Satria Mandala Museum
Introduction
On 30th October 2011, after remembering that I had a history assignment to visit the museum, I was immediately went to any museum that is available around Jakarta and also not far from my home which is in Cilandak. At first I decided to go to Museum Gajah in central Jakarta, after considering that there’s a traffic jam at Bunderan Hotel Indonesia at that time, so I had to change to another museum available in another place around the city, so I decided to go to the Satria Mandala Museum.
Museum’s general information
Satria Mandala Museum is a museum that fills with the history of the Indonesian National Army, located at Jalan Gatot Subroto, Jakarta. The museum which was officially open for public in 1972 by Indonesia’s former president Soeharto. This museum owns various collection of Indonesia’s war equipment from the past to modern age, such as small weapons, heavy weapons, anti-air guns, land or sea mines, rockets, helicopters, planes, etc. This museum also has several diorama which depicts the struggle of the Indonesia’s National Army against threats from outside and inside the country in order to uphold the Indonesia’s independence.
First let’s talk about the diorama that the Satria Mandala museum owned. One of the five dioramas that is avalaible in the Satria Mandala museum depicts the armed forces organization in the war to uphold Indonesia independence. This diorama is about the early days of this Republic, precisely August 23, 1945, when People's Safety Agency (BKR) whose members originated from paramilitary People (Seinendan, Gokutotai, etc.), PETA (Defenders of the Homeland), and the KNIL (Koninklijk Nederlandsche Indie Leger) was formed. BKR later changed to the People's Security Army (TKR) on October 5, 1945, which was then celebrated as the birth of the TNI.
The second diorama in the Satria Mandala museum is about the independence proclamation at August 17th 1945. At 10.30, at the premises of Jalan 56 Pegangsaan Timur (at the present is called Jalan Proklamasi). Mr. Soekarno with Mr. Mohammad Hatta at his side read the text of the independence proclamation. The proclamation is followed by the hoisting of the red and white flag of Indonesia and also accompanied by the national anthem “Indonesia Raya”.
The third diorama is about the battle of Surabaya at 10th November 1945. In October 1945 the allied forces landed in Surabaya. Their promised not to interfere with the internal affairs of the republic of Indonesia was not fulfilled, as the results indents broke out that deteriorated into a battle. In one of those armed clashes, Brig. Gen. Mallaby was killed. The commander of the allied forces for east java, Maj. Gen. Masergh issued an ultimatum that the population of Surabaya including its authorities should hand over all weapons in their possession before 6 A.M. On November 10th1945 the ultimatum was ignored by the people of Surabaya. On November 10th 1945, the British opened their attack on land, sea and air. This diorama shows engagements in Surabaya that occurred in the vicinity of the “Red Bridge”.
Moving to the next room inside the Satria Mandala museum, which is full of with things that General Soedirman used during the wars to uphold the independence. One of the things that is available in this room is A sedan chairs which is used to transport General Sudirman when he fight by guerrilla against the Dutch army during the war of independence. General Sudirman led the guerrilla during the eight months between the years 1948-1949, with a distance of about 1000 km in Central Java and East Java.
Moving onto the next room after the General Soedirman room, we’ll find the armory room which hold many weapons that is used during the wars to uphold independence from foreign armed forces and also from the rebellion throughout the country. The weapons that is available in this room includes machine guns, cannons, pistols, rocket lauchers, submachine guns etc. The machine guns that is available in this room such as the all around powerful MG-42 which was taken by the Indonesian people’s from the deceased allied armed forces. The MG-42 is a 7.9mm universal machine gun that was developed in Nazi Germany and entered service with the Wehrmacht in 1942. It supplemented and in some instances, replaced the MG 34 general purpose machine gun in all branches of the German Armed Forces, though both weapons were manufactured and used until the end of the war.
