Special/Elite Forces in Indonesia

Before this, I have posted about the Malaysian Special Forces and now I'm going to write about my neighbouring country, Indonesia. Indonesia is the biggest Muslim populated country, yet, it is a secular Republic. Hence, the use of president as the Commander in Chief. (Correct me if I am wrong) Probably the most well known Indonesian unit is the Kopassus or Komando Pasukan Khusus (Special Forces Commando) of Indonesia's army.

Kopassus as I was saying, trained with the British SAS, the American Green Beret and their Malaysian counterparts, the GGK. Kopassus is designated into 5 groups which includes the presidential guards aka the Paspampres.

A picture of the Paspampres.

The counter-terrorism group is called the Satgultor. They maintain close ties with the American Green Berets.

Satgultor troopers conducting CQB training.

Now moving to Kopaska. Indonesia's Navy premier special forces. This elite unit is tasked in underwater demolition, CT and at times assisting Kopassus's Paspampres for the President's security. Heavily influenced by the Navy SEALs, these guys are the real deal.

Indonesia, unlike Malaysia has a Marine Corps. Yontaifib or Taifib for short is the elite unit of Indonesia's Marine Corps. These guys do amphibious recoinassance and they are no ordinary marines.
A photo of Taifib snipers scouting.

The next unit I'm going to talk about is quite unique because this next unit is a combination of Taifib Marines and Kopaska troopers. The unit I'm talking about is Denjaka. Indonesia's Navy special force, tasked to do anti-sabotage operations, anti-terrorism, maritime counter terrorism, and other special operations. The unit is composed of Marines for the 90% and the rest are sailors.


Writing about Indonesia's Special Forces is quite complicated as there are so many of them and most of their jobs often overlap with each other. However, despite such complex organization, they have maintain good qualities of profesionalism and bonded together and able to work side by side. Such unity is what every country must have to succeed. As a Malaysian I respect these people as much as I respect my own country's special forces/conventional forces.