Early and Brief History of 4th Royal Atillery Regiment

4^th Royal Artillery Regiment (RAR) was formed as field close support regiment on Jan 1980 in Paroi Camp, Negeri Sembilan. Before that, it was known as 5 RAR until  finally  officiated by Jan 1982. During its young establishment, 12 Independent Battery had been included in 4 RAR organisation which later renamed as  Bravo Battery 4 RAR.  The battery served as a nucleus in forming up the regiment while 11 Independent Battery from Terendak  Camp came to join later. Most of the unit members were newly recruited from training centre. By that time, only Alpha and Bravo Battery was assigned as  operational status.

Due to limited locality and  facilities ,  it was impossible to accommodate the full regiment in Paroi Camp. Later it become more constraint when State Authority claimed over some land within the camp to build local sport complex. Charlie and Delta battery were finally intact to unit in early 1981.

First Commanding Officer was Lieut Col Birinder Singh who took in charge until Julai 1981 before replaced by Lieut Col Pulendran. He lasted commanding the regiment until December 1982 when the country faced economic turndown. The regiment was dissolved, members of the unit were reallocated  and guns restored as war reserve.

In early 1984, Artillery Directorate has layout future plan to re-established  4 RAR under service arrangement scheme. The nucleus  was set up with proper appointment to initiate  administrations and logistics and relocated at  School of Artillery on  Jan 1985.  Among officers held the early  post during the time were Major Wee Tiong Kean (2IC) , Major Abdul Hamid bin Md Nor ( BCHQ) , Major Padil Othman (QM) and Kapt Zakaria bin Salleh (Ajutant).

Members of the regiment was gradually added up by stages and by April 1985 the regiment reached 80% of overall strenght. A  Baterry from 1 RAR, 2 RAR and 3 RAR were arranged to move to Paroi Camp to complete the regiment along with their own organic equipment and guns.

The Gun Batteries of 4 RAR originally derived from  1 RAR , 2 RAR and 3 RAR which formed Alpha, Bravo and Charlie Batteries  of 4 RAR that existed until today. Alpha Battery was under Major Ganeson Alwar from 1 RAR as Battery Commander came intact by  2 Jul 1985. While Bravo Battery was originally from Delta Battery 2 RAR commanded by Major Haniff bin Othman.  On middle 1985 , Charlie Battery was completely transferred  from D Battaery 3 RAR under Capt Mustafa bin Ali.

In Jun 1985  4 RAR took over Sikamat Camp from 18^th Royal Malay Regiment and welcomed  Lieut  Colonel  Hussein Kamal bin Hazizi  as new Commanding Officer. Finally the whole regiment was fully operationalised iby 1986.

Since 1986, the regiment has  been deployed under 3 Division and 11 Division Strategic  for operational tasks. In 1986 a Battery had involved  in OP Kota Golf at  Batu Melintang and  later OP Paksi Indera at Batu Melintang. The regiment had been  few times deployed for anti -communist operational task from 1987 to 1989.The Tactical HQ was located at Pengkalan Hulu Camp, while each batteries  were deployed in different location  in Klian Intan, Sri Toman dan Gubir camp respectively. Regiment successfully execute  the operations without any reported casualty.

Rewarding the excellent performance, 4 RAR was the first unit to carve history by the establishment of its Regimental Brass Band. The band was initially trained under 23^rd Royal Malay and later was put under supervision of 61 RAR in Paroi Camp untill Jul 1989. After 61 RAR  was transferred to Kluang Camp, the Band became under 21 RAR until 1998.  Starting for  April 1998, the band returned to its original unit 4 RAR  but became disbanded recently. In another auspicious occasion, the regiment  was conferred as 'Royal Regiment' on 6 Jun 1992 .  A detachment  was involved glorious parade which was held at Stadium Merdeka.

Malaysian Army  had reorganized  its formations and installed 11 Division  PSTD as strategic division which was officiated on Jan 1990. Therefore  4 RAR was omitted from 3 Division  and restored under command of 11 Strategic Division. The Division conceptually  has capability to be deployed as rapid reaction force within 48 Hours. Considering the  requirement, Artillery Corp was to establish rapid reaction force  (RRF)  and   Charlie Battery was first  to be parachuted and became pioneer in Artillery RRF.  The two officers awarded with parachute wings were Major Jaafar bin Majid and Capt Aminuddin bin Yaacob.

4 RAR went through a long  journey as highly credible field regiment with proud 105mm Oto Melara guns which still serviceable until today. It started  with ¾  Ton Volvo  and later replace by  Pinzgauer as gun tower while the regiment was fully mobile with 21 robust 3 ton  Mercedez Benz.

Proudly to claim, many years later in year 2007, I was signed-in to the regiment, as Battery Commander of Bravo Battery 4 RAR and served the unit  for 5 incredible years.