Nightmares for countries such as Indonesia , Malaysia etc.

No not really, i don't fear Australia at all.
Australia alone is nothing militarily compared to Indonesians alone. Maybe they have better weapons, maybe they have better technology...... but we have more experience soldiers, we have a bigger population so if our ammunition is depleted we can always throw people jks. Bambo sticks are probably more preferable.

The chance of Australia attacking Indonesia is slim, they can attack us straight to our capital but if the capital falls does Indonesia falls too ??? in 1-2 days they would be surrounded and massacred. Now if we want to attack them......i think we have a slight chance to do it with our current arsenals, that is if it's a 1v1 not a tag match. then again we come to the point we would we want to attack them or they want to attack us ?

Do it, attack the Anglo-criminals.

everybody got weapon power, what are the chances of ww3 to happen?

Actually, Australia train Indonesian and malaysian arm forces, these two countries don't have expertise like Australia have.
Australian defense budget is twice or even more of that of Indonesia.

Australia don't need to attack Indonesia.

Wrong, Australia have more experience in war than Indonesia ever be, did Indonesia went to Iraq? Afghanistan? Somalia?
If you look at the Indonesian army in action in East Timor and New Guinea, they are still miles behind Australia.

Oh it will happen, trust me.
Listen it doesn't make sense to make all that firepower and just let it sit there.
Countries develop weapons for a reason, and they are either for defense, offense or to sell.

Countries develop weapons as deterrents so as there may not be a war. It can be explained with Game Theory. However, it doesn't mean that they need to be used. It only pays off to use weapons when the benefit exceed costs. Thankfully, with so much destruction that would result from another world war, the costs are far too high. Let's hope.

This is so stupid.

This is an academic paper that has come out saying that if Australia wants to be a "Regional Power" they have to increase spending and we are getting bagged for this.

Firstly does anyone really need an academic paper to say that to become a regional power, a country needs to increase its defence spending.

Secondly, where does it say that Australia even wants to become a regional power.

Thirdly, how is Australia different to China and Indonesia becoming a regional power? If you want to criticise Australia for becoming a "regional power" then why not China and Indonesia as well.

Frankly, Australia did tried , or at least they are acting like asian leader now.
APEC was introduced by Australia and even Australia is pushing military alliance with US and Japan.

Also, Australia is biggest donor for SE Asian countries & pacific.

Australia has not tried to be a regional power. We are, along with Singapore the wealthiest country in this region and as such would be in a better position to aid our neighbours financially. So, its wrong for us to provide aid to our neighbours? How does this make us a regional power.

APEC is not an example of Australia trying to become an "Asian Leader" many countries have "economic bloc" ties with other countries, the EU, ASEAN are just 2 examples. Australia due to its geographical location, would not qualify to be in any of these traditional economic blocs, so its important for us to try to form one where we could be a member of, otherwise everybody else would be at a party and we'd be left out at our own economic detrement.

Pushing for a military alliance is to ensure our border security without having to spend so much on defense, an exact opposite to wanting to become a regional power. Do you think either Japan or the US would automatically send troops if Australia decided to invade Indonesia. Of course not, these agreements would usually only mean that these countries would send military support IF AUSTRALIA WAS INVADED. Being a regional power would include the capability to project that power regionally. Australia neither has the aircraft carriers, missles or the adequete military size to achieve any of this. The only thing we have that could possibly project power are our submarines which are not nuclear capable and are only designed for costal defence. China, India, Pakistan and North Korea are more regional powers then Australia is.

And IF Australia did want to become a regional power, so what? Other countries are regional powers, why single out Australia for criticism? Why not criticise those countries already mentioned as well. Or is this a case of double standards.

Coz Australia is totally awesome

Australia is only building up because they're scared of china's miltary growth. To be honest they don't have the population to be a serious threat, it's more like a speed bump

oooohh rise of China and India huh. im glad they are so open to where they stand. i always figure they should just team with new zealand and leave Asia alone. none of their business.

May be they are trying to be seen as regional power, but Australia definitely have experience and expertise to be regional power.
Look, Australia is already regional power in Oceania region, and have claimed most of South pole, south pacific, south indian oceans.
Australia is world largest provider of uranium and alloy minerals, and possibly the largest gas reserve.

