Indonesia is so rich that it can do whatever it wants? It purchases foreign weapons on a large scale and continues to develop a sci-fi "three-body stealth speedboat"

Indonesia has approved a $125 billion budget to modernize its defense.

After receiving this huge amount of money, Indonesia began to expand its military. In terms of the air force, Indonesia has restarted the purchase of fourth-generation and a half fighter jets. However, in order not to offend either the United States or Russia, Indonesia decided to purchase the Rafale fighter jets from France. Of course, in addition to the fourth-generation and a half fighter jets, Indonesia has a greater ambition, which is the desire for the fifth-generation aircraft. Therefore, Indonesia is ready to continue to invest in South Korea's KF-21 fighter jets. In addition to these intentional plans for the air force, Indonesia's biggest move is the purchase of six FREMM frigates from Italy. If these six frigates are in service, Indonesia will become the undisputed first maritime power in Southeast Asia.

As an ambitious Southeast Asian power, Indonesia definitely does not want to achieve its military modernization only through procurement. Therefore, in the procurement process, many additional conditions such as construction in Indonesia were introduced. At the same time, it is also strengthening its weapons development capabilities and construction technology through cooperation with major military powers. Not long ago, Indonesia successfully developed the "X18 fire support boat" for the army, which is suitable for offshore operations and inland patrols. After this type of "tank boat" began sea trials, Indonesia has begun to re-manufacture the "three-body stealth speedboat."

The development of this three-body stealth speedboat named X3K class began as early as 2000. At that time, the Indonesian Navy signed an agreement with PT Lindun to build four state-of-the-art stealth ships. After receiving the construction task, the X3K type "three-body stealth speedboat" was developed based on the "Earthrace" trimaran developed by the company in cooperation with LOMOcean Design Company of New Zealand. However, the construction agreement of this project, which was launched in 2000, was finally signed in 2009, and the construction did not start until 2010. However, due to its advanced design and construction technology, the progress of the project has been highly confidential. The launching ceremony will be held on August 31, 2012 at PT Lundin's shipyard in Banyuwangi, East Java.

The three-body stealth missile boat named "Klevan" is 63 meters long, 16 meters wide, and has a displacement of 219 tons. It is powered by four MAN V-12 marine diesel engines, with a maximum speed of 35 knots, a cruising speed of 22 knots, and a cruising range of 2,000 nautical miles at a speed of 16 knots. According to the plan, the boat is likely to be armed with a 40mm "Bofors" rapid-fire gun and four C-802 anti-ship missiles (no weapons were installed during the sea trial phase). Judging from these data, the X3K speedboat is unremarkable. However, due to the trimaran design, it has the advantages of good overall layout, good lateral stability, good anti-sinking, low underwater noise, etc. At the same time, it adopts a comprehensive stealth design. The hull is made entirely of carbon fiber materials, and a lot of "polyethylene resin materials" are used to reduce radar, infrared, acoustic and electromagnetic signal characteristics.

It can be said that the emergence of the X3K boat has made many people take a new look at Indonesia's shipbuilding industry. It is said that Russia is preparing to purchase 8 speedboats of this type from Indonesia. However, what makes the Indonesians helpless is that this sci-fi stealth speedboat was burned during the sea trial in 2012. But what is more surprising than the burning speedboat is that Indonesia has not yet found out the cause of the fire in these speedboats. The final reason given is that the circuit of "unknown location" caught fire and completely burned. It can be said that the burning of the "Klewang" has seriously frustrated Indonesia's plan to build naval vessels. Therefore, after the burning of the "Klewang", this type of stealth speedboat has temporarily disappeared from people's sight.

Just when people gradually forgot about this type of speedboat, people suddenly discovered that this type of three-body stealth missile boat was "resurrected" again. The second boat named "Guolo" reappeared in front of people in August 2021. Although, compared with the previous "Klewang", many data indicators are still very similar, the No. 2 boat of this X3K speedboat has reached a length of 62.53 meters and a displacement of 245 tons; the cruising speed has also increased from the previous 22 knots to 28 knots; in terms of armament, the naval gun will be replaced with a 30mm machine gun, and the missile model may continue to use the C-802 anti-ship missile. In addition to these changes, the biggest change in the "Guolo" is the construction of new composite materials, adding "self-extinguishing resin" technology to the material to improve fire resistance. The combat control system has also been replaced from the French TACTICOS system to the Dutch Sewaco system. In addition, the boat will also carry a type of drone.

It can be said that the latest X3K missile boat "Golok" has been upgraded on the basis of maintaining the original design. Of course, will this speedboat repeat the mistakes of "Klewang"? Even if the "Golok" can be successfully put into service, how much can it enhance the strength and shipbuilding capacity of the Indonesian Navy?