Military split

These same policies, however, won Sukarno few friends and many enemies in the Western world. These especially included the United States and the United Kingdom, whose investors were increasingly angered by Sukarno's nationalisation of mineral, agricultural, and energy assets. In need of Indonesian allies in the Cold War against the Soviet Union, the United States cultivated a number of ties with officers of the military through exchanges and arms deals. This fostered a split in the military's ranks, with the United States and others backing a right-wing faction against a left-wing faction overlapping with the PKI.

When Sukarno rejected food aid from USAID, thereby exacerbating famine conditions, the right-wing military adopted a regional command structure through which it could smuggle staple commodities to win the loyalty of the rural population. In an attempt to curtail the right-wing military's increasing power, the PKI and the left-wing military formed several peasant and other mass organisations.

Indonesia–Malaysia confrontation

In 1963, a policy of Konfrontasi (Confrontation) against the newly formed Federation of Malaysia was announced by the Sukarno regime. This further exacerbated the split between the left-wing and right-wing military factions, with the left-wing faction and the Communist Party taking part in guerrilla raids on the border with Malaysia, while the right-wing faction was mostly absent from the conflict (whether by choice or orders of Sukarno is not clear).

The Confrontation further encouraged the West to seek ways to topple Sukarno, viewed as a growing threat to Southeast Asian regional stability (as with North Vietnam under the Domino theory). The deepening of the armed conflict, coming close to all-out warfare by 1965, both increased the widespread dissatisfaction with the Sukarno regime and strengthened the hand of the right-wing generals whose forces were still close to the centre of power in Jakarta.

30 September Movement

On the night of 30 September – 1 October 1965, six senior army generals were kidnapped and executed in Jakarta by a battalion of soldiers from the Tjakrabirawa Regiment (Presidential Guard) in an "attempted coup". The right faction among the top generals was wiped out, including the powerful Chief of Staff of the Army, Ahmad Yani, but the Minister of Defence, Abdul Haris Nasution, escaped. Around 2,000 troops from coup groups occupied three sides of Merdeka Square, and commanded the Presidential Palace, radio station, and telecommunications centre, but did not occupy the east side, site of Kostrad headquarters.^[7] Calling themselves the "30 September Movement", the group announced on radio around 7 am that they were trying to stop a military coup backed by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) that was planned to remove Sukarno from power.^[7]

They claimed to have arrested several generals belonging to a conspiracy, the "Council of Generals", that had plotted a military coup against the government of President Sukarno. They further alleged that this coup was to take place on Armed Forces Day (5 October) with the backing of the CIA and that the Council would then install themselves as a military junta.^[8][9] Furthermore, the soldiers proclaimed the establishment of a "Revolutionary Council" consisting of various well-known military officers and civilian leaders that would be the highest authority in Indonesia. Additionally, they declared President Sukarno's Dwikora Cabinet as invalid ("demisioner").^[10]

According to one chief conspirator, Lt. Col. Latief, the Palace Guards had not attempted to kill or capture Major General Suharto, commander of Kostrad (Komando Strategi dan Cadangan TNI Angkatan Darat – the Army Strategic Reserve Command), because he was considered a Sukarno loyalist.^[11] Suharto, along with the surviving General Nasution, made the counter-allegation that the G30S was a rebellious movement that sought to replace President Sukarno's government with a Communist government under the PKI, whose leaders were cabinet ministers without portfolio. Upon hearing of the radio announcement, Suharto and Nasution began consolidating their forces, successfully gaining the loyalty of Jakarta Garrison Commander Maj. Gen. Umar Wirahadikusumah and Colonel Sarwo Edhie Wibowo, the commander of army special forces RPKAD (Resimen Para Komando Angkatan Darat – the Army's Para-Commando Regiment).

During the evening of 1 October, RPKAD soldiers recaptured RRI and Telecommunications Building without any resistance as the rebel soldiers had retreated to Halim Air Force Base. RPKAD forces proceeded to attack Halim Perdanakusumah AF Base on the morning of 2 October but was stopped by the rebel soldiers in a fierce gunbattle in which several fatalities were inflicted on both sides. A direct order from President Sukarno managed to secure the surrender of the rebel soldiers by noon, after which Suhartoist forces occupied the base. On 4 October, the generals' bodies were discovered at Halim, and on 5 October (Armed Forces Day) a large public funeral was held.^[12]

Internal military power-struggle

The killing of the generals saw influence in the Army fall to those more willing to stand up to Sukarno and the Army's enemies on the left.^[13] After the assassinations of those generals, the highest-ranking officer in the Indonesian military, and third-highest in the overall chain-of-command, was the Defense Minister and Armed Forces Chief-of-Staff Gen. Abdul Haris Nasution, a member of the right-wing camp. On 2 October, Suharto accepted Sukarno's order for him to take control of the army, but on the condition that Suharto personally have authority to restore order and security. The 1 November formation of Kopkamtib (Komando Operasi Pemulihan Keamanan dan Ketertiban, or Operational Command for the Restoration of Security and Order), formalised this authority and Suharto was appointed its first commanding general.^[12] However, on 5 October Sukarno moved to appoint Maj. Gen. Pranoto Reksosamudro, considered a Sukarno loyalist, to the office of Chief of Staff of the Army to fill the vacancy caused by Yani's death.

