Not Only Physical War, The Deputy Minister Of Defense Predicts Damage From The Probabilities Of Cyber War

Photo by Shahadat Rahman on Unsplash

JAKARTA - Deputy Minister of Defense (Wamenhan) M. Herindra reminded the importance of being alert to cyber warfare because its effects could cause more severe destruction than physical warfare.

"The concept of threat has changed, from the original form of physical war, now destruction at the resilience of a nation can be penetrated through cyber networks. The impact of damage from cyber warfare is more severe than the destruction caused by physical war," said Herindra while delivering a key speech to Defense Industry Collaboration: For Better Economy and Stronger Defense at the Indo Defense 2022 Expo & Forum at JIExpo Kemayoran, Jakarta, Thursday, November 3.

The war, which utilizes the cyber medium, has a more severe impact on destruction than physical warfare because it directly attacks a nation's mindset. As a result, the war can cause mental, economic, social, cultural, political, and even ideological destruction.

Therefore, according to him, the Indonesian nation, especially those involved in the national defense sector, needs to increase mastery of technology in order to protect Indonesia from cyber warfare attacks.

In addition to cyber warfare, Herindra also conveyed several other defense threat spectra that the Indonesian people need to watch out for. The spectrum of the threat is a violation of state sovereignty, theft of natural resources (SDA) at sea, radicalism, threat of biological attacks, and natural disasters.

"Other threat spectra include violations of sovereignty, theft of natural resources at sea, radicalism, and biological threats, as well as natural disasters. All of this has gone from traditional (threats) to non-traditional," he explained as quoted by Antara.

Even so, Herindra reminded the Indonesian people not to ignore traditional wars, such as physical wars. According to him, traditional wars still have the potential to occur, such as the current volatile war between Ukraine and Russia.

"We are also a nation and a country, don't forget, we are sometimes given the knowledge that in the future there will be no physical or traditional or conventional war, but it turns out to be happening," he said.