SHAH ALAM: IT appears half of the 18 Self Propelled Howitzer (SPH) – once they are procured and delivered to the Army – will be based at Camp Paradise in Kota Belud, Sabah. The SPH will be operated by the 22 Rejimen Artileri DiRaja (22 RAD) – a unit which has yet to be stood up.
This was revealed by Defence Minister DSU Mohamad Hasan in Dewan Negara on December 11, which turned out to be his last in Parliament for the ministry. (This was supposed to be posted yesterday but other things were more important.)
“Your excellency, the (22) Rejimen is mechanised. The procurement of the SPH, which will be truck mounted – half of it will be deployed to Sabah to boost the capability of the Army,” he said without revealing the development of the SPH procurement itself.
This means 22 RAD will have two batteries of four SPH each with one gun with the headquarters unit. The unit will also have around 25 to 30 support vehicles as the plan was to get also around 50 to 60 of them with the SPH procurement.
Apart from 22 RAD, according to Mohamad, the Paradise Camp will also accommodate the 5 Briged headquarters and 19th Mechanised Royal Malay Regiment. The redevelopment of the Paradise camp will see the construction of new facilities to accommodate the 5 Briged, 19th RMR and 22 RAD. The project costing RM584 million will also include the building of 632 family quarters.
He said construction work for the 5 Briged and 19 RMR camps will start in early 2024 and expected to be completed by 2027. As for 22 RAD camp its funding has been approved and the tender is expected to be called in September 2024. The 22 RAD camp is expected to be completed in 36 months.
19 RMR, according to Mohamad will be relocated from its current camp at Sungai Petani, Kedah. Mohamad also told Dewan Negara that 5 Briged will relocate to Paradise Camp from the Lok Kawi Camp in Kota Kinabalu, though this is incorrect as the unit had moved to Kota Belud, several years ago. Only the brigade headquarters moved there though as its subordinate units remained at Lok Kawi Camp.
Malaysian Defence understands the plan to move 19 RMR to Paradise Camp has been in the works since 2013/2014 but it was never completed as the work to construct new facilities at Kota Belud had not been funded. 19 RMR has a squadron of its Gempita APC stationed at the 22 RMR camp in Sandakan.
Two units are currently operating at the Paradise Camp, 5 Briged and 5 Kor Armor Di Raja. 5 Briged was previously located at Lok Kawi Camp in Kota Kinabalu but moved to Kota Belud when 5 Divisyen was stood up. 5 Briged was part of 1 Divisyen previously.
It is unclear where 5 KAD will go once 19 RMR moved to Paradise camp, but it is likely to Lahad Datu where a new camp is also being built as told by Mohamad in Dewan Negara.
He said the new camp located in the vicinity of Felda Sahabat in Lahad Datu, was the most important project for the ministry in Sabah. The tender process for the RM547 million project has been completed and the contractor has entered the site.
The new camp will house the headquarters of 13 Briged and its subordinate units. 13 Briged is currently located at Kem Cenderawasih, at Felda Cenderawasih near Felda Sahabat in Lahad Datu.
13 Briged was formed as part of the expansion of Army units in Sabah following the Lahad Datu incident culminated in the standing up of the 5 Div in September 2019. The third brigade of 5 Div – 32 Briged – which is supposed to be formed at Kalabakan, Tawau, has yet to be stood up. Other units announced to be set up previously -27 RMR and 11 RRD – has not been stood up.
Both 13 and 32 brigades are also supposed to have their own artillery regiments each, but they have also not been stood up. It is likely that their funding has not been approved by the treasury. With two new camps in Sabah costing more than RM1 billion it is understandable. The Army stood up two RAD units – ad hoc – 8th RAD (Kuching) and 23 RAD (Taiping) in 2021 and this year, respectively.
— Malaysian Defence
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View Comments (59)
SPH...good news indeed.
