinces. While it's true that they'll also receive some forms of subsidies (i.e. department/position and family subsidies, remote area bonus, etc..), but the fact remains that a soldier must achieve a rank of at least second lieutenant to have a comparable basic salary as the minimum wage of the province where he's/she's assigned to.

 

[Madokafc]

Interesting.

We can still boast about the large number of our potential reserve, i.e. men and women within a certain age range that can be mobilized if the situation calls for it, but then they will likely have many disadvantages of conscription system.

In a way, I guess that Komcad is an attempt to mitigate this to a certain degree although their standard is still below regular and professional troops but will still remains higher than emergency conscripts.


Aren't these two points also the same with conscription system? If anything, what we're seeing in Ukraine regarding the result of corruption in the Russian armed forces can and, God forbid, will also happen here. In fact, I feared that in case of war, while I still think that - on average - our regular troops still posses a higher morale compared to conscript soldiers somewhat, but many other supporting factors still need to be addressed to make sure that it will remains high.

Take the average pay of a common private, for starter. For the lowest rank it's between 1.6 to 2.5 mil IDR - still below the minimum regional wage standard for most, if not all, provinces. While it's true that they'll also receive some forms of subsidies (i.e. department/position and family subsidies, remote area bonus, etc..), but the fact remains that a soldier must achieve a rank of at least second lieutenant to have a comparable basic salary as the minimum wage of the province where he's/she's assigned to.

Even US Armed Forces still have some corruption Cases within themselves, and from time to time there is always case happened. It just their prevention mechanism is working and punishment is already in place, including for spying activity in which no less worse than corruption Cases.

Indonesia armed Forces after Reform is doing better jobs and corruption Cases is started being investigated from time to time and one including high official person. And not only corruption Cases, that's including criminal Cases and other discipline infringement is started being published and announced

 

[JATOSINT]

- Military being prestigious and lucrative job makes the soldier tend to be corrupt and self-serving
- Bureaucratic and aristocratic, often become detached from reality by serving outdated doctrines and interests

Nah, these two are not caused/unique to the AVF

As others have mentioned, corruption and bribery also happened in countries with conscription such as Rusia, South Korea, Israel, etc

 

[HellFireIndo]

Aren't these two points also the same with conscription system?

The difference is between having these problems among officer corps in a conscription system vs the entire military in a professional system. So in the conscription system you really rely on the quality of professional officers, these guys are the full-time ones and if they fck up then the damage will affect the entire army. Meanwhile, in the professional system, organizational culture sticks longer and more thorough throughout the military, because of the simple fact that the soldiers stayed there much longer, and bad habits easily become a norm that is very hard to fix. We really do know that from general down to private, there's this exact same faulty mindset that trickles down in our military. Yet all can be blamed on everyone, while in the Russian army it's easy to point out which officers did what blunder.

In fact, I feared that in case of war, while I still think that - on average - our regular troops still posses a higher morale compared to conscript soldiers somewhat, but many other supporting factors still need to be addressed to make sure that it will remains high.

If ask me, honestly morale is not an issue on our part imo. The issue is reserve manpower, equipment, logistics, and leadership quality. Good morale can easily be broken with bad officer corps, and even more so with bad logistics. Russia compensates shortage in conscript's capability by simply having tons of reserves and equipment. We haven't thoroughly developed such a system of mobilization, we are more like the Americans who only begin training volunteers only after they need them, but without the luxury of geography, and resources the Americans have.

Take the average pay of a common private, for starter. For the lowest rank it's between 1.6 to 2.5 mil IDR - still below the minimum regional wage standard for most, if not all, provinces. While it's true that they'll also receive some forms of subsidies (i.e. department/position and family subsidies, remote area bonus, etc..), but the fact remains that a soldier must achieve a rank of at least second lieutenant to have a comparable basic salary as the minimum wage of the province where he's/she's assigned to.

There's tunjangan operasional and all, but that's for another day. Our condition cannot afford to have the American solution of having a military job as a profitable short-term career (meaning high pay and financial benefit). Adequate pay is mandated by the law, but we cannot realistically make the soldiers rich either. Most people simply went for the stable pay and rank, those general PNS-like benefits, some went for the guns and coolness, but I think most below Bintara rank never really care about getting rich off regular salary (it's never that much, but enough for middle-class).

I actually came from rural areas, interestingly regular soldier's pays and benefits are still higher than average peasants and workers.

 

[schuimpjes]

The difference is the conscription system vs the volunteer system.

Russia uses a conscription system, males aged 18-27 are up for the draft. The thing is this range is pretty wide that they have 9 years range of age for conscription and serve for 1 year. That means Russia actually have a shortage of men that they require such a law to fill the ranks (well consider that they lost millions of men in wars). Not only the conscription is universally enforced, but the training and on-the-job time are short, bullying is commonplace and living condition is poor.

