Thread: My Jakarta: Connie Bakrie, Military Defense Analyst

My Jakarta: Connie Bakrie, Military Defense Analyst
Zack Petersen | March 27, 2012
‘There’s a Misconception That the Military Is Corrupt and Runs All the Businesses’




Connie Bakrie can’t stop talking about the Indonesian Military. She’s obsessed — eating, sleeping and breathing maritime borders, defense budgets and strategic analysis. She delves into and debates strategic diplomatic ties the way most of us talk about traffic or the Kardashians.

But that’s why Connie is one of Indonesia’s top military defense analysts, and perhaps why tickets to see her talk at an upcoming TEDx Jakarta event sold out in less than three minutes.

At her talk this Sunday, Connie will try to clear up some misconceptions about the military. Here she tells My Jakarta what it’s like to work in a male-dominated field, why she thinks the armed forces deserve a little more love and how to put the nation’s defense efforts back on track.

What’s the biggest threat to Indonesia?

People go to war for three reasons: religion, resources and trade. If we look at the maritime borders of Indonesia and Australia, we start talking about fish reserves, food security, oil and gas. Remember, 80 percent of the world’s goods pass through our straits, polluting our waters and destroying biodiversity in our seas.

For our defense, when I released my book in 2009, I said that we needed at least 12 submarines to protect our waters. People laughed, saying I was crazy, but they didn’t say anything when the US deployed 12 submarines to Guam and now Darwin. Indonesia has only two submarines to protect 3,257,483 square kilometers of maritime borders.

You’re the media’s go-to defense analyst. How does it feel to be a woman in what some might call a man’s game?

Have you ever heard of Laksamana Malahayati? During the Dutch occupation she ran the Navy in charge of protecting Aceh. That’s who I want to be. When women talk and do something about defense and the military, it attracts more people. I want to put our military back on the right track. For me, it’s about correcting misconceptions of how we should defend our nation.

Can you give us a pre-TEDx teaser about your session?

I want to give people a better understanding of the military’s role and bring a little bit of love back to the military. I think that after 1998, there’s been this misconception that the military is corrupt, that they’re running all the businesses and, worst of all, don’t respect human rights.

Well, were they not?

Under [former President] Suharto, it was the military that held this country together while everyone else tried to build Indonesia from scrap. The country needed strong leaders and clear guidance, and the military filled those roles. But it seems that appreciation for the military fell to zero because of the so-called 1998 SSR [security sector reform].

What would you like people to know about the military?

Civilians expect the military to be professional, like in the United States, but they don’t want to provide the military with the necessary technology, fighters, warships and guns because they say it’s too expensive.

Indonesians love going to Singapore because they feel like the country is very secure. Do you want to know why? Because there is one soldier for every 98 people. Compare that to Indonesia, where one soldier protects 800 people. And 12 years ago there was only one Indonesian soldier for a million people.

So it’s not about some tour de force between countries — it’s about protection. Seventy percent of our territory is ocean, and Indonesia covers about 13 percent of the globe. How are we going to protect our waters if we can’t even buy submarines and ships? Indonesia simply can’t afford to have a weak military.

What about conscription? Would that give people a better understanding of the military?

I did my dissertation on military conscription in Israel. In Israel, they start sorting people in high school, whether one goes to computer science or those with the highest IQs become fighter pilots. But here in Indonesia, ever since SSR in ’98 there’s been so-called civilian supremacy over the military, with Commission I of the [House of Representatives] overseeing defense and the Defense Ministry. We’re proud to have our military act as peacekeeping forces elsewhere — we secure someone else’s land, air and sea — but do we keep our own [territory] safe?

Strategically, which country is a more important ally, China or the United States?

I think the middle to eastern part of Indonesia should align with the US and its Pacific Command base in Guam or its new Darwin base in Australia, because we need to secure that zone. But on the western side, we have no choice, our closest neighbor is China and we have to secure the Southwest Pacific to maintain ‘mare pacificum,’ the peaceful sea.

You’re part of MIT’s IDEAS program — what’s that?

It’s a leadership program presented by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. There are 23 of us in the program. IDEAS is made up of people from the media like Desi Anwar; the CEO of Antara, [Ahmad] Mukhlis Yusuf; figures from the energy and resources sector and some from the legislature.

Connie Bakrie was talking to Zack Petersen.

Originally Posted by Sir Wilson

What about conscription?

I thought that said " what about corruption ?" - but it did not , so thus Zack Petersen is a gay bar loiterer pretending to be a Journalist