19 RAMD to move permanently to Sabah? That is news to me. Then 4 Briged Mekanize will transform into a fully tracked armored brigade? Previously the plan is to transform 1 Briged Infantri (Negeri Sembilan) into armored brigade.
32 briged should be a rejimen sempadan brigade, so i don't think there will be a RAD howitzer regiment attached to it.
As for 22 RAD deployment to Sabah. It has been a normal procedure in the past for a battery of semenanjung-based artillery regiment to have a somewhat permanent detachment to sabah or sarawak. Usually an artillery regiment will consist of 3 batteries, with 1 deployed to sabah/sarawak. For a regiment with 18 guns, it is usually divided into 3 batteries of 6 guns each. Personnel from all 3 batteries will regularly rotate to the deployment.
I am guessing that 8 RAD and 23 RAD will receive 2 batteries of Denel G5 each
@ hasnan
8 RAD is a close support regiment (Regimen Bantuan Rapat). This is usually equipped with 105mm howitzers.
Recently tentera darat did a survey and maintenance of all the L5 Pack Howitzers in its inventory. The number of serviceable L5 is 127 guns.
20 series regiments (designated as Rejimen Bantuan Am) are the one equipped with 155mm howitzers. Currently 23 RAD has 1 battery of Denel G5. The rest of the G5 is with 21 RAD and PUSARTI.
In this picture:
https://www.malaysiandefence.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/47A.jpg
The location is on the grass runway of the old Sungai Petani airstrip (length of about 500m, now inside Kem Lapangan Terbang), although no longer actively used by fixed wing aircrafts (and no longer included in CAAM airfield database), the runway markers are still maintained up to this day.
Actually there is only 42 AV8 Gempita in the picture. Another 3 is the new Volvo Recovery truck with armored cab and dozer blade, all the way back of the picture.
Interestingly at the both end of the first row of vehicle, is the LCT30 Ingwe ATGM variant.
There were other Gempita in the field but not placed with the others. One is the command version fitted to carry the VIP, in this case the CO.
Hopefully we can see another SPH regiment to be raised such that there's 1 full strength SPH regiment in Peninsula and another in S&S
The fact that RAD is reforming 22 RAD for SPH (the original 22 RAD was transformed into 52 RAD with ASTROS MLRS in 2009) and creating the new 23 RAD for G5 howitzers means that both the towed G5 howitzers and the new SPH will be operated concurrently for considerable time into the future.
I am hoping that the government could contact Qatar and buy off their recently retired G5 howitzers (12 units in total). That would exactly fit into 23 RAD to have 3 batteries of G5 howitzers, same as 21 RAD.
But just thinking of getting SPH and additional towed 155mm howitzer is not the end of it.
RAD needs :
1) embedded RAD ISTAR UAV capability. long endurance and able to be launched and recovered from small spaces. It would be fine if it is attached to each Division Artillery HQ
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F6DJ6M1a0AAPqDE.jpg
2) Precision artillery strike. To do this with low cost, we need precision artillery fuse similar to US M1156 Precision Guidance Kit (PGK). A few companies in Turkiye already manufactures these. We can also try those from China, just to test them out.
3) App-based artillery request system. Functions just like Grab or Foodpanda app to buy food. But this is to request fire on target. Has been used with success in Ukraine. Can run on tablets or even mobile phones.
https://themoloch.com/conflict/uber-for-artillery-what-is-ukraines-gis-arta-system/
Marhalim, is the Yavuz still the favourite?
Caesar is ranked number one based on the test and evaluation.
Just putting the numbers out here
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F-YUi0jbEAAWaST.jpg
For complex systems, we need to make sure the opex is adequate annually. Not having enough opex will mean low operational readiness. Just look at the appalling readiness percentage of the complex artillery systems. An advantage of simple systems like towed howitzers is that it does not need a lot of opex to be operationally ready.
Go for caesar 6x6 mark 2 (NG), but if the allocation for sph remain the same and capped at 900 million well then..can only get mk1 caesar
They stopped making Mk1 Caesar for the Mk2. The budget is enough IMO.