This week the navy was in town. And the army and the air force and all kinds of military folk. They all swooped in for BRIDEX 2011, the bi-annual defense exhibition organized by Royal Brunei Technical Services that was officially opened last Wednesday. It marked the beginning of an exhibition filled with machine guns, fighter planes, all manner of vehicles amphibious and deadly. If you lived between Jerudong and Rimba, you would have heard the rumbling of the fighter planes or seen them in the sky. From a distance looking like a harmless flock of birds, and not a billion dollars worth of shiny aluminum that you would not wish to see deployed in anger.
The show started with a spectacular aerial display. The BRIDEX compound faces the South China Sea and provides a sky blue background for F16s looping twirling and performing low passes.
In the exhibition halls, gentlemen in dark suits and the odd Miss Tourism, or four, showed off their wares.
We saw bullets and bombs. Artillery rockets the length of a people carrier. Army fatigues and all manner of stealth. Turkey had a massive booth. The man behind the Turkish pistol counter took out a picture of a gold plated Colt, diamond encrusted and going for USD25, 000.
Singapore Technologies showcased a high tech armored personnel carrier in tents outside the hall. It was amphibious no less, with a remotely controlled gun on the roof. Inside, a deploy and forget robotic turret gun and videos of an unmanned marine patrol vessel.
A Malaysian manufacturer showed off a wide range of ammunition and M4 rifles, licensed by the American inventors. They also exhibited a range of add-ons with infrared sights and grenade launcher attachments.
I was quite partial to The Scout, a tiny unmanned aerial vehicle with a remote control touch screen console that looked like a hardened iPad. It was lightweight and reminded me of an aluminum-flying spider. Going for around USD100K, it looked like something a workshop class could make with a little effort - oh the price of innovation.
I confess that my knowledge of matters military is however limited to playing the console game, Call of Duty, Modern Warfare. But, for me, a blooded veteran of the Middle East, the Balkans and the favelas of South America, find me a middle-aged woman who's beaten all ten juggernauts on the last oilrig in special ops mode and I will call her sister.
But enough armchair commando. Should we consider the utility of it all?
It was a pleasant defense exhibition; in chilly air-conditioned halls the armored vehicles sit quietly pondering their existence. Many exhibitors appeared to come with the Brunei market in mind, bringing to my mind, a targeted level of technology and price. It was however still like any good bazaar or market. People come to browse, see what’s available; to see what other people are interested in and suppliers come to see what armed forces will be looking for and what the competition has to offer.
It’s good that we can organize ourselves and bring high tech defense manufacturers into the country. By opening up and allowing people to come in and show their innovation and technology it does expose us all to new ideas, to new ways of doing things, it shows us what can be done with technology and, surprisingly, a limited budget.
It also brought a fair amount of people into the country and filled up our hotel rooms. I'm sure Gadong bustled a bit more with the presence of foreign military personnel dressed in uniform. Local contractors and business surely gained from the influx of delegates.
It’s also about a tiny country being able to put on an international show with excellence, where the tangled logistics of dealing with multiple visiting air forces, navies and armed forces was handled with aplomb. It is something that we always do well, and something that we can be proud of.
@emmagoodegg
Illustration by Cuboi Art.
For the edited online version click here.
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