Other machine guns that the Satria Mandala owned is the M16 assault rifle, AK47 assault rifle, Thomson submachine gun, G3 assault rifle, M1 Garand rifle, etc. There are two type of guns in the Satria Mandala armory that I would like to describe since it’s has been used by the Indonesia armed forces for many operation to defend the homeland. First there’s the M16 assault rifle. The M16 (officially Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16) is the United States military designation for the AR-15 rifle adapted for both semi-automatic and full-automatic fire. Colt purchased the rights to the AR-15 from ArmaLite, and currently uses that designation only for semi-automatic versions of the rifle. The M16 fires the 5.56×45mm NATO cartridge. The rifle entered United States Army service and was deployed for jungle warfare operations in South Vietnam in 1963, becoming the U.S. military's standard service rifle of the Vietnam War by 1969, replacing the M14 rifle in that role. The U.S. Army retained the M14 in CONUS, Europe, and South Korea until 1970. Since the Vietnam War, the M16 rifle family has been the primary service rifle of the U.S. armed forces. And second, there’s the AK-47. The AK-47 is a selective-fire, gas-operated 7.62×39mm assault rifle, first developed in the Soviet Union by Mikhail Kalashnikov. It is officially known as Avtomat Kalashnikova (Автомат Калашникова). It is also known as a Kalashnikov, an "AK", or in Russian slang, Kalash. Design work on the AK-47 began in the last year of World War II (1945). After the war in 1946, the AK-46 was presented for official military trials. In 1947 the fixed-stock version was introduced into service with select units of the Soviet Army. An early development of the design was the AKS (S—Skladnoy or "folding"), which was equipped with an underfolding metal shoulder stock. In 1949, the AK-47 was officially accepted by the Soviet Armed Forces and used by the majority of the member states of the Warsaw Pact.
The rocket launcher that is available in this armory such as bazooka and the Czech’s rocket launcher. Bazooka is the common name for a man-portable recoilless rocket antitank weapon, widely fielded by the U.S. Army. Also referred to as the "Stovepipe", the innovative bazooka was amongst the first-generation of rocket propelled anti-tank weapons used in infantry combat. Featuring a solid rocket motor for propulsion, it allowed for high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) warheads to be delivered against armored vehicles, machine gun nests, and fortified bunkers at ranges beyond that of a standard thrown grenade or mine. The universally-applied nickname arose from the M1 variant's vague resemblance to the tubular musical instrument of the same name invented and popularized in the 1930s by U.S. comedian Bob Burns. During World War II, German armed forces captured several bazookas in early North African encounters and soon reverse engineered their own version, increasing the warhead diameter to 8.8 cm (amongst other minor changes) and widely issuing it as the Raketenpanzerbüchse "Panzerschreck" ("Tank terror").
Outside the museum’s building, we’ll find various war vehicle that is used by the National Army of Indonesia. The vehicle is divided in three section, the first section is the land vehicle. The land vehicle in the Satria Museum is also divided into two section, the first section is the land vehicle, and the second section is the amphibious land vehicles. In the land vehicle section, there are five different land vehicle, but in this essay I will describe only two of them. The first vehicle is the Panhard Type 54-11. This vehicle was manufactured from France. It’s powerful twelve cylinder Panhard engine which is also integrated with the cooling system, created 200 horse power to move the 13,5 tons bodyweight. It’s unique combination of the wheel which is the combination of rubber tires and metal tires makes it agile in almost every terrain.
The second armored land vehicle is the Stuart M3 A1. This tank is manufactured in the United States, with the seven cylinder continental engine, this engine produced 250 horsepower to move the 13 tons bodyweight. It’s used by the national armed forces to eradicate the rebellion in Maluku (1950), the DI/TII rebellion in (1965), the PRRI and Permesta rebellion (1958), and the G 30 S/PKI rebellion (1965).
At the amphibious armored vehicle section, I was fascinated with this particular vehicle due it’s enormous size. It was called the PT. 76 amphibious tank. This tank is created in Russia, this tank has a height that reached 3,700 mm and 7625 mm long. It has also enormous weight that reached 14,5 tons that is moved by a 4-stroke diesel engine, so it can only reached the speed of 25 km/hours at the battle field. This vehicle has been used by the military at the trikora operation (1962-1963), dwikora operation (1964), G 30 S/PKI (1965), Seroja operation (1975-1979).
At the second section, the water vehicle section, unfortunately there are no boats available in this section, what’s left on this section is only the cannon that is installed at boats as a defense equipment, and a sea mines.
Satria Mandala Museum's collection of aircraft that are stored on the side behind the museum, which one of them is Cureng aircraft ever flown by Air Marshal Adi Sucipto Augustine. The museum where tourism is a very interesting military museum to be visited by all members of the family. Here visitors can see from very close range combat a variety of equipment that is difficult to be found in other places.