Indonesia uses a voluntary lifelong service system. So males aged 17 and above are eligible to enter military services. The thing is they have a strict age limit on recruitment, many service branches only admit private level students aged 21 at the eldest, while officer level 30-32 years old. So Indonesia limits the number of people eligible for military service. That means the personnel is regarded as an expensive asset rather than "cheap resources". After being admitted, military personnel is expected to serve until retirement, but considering many see the military as a prestigious institution most are OK with it.

Both poses different advantage and disadvantages.

Advantages of the Russian system:

- Better management of manpower reserves
- Larger manpower reserve
- Cheaper cost in the long run
- Steady stream of troops suited for wartime replenishment
- Predictable recruitment system

Disadvantages of the Russian system:

- Poor morale
- Inadequate training due to short service time
- Conscripts don't have any idea why they are there
- Very inconsistent troops quality, tended to be poor fighting spirit if maintained incorrectly
- Requires tremendous investment in maintaining the system

Advantages of the Indonesian system:

- Personnel are voluntary and therefore morale can be better maintained
- Can select the best candidates
- Better for personnel career and education advancement
- Longer training time = more indidivual capability
- Longer tour of duty time = more peacetime experience

Disadvantages of the Indonesian system:

- Costly
- Smaller force potential in a large war
- Reserve management is negligible, personnel hard to replace in event of massive losses
- Military being prestigious and lucrative job makes the soldier tend to be corrupt and self-serving
- Bureaucratic and aristocratic, often become detached from reality by serving outdated doctrines and interests

Really appreciate this "effort post" however is that.

So in the conscription system you really rely on the quality of professional officers, these guys are the full-time ones and if they fck up then the damage will affect the entire army.

In case of US, ya, they have no conscription anymore but I will put enlisted soldiers and conscripts as same here. NCOs are the one that important in the field because they are the one that directly blended with the conscripts/enlisted soldiers. They also have a case of in order to become an NCO, that certain people have to pass through long masa tugas because there is no other path except enlist and reach the rank of NCO. That's also meant they already pass through a lot of situations which become experience, and they even can giving recommendations to the officers in charge of platoon.

"The U.S. pours resources into training and educating its enlisted service members, who become noncommissioned officers, or NCOs, as they promote through the ranks. Often referred to as the “backbone” of the U.S military, NCOs are essential to military operations. They are subject matter experts who bring in years of experience to help officers lead their units, and serve as small-unit leaders across the services. While service members become NCOs at different ranks, depending on the service they’re in, the fact remains that each branch of the U.S. military has — and relies on — noncommissioned officers." [1]

That a worth reading paragraph from a based article for me.

Source:
[1]

NCOs are the US military's greatest strength — and one of Russia's biggest weaknesses

"You can’t eat, you can’t sleep, you can’t shoot, you can’t physically train without an effective NCO."

taskandpurpose.com

 

[R4duga]

i guess it has some correlation with our arhanud, the ukrainian are reported to operate Martlet LMM, and has been proving it's anti UAS/UAV capability by shooting down russian Orlan-10 drones.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1513056393326125059

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1513084650947858436

since rotary small UAS/UAV like that have a very low thermal emission, Beam riding missile are better at intercepting them compared to IR Homing.

 

[HellFireIndo]

Really appreciate this "effort post" however is that.

In case of US, ya, they have no conscription anymore but I will put enlisted soldiers and conscripts as same here. NCOs are the one that important in the field because they are the one that directly blended with the conscripts/enlisted soldiers. They also have a case of in order to become an NCO, that certain people have to pass through long masa tugas because there is no other path except enlist and reach the rank of NCO. That's also meant they already pass through a lot of situations which become experience, and they even can giving recommendations to the officers in charge of platoon.

"The U.S. pours resources into training and educating its enlisted service members, who become noncommissioned officers, or NCOs, as they promote through the ranks. Often referred to as the “backbone” of the U.S military, NCOs are essential to military operations. They are subject matter experts who bring in years of experience to help officers lead their units, and serve as small-unit leaders across the services. While service members become NCOs at different ranks, depending on the service they’re in, the fact remains that each branch of the U.S. military has — and relies on — noncommissioned officers." [1]

That a worth reading paragraph from a based article for me.

Source:
[1]

The thing is our recruitment system is very funny and there are decades long human resource mismanagement.

Tamtama, Bintara, and Perwira, all started recruitment from the same age: 17-18. There's SECATA, SECABA, and AKMIL all open for all high school graduates at the same time. So such a US model of NCO/ Bintara cadre won't work in Indonesia. Two of my former classmates entered Bintara directly after high school graduation, while others tried SECATA and AKMIL unsuccessfully (all roughly the same age but massively different ranks). While some villagers were former military, entered as prajurit and retired a sersan, so he never had the chance to actually exercise "NCO expertise" at all.

