National Vigilance Is the Nation’s Immunity

The Head of the State Intelligence Agency (BIN) for 2023–2024, Lieut. Gen. (Ret.) I Nyoman Cantiasa, emphasized the importance of strengthening national vigilance amid complex, rapidly changing, and uncertain global conflicts. He delivered this message during a lecture to participants of the Consolidation Program for National-level Leaders (P3N) Batch XXVII at Lemhannas RI, held in the Bhinneka Tunggal Ika Room, Pancagatra Building, on Friday (2/27).

According to I Nyoman Cantiasa, national vigilance requires a high level of preparedness and readiness for Indonesia to be able to detect, anticipate early, and prevent various forms and characteristics of potential threats.

In the context of global conflict, national vigilance acts as the nation’s immunity by maintaining domestic social cohesion amid the spillover of various global threats.

Geopolitical dynamics have shifted from an era of stability to a phase of high volatility, which has certainly impacted Indonesia. From a geopolitical and security perspective, the ongoing Iran–US/Israel conflict has had repercussions for Indonesia. One of the impacts on economic stability is the disruption faced by national investors with business interests in the Middle East and Europe, particularly due to disturbances in international shipping, supply chain disruptions, and rising oil prices caused by the forced rerouting of commercial vessels around the Cape of Good Hope (South Africa), adding approximately 14 days to shipping time. This, Nyoman added, will inevitably increase shipping costs.

“Global and national threats will put pressure on the nation’s condition; therefore, a sense of vigilance must be instilled in Lemhannas’ education participants through a Sense of Crisis, Sense of Urgency, Leverage Intelligence, strengthened diplomacy, information filtering, and inter-agency synergy,” said the former Commander of the XVIII/Kasuari Military Regional Command. He also noted that the government has prepared various national programs to reduce these potential threats.

Furthermore, Nyoman stated that in facing an increasingly transactional and unpredictable world, Indonesia can no longer rely solely on the traditional rhetoric of “Non-Aligned and Free and Active” foreign policy. Instead, Indonesia must adopt an active neutrality stance as a balancing power with strong bargaining power, grounded in its strategic geographic position and abundant natural resources, while also being capable of mitigating the impacts of global geopolitical volatility.

In front of 85 participants of the P3N Batch XXVII Lemhannas RI, Nyoman cited Sri Lanka as an example of a country that experienced economic collapse and political instability exploited by foreign interests due to a leader’s failure to effectively integrate instruments of vigilance. “What is the lesson for Indonesia?” he asked.

“National vigilance is a strategic instrument that functions as an early warning system to prevent external pressures from developing into internal conflicts,” he concluded.

At the end of his lecture, the former Commander of the Army’s Special Forces (Kopassus) introduced the concept of organizing the state through LeverageDIME (Diplomacy, Intelligence, Military, and Economy) to restore the nation to its original objectives for a more prepared and sovereign Indonesia.