Dakota RI-002 is one of the aircraft that strengthened the Republic of Indonesia Air Force (AURI) at the beginning of Indonesian independence . The C-47 Skytrain or Dakota (the nickname of the RAF ) medium transport aircraft made by the US manufacturer Douglas Aircraft was rented from a veteran United States Navy pilot , namely Robert "Bob" Earl Freeberg. Freeberg was a former United States Navy fighter pilot during World War II .
After the war ended, this man from Kansas became a CALI (Commercial Air Lines Incorporated) charter pilot in the Philippines. One day, through an Englishman named Savage, Freeberg met an Air Force officer, Air Officer III Petit Muharto Kartodirdjo, who was in Singapore looking for planes for the Air Force in the context of Indonesia's struggle for independence. Without much thought, Freeberg immediately expressed his willingness to help AURI. Freeberg then purchased a used ' war-surplus ' aircraft from the United States Clark Air Base in the Philippines . Freeberg flew a plane from Maguwo Air Base, Yogyakarta in 1947 with its first destination to Singapore, via Bukittinggi . From Singapore he returned to Manila, Philippines, to pick up his plane, the Douglas C-47 Skytrain or RI-002, which the Indonesian government had agreed to rent. The plane was taken secretly. At first Bob's friends didn't agree, so the plane was hidden. Bob was confused, tried to search, until finally he managed to find the hidden plane. He then took two Filipino flight-engineers to fly to Indonesia at night under the pretext of holding a test flight . Turns out it was a ruse. So, that same night, Bob took the R1-002 plane plus two engineers to the Maguwo Airplane Base, Yogyakarta .
Then in early morning, 1 October 1948, RI-002 took off from Maguwo Air Base with the destination Bukittinggi. The route taken is; Maguwo-Gorda-Tanjung Karang-Bukittinggi. According to the plan, the plane will continue overseas to buy a new plane to transport 20 kg of pure gold. As written in the book History of Indonesian Aviation Operations for the period 1945-1950 published by the Indonesian Air Force History Service, RI-002 was flown by pilot Robert Earl Freeberg alias Bob. Meanwhile, the co-pilot was Air Officer Bambang Saptoadji, engineer Junior Air Officer I Sumadi, and radio operator Air Sergeant Suryatman. During the flight, RI-002 connected several times with the air radio station or PCI call sign in Sagan, Yogyakarta. This radio channel is known as Aerodio, which is a radio connection between the aircraft and the radio station on the ground. At that time the radio was guarded by Air Sergeant Major Sumarno.
Communication between RI-002 and the radio station was reported to be running smoothly as far as Tanjung Karang. But in reality, the radio connection between the plane and radio stations in both Java and Sumatra did not work well. According to procedures, communication should be carried out periodically within one hour after takeoff. But that didn't happen.
Sergeant Major Sumarno several times ordered RI-002 to stand by at any time, but there was no answer. So since then the chartered transport plane has been considered missing along with its passengers. During its flight, RI-002 was never ambushed by a Dutch plane, although on one of its flights to Sumatra it got lost due to bad weather.
Newspapers in the Netherlands were busy reporting that the plane had disappeared because it was ambushed by Dutch planes. However, the colonial government never confirmed or denied this. Thus, the AURI stated that RI-002 was declared missing, and the cause was unknown. However, after 30 years of disappearance, it was only on April 14 1978 that the wreckage of the plane and its remains were found by a resident who was looking for firewood in the mountains of South Sumatra. RI-002 is thought to have crashed on Pungur Hill, Kasui District, Lampung Regency, crashing into a hill due to bad weather. This was proven by the discovery of pieces of former airplane wings which had been reassembled with the words RI-002. The remains were unrecognizable. Finally, they were symbolically buried at the Tanjung Karang Heroes' Cemetery to commemorate Indonesian Air Force Service Day on July 29 1978.

Control :
AG2 & 3 = cargo doors.
VTOL = flaps

Images :

It appears that the Dakota in the picture below is an AC-47 (We can tell from a feature under the rear window). It is possible that this AC-47 was used in an Indonesian war film in the 1980s

Variant :
AC-47 RI-002 Livery (Reenactment)
C-47 RI-002 (Mobile Friendly)