By looking at the global firepower index:

GFP Ranking
1 United States
2 Russia
3 China
4 India
5 Germany
6 France
7 Japan
8 Turkey
9 Brazil
10 United Kingdom
11 Italy
12 South Korea
13 Indonesia
14 Mexico
15 Canada
16 Iran
17 Egypt
18 North Korea
19 Spain
20 Pakistan
21 Australia
22 Saudi Arabia
23 Thailand
24 Argentina
25 Sweden
26 Israel
27 Greece
28 Taiwan

And Australia spend more than Brazil, Turkey and Canada on defense spending and 12th largest military spending nation on earth, but they have the smallest in men power compare to top 20 military spending nations.

Rank ↓ Country ↓ Military expenditures (USD) ↓ Date of information ↓
— Flag of World World Total 1,470,000,000,000 2008[1]
— NATO Total 1,049,875,309,000
1 Flag of the United States United States 711,000,000,000 2009[2]
— Flag of Europe European Union Total 311,920,000,000 2007[3]
2 Flag of France France 61,571,330,000 2008-2009[4]
3 Flag of the United Kingdom United Kingdom 61,280,890,000 2008[5]
4 Flag of the People's Republic of China People's Republic of China 61,036,400,000 2008[6]
5 Flag of Russia Russia 50,000,000,000 2009[7][8]
6 Flag of Japan Japan 48,860,000,000 2008[9]
7 Flag of Germany Germany 45,930,000,000 2008[10]
8 Flag of Italy Italy 40,060,000,000 2008 (est.)[citation needed]
9 Flag of Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia 31,050,000,000 2008[11]
10 Flag of South Korea South Korea 28,940,000,000 2008[12]
11 Flag of India India 26,500,000,000 2008-2009[1]
12 Flag of Australia Australia 24,802,000,000 2008[13]
13 Flag of Brazil Brazil 23,972,836,012 2009[14]
14 Flag of Turkey Turkey 30,936,000,000 2009[citation needed]
15 Flag of Canada Canada 18,695,342,000 2008-2009[15

I would say Australia does show sign of becoming regional power.

Not sure if Australia is flexing its muscles but do know Australia has invested plenty to develop

Its an over the horizon radar system which

Got info. from Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jindalee_over-the-horizon_radar

Do know Australia and US sometimes do joint training in Australia.

This is a story from 2007: http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200706/1...618_385265.html

Of course we a "regional power" in Oceania. Oceania is made up of Australia, New Zealand and lots of small Pacific Islands. Not really impressive to be a "regional power" here is it. We are the Oceania champions at football. Does it mean that globally we are any good? Sure we're better then most of Asia but we're not the best in Asia. Looking at the list you have provided above, like I've said, China, India, North Korea, South Korea, Japan, INDONESIA etc are all above us. Why not criticise any of these countries for becoming or wanting to become a "regional power". Why single out Australia, when we are not even the strongest in our area. We "control"(and in the South Pole its not really controlling in the usual sense) large parts of the South Pole becasue of geography, not because of "Regional Power". Besides there is an unwritten agreement that the South Pole will not be exploited for commercial gain by all countries.



We have to spend more for the size of our population because our country is the 4th largest in the world. We have more ground to cover. Even so we spend much less then countries who are significantly smaller then we are.

But like I said even if we were a "Regional Power" so what, if you wan to to criticise us for it, then you really should also be critical of all the other countries above us in the GFP ranking.

We don't have enough ships to patrol our waters, thats whey illegal immigration and illegal fishing occurs in our waters. We had a choice of buying more ships to patrol our borders or developing a better radar system so we could use our existing ships more effectively. If we had bought more ships we would have been accused of trying to become a "Regional Power" won't we. We chose the better radar system becasue its cheaper then buying and maintaining more ships. Even so I personally don't think it will be as effective as having more ships patrol our borders.

Other countries with higher GFP are all located in hot spots where their neighboring nations are hostile.
Australia in other hand, have no such threats from her neighbors and yet joined every global wars and continuously upgrading war machines.

Australian army, navy & airforce are far better equipped & well trained than most SE Asian and Oceanian nations. So you still believe Australia is not trying to become regional power?

Really, what hot spot is China, Germany, Indonesia, Italy, Great Britain, France, Turkey, etc etc in? Besides India, Pakistan North and South Korea and Iran, I can't identify any other country above Australia that is more in a hot spot then Australia is.