After the promotion, The New York Times reported that an unnamed Western "diplomatic report" alleged that Pranoto was a former member of the PKI. Pranoto's alleged communism, as well as his timely promotion, led them to promote the view that the PKI and Sukarno conspired to assassinate the generals to consolidate their grip on power.^[14]

In the aftermath of the assassinations, however,MG Suharto and his KOSTRAD (Army Strategic Reserve Command) units were closest to Jakarta. By default, Suharto became the field general in charge of the prosecution of the G30S. Later, at the insistence of Gen. Nasution, Pranoto was relieved of his post, and Suharto was in his stead appointed the new Army Chief-of-Staff on 14 October 1965.^[15]

Anti-communist purge

In early October, a military propaganda campaign began to sweep the country, successfully convincing both Indonesian and international audiences that it was a Communist coup and that the murders were cowardly atrocities against Indonesian heroes.^[16] 30 September Movement was called Gestapu (from Gerakan September Tigapuluh, "30 September Movement"). The Army, acting on orders by Suharto and supervised by Minister of Defense Nasution, began a campaign of agitation and incitement to violence among Indonesian civilians aimed at the Communist community and toward President Sukarno himself. PKI's denials of involvement had little effect.^[17] The regime was quickly destabilised, with the Army the only force left to maintain order.^[18]

At the funeral of Nasution's daughter Irma, Chief of Staff of the Navy Admiral Eddy Martadinata gave Muslim leaders the signal to attack Communists and their allies, who then responded with calls for Holy War against the PKI and its member and affiliate organisations in Indonesia, a general obligation upon the Muslim community. On 8 October, the PKI head office was ransacked and burned to the ground while firefighters stood by idly.^[19] They then marched demanding the dissolution of the Communist Party. The homes of senior party figures, including PKI chairman D. N. Aidit, M. H. Lukman and Nyoto were also torched. The army led an armed forces campaign to purge Indonesian society, government, the armed forces and law enforcement of the influence and power of the communist party and other leftist organisations allied to it (but not the Murba Party that was against the PKI and had been banned by the government because of its opposition to it). Leading PKI members were immediately arrested, some summarily executed.^[16]

On 18 October, a declaration was read over armed forces-controlled radio stations, banning the PKI and organizations affiated to the party. The ban included the party itself, and its youth and women's wings, peasant associations, intellectual and student groups, and the SOBSI trade union. At the time, it was not clear whether this ban applied only to Jakarta (by then controlled by the Army), or the whole Republic of Indonesia. However, the ban was soon used as a pretext for the Indonesian Army to go throughout the country carrying out extrajudicial punishments, including mass arrest and summary executions, against Sukarno loyalists and suspected leftists linked to the PKI and its allied organizations. As the violence spread, Sukarno issued orders to try to stop it, but he was ignored. He also refused to blame the PKI for the coup, let alone ban it as the Army demanded. However, although Suharto and Nasution were increasingly suspicious about Sukarno's role in the affair, the Army was reluctant to confront the president directly because of his still widespread popularity.^[19]

Beginning in later October 1965, and feeding off pent-up communal hatreds, the Indonesian Army and its civilian allies (especially Muslim vigilante groups) began to kill actual and suspected^[12] members and associates of the PKI and members of party affiliated organizations. The US government covertly supported the massacres, providing extensive lists of suspected communists to be targeted.^[20][21] The killings started in the capital Jakarta, spread to Central and East Java, and later Bali. Although killings occurred across Indonesia, the worst were in the provinces of Central Java, East Java, Bali, and North Sumatra - all PKI-loyal provinces.^[22] The massacres reached their peak over the remainder of the year before subsiding in the early months of 1966.^[23] The estimates of the death toll of the violence range from over 100,000 to three million, but most scholars accept a figure of around 500,000.^[24] Many others were also imprisoned, and for the next ten years, people were still being imprisoned as suspects. It is thought that as many as 1.5m were imprisoned at one stage or another.^[25] As a result of the purge, one of Sukarno's three pillars of support, the PKI, had been effectively eliminated by the other two, the armed forces and political Islam, helped in Bali by proponents of the Balinese caste system who saw the PKI and its allies as a threat to their way of life.

