Disaster at Ardasier Reef
The Indonesians, still with initiative, ended up with a reinforcing mission for Ardasier Reef. Success here again would probably put this Reef beyond Malaysian recovery.
Their task force for this mission consited of two Diponegoro Class Corvettes. Diponegoro and Hasanuddi. 1,700 tons 76mm DPgun, Harpoon SSM and Mistral SAMs. Plus strike mission of two Hawk light bombers. One LST with 6 40mm and 100 combat troops.
The Royal Malaysian Navy have two ships patrolling in the area. Kasturi a 1,700 tons Corvette with 76mm DP gun, MM38 Exocets. Perkasa a 240 ton Patrol boat 57mm DP gun and MM38 Exocets. On stand by were 4 SU30 Strike Jets.
The Indonesian task group, to the west, head towards the landing point.
RMNS Kasturi (at top) spots KRI Diponegoro within the exclusion zone and fires two Exocets.
KRI Diponegoro spots the two missiles at the last minute and targets them with Mistral SAMs, both fail to lock on. In the final seconds She fires chaff. The first missile hits causing a terminal flash fire amid ships. The second missile is unfortunately decoyed onto the LST troop ship KRI 502.
KRI 502 is fatally hit by the decoy. Hasanuddi picks up some survivors but then decides to withdraw.
At no stage did the Indonesians detect any enemy ships.
RMNS Kasturi signals its success continues the patrol.
The campaign initiative now passes to the Malaysians.
No comments:
Post a Comment