Strategic Leadership Strengthens Indonesia’s Adaptive Defense Capabilities Amid Increasingly Uncertain Multidimensional Global Threats

Lila Irawati Tjahjo Widuri (Defense Health, Indonesia Defense University, Jakarta)
Yahdiana Harahap (Defense Health, Indonesia Defense University, Jakarta)
Dian Andriani Ratna Dewi (Defense Health, Indonesia Defense University, Jakarta)
Sutanto Sutanto (Defense Health, Indonesia Defense University, Jakarta)
Faonaso Harefa

Publica: Jurnal Pemikiran Administrasi Negara
Vol. 18 No. 2 (2026): Publica

The convergence of multidimensional threats has increased the need for defense institutions to develop adaptive capabilities beyond static doctrines, force structures, and material modernization. This study aims to examine the contribution of strategic leadership to adaptive defense capability in Indonesia and to analyze how this relationship is influenced by organizational inertia and strategic culture. The study employs a qualitative approach through a hybrid narrative-integrative review involving semi-systematic searching, structured screening, thematic synthesis, theoretical triangulation, and mechanism-based conceptual integration. Rather than treating strategic cognition, organizational learning, and resource orchestration as entirely new constructs, this study integrates them into a sequential yet recursive defense-adaptation pathway. The findings indicate that strategic leadership functions as the antecedent construct, strategic cognition as the interpretive leadership mechanism, organizational learning as the institutionalization mechanism, resource orchestration as the implementation mechanism, and adaptive defense capability as the principal outcome. Organizational inertia and strategic culture operate as boundary conditions that may weaken or strengthen the translation of strategic interpretation into institutional and operational change. Defense adaptation therefore depends not only on resource possession but also on the capacity to interpret global environmental change, institutionalize learning, and align national resources with strategic priorities. The study concludes that strengthening Indonesia’s adaptive defense requires strategic leadership capable of integrating threat interpretation, institutional learning, and resource implementation. It recommends strengthening strategic leadership education, formal lessons-learned systems, interagency coordination, and continuous defense-adaptation evaluation supported by cross-domain threat analysis, scenario planning, interoperability, and measurable strategic resource prioritization across national defense institutions and relevant governmental agencies.