Indonesia to buy 11 Su-35 Flanker jets from Russia.

According to the information released by The Jakarta Post on Aug. 4., Indonesia is going to barter its resources, including coffee, to acquire the Russian Su-35 supermaneuverable fighter aircraft.

The whole deal is to be directed by an Indonesian state-owned company – PT Perusahaan Perdagangan, collaborating with Rostec. The Parties in question, as The Jakarta Post reports, have signed a memorandum of understanding, assuming that Indonesian agricultural commodities would be traded for the Russian fighter aircraft, specifically 11 examples of the Su-35 jets.

Jakarta, in exchange, is to provide Russia with, among other goods, coffee, palm oil, or tea, as the Indonesian Trade Minister, Enggartiasto “Enggar” Lukita, stated, during his official visit to Russia which ended on Aug. 5.

The aforesaid deal is a clear sign that Russia is trying to find a variety of workarounds in order to mitigate the effects sanctions have on its economy. Indeed, during our recent trip to Moscow for MAKS 2017, high prices could have been noticed in case of commodities, the trade exchange of which has been limited by the EU or the US, e.g. apples.

The Indonesian officials interpret the above situation as a major opportunity also to expand and deepen the collaboration with Russia beyond the trading area in fields like tourism, student exchange, energy or technology – according to the statement made for The Jakarta Post by the Indonesian Trade Minister.

The Sukhoi Su-35 is a Russian jet fighter considered to belong to the 4++ generation, with its supermaneuverability capabilities demonstrated during this year’s edition of the Moscow MAKS Aviasalon.

Image Credit: Jacek Siminski

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On Aug. 17, the Indonesian Air Force staged an interesting flypast over Jakarta to celebrate the 68th anniversary of Indonesia’s independence.

Eight Su-27/30 fighter jets belonging to the 11 Sqn (Skadron Udara) and six F-16s from 3 Sqn deployed to the Jakarta Halim Perdanakusuma international airport to take part in the rehearsals and the final flypast over the State Palace in Indonesia’s capital town.

The images in this post, showing the (once top secret) Sukhois were taken by Roland Adrie.

H/T to Emiliano Guerra for the heads-up

 

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Indonesia’s front-line jet fighters have just arrived in Australia to take part in Pitch Black 2012, the largest multi-national biennial air combat exercise held downtown, which officially kicks off on Jul. 30. The arrival of the once top-secret Sukhoi Su-30s, at their first deployment abroad, marks the beginning of a new era in the Australia and Indonesia relations, after defense cooperation between the two nations stalled on the East Timor crisis.

The formation of two Su-30s and two Su-27s of the Indonesian Air Force (TNI AU)  was welcomed by a flight of F-18 Hornet of the No. 77 Squadron of the Royal Australian Air Force that escorted the Indonesian planes to Darwin airport, in the Northern Territory.

The four Russian fighters (of a fleet made of 10 Sukhoi-27s and four two seater Sukhoi-30MK2 jets, with six more on order) attending the bi-annual will have the opportunity to train with the RAAF assets, performing dissimilar air combat training within the Australian and Indonesian airspace.

Exercise Pitch Black 12 will be held until Aug. 17 and involve 2,200 personnel and up to 94 aircraft from Australia, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, New Zealand and the United States.

Image credit: © Commonwealth of Australia  

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