Improve troops' mobility in nearly lawless Maluku
Improve troops' mobility in nearly lawless Maluku
Siswo Pramono, PhD Candidate, Australian National University, Canberra
A modicum of "peace" has been attained in Maluku and cemented
in the Malino II peace agreement. The incident in Soya coined a
question of how to protect the fragile peace. If technicality
matters, the business of keeping the "peace" in Maluku is
difficult due to geographical and demographical factors. This
must be addressed.
Taken together, the total area of Maluku (including the North
Maluku province) is about 74,000 square kilometers and it is the
only Indonesian region in which the land mass makes up just 10
percent of the province's total surface area.
It has a population of two million inhabits and more than a
hundred islands.
The average population density is 19 people per-square
kilometer but the distribution is uneven. Maluku has only 160
kilometers of roads.
Those who attempt to sabotage the Malino II agreement might
exploit these geographical and demographical "disadvantages" by
instigating sporadic violence in remote areas and waterways.
Has Indonesia deployed enough troops, transport and
surveillance equipment in Maluku? In the heyday of communal
conflicts in mid-2000, about 14,000 military and police personnel
served in Maluku. The then issue of impartiality aside,
commanders complained that they did not have enough personnel and
transports to sustain the troops' mobility. This is a typical
problem faced by peacekeeping forces elsewhere. Bosnia is one
such example.
The total area of Bosnia is 51,000 square kilometers and thus
smaller than Maluku.
There are, however, stark differences. Bosnia is landlocked;
Maluku is archipelagic. Bosnia has a total population of 4.4
million, or twice that of Maluku's. Nonetheless, the nature of
conflicts in Bosnia and Maluku are similar -- politicization of
sectarian conflicts -- although the magnitude and the political
triggers are different.
The United Nations deployed nearly 40,000 peacekeepers in
Bosnia (while part of the troops also served in Croatia) and the
number was considered too small. In 1995-96, a NATO-led
international peacekeeping force of 60,000 troops served in
Bosnia to implement and monitor the Dayton peace agreement.
Since Bosnia is a mountainous country with poor transport
infrastructure, the peacekeepers faced tremendous geographical
challenges. The troops hardly responded to sporadic violence
instigated by radical groups in remote areas. The UN Security
Council (through Resolution 998 in 1995) then improved the rapid
reaction capacity of the troops and introduced airborne early-
warning aircraft over Bosnia. Unfortunately, the TNI/Polri in
Maluku does not have such a luxury.
With the military embargoes imposed by some Western suppliers,
the TNI/Polri in Maluku is unlikely to be able to improve its
mobility and monitoring capacities. But the need to protect the
Malino II agreement is pressing.
Article 1 of the Malino II agreement obliges the people of
Maluku to end the conflict and all kinds of violence. Yet the
death toll of more than 6,000 is growing since Soya is unlikely
to be the last incident. As demanded by the agreement
(particularly article 8), the government is taking the initial
steps of the rehabilitation program, including rehabilitation of
psychological damage. However, a new cycle of violence can
disrupt this program. Bosnia's experience is worth considering.
If counted from the signing of the Dayton peace agreement in
1995 to the initial signs of socio-economic recovery in 2000,
Bosnia then needed five years of relative peace to give the
rehabilitation program a chance to work. As such, one of the main
tasks of the civil emergency authorities in Maluku is to carry
out an effective peacekeeping operation for at least five years.
The major reduction of violence is a precondition of a robust
socio-economic recovery in Maluku.
While acknowledging that a heavy-handed security approach is
not the best solution for Maluku, the experience in Bosnia
indicated that a rapid reaction capacity assumes the central role
in peacekeeping operation and hence in controlling violence.
After all, speed safes lives.
Maluku has 32 seaports and 20 airports. But, the lack of
personnel aside, the security forces are in shortage of transport
helicopters, patrol aircraft, and patrol boats, which are vital
to sustain their mobility and surveillance capacity. As a
comparison, Bosnia has 28 airports and transport helicopters made
up the backbone of the peacekeepers' mobility.
As such, the lack of military transport and (aerial)
surveillance in Maluku must be addressed immediately. Indonesia,
the largest archipelago in the world with acute violent conflicts
in at least five regions, has only about 100 military
helicopters, 110 transport aircraft, and less than 60 patrol and
coastal combat ships, about half of which are coastal and inshore
patrol boats (IISS, The Military Balance 1997/98).
The government can move from other parts of Indonesia a
portion of the existing military equipment to Maluku at the risk
of weakening troops' mobility in other conflict regions.
Alternatively, Indonesia can seek outside help.
Since purchasing new equipment is unlikely, due to the
national economic crisis and the military embargo, Indonesia must
explore the possibility of "borrowing" the equipment from China,
India, Russia, South Korea, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and
some ASEAN states.
There is precedence to follow. For instance, in 1993 a
Pakistani battalion was equipped and trained in Slovakia by the
German Army before being deployed as peacekeepers in Bosnia. And
the U.S. was then prepared to provide transport to troops from
any country joining the peacekeeping mission in Bosnia
(Shawcross, 2000).
Peacekeeping in Maluku is already a matter of international
concern and surely one of the most important matters on
Indonesia's agenda. At least 17 foreign governments pledged
assistance to help rehabilitate Maluku. Australia has donated
five patrol boats to Indonesia (to help solve the problem of
people smuggling). Australia also supplied 20 transport aircraft
(Nomad) to Indonesia in 1997.
Thus, there is a window of opportunity to be further explored
in attempts to improve the mobility of the troops in Maluku and
hence the effectiveness of its peacekeeping mission. If the
borrowing of equipment from friendly countries is an option, the
lending agreement can be concluded under strict conditions that
the equipments will solely be used for peacekeeping purposes in
Maluku. The diplomatic representatives of the lender countries
(i.e. the embassies) can act as the monitoring agents.