Our Army, Navy and Air force is better equipped then our neighbours because we can afford to spend money simply because we are richer. If you look at other countries who are as "rich" as we are in the same region ie Singapore, Japan, South Korea, our armed forces are no better equipped then they are. Besides the bottom line is that to be a regional power, you have to project that power, which our armed forces from the GFP listing you yourself have given us, clearly demonstrates that we don't do it as much as other countries in our region. You might think that we have no threat from our neighbours, I disagree. Although Indonesia is much more stable then it used to be, in my opinion, the military is still too influential in Indonesian politics. If Indonesia was to destabalise, as it has in the past, it would become a direct threat to Australia. In fact looking at the size of the Indonesian armed forces, we would need a much better equipped Armed forces to just compete defensiveky against Indonesia. We have no military power which we can project over Indonesia, but simply from the size of Indonesias Armed Forces, they could project their influence over her neighbours. Why not criticise Sinagpore for maintianing a modern army?

swingdoctor, you're too sensitive and defensive about the apparent "criticism".

If Australia didn't have potential to be a regional power, no one would care to discuss the matter.

Possibly, but I've been around here long enough to see the double standards that Australia is judged against compared to other countries.

Well, if you don't understand the full picture of "hotspot" then you will never agreed with me.
Firstly, you ask about China, Germany, Indonesia, Italy, Great Britain, France, Turkey?

China - surround by Russia, India, Korea & Vietnam all sizable armies and possibly at cold war.
Germany - This country always have been center of military attention even before modern era.
Indonesia - Indonesia have been slowly expanding its territory ever since it was founded.
Italy - Again, once the center of European power, its neighbors are quit capable of being hostile.
GB - Man, you should know, they have participate every major wars in the world, and it's the reason how Australia begun.
France - Middle power, surround by other middle powers.
Turkey - always have been center of trouble spot, Greece & Persia & Arabs have been trying to hold onto Turkey, and they are located at gateway for Europe.
Singapore ? - Man, it's smallest state in SE Asia, if you don't keep it up you can't guarantee the future. It's more insurance for them.
Korea & Japan modernizing their war machines? wow where did you have been all this time?
They have been sworn enemy for past 10 centuries and when you mix with North Korea, China and Russia nearby, then you get the picture.

Australia?
It's socialist democratic nation, have no known enemies other than little scared relation with Indonesia.
Australia didn't wanted Indonesia to be in strong position, so they drag East Timor issue, now it's under Australia's control.

Because of its unique location, Australia practically have no known threats other than illegal immigrant boats heading to their shores every month. Yet, Australia makes $$$$$ from sale of its vast natural resources and spend more than Brazil & Indonesia on military, have more experience & expertise.

Australia is only few country in the world that can make it's own aircraft engine, rocket engine, nuclear weapon if they want to, war ships and submarine, attack helicopters etc.. And because of special relationship with Britain, US and many other advanced countries, Australia can obtain latest technologies. Not only that past Howard administration made substantial effort to bring US military base into Australia and building space launch site & research site for space exploration.

Australia have been showing how they can do at Iraq and Afghanistan, even US was surprised about how well Australian soldiers were trained and skilled. Aussie pilots are one of the best in the world.
Australia is major education & training service provider for Asia, even Chinese, Japanese, Singaporeans, Malaysian are doing their pilot, special diving training in Australia.

Also, Australia have been known for providing skills & knowledge for China's agricultural industry, even Koreans have sent their engineers on nuclear physics in Australia.

Australia is like little US in Oceania; with vast resource, technology, all Australia need is men power to become major power.

Australia might be large but most of Australia is a hostile desert. So getting a large population like the US would be a feat.



Maybe with technology they could increase the green areas and thus there population.
Read this on water technology in Australia: http://blogs.smh.com.au/science/archives/2...g_the_de_1.html

It's more like a counter-part to another counter-part rather than a teacher to a student and like i said Australia may have a bigger defence budget that we do but does that necessarily means they will win a war ??

Well we fought in WW2 then our war of Independence, then came various civil war from RMS, GAM, OPM to PRRI and Permesta then comes Trikora ( Irian Jaya) then Confrontation with Malaysia then East Timor. As you can see we fought in wars that are only close to home, not wars that our not our business. Well our soldiers are meant to be light infantry suited for the terrain, we would we want to have big motorized infantry in the in the tropics ?? a bit stupid don't ya think ?

