Sukarno became convinced that he was uniquely capable of divining and interpreting the wishes (including the unconscious wishes) of the Indonesian people, and of serving as their prophet. After the 1955 Bandung conference of Asian and African states, Sukarno extended his goals to the world stage and began to view it as his personal responsibility to have Indonesia play a leading role in Third World anti-colonial politics at a time when Indonesia’s own internal problems were so pressing (Plate 5.2). In 1963 he let himself be declared president-for-life.
Sukarno launched two campaigns to translate his anti-colonial stance into deeds, by trying to annex two territories on the verge of independence. The first campaign was directed at Dutch New Guinea, which because of its ethnic distinctness the Dutch had refused to cede to Indonesia after the revolution. The Dutch launched a crash program to prepare New Guineans for independence, and New Guinea leaders adopted a national flag and a national anthem. But Sukarno claimed Dutch New Guinea for Indonesia, increased diplomatic pressure on the Dutch, and in 1961 ordered all three branches of the Indonesian armed forces to take Dutch New Guinea by force.
The result was a political success for Sukarno, but a tragedy for many of the Indonesian troops involved, and for those Dutch New Guineans looking forward to independence. While one of the paintings displayed in my Indonesian hotel lobby in 1979 depicted what was described as an Indonesian “battleship” sailing against the Dutch, it was in fact just a small patrol boat sunk by a Dutch warship, causing the deaths of many Indonesian sailors. Indonesian paratroops were dropped by Indonesian air force planes into Dutch New Guinea, with results described to me by a friend who served then in the Dutch defense forces. Presumably out of fear of Dutch anti-aircraft capabilities during daylight hours, the paratroops were dropped blindly at night over forested terrain, in an incredible act of cruelty. The unfortunate paratroops floated down into a hot, mosquito-infested sago swamp, where those who survived impact on sago trees found themselves hanging from the trees by their parachutes. The even smaller fraction who managed to free themselves from their parachutes dropped or clambered down into standing swamp water. My friend and his Dutch unit surrounded the swamp, waited a week, and then paddled into the swamp with boats to retrieve the few paratroops still alive.
Despite those Dutch military successes, the U.S. government wanted to appear to support the Third World anti-colonial movement, and it was able to force the Dutch to cede Dutch New Guinea. As a face-saving gesture, the Dutch ceded it not directly to Indonesia but instead to the United Nations, which seven months later transferred administrative control (but not ownership) to Indonesia, subject to a future plebiscite. The Indonesian government then initiated a program of massive transmigration from other Indonesian provinces, in part to ensure a majority of Indonesian non–New Guineans in Indonesian New Guinea. Seven years later, a hand-picked assembly of New Guinean leaders voted under pressure for incorporation of Dutch New Guinea into Indonesia. New Guineans who had been on the verge of independence from the Netherlands launched a guerrilla campaign for independence from Indonesia that is continuing today, over half-a-century later.
Sukarno’s other campaign to translate his anti-colonial stance into deeds was directed at parts of Malaysia, a group of former British colonies. Malaysia consists of states on the Malay Peninsula of the Asian mainland that achieved independence in 1957, plus two ex–British colonies (Sabah and Sarawak) on the island of Borneo, which is shared with Indonesia and with Brunei. Sabah and Sarawak joined independent Malaysia in 1963. Whereas Sukarno claimed an Indonesian right of inheritance to Dutch New Guinea as a former part of the Dutch East Indies, he could make no such claim to Malaysian Borneo. Nevertheless, encouraged by his success in Dutch New Guinea, Sukarno began what he termed a “confrontation” with Malaysia in 1962, followed by military attacks on Malaysian Borneo in the next year. But the population of Malaysian Borneo showed no sign of wanting to join Indonesia, while British and Commonwealth troops provided effective military defense, and the Indonesian army itself lost its appetite for confrontation.
