Australia has sent a troop of M1A1 Abrams tanks, an infantry platoon and a small fleet of armoured vehicles, trucks and recovery vehicles as well as command and control posts into the north-east of the Indonesian island of Java as part of United States forces-led military exercises with our nearest northern neighbour.
The deployment to the exercise of the tanks is the first time “this type of vehicle” — read heavy tracked firepower — has left Australian shores since the Vietnam War, Defence says.
In a sign of ever-changing strategic times, the Australian Defence Force (ADF) will contribute armour, personnel and firepower to Exercise Super Garuda Shield at the invitation of the Indonesian Armed Forces (the Tentara Nasional Indonesia or TNI) as this year’s seasonal sequence of regional multilateral wargames continues.
The Javanese friendly tour for the M1A1 Abrams tanks from Australia’s 1st Armoured Regiment is a long way from home for the heavy armour and the 10th/27th Battalion, Royal South Australian Regiment and has included a July overland line-haul trek from Adelaide to Darwin where the firepower is loaded onto US vessels and shipped into Surabaya.
The strategic signal of the Exercise Super Garuda Shield is fairly straightforward. It demonstrates reciprocal trust at a military level between Australia and Indonesia and the tangible ability to deploy and operate there is requested.
The exercise is a major step forward against the backdrop of historical regional frictions over Timor-Leste and subsequent Australian deployment there after a referendum in the former Portuguese colony opted for independence.
The official line from Defence is that Super Garuda Shield “provides training and rehearses the ADF’s ability to collaborate with partner nations to effectively deploy significant land forces, including armour, across the Indo-Pacific region.”
Defence said over ADF 125 personnel will participate in the exercises in September, with the tanks and heavy equipment shipped to Indonesia last week for “the TNI- and United States Indo-Pacific Command-led bilateral training activity” in East Java that runs from 31 August to 13 September.
Notably, they include Army Reserve personnel, including members of Defence’s Reserve Accelerated Training Scheme (RATS).
“The opportunity for these soldiers to deploy and exercise alongside flanking unit 1st Armoured Regiment, as well as our partners in Indonesia and the United States, is really exciting,” Commanding Officer 10/27RSAR Lieutenant Colonel Sam Benveniste said.
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