Indonesia sets new military target

JAKARTA - Indonesian Defense Minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro said on Tuesday that the country's military is expected to meet a new power level, inscripting in presidential decree as Minimum Essential Force (MEF), within two years.

"After seeing what are displayed here, I am optimistic that we can settle the military improvement and restructuring jobs within two years as mandated by the existing law," Purnomo said on the sidelines of an exhibition displaying advancement of national defense industry in the military headquarters here.

The MEF is a new military regime requiring massive development in the military implemented from 2010 to 2014 so as to meet optimum level of force sufficient to guard the nation. ?

The effort to improve the military might was endorsed by presidential decree No 5/2010.

To do so, Indonesian government has arranged massive amount of allocation to buy brand new military vehicles, equipment and armaments from foreign countries.

The purchase of military equipment from abroad also constitutes transfer of technology scheme aimed at improving national defense industry.

New navy ships, submersibles, fighter jets, helicopters, tanks and high technology military equipments were among the shopping list that have already been procured from foreign producers.

Indonesia is expecting deliveries of F-16 C/D and Sukhoi Su-30 fighter jets from US and Russia respectively. It bought hundreds of Leopard main battle tanks from Germany, and planed to purchase AH-64 Apache helicopters for its army.

Indonesia also established a joint cooperation with South Korean producers in designing and producing the so-called 4.5 generation fighter jet codenamed KFX. The joint project with South Korea initiated in 2009, worth $2 billion. The initial prototypes of the plane is expected to roll-out from the production facility in South Korea by 2020.

Approximately 200 KFX fighter jets will be manufactured for both the Indonesian and South Korean Air Forces.