Roesmin Nurjadin

Roesmin Nurjadin trained as a pilot in the early 1950s and began flying with Indonesia's Third Fighter Squadron in 1952. His further training included the Air Command and Staff College and courses in Britain, and he became a flying instructor and senior operations officer. He also served as air attaché in Moscow before taking command of the air force in 1966. ^{1, 2}

His command coincided with Suharto's consolidation of power after the 1965 crisis. The force lost much of its access to equipment from the Soviet bloc and underwent purges of personnel suspected of involvement in, or sympathy with, the September 1965 movement. Nurjadin remained its chief until November 1969, then served as ambassador to Britain from 1970 to 1974 and to the United States from 1974 to 1977. ²

In Washington he defended the government's treatment of political detainees against international criticism. A letter he sent Representative Donald Fraser on 17 October 1977, preserved with a congressional human rights hearing, argued that the detention question was an internal Indonesian matter and accused Amnesty International of distorting the record. He pointed instead to cooperation with the International Red Cross and a recent congressional visit, including to East Timor. ³

Nurjadin returned home as transport minister in 1978 and remained in the cabinet through 1988. His responsibilities ranged from communications and postal services to river and road transport; contemporary profiles discussed the ministry's shortage of auxiliary post offices and slow postal money transfers. He died on 8 September 1994, and the air base at Pekanbaru was subsequently named for him. ²