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xperts from the University of Indonesia separately told The Jakarta Post Saturday that Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) will continue to foster radicalism even if the police had managed to kill Noordin M. Top, the Malaysian top recruiter and motivator for JI.

"Ideologically speaking, Noordin's death will not stop JI. Their members will regroup in smaller embryos," said Bambang Widodo Umar, an expert on police and security affairs

Defense and security expert Andi Widjayanto concurred and said JI had been proven to be able to find worthy replacements for any killed high-ranking members.

"When JI's best bomb-builder, Azahari, was killed, the organization managed to find a replacement. I still have doubts that the police did kill Noordin, but even if he was killed then JI will not have any problems replacing him.

"We should also note that for JI members, Noordin's death will become an inspiring indoctrination. His death shows that even high-ranking figures in JI are willing to die for what they deem as jihad."

Meanwhile, criminologist Adrianus Meliala said that he believed it would take at least five years for JI to fully rebound.

"JI is the kind of organization that lives in its own world. That group does not have a tradition to launch a direct vengeance attack as soon as one of its top members is killed.

"Instead, their smaller cells will regroup slowly. Based on past experience, it took JI four years to launch another attack after the government put pressure on them after the second Bali Bombing in 2005.

"So, I guess Indonesia will have a peaceful time from terrorists in the next five years after Noordin's death."

Noordin was allegedly killed during a police raid on a house in a village located in Temanggung, Central Java, on Saturday. A man, who was believed to be Noordin, defended himself for about 18 hours against the police's 88 Anti-Terror Special Detachment in a battle of wits and shoot-out.

The man was then killed after being cornered into the house toilet. Television reports said that the man had identified himself as Noordin during the raid.

The National Police had yet to confirm whether the man killed was indeed Noordin and said that it would perform a DNA test on the man to confirm his identity.

Despite congratulatory notes from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to the officers involved in the operation, Bambang deemed the police anti-terror squad "unprofessional" during their raid.

"It took them half of a platoon just to apprehend one man, and they could not even take him alive."

"If the man was indeed Noordin, then he could become a key witness to unveiling JI's networks and activities had the police kept him alive."

Bambang said he hoped in the future the police would improve its standard operational procedure when handling terrorists' activities.

"I do not want to speculate on the police motives for killing Azahari in the past and possibly Noordin now.

"However, the police needs to improve their professionalism. If they continuously kill terrorists' key figures without getting any information, then terrorism will continue to haunt the people and make them restless."

Andi said that the police had done the right thing and that the mysterious dead man left them no choice.