Demonstrations

Three People's Demands TRITURA Tri Tuntutan Rakyat (Indonesian)
Part of the Transition to the New Order
KAMI, KAPPI mass demonstration, 1966
Date	1966
Location	Jakarta, Indonesia
Caused by	Authoritarianism of Sukarno 1963‑1965 Indonesian hyperinflation PKI failed coup attempt
Goals	Ban of the Communist Party Call for the dissolution of the Dwikora Cabinet Lower food prices demand
Methods	Political demonstration
Parties
Sukarno Dwikora Cabinet KAMI KAPPI
Lead figures
Sukarno No centralized leadership

In October 1965, students in Jakarta formed KAMI (Kesatuan Aksi Mahasiswa Indonesia, Indonesian Students Action Front), which called for the banning of the PKI.^[26] It was soon joined by a host of similar organisations made up of high school students, workers, artists and labourers and the like. Other targets for the demonstrators were rising prices and government inefficiency.^[19] They also demonstrated against Subandrio, the foreign minister and head of the BPI intelligence agency and the number two man in the government.^[9]

On 10 January 1966, demonstrators, including KAMI, demonstrated in front of the Provisional legislature and announced what became known as the Three Demands of the People (Tritura):

• Dissolution of the PKI
• The expulsion from the cabinet of G30S/PKI elements
• Lower prices and economic improvements^[26]

In February 1966, as anti-communist demonstrations continued, Sukarno tried to placate Suharto by promoting him. On 21 February, he tried to regain the initiative by announcing a new cabinet - the Revised Dwikora Cabinet, which included former Air Force chief AVM Omar Dani, who had issued a statement on 1 October 1965 initially supporting the coup. More provocatively still, Sukarno fired General Nasution as Minister of Defense and was replaced by MG Sarbini, while Suharto remained as Chief of Staff of the Army and a member of the cabinet. The new cabinet immediately became known as the Gestapu cabinet, after the acronym coined by the military for the 30 September Movement.^[19]

Two days after the announcement, a huge crowd attempted to storm the presidential palace. The next day, while the new cabinet was being inaugurated, soldiers from the presidential guard opened fire on a crowd in front of the palace, killing student protester Arif Rachman Hakim, who was turned into a martyr and given a hero's funeral the following day.^[19][26]

On 8 March 1966, students managed to ransack the foreign ministry building and held it for five hours. They daubed slogans, one accusing Subandrio of murdering the generals and drew graffiti showing him as a Pekingese dog (a reference to his perceived closeness to communist China) or hanging from gallows.^[19]

Sukarno then planned a three-day series of meetings to restore his authority. The first, on 10 March, involved the leaders of political parties. He managed to persuade them to sign a declaration warning against the undermining of presidential authority by student demonstrations. The second stage was a cabinet meeting planned for 11 March. However, as this meeting was underway, word reached Sukarno that unidentified troops were surrounding the palace. Sukarno left the palace in haste for Bogor, where later that night, he signed the Supersemar document transferring authority to restore order to Major General Suharto. Suharto acted quickly. On 12 March, he ordered a nationwide ban on the PKI and its member and affiliate organizations, as well as all party activities. The same day, there was a "show of force" by the Army in the streets of Jakarta, which was watched by cheering crowds.^[19] On 18 March, Subandrio and 14 other ministers were arrested, including the third deputy prime minister Chairul Saleh. That night, the radio announced that the ministers were in "protective custody".^[19]

Suharto later admitted in his autobiography that he frequently liaised with the student protesters throughout this period and that Sukarno often pleaded with him to stop the demonstrations.

Anti-Chinese laws

While resentment toward Chinese Indonesians by indigenous Indonesians-descended peoples of the archipelago dated back to the Dutch East Indies era, the New Order instigated anti-Chinese legislation following the quashing of the Communists. Stereotypes of the Chinese as disproportionately affluent and greedy were common throughout the time (both in Indonesia as well as Malaysia), but with the anti-communist hysteria, the association of the Chinese Indonesians with the People's Republic of China caused them also to be viewed as a communist fifth column.^[30][31]

Indonesia's hitherto friendly diplomatic relations with mainland China were severed, and the Chinese Embassy in Jakarta burnt down by a mob. New legislation included the banning of Chinese language signs on shops and other buildings, and the closure of Chinese language schools, adoption of "Indonesian" sounding names, and limits on Buddhist temple construction.^[32]

A new political system

The liquidation and banning of the Communist Party (and related organisations) eliminated one of the largest political parties in Indonesia. It was also among the largest Communist Parties in the Comintern, at an estimated three million members. Along with the subsequent efforts by Suharto to wrest power from Sukarno by purging loyalists from the parliament, the civilian government in Indonesia was effectively put to an end by the coup countermeasures.