So Indonesian recruitment system is not based on such a concept of preparing certain ranks for a certain combat role. For they are prepared for the bureaucratic role instead, literally just filling the numbers because that's what the anggaran demands. The difference between Tamtama, Bintara, and Perwira is simply the level of competition, the prestige, and the price of bribes for you to get admitted. Even if inside the military there's a strict watch on corruption, people outside the military AKA recruits are ripe for exploitation, pay 100 jt for tamtama, 300 jt for bintara, 1 milyar for perwira/ akmil. Of course, people can get in without paying as both of my friends have proven, but this bribe and nepotism culture is still rampant in the military. The personnel numbers you see on statistics don't really have the same idea as what most people expect.

And there's a surplus problem in the officer corps: there are too many officers but not enough job. It has been a thing since the 90s but never fixed even today 30 years later. This means hundreds of officers are jobless, frustrated, and angry. This creates pressure for the government to open more civilian positions for military officers regardless of their actual capability. Such a thing really hampers the professionalization effort away from Dwifungsi. Yet the TNI system is still a leftover of Dwifungsi, so many officers who used to be posted on jabatan sipil suddenly cannot and therefore have no job.

 

[schuimpjes]

Tamtama, Bintara, and Perwira, all started recruitment from the same age: 17-18. There's SECATA, SECABA, and AKMIL all open for all high school graduates at the same time. So such a US model of NCO/ Bintara cadre won't work in Indonesia.

Wkwk..... that's why I always thinking, "where this country's military can find the inspiration for this kind of NCO pipeline?", for I don't know any other country has this kind recruitment.

And there's a surplus problem in the officer corps: there are too many officers but not enough job. It has been a thing since the 90s but never fixed even today 30 years later. This means hundreds of officers are jobless, frustrated, and angry.

Can relate, a lot of time I heard from stories that the wifes kind of sikut-sikutan and cynical to each other because thinking that their husband don't get expected position. It's more hurting when structurally, the adik lichting are in the higher positions, there is almost no way for the kakak lichting to get in the higher position, because those who will replace that higher adik lichting is another even newer lichting, their only fate is ngendap on that office or try their best to lobby to get another higher position in the other office, for there are positions also in their own branch, TNI HQ, BIN, Search and Rescue, etc.

This creates pressure for the government to open more civilian positions for military officers regardless of their actual capability. Such a thing really hampers the professionalization effort away from Dwifungsi. Yet the TNI system is still a leftover of Dwifungsi, so many officers who used to be posted on jabatan sipil suddenly cannot and therefore have no job.

Higher the rank, smaller position exist, always be like that, especially for officers. I think, rather than keep a lot of jobless officers, it's better for Indonesian Military to introduce contract system to military. Rather than keep the soldiers forever, they are kept by the system of contract that every few years must be renewed, If the upper echelon think this certain people get no position, the contract will not be renewed. So for those that the contract were not renewed, they can get Indonesian DD-214 like privileged that they can used to do more study in higher education and prioritize when they applying for civilian jobs, but I know, there are not like lot of civilian job here also, but that exist, I was ever told about ex-TNI officer get out of military and paid better in HSSE position at Pertamina or another officers that also out to work as pilots in commercial airlines. There is another possibility too that who the contract are not renewed will get business loan and knowledge, they also helping creating jobs for another if they make business.

That's evil for some, I know. I just saying 1 of the thing on my head, not the final draft.

 

[schuimpjes]

corruption/bribe culture when recruiting.

Some name already failed on certain phase, then come out again on the next phase wkwk what a very real ghost story, some in military called them zombies.

 

[schuimpjes]

just like the higher-ups in Afghanistan military.

Hoho... talking about Afghanistan, actually the Afghan SF and NDS or other that heavily interacted with NATO forces on the ground were based tho. Even there are proposed idea in UK, I don't remember who proposed it, to integrate ex-Afghan forces that migrated to UK to British Army. So they will operate like the Gurkhas, but they are Afghan.

 

[Parry Brima]

I think we can use this IKN event to see how serious their intention for reformation.

Time will tell.

Pretty sure the only 2024 presidential candidates who will fight tooth and nail for IKN will be coming from any of PDIP coalition (PS, GP, TR, etc).

Others will probably put it aside as last priority as the money needed is simply crazy.

TNI will follow the direction from the new elected president, whatever it is.

(IF, again IF, the LCS situation is considerably getting worse and the new president decides to reallocate IKN budget towards TNI modernization pretty sure TNI will wholeheartedly support it.)

 

[Madokafc]

Many people doesn't realized, if Indonesian armed Forces heavily emphasize and giving much Investment on logistic issue, and carefully maintain heavy fleets and cohort of logistic battalion or regiment at much of their formation units beside internal logistic units. Pusbekang AD, CSS, or in English they called them Quartermaster corps is indispensable units within the army. And coupled them with the Navy strategic sealift command and air force logistic mobility command, we already had backbone organization to handle logistic issue at comprehensive level (though we are likely copying some of the US Armed Forces organization structure and level but minus behemoth funding and commitment level). Not to mention, even within the army they invested too for LCU and LCT vessels at considerable number and the government is have tradition to Levy numerous civilian Cargo vessels either owned by SOE, government agency and commercial private units to help during military mobilization regularly.