Dading Kalbuadi was an Indonesian Army Officer and the commander of Operation "Seroja" during the illegal Indonesian invasion of East Timor. He last served as an Inspector General of the Departement Of Defense of Indonesia. He collected over 25 medals and a number of honors from abroad, including from France, United States, Vietnam, Singapore, and Malaysia.
Early life
Dading Kalbuadi was born in Adipala, April 14, 1931. As a teenager, he joined the IMAM which has most of its operation in Banyumas. He was jointed with Chalmi Imam Santoso who also joins the Indonesian Special Forces together with him. CI Santoso was first recognized after helping Colonel Edhi Wibowo during the crushing raid of PKI in Java.
Military career
The person that is most responsible in determining Dading's Career is General Benny Moerdani. They have been close friends since P3AD in the early 1950s. They have been with one another since they were students in the P3AD, and eventually became respected officers together in the TNI headquarters. When Benny became the Armed Forces Commander, Dading became the second person after him as a Chief of General Staff . When Benny became the Minister of Defense, he again invited Dading, placing him as an Inspector General of the Department of Defense. They were really close; when people read Benny's biography, it sometimes seems as though that one is reading the journey of Dading Kalbuadi's life, because he often mentions his name. After Indonesia's independence war ended, Dading was accepted as a student in the P3AD. In this Institute, not only did he meet Benny Moerdani but also he met other respected Indonesian armed force Officers like Soweno, Sutaryo, Sebastianus Soekoso, and Gunawan Wibisono. They are known as "Benny's Man". Despite being deployed in various combat operations, for Dading there are no other memorable operation than the operation in East Timor. One of the reason why it is memorable because, he at that time had obtained the rank of general and was therefore appointed as the Commander of the Regional Defense and Security of East Timor, replacing Soewano who happened to be his close friend. Dading is the type of commander who enjoys every second of battlefield, he also once quoted from General Douglas MacArthur that "Man will not fight and die unless they know what they fight and die for". Evidence indicates that major-general Dading Kalbuadi gave orders to his field commanders to assassinate the five journalists of an Australian TV team in Balibo during Operation Flamboyan, a series of murderous, secret Indonesian military intrusions across the Indonesian-East Timorese border in 1975. Major-general Dading Kalbuadi's brutality during Operation Seroja, as the illegal invation of East Timor by Indonesian troops in December 1975 was named, was notorious. During his career in the military, he had served as the 16th Bali Udayana Military Commander, Chief of Armed Forces Procurement, Assistant Headquarter of the Armed Forces Logistics, Aslog Kasum ABRI, ABRI Kasum and last served as an Inspector General in the Departement of Defense.