Strident anti-communism remained a hallmark of the 31-year regime.^[33]

The new regime that emerged from the upheavals of the 1960s was dedicated to maintaining political order, promoting economic development, and excluding mass participation from the political process. The military was given a substantial role in politics, political and social organisations throughout the country were bureaucratised and corporatized, and selective but effective and sometimes brutal repression was used against opponents of the regime.^[33]

Some seats in the parliament were set-aside for the military as part of the dwifungsi (dual function) doctrine. Under the system, the military took on roles as administrators at all levels of government. The political parties not banned outright were consolidated into a single party, the Party of the Functional Groups (Indonesian: Partai Golongan Karya), more commonly known as Golkar. Though Suharto would allow for the formation of two non-Golkar parties, these were kept weak during his regime.

Rise of Islamism

The purging of two secularist parties, the Nationalists and the Communists, had a notable side effect of giving more space for the development of Islamism in Indonesia. This included liberal, conservative, and extremist groups practising Islam in Indonesia.

Improved ties with the West

The change in regime brought a shift in policy that allowed USAID and other relief agencies to operate within the country. Suharto would open Indonesia's economy by divesting state-owned companies, and Western countries, in particular, were encouraged to invest and take control of many of the mining and construction interests in Indonesia. The result was stabilisation of the economy and the alleviation of absolute poverty and famine conditions that had resulted from shortfalls in the rice supply and Sukarno's refusal to take Western aid.

As a result of his elimination of the communists, Suharto would come to be seen as a pro-Western and anti-Communist. Ongoing military and diplomatic relationships between Indonesia and the Western powers were cemented, leading to US, British, and Australian arms sales and training of military personnel.

US assistance to Suharto

General Suharto

Some experts assert that the United States directly facilitated and encouraged the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of suspected Communists in Indonesia during the mid-1960s.^[34][35] Bradley Simpson, Director of the Indonesia/East Timor Documentation Project at the National Security Archive, says "Washington did everything in its power to encourage and facilitate the army-led massacre of alleged PKI members, and U.S. officials worried only that the killing of the party's unarmed supporters might not go far enough, permitting Sukarno to return to power and frustrate the [Johnson] Administration's emerging plans for a post-Sukarno Indonesia."^[36] According to Simpson, the terror in Indonesia was an "essential building block of the quasi neo-liberal policies the West would attempt to impose on Indonesia in the years to come".^[37] Historian John Roosa, commenting on documents released from the US embassy in Jakarta in 2017, says they confirm that "the US was part and parcel of the operation, strategising with the Indonesian army and encouraging them to go after the PKI."^[38] Geoffrey B. Robinson, a historian at UCLA, argues that without the support of the U.S. and other powerful Western states, the Indonesian Army's program of mass killings would not have happened.^{[39]: 22–23, 177}

As early as 1958, the U.S. and its allies backed anti-communist elements within the Indonesian Army with secret assurances, financial and military support, and this support solidified once the mass killing campaigns were underway, demonstrating the "resolve" of the army.^{[39]: 83, 179} During the height of the violence, U.S. embassy official Robert J. Martens provided lists containing roughly 5,000 names of high ranking PKI members to the Indonesian Army, which, according to Robinson, "almost certainly aided in the death or detention of many innocent people". He notes that providing these kill lists "sent a powerful message that the US government agreed with and supported the army's campaign against the PKI, even as that campaign took its terrible toll in human lives."^{[39]: 202–203}

Bibliography

• "Army in Jakarta Imposes a Ban on Communists." The New York Times. 19 October 1965
• Aspinall, Edward; Feith, Herbert; Van Klinken, Gerry, eds. (1999). The Last Days of President Suharto. Clayton, Victoria, Australia: Monash Asia Institute. ISBN 0-7326-1175-X.
• Blum, William. Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II, Black Rose, 1998, pp. 193–198 ISBN 1-56751-052-3
• "CIA Stalling State Department Histories". The National Security Archive. Retrieved 23 May 2005.
• Cribb, Robert, 'Genocide in Indonesia, 1965–1966', Journal of Genocide Research 3 no. 2 (June 2001), pp. 219–239
• Easter, David. "'Keep the Indonesian pot boiling': western covert intervention in Indonesia, October 1965 – March 1966", Cold War History, Vol 5, No 1, February 2005.
• Feith, Herbert; Castles, Lance, eds. (1970). Indonesian Political Thinking 1945–1965. Ithaca, New York, U.S.: Cornell University Press. ISBN 0-8014-0531-9.
• Friend, Theodore (2003). Indonesian Destinies. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-01834-6.
• Hughes, John (2002), The End of Sukarno – A Coup that Misfired: A Purge that Ran Wild, Archipelago Press, ISBN 981-4068-65-9
• "Jakarta Cabinet Faces Challenge." The New York Times 16 December 1965
• "Jakarta Leftist