Less than three months after his appointment as head of Kostrad, on the first day of the May 1998 riots, Prabowo urged the commander of the Indonesian National Armed Forces, Wiranto, to let him bring his Strategic Reserve units from outside Jakarta into the city to help restore order. Hundreds of men trained by Kopassus (Prabowo's former command) were flown from Dili to Yogyakarta in chartered planes, and then on to Jakarta by train. Prabowo publicly urged Indonesians to join him to fight "traitors to the nation". On the morning of 14 May, Kopassus troops escorted young thugs from Lampung in southern Sumatra into the capital. Thus Prabowo was accused of using his contacts in his former command to import and create trouble, while Wiranto had declined to give Prabowo's current command, Kostrad, permission to quell the existing trouble, in line with classic Javanese tactic to stir chaos to discredit a rival and/or seize power.