During the 1960’s a complex and confusing three-way power struggle unfolded among the strongest forces in Indonesia. One force was Sukarno, the charismatic leader and skilled politician who enjoyed widespread support among Indonesians as the father of their country’s independence, and as the first and (until then) only president. The second force was the armed forces, which monopolized military power. The third force was the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI = Partai Komunis Indonesia), which lacked military power but had become by far the strongest and best-organized political party.
But each of these three forces was divided and pulled in different directions. While Sukarno’s “guided democracy” rested on an alliance between himself and the armed forces, Sukarno also aligned himself increasingly with the PKI as a counter-weight against the armed forces. Chinese Indonesians had become so alarmed by anti-Chinese sentiment in Indonesia that many had returned to China. Yet Indonesia simultaneously increased its diplomatic alliance with China and announced that it would soon imitate China by building its own atomic bomb—to the horror of the U.S. and Britain. The armed forces became divided among Sukarno’s supporters, PKI supporters, and officers who wanted the armed forces to destroy the PKI. Army officers infiltrated the PKI, which in turn infiltrated the army. To remedy its military weakness, in 1965 the PKI with Sukarno’s support proposed arming peasants and workers, ostensibly to serve as a fifth national armed forces branch along with the army, navy, air force, and police. In frightened response, anti-communist army officers reportedly set up a Council of Generals to prepare measures against the perceived growing communist threat.
This three-way struggle came to a climax around 3:15 A.M. during the night of September 30–October 1, 1965, when two army units with leftist commanders and 2,000 troops revolted and sent squads to capture seven leading generals (including the army’s commander and the minister of defense) in their homes, evidently to bring them alive to President Sukarno and to persuade him to repress the Council of Generals. At 7:15 A.M. on October 1 the coup leaders, having also seized the telecom building on one side of the central square in the Indonesian capital city of Jakarta, broadcast an announcement on Indonesia radio declaring themselves to be the 30 September Movement, and stating that their aim was to protect President Sukarno by pre-empting a coup plotted by corrupt generals who were said to be tools of the CIA and the British. By 2:00 P.M. the leaders made three more radio broadcasts, after which they fell silent. Note: despite the account of a communist coup described vividly in the lobby display of my 1979 Indonesian hotel, the revolt was by Indonesian army units, not by a communist mob.
But the coup was badly bungled. The seven squads assigned to kidnap the generals were untrained, jittery, and assembled at the last minute. They hadn’t rehearsed the kidnappings. The two most important squads, assigned to kidnap (not to kill) Indonesia’s two highest-ranking generals, were led by inexperienced low-ranking officers. The squads ended up killing three of the generals in their houses, two by shooting and one by bayonet. A fourth general succeeded in escaping over the back wall of his house compound. The squad accidentally shot his five-year-old daughter as depicted in one of the paintings in my Indonesian hotel, and also killed his staff lieutenant, whom they mistook for the general himself. (For brevity, I’ll still refer to “seven generals.”) The squads succeeded in capturing alive only the remaining three of the generals, whom they nevertheless proceeded to murder instead of carrying out their instructions to bring the generals alive to Sukarno.
Despite the fact that the coup leaders included a commander of President Sukarno’s bodyguard, whose job it was to know where Sukarno was at all times, the leaders could not find Sukarno, who happened to be spending the night at the home of one of his four wives. A crucial error was that the coup leaders made no attempt to capture the headquarters of the Indonesian Army Strategic Reserve (called Kostrad), located on one side of the central square, although c
oup troops did capture the other three sides of the square. The coup leaders had neither tanks nor walkie-talkies. Because they closed down the Jakarta telephone system at the time that they occupied the telecom building, coup leaders trying to communicate with one another between different parts of Jakarta were reduced to sending messengers through the streets. Incredibly, the coup leaders failed to provide food and water for their troops stationed on the central square, with the result that a battalion of hungry and thirsty soldiers wandered off. Another battalion went to Jakarta’s Halim air force base, where they found the gates closed and spent the night loitering on the streets outside. The PKI leader who apparently was one of the coup organizers failed to alert and coordinate actions with the rest of the PKI, hence there was no mass communist uprising.
The commander of the Army Strategic Reserve was, after Sukarno, Indonesia’s second political leader with unusual qualities that influenced the course of history. He resembled Sukarno in having the confusingly similar name of Suharto, and in being Javanese and politically skilled (Plate 5.3). Suharto differed from Sukarno in being 20 years younger (1921–2008), not having played a significant role in the struggle against the Dutch colonial government, and being little known outside Indonesian army circles until the morning of October 1, 1965. When Suharto learned of the uprising early on that morning, he adopted a series of counter-measures while playing for time and trying to figure out a fast-moving and confusing series of developments. He summoned the commanders of the two army battalions on the central square to come meet him inside Kostrad headquarters, where he told them that they were in revolt and commanded them to take orders from him; they dutifully obeyed. The coup leaders, plus Sukarno, to whom the fast-moving situation may have been as confusing as it was to Suharto, now gathered at Halim air force base, because the air force was the branch of the Indonesian Armed Forces most sympathetic to the communists. Suharto responded by sending reliable troops to capture first the telecom building, then Halim air force base, which the troops succeeded in doing with minimal fighting. At 9:00 P.M. on that evening of October 1, Suharto announced in a broadcast over the radio that he now controlled the Indonesian army, would crush the 30 September Movement, and would protect President Sukarno. The coup leaders fled from Halim base and from Jakarta, proceeded separately by train and plane to other cities in Central Java, and organized other uprisings in which other generals were killed. But those uprisings were suppressed by loyalist army troops within a day or two, just as had been the uprising in Jakarta.
To this day, many questions about the failed coup remain unanswered. What seems clear is that the coup was a joint effort by two sets of leaders: some junior military officers with communist sympathies, and one or more PKI leaders. But why did professional military officers stage such an amateurishly bungled coup, with such lack of military planning? Why didn’t they hold a press conference to enlist public support? Was the involvement of the PKI in the coup confined to just a few of its leaders? Was Communist China involved in planning and supporting the coup? Why didn’t the coup leaders include Suharto on their list of generals to be kidnapped? Why didn’t the coup forces capture the Kostrad headquarters on one side of the central square? Did President Sukarno know of the coup in advance? Did General Suharto know of the coup in advance? Did anti-communist generals know of the coup in advance but nevertheless allow it to unfold, in order to provide them with a pretext for previously laid plans to suppress the PKI?
The last possibility is strongly suggested by the speed of the military’s reaction. Within three days, military commanders began a propaganda campaign to justify round-ups and killings of Indonesian communists and their sympathizers on a vast scale (Plate 5.4). The coup itself initially killed only 12 people in Jakarta on October 1, plus a few other people in other cities of Java on October 2. But those few killings gave Suharto and the Indonesian military a pretext for mass murder. That response to the coup was so quick, efficient, and massive that it could hardly have been improvised spontaneously within a few days in response to unexpected developments. Instead, it must have involved previous planning that awaited only an excuse, which the bungled coup attempt of October 1 and 2 provided.
The military’s motives for that mass murder arose from Indonesia’s breakdown of political compromise and democratic government in the 1950’s and early 1960’s, culminating in the three-way power struggle in 1965 among the PKI, the armed forces, and President Sukarno. It appeared that the armed forces were starting to lose that struggle. As Indonesia’s largest and best-organized political party, the PKI threatened the army’s political power and the money that the army extracted from state-owned businesses, smuggling, and corruption. The PKI’s proposal to arm workers and peasants as a separate armed force threatened the army’s monopoly of military power. As subsequent events would show, President Sukarno alone could not resist the army. But Sukarno was looking to the PKI as a potential ally to serve as a counter-weight to the army. In addition, the military itself was divided and included communist sympathizers, who were the organizers of the coup (along with one or more PKI leaders). Hence the coup gave anti-communist army officers an opportunity to purge their political opponents within the army itself. Not surprisingly, army commanders alarmed by the PKI’s rising power prepared their own contingency plan, for which the coup offered a trigger. It remains unknown whether Suharto himself was already involved in drawing up that contingency plan, or whether (like Chile’s General Pinochet) he became at the last minute the leader of a military take-over prepared by others.
On October 4 Suharto arrived at an area called Lubang Buaya (“Crocodile Hole” in the Indonesian language), where the coup squads had thrown the bodies of the kidnapped generals down a well. In front of photographers and television cameras, the decomposing bodies were pulled out of the well. On the next day, October 5, the generals’ coffins were driven through Jakarta’s streets, lined by thousands of people. The military’s anti-communist leadership quickly blamed the PKI for the murders, even though the murders had actually been carried out by units of the military itself. A propaganda campaign that could only have been planned in advance was immediately launched to create a hysterical atmosphere, warning non-communist Indonesians that they were in mortal danger from the communists, who were said to be making lists of people to kill, and to be practicing techniques for gouging out eyes. Members of the PKI’s women’s auxiliary were claimed to have carried out sadistic sexual torture and mutilation of the kidnapped generals. President Sukarno tried to minimize the significance of the October 1 coup attempt and objected to the scale of the military’s counter-measures, but the military had now wrested control of the situation from Sukarno. From October 5 onwards, the military began a round-up aimed at eliminating every member of the PKI and of every PKI-affiliated organization, and all of the families of those members.
The PKI reaction was not what one would expect of an organization that had been planning a coup. Throughout October and November, when PKI members were summoned to come to army bases and police stations, many came willingly, because they expected just to be questioned and released. The PKI could have supported the coup and thwarted military counter-measures by mobilizing railroad workers to sabotage trains, mechanics to sabotage army vehicles, and peasants to block roads; but it did none of those things.
Because the Indonesian killings were not carried out with the meticulous organization and documentation of the Nazi killings in World War Two concentration camps, there is much uncertainty about the number of Indonesian victims. The highest estimates are about 2 million; the most widely cited figure is the contemporary estimate of half-a-million arrived at by a member of President Sukarno’s own fact-finding commission. Indonesian killing technology was much simpler than that of the Nazis: victims were killed one by one, with machetes and other hand weapons and by strangling, rather than by killing hundreds of people at once in a gas chamber. Indonesian disposal of bodies was also haphazard, rather than carried out by utilizing
specially built large ovens. Nevertheless, what happened in Indonesia in 1965 and 1966 still ranks as one of the world’s biggest episodes of mass murder since World War Two.
A common misconception is that the killings were only or mainly of Chinese Indonesians. No, most of the victims were non-Chinese Indonesians; the targets were Indonesian suspected communists and their affiliates, not specifically Chinese. Another misconception is that the killings were a spontaneous explosion by a population of irrational, emotionally unstable, and immature people prone to “run amok,” a Malay expression that refers to individuals who go crazy and become murderers. No, I’m unaware of any evidence that Indonesians are intrinsically unstable and murderous. Instead, the Indonesian military planned and orchestrated the killings in order to protect its own interests, and the military’s propaganda campaign convinced many Indonesian civilians to carry out the killings in order to protect in turn their own interests. The military’s killing campaign was evil but not irrational: it aimed to destroy the military’s strongest opponents, and it succeeded in that aim.
The situation as of the end of October 1965 was thus that Suharto commanded the loyalty of some but not all military leaders. Sukarno was still president-for-life, was still revered by much of the public as Indonesia’s founding father, was still popular among military officers and soldiers, and was politically skilled. Suharto couldn’t just push Sukarno aside, any more than some ambitious American general could have pushed George Washington aside half-way through our beloved founding father’s second term as president.
Suharto had previously been considered just as an efficient general, and nothing more. But he now proceeded to display political skills exceeding even Sukarno’s. He gradually won the support of other military leaders, replaced military and civil service officers sympathetic to the PKI with officers loyal to him, and over the next two-and-a-half years proceeded slowly and cautiously to displace Sukarno while pretending to act on Sukarno’s behalf. In March 1966 Sukarno was pressured into signing a letter ceding authority to Suharto; in March 1967 Suharto became acting president, and in March 1968 he replaced Sukarno as president. He remained in power for another 30 years.
Upheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis Page 19