All those wars you mention are not our wars, we should we participate in it ?? Just to have some "Battle experience"
And Australian troops are in Iraq for security reasons escorting the Japanese engineers, only their SAS are figthing a war in Afghanistan while in Somalia they were assign to keep the peace, not fighting the war. We may still be behind in technology but that doesn't meant we can't beat them. If you think we can't strike as hard as Australia can you might want to consider it.


You don't know what you're talking about.......more like losing land than getting them.

Australia is spending much is simply because they fear that their Asian counter parts would be too powerful and another Darwin or even worse could happen and it's normal for a country to fear the growing power of it's neighbours. They need to protect their existence, after all they are alone in the region.

Ha, ha, this is one of the stupidest arguments I've heard. Dutchie is right you don't know what you are talking about. Your arguments justifying China, Germany, Indonesia etc as being in hot spots is so rediculous it doesn't deserve a counter argument.

With all due respect to the Indonesian forumers here, Australia still fears Indonesia. This is because although Indonesia has come a long way in the last 10 years and still improving, it is still not as stable as Australia would like it to be, the military is still very influential politically and sadly, a small but significant number of Indonesians still target Australia and Australians. Bali bombings and the bombing of the Australian embassy bring back memories. Indonesia has a population of 700million, there is no way, Australia with its population of 20mil is a threat to Indonesia, its population is too large for us to "invade". By the same token I'm not saying that if Indonesia invaded us they would win either. It is in Australia's best interest, that Indonesia became prosperous because their prosperity would lead to stability and wealth to the region.

You argue that technology means the most in a war. I disagree. Remember the Korean war and Germany vs Russia in WW2. When China invaded North Korea to prevent the US overrunning that country their soldiers didn't even have enough guns to go around, the soldiers behind would pick up the guns of their follen comerades. The Americans kept shooting the Chinese until their guns overheated and jammed. The Russians in WW2 had a much larger army and had much larger casualties then the Germans eventhough the Germans overall had the better weapons and were better trained. And what about Vietnam and the Russians in Afghanistan. Technology is important but its certainly not the only determining factor in a war and I would argue it may not even be the most important.

BTW any idiot country can make a basic jet engine. Australia would need many many years of research to be able to make a decent "modern day" jet engine and its not economically feasable for us to do so. Australia does not manufacture any rocket engines nor nuclear weapons. The science of nuclear weapons is not difficult, you just need testing and most importantly a way in which to deliver them, which in todays era means rockets. We have neither a research programme in rockets or nuclear weapons. What we do have is about 1/2 of the worlds known Uranium deposits, which we sell to the rest of the world for nuclear power, including soon to include Indonesia.

I don't deny that Australian armed forces personel are well trained but this is becasue they have to be, our armed forces are so small by comparison to other countries.

Finally, if Australia doesn't have the capability to adequtely control her borders, how on earth can we launch an offensive war against anyone. To me its quite sad that we can't stop foreigners from fishing in our waters, from stopping on our shores and killing our endangered wildlife. More needs to be spent on defense to prevent foreigners from getting away with this.

...noone really fear asutrilia... their population means a restricted army. They also dont have large enough of an economy to backed a strong military. Military needs money, and resoures...asutrila dont really have enough of them to physically challegue Asia other powers such as China or India. By hey, they can dominate Ocenia all they want, most of us dont really care.

Of i may add to Swingdoctor's argument....
Quantity has it's own quality.

Australia doesn't fear Indonesia anymore, study East Timor and how Howard administration have done so far on Indonesian affairs.

Technology in wars is now very different; new war don't fight with just guns and bullets.

Any country can make simple jet engine? oh yeah if it's simple jet engine.
DEAD wrong here, rest of Asia still buys American, British & Russian made jet engines. I'm surprise you didn't knew about jet engine. Indonesia can't even produce their own war ships by themselves.

Australia is training Singaporean, Malaysian, Thais and Indonesians on how to manage resource, technologies and deploy rescue missions for navy, boarder controls, army & airforce, I'm surprise you didn't knew this too. Australia is like US when it compares to rest of SE Asians & oceania.

Also, with nuclear science, yes everyone with university degree will know about it, but they don't know how to deploy and make it to weapon grade, very few countries know this and Indonesia, malaysia isn't one of them

The bottom line is Australia can own Indonesia, malaysia, Thai etc.. given war situation.
Australia know about the weakness & strengths of SE Asian nations, but SE Asians don't know about Australia. That's the key difference.

LOL.

