As most of you probably know, the country that is now Indonesia used to be the Netherlands East Indies. After WWII, the people living there wanted autonomy while the Dutch wanted things to return to the way they were before WWII. It was the same deal with the French and Indochina. However, the insurgency against the Dutch did not last as long, and under intense pressure of the United Nations, the war of about a year or so was ended in 1949 with autonomy passed on to the new nation. Part of the agreement was to transfer many of the aircraft used by the NEIAF over to the new Indonesian government. Some of these aircraft soldiered on for many years.

This particular sheet concentrates on the ex-Dutch planes used by the new AURI, the Indonesian Air Force. Thanks to the way the instructions are done, it is not possible to show all the aircraft and schemes provided by the sheet, but there are quite a few with some of them shown on the cover.

There are three B-25s on the sheet, all of them without upper turrets and two of them completely unarmed with the tail gun position capped off. These two are both in OD or Dark Green over Light Grey or faded Neutral Grey. The third option is an all metal gun nosed aircraft that, aside from no top turret, is fully armed.

Next are four P-51D options. Three are unpainted metal and all options have a red spinner. The first has a big unit badge on the fuselage and the initial red/white rectangular insignia. The next has the new pentagon insignia and a red rudder with a third bare metal plane having a large shark mouth, large unit bads and black checkered rudder. The OD/Dark Green over Light Grey plane has a large red nose with shark mouth.

The B-26 is from 1958-1977 and is the last fully armed Invader with a military service. As you can see, it has a large shark motif that will need some careful decal applications and a bit of painting.

The C-47 is in unpainted metal  and operated in 1958-59.

Not shown on the cover are two liaison aircraft in the early insignia. One is a Piper L-4 Cub in overall OD with Neutral Grey wings and tailplane undersides. The other is an Auster AOP IV in silver dope.

A final addition that is just a serial is a White PBY-5A with black lower floats/hull. This plane was flown by the CIA on clandestine missions in Indonesia during the 1948 war of independence.

In all it is an excellent sheet that is superbly printed. The instruction sheet is large and quite detailed with not only a markings guide, but with several photos of these planes and a couple of others.  This one is sure to sell out rather quickly so get yours as soon as you can.

Thanks to www.dutchdecal.nl  for the review sheet. You can get yours at your favorite shop. This is Dutch Decal's 25th Anniversary so congratulations to Luuk and his gang for providing interesting markings for the last quarter century.

April 2012

If you would like your product reviewed fairly and fairly quickly, please contact the editor or see other details in the Note to Contributors.

Back to the Decal Review Index