Indonesia To Buy Six More Sukhoi

Balikpapan (Antara Bali) - Indonesia plans to buy six more Sukhoi fighters until 2014 to bring the total number of  Russian-jets in its possession  to 16 or a squadron.

"In addition , we also plan to acquire three submarines and more F-16 jet fighters so that by the end of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's term , our defense forces will  be strong," Defense Minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro said at Semayang port here on Saturday.

Purnomo was here to close the Saka Bahari Nusantara sail that was held since  the end of December 2011.

He said "our economy is very strong and we have a defense budget of Rp150 trillion."

He said the Indonesian Air Force (TNI-AU) at present already had 10 Sukhoi fighter aircraft since the period of former president Megawati Soekarnoputri.

At the time, he said, the government only targeted one mini-squadron consisting of 12 Sukhoi SU-27 and Sukhoi SU-30 aircraft.

He said all the forces including the submarines would be assigned in the Indonesian eastern region especially to safeguard the second  archipelagic sea lanes (ALKI II) namely from the northern border with Malaysia and the Philippines, the Makassar Strait to Nusa Tenggara islands in the south.

"It takes only an hour for Sukhoi to fly normally from Makassar to the Malaysian border in Sabah. Meanwhile a Sukhoi plane could fly up to Mach-2 or twice the speed of sound," the chief of the Squadron XI Wing 5 at the Sultan Hasanuddin airbase in Makassar, Lt Col Tonny Haryono said on a separate occasion.

The procurement of more Sukhoi planes would also be accompanied by procurement of more F-16 fighters. (IGT/T007)