Australia didn't want to go into East Tmor, we did it because 1) we couldn't ignore the problems there any longer and 2) it was destabalising the region. Besides we only went in at the invitation of Indonesia and under the UN banner, remember among other troops there, malaysia also sent troops. We did not "invade" East Timor and take it by strength of force.

Yes Asia still buys their jets from overseas, as does Australia, so how are we different from Asia? Most countries buy their jets from overseas because the cost of research to build modern day jet fighters is prohibitive unless you are a big country who can afford the cost of development.

I know that a basic jet engin is not difficult to produce, and yes Australia can build an antiquated jet engine as can virtually every country in the world. The science of jet engines is not difficult.

How is Australia any differnet to Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand etc, when it comes to uranium enrichment, none of these countries have research programmes to produce weapons grade uranium.

I know Australia has programmes to train its neighbours defence forces, so what, it just means we have better training programmes, it does not mean we are militarily stronger then our neighbours.

Your last statement, is so wrong and without basis, how do you know Malaysia and Indonesia "don't know about Australia" and how do you know we kinow about them. I can assure you, the Indonesian military is not afraid of military action from Australia.

Both GE/Boeing & British all assemble their jetengines in Australia, and Australia is one of very few countries in Pacific region to obtain the knowledge. Far different from rest of SE Asia.

Australia doesn't need to enrich uranium but still have better knowledge & knowhow to produce weapon grade than Indonesia and Malaysia. Australian nuclear science lab is now training Indonesian and malaysian scientists & engineers, I'm surprised that you didn't knew about it.

Australian military is far more better trained and ready than these of Indonesia and malaysia. Otherwise they wouldn't come to Australia for training.

To tell you the truth, Indonesia and malaysia doesn't know much about Australia than Australia know about them. Needless to say, Australia spend more $$$ on defense budget than Indonesia & malaysia combined and more experienced and more flexible as well as more advanced.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Defence_Force

Looking at the experiences and advancement of Australian military, Aussies are far more trustworthy than Indonesia and malaysia. Also, Australia have strong allies like US, Japan & India.

Indonesia and Malaysia don't have such connections. Comparing them to Australia is like comparing egg with rock.

I agree, Australia is too small of a country to challenge Indonesia. In an all out total war: Indonesia has 64 million males 16-49 years old for military service vs only 5 million for Australia in the same age group

@ MrFalsedata0101

Why do you emphasize on the budget defence ?? Just because Australia have this fear of China (like any western nation) they increase their defence spending.......budget defence does have an effect on the out come of the battle but it does not necessarily means the one who has a bigger defence budget would win. It solely depends on the soldiers. I agree Australia trains Indonesians and other Asian nations but they also come to be educated by Indonesia and Malaysians too. Their SAS and some few selected soldiers come to both countries annually to be train in jungle warfare. Thus it is a mutual relationship.

It seems to me that you are just a white supremacist, who thinks that westerners knows everything about anything.



Not always the best but we do which means you're wrong.





For more....Indonesian Made Weaponry

And FGS they only got two Kanimbla class Landing Platform Amphibious, the Landing Ship Heavy HMAS Tobruk and six Balikpapan class Landing Craft Heavy. How are they going to perform an amphibious assault ??

You seriously got no idea what you're talking about as so much facts are wrong.

I'm unaware of those companies assembling jet engines in Australia, even if you are correct, a few pointers. Firstly they are not Australian companies and neither were the engines designed in Australia. Secondly, the engines are for commercial use and not military, very different usage. Its like saying you'd put a bus engine into a sports car.

Australian alliance with Japan, US etc would be for defensive porposes as all alliances are. Do you really think Japan or anybody else would send troops to attack Indonesia simply becasue Australia did.

Dutchy is also right, we do not have the necessary landing craft to maintain any sort of amphibious assault. We don't even have enough surface ships to maintain border security. We are not a threat to Indonesia, and to say we are a threat to Malaysia is even more laughable. To attack Malaysia unless Indonesia allows us to use their airspace and waters, we would have to around Indonesia to attack Malaysia. Unless of course yo think Australia is stong enough to fight Malaysia and Indonesia combined.

Australian armed forces are designed to be defensive in nature. I believe we are strong enough to hold our borders from attack from our neighbours, but there is not a hope in hell of any aggressive campaign against any of our neighbours.

Listen to Duchy and eveybody else here, the more you try to defend this, the more silly you sound.

C'mon Australian navy is far better than Indonesian & malaysian navies
Australia got more ships and naval equipment than Indonesia & malaysia.

