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Police facing escalating urban guerrilla warfare
The National Police is expected to step up its counterterrorism efforts to combat terrorist groups that are resorting to what analysts are calling a strategy of urban guerrilla warfare targeting state symbols, particularly police officers
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he National Police is expected to step up its counterterrorism efforts to combat terrorist groups that are resorting to what analysts are calling a strategy of urban guerrilla warfare targeting state symbols, particularly police officers.
Late on Monday, a low explosive was detonated at a traffic police post on Jl. Kaligawe in Semarang, Central Java. The explosion cracked the post's windows and pavement. No injuries were reported.
Central Java Police chief Insp. Gen. Dwi Priyatno said that investigators had found pieces of aluminum cans and plastic at the scene. 'It was a low-explosive blast. However, the materials are quite dangerous if they hit [people],' he said on Tuesday.
The Semarang Police are looking at CCTV footage from a camera placed near the post to identify the perpetrator. The footage shows a 20-something man wearing a white shirt placing the package containing the bomb at 7:04 p.m. on Monday.
The explosion was the seventh attack targeting police in the last two months, a high-profile spate that has left four police officers dead and two injured.
On Sept. 13, First Brig. Ruslan, an officer with the National Police's Sabhara rapid response unit, was shot in the leg on the outskirts of Jakarta in Depok. The Jakarta Police claimed that the shooting was a mere robbery, as the officer was out of uniform and the perpetrators stole his Kawasaki Ninja motorcycle.
The National Police, however, have suspected the other attacks were perpetrated by terrorists.
The force has so far arrested 17 individuals accused of supplying firearms or orchestrating the attacks. Among them is Iqbal Khusaeni, an Abdullah Sonata loyalist, who was once jailed for planning the murder of Liberal Islam Network activist Ulil Abshar Abdalla and a Christian pastor.
Aside from the attacks, some terrorists are also urging members of the public to wage war against
the state.
Recently, media outlets reported the emergence of an online book titled The Guidelines for Guerrilla War Practice in City, which was uploaded to Scribd digital documents library by an account named Syarif Ramzan Saluev.
The 112-page book provides a detailed description on how to manufacture explosives and strategies to evade the police. 'Forum Islam Al-Busyro' is written on every page of the manual. 'The manual is for regular citizens who believe that armed strikes are the only way to overthrow the ruling regime,' it says.
'We are colonized by kafir [infidel] military power [...] The colonizers then take over broadcasting institutions, television, radio, weapon factories, energy sources and all things that pose threats to its power in the country,' it reads.
'The sources of economic, military and political power are concentrated in the city. Therefore, the fighters must plan a city guerrilla strategy, by bringing their weapons to the jungle of skyscrapers. Only with war in the city, can the ruling regime be toppled.'
Noor Huda Ismail, a terrorism expert, expressed concern that the manual would inspire people with no terrorism links to launch attacks against police or government officials.
'Around 900 people have downloaded the manual. Just imagine if 10 percent of them became inspired to exercise the attacks written in it,' he said on Tuesday.
