Indonesia criticises Australia's missile plan

Producer: Bharati Jagdish
First broadcast: 27 August 04, Radio Singapore International

The Indonesian government has expressed concern about Australia's plan to equip its fighter jets with long-range cruise missiles.

Australia says that the cruise missile programme will give it "the region's most lethal" air combat capacity.

The air-to-surface missiles can destroy targets up to 400 kilometres away and will be installed between 2007 and 2009.

Indonesia claims that it was not consulted about Australia's plan and is questioning Australia's intentions in beefing up its offensive capabilities.

For more on this, Bharati Jagdish (BJ) spoke to Dr Ron Huisken (RH) from the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre in Canberra.

RH: "It's a programme that has been on the books for some time - the generic decision to buy such capabilities, but there are other pressures in Australia to put even longer-range missiles on our surface ships and submarines for example."

BJ: Australia says that the weapons system is not targeted at its neighbours and that it has good relations with its neighbours. So who then iwould such a system targeted at?

RH: "The major intention is to fill the gap, as we see it, left by the early retirement of the medium bomber the F1-11. The other dimension is that we're a close ally of the United States. We've always had an ambition to be able to contribute to either United Nations or United States-led coalitions' top-end military conflicts in more distant theatres. Although we have a defensive defence posture. We wouldn't start a war, but if war came to us, we've reserved the right to take some strategic and tactical initiatives. But I admit that can lead us to have capabilities that, in the regional context, may appear disturbing."

BJ: So would you say that Indonesia's sense of unease is justified to some extent, even though Australia has no intention of targeting its neighbours?

RH: "Australia has a perennial dilemma in this regard. Although we're close to Southeast Asia and we've been trying for 25,30 years and have succeeded, I think, in transforming our relations with Southeast Asian states. A defence force geared towards the defence of Australia in a region where the distances from Southeast Asia to Australia are so immense, can lead to, logically, capabilities that, in the regional context, look somewhat disturbing. You may recall that back in the 1980s, when Kim Beazly was Australia's Defence Minister, he began the practice of detailed prior briefings to regional governments on where our thinking was going and why. It was not done so well this time. It was done hastily, I think, on the very day the decision was announced."

BJ: Well, Australia claims that the government had already briefed countries in the region about this?

RH: "Yes, to my understanding our Department of Foreign Affairs did give a briefing some time this week. That was too short a time period before the announcement was made to the media."

BJ: Do you expect this Australian move to cause any real long-term tensions with Indonesia or do you expect it to blow over quickly?

RH: "I don't think it will blow over, but equally, I don't think there's any reason for it to become a constant irritant. We need to do much more intensive homework in the region in order to explain our thinking and why certain decisions have been taken, not in an especially public manner, but quietly and in advance. Sometimes, governments feel they have to take decisions even if they have learnt through discussions that these decisions will cause offence, but if you've established a track-record of having dialogue in the initial stages of which you're open to changing your instincts or preferences in some way, it helps enormously for both sides to accommodate such decisions and not allow them to become significant irritants in relations."