Oh, what about airforce, you guys seriously think Indonesian & malaysian airforce can over kill Australia's airforce??? Aussies are training them for god sake.

Comparing Australia with these countries in SE Asia is like comparing US with some small European countries.

Australian military is not big enough for massive assault, but you should have seen them in Gulf war & Afghanistan war. Far far different with un-experienced Indonesian & Malaysian troops.

^HA HA HA HA HA YEAH RIGHT










No Idea what you're talking about......assuming assuming or go to Wikipedia.



From what i see in this sentence you know your facts are wrong but you're not admitting it......also covering it with you laugh.gif doesn't work.



Fair enough we have less plane but you can't win over a country with only airplanes...... and then comes to the question why would Australia trained Malaysian and Indonesia Air force personnel when we buy our planes from Russia and America ???? Doesn't make sense to me.....



Assuming again........Well you should see Australia in the Gulf and Afghanistan without America nor NATO....
Then again you got any hard evidence ?? or at least internet evidence.....?

I have served in ns in Singapore before and I have been posted to various countries and places around the world including Australia. I kind of like Australia when I was there because of the vast expanse of land. The area the australian guys gave us singaporeans was so many times the size of singapore. With nothing inside but vegetation and kangaroos. So its a good place to train. The planners can let their imaginations run wild on how to train there. The US army also trains there but they are quite controversial in the local australian news because they use depleted uranium rounds.

Another thing about the military might of a country. It is not dependent on the population size of the country. It may depend on the population size of the military but not the country. And everyone knows the largest military may not be the most efficient. Even if there are an additional 50 million males willing to enlist in the military and fight for the country, its not going to work out. Thats not how the military works. Thats not how any organisation works. The 50 million males can't fit into the current organsation structure because the structure doesn't allow it. What about the bunks, the food, who is going to provide all these. Lets not talk about the weapons even. So all these talk about australia being afraid of indonesia because of its population size is all junk. The discussion about indonesians swimming over is greater load of crap. Maybe I'm biased towards the australians because i've seen first hand how modern their military is rather than just quoting from news articles I have read before in where they are posted to these and that.

Generally I agree with what you've said. However I don't remember anyone saying that Australia was afraid of Indonesia militarily. I've said that Australia is concerned about Indonesia politically. With the size of Indonesia all her neighbours would be concerned if Indonesia was unstable politically. As a general rule the size of a country's military is loosely reflected in the size of its population. With Indonesia specifically, its military is many times the size of Australia's. Yes we have better equipment in particular our air force but at the end of the day control of land is still by ground forces and in terms of Australia being a military threat to Indonesia we have no way of projecting any of our ground force strength into Indonesia. I still feel in a straight out war, Indonesia simply from the size of its military, has a slight advantage over Australia, but if Indonesia were to invade Australia, I think its main problem would be logistics. I feel Australia has the strength in the right places to prevent any invading Indonesian army from adequtely resupplying its forces. Even Singapore recognises that the size of the military in important in a war, hence it has National Service.

Size does matter. During World War 2, the Soviet Union conscripted 34.4 million males for military service out of a total population of 168 millions;that's like 41% of the total male population for military service. Every able-bodied male went into battle, leaving only women behind in the factories and farms to supply for the military.

Australia is the country that can only flex its muscles to Oceania, not Indonesia

Firstly, why would Australia want to or need to become a 'regional power'. I think the article may be heading more towards just simply increasing the defense force to maintain and help other countries and to protect themselves. Rather then an actual power and control.

In these unstable economic times, alliances between Australia and other Asian countries are more likely to happen, due to trade, etc. Money speaks louder, especially these days. People should see how much debt a country has and see how much these debted countries are going and how much they may rely on the 'business' of the other countries with less debt or who has a booming economy.

Oh is that best you can come up?
C'mon you can admit that Australia is far better country than Indonesia.

Where was Indonesia when Australian military was side by side with British, American against to Germans & Japanese???? EXPERIENCE DOES MATTER

Australia manufactures Submarines where Indonesia can't. Why? Indonesia is not technologically advanced than Australia. Why would Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand all send their technicians, engineers, scientists and pilots to Australia for training?

Ask yourself, why would so many Indonesian and Malaysian sends their students in Australia?

This discussion is not about the standard of education in Malaysia and Indonisia vs Australia. Nor is it about Australia's technological capacity or its ability to build its own submarines. This is a discussion about Australia wanting to be a regional power and its ability to project this power.

