Feb 1, 2005SAF proves capable as humanitarian forceDiverse skills and mutual trust clear the way in tsunami-hit Aceh
By Bernard Loo and Joshua Ho
FOR THE STRAITS TIMES
BRIDGING THE GAP: Indonesian children enjoying a game with SAF troops in Meulaboh. Officers who could speak Bahasa Indonesia bridged the language gap with locals.THE Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) completed its emergency relief mission after three weeks in Aceh as rescue and relief work in the tsunami- affected areas moved into a new phase.
In this next phase - recovery, reconstruction and rehabilitation - the bulk of Singapore's contribution will be undertaken by civilian volunteer groups like the Singapore Red Cross and Mercy Relief.
Volunteers have been helping to set up centres for displaced persons, providing them with basic necessities and delivering school kits for children. This is to help restore some semblance of normalcy to their lives until they can be more permanently rehoused.
At least 24 centres are being built to re-house the more than 400,000 internally displaced persons who have lost their homes.
As the soldiers from the SAF humanitarian assistance support group hand over their duties to their Indonesian counterparts and return home, they and other Singaporeans should be proud of what the SAF has achieved in such a short time.
Non-defence role
SINCE the 1990s, an increasingly fashionable argument suggests that the roles of military organisations in future will revolve less around the traditional - military defence - and more around the non-traditional, such as humanitarian relief, peacekeeping and peace enforcement.
The argument further asserts that training for traditional military defence roles has ill-prepared military personnel for assuming the new functions and missions. The argument then concludes that, more and more, military training ought to focus on these new, so-called non-traditional roles and less on the traditional concerns of military defence.
More importantly, decisions on force structures ought to focus on the capabilities needed to support these new non-military missions.
In other words, conventional military operations, basically, ought to be seen as a thing of the past.
Indeed, this is increasingly becoming the case for the armed forces of some European states, which now devote more time to training for non-traditional roles than for traditional military defence missions.
The manner in which the SAF responded to the tsunami disaster, however, highlights the limits of the above argument.
The SAF responded swiftly by putting together a combination of forces, supplies and equipment over what is traditionally a holiday period. Within two days of the disaster, the first sorties of C-130 aircraft had ferried tents, groundsheets, blankets and medical and food supplies to Medan.
Over the next three weeks, SAF Chinook and Super Puma helicopters as well as C-130 and Fokker 50 aircraft flew some 250 missions, carrying more than one million pounds of cargo and 4,000 people.
Three Republic of Singapore Navy helicopter landing ships and fast craft ferried relief supplies, NGO personnel and volunteers.
But more critically, they brought engineering equipment like bulldozers, excavators and cranes to establish beach landing points and clear supply routes from the coast to the devastated city of Meulaboh. The SAF medical teams treated 4,000 people in Banda Aceh and Meulaboh.
That rescue and relief mission was the largest SAF operational deployment ever undertaken to date. More than 1,200 personnel were deployed - to Phuket in Thailand and to Medan, Banda Aceh and Meulaboh in Indonesia.
RSAF aircraft flew supply and support missions between Jakarta, Singapore and Aceh, and around the Indian Ocean rim to Phuket, Sri Lanka, the Maldives and Mauritius.
Besides people deployed on the ground in the disaster-stricken areas, many more SAF personnel supported the men and women in the field. They worked very hard to get the aircraft, ships, equipment and men ready to go at short notice.
The assets that the SAF has been able to deploy in support of its humanitarian efforts - the C-130 aircraft, Chinook and Super Puma helicopters, as well as helicopter landing ships - are all conventional military assets and are the result of the SAF's continuing focus on conventional military defence.
Key capabilities
WHY was the SAF able to respond so swiftly, effectively and sensitively? Partly because of the prudent development of a diverse and flexible set of capabilities, partly because of the high quality of training.
Soldiers were able to perform their tasks professionally and sensitively in a manner attuned to the needs and concerns of a population affected by a major disaster.
Furthermore, the SAF was able to coordinate closely with its Indonesian counterparts, thanks to many years of extensive interaction and cooperation in exercises, personnel exchanges and attending each other's training courses, which have resulted in the development of mutual respect and understanding.
Indeed, such was the trust that the SAF was given freedom to deploy troops for relief work in and around Meulaboh without having to be escorted by Indonesian soldiers.
An especially critical group of soldiers were the liaison officers who could speak Bahasa Indonesia and thus act as a bridge between the Indonesians and the 30 non-governmental organisations.
At the higher political and senior command levels, close ties enabled Singapore to understand the specific needs of the Indonesians and for the SAF to tailor assistance accordingly. A phone call, a quick meeting, and the thing was done.
In the coming years, the SAF will develop yet further. It will leverage on information technology, precision capabilities and networks to transform itself into what is called the 3G (3rd generation) SAF, one expected to respond to a wider spectrum of threats and challenges and to deal even more swiftly and capably with the unexpected.
But success in such a transformation is not dependent on the application of technology alone. As the SAF's response to the tsunami showed, the human factor is just as crucial.
Bernard Loo is an assistant professor and Joshua Ho is a research fellow at the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, Nanyang Technological University.