And the simple truth is that Australia does not have the military assets to threathen Indonesia and there is no evidence we want to be a military regional power.

I'm sure Australia want to be regional player than outsider.
How many times we've hear Australia engaging world affairs while Indonesia & Malaysia shy away.

Australia is more influential and accepted by others than countries in SE Asia.
Btw, Australia is already regional power in South pacific & Oceania.

Well I'm not going to dispute whether Australia is able to flex its muscles in Indonesia or not. I do not have enough information to say anything about that.

But I do know that in today's warfare, size matters less than technology, communications and coordination. A large an inefficient army impedes all that. Thats why the PLA of China is trying so hard to downsize its military. Thats why the US is able to invade and occupy Iraq with thousands of soldiers. The whole of Iraq has millions of people. But that doesn't matter because if the government is unable to coordinate any plans for mobilising the millions, they are as good as useless. The crux of today's warfare is not like the past where one more fighter add one point and one less means one less point. The crux today is the ability to disrupt command and control. To seperate the masses and the troops from command so they would be nothing more than guerillas or sitting ducks. Thats why the US took out any means of the Iraqi military to communicate first thing in the war.

I'm not saying that a military with small size is better. Too small is no good. Otherwise I wouldn't have to spend 2 years in the army. But too large is also no good as well. There has to be an optimum amount.


Another thing about experience. Yes it does matter. But how many armed forces in the world has experience? Only a few like the US and Israel. Other countries like Australia may send some forces. But does the experience of one or 2 battalions means the whole military has experience? I think that would be stretching it too far. A single arm of any military can consists of many divisions. Even sending a few battalions would mean only a very small proportion of the armed forces would have experience. And those who say that so and so armed forces has fought in world war II and fought the communist therefore they are experienced are also stretching it quite far. FYI, the average worklife of a soldier is even shorter than a banker. A.k.a, they retire early. The experienced gain is quickly lost again. The new soldiers aren't the reincarnations of those who retired. The only way of maintaining the military is training. Experience is too costly.

You are absolutely right ... Australia want to be appointed as a "Deputy Sherif" of US in the region ...

^ But it has no power to do so...

@Mrdata101
I do admit Australia is a far better country than Indonesia, I myself have experience first hand living in Australia. However this is not the topic, you are trying to change twist the topic and hide the fact that you are outspoken by Swingdoctor and you can't answer the very question i asked you and you bold it, with that pathetic laugh of yours.




Well like i have said many times before....you got no idea what you are talking about....
When the Allies are fighting the Japanese, Indonesians we were siding with the Japanese fighting against the Allies. It is a well known fact that Indonesia was the only country in SEA that were friendly and supported the Japanese although thousands of our people were massacred and enslave by them. Peta, Heiho and Giguyun are some of the military formations that the Japanese organize. For you to not know that, is very silly,get you facts right.



Like Swingdoctor have point out, we are not debating on who's education system are better but i will answer some of it. Indonesia had trouble growing up...thus it did not reach each full potential like other nation like Australia. Though you can't compare Australia with Asian countries because most of them were being enslave when Australia reach it's 100 years and even when they became a Federation and they were help by the British because they were descendants of the British.Simply Australia got a head start than any other Asian nation and that's why you can't compare them.

Australia does not want to be a super power, we like to be nuetral.
As for Indonesia being worried its the other way around....

^You have to see it from both side of the story.
What Indonesia wants are, like any other country stable region, a close relationship with our neighbours, safe borders (no incoming outside threat) and the respect of our sovereignty. If you want these situations in your region, then why would you want to change the situations by try to be a "Superpower".

I agree that Most countries want to be stable, prosperous and have good relationships with her neighbours. Although I do believe that at its core Indonesia does want this, there are a few things that would concern her neighbours. Firstly Indonesia is by far the most populace country in the region, secondly, although becoming less influential, Indonesia's armed forces still have influence in its politics and thirdly Indonesia was formed at the point of a gun and in the last 50yrs has had military confrontations with her "neighbors", wanting to expand its sovreinty ie Konfrontasi and East Timor.

Having said all of this, I believe that Indonesia is more stable and is the best "neighbour" it has ever been in its short history of existance. I also agree with you that part of the issues in Indoneisa stem from it being a relatively new country, unlike Australia. I think Indonesia is still finding its feet, and surely but surely it is achieving this.

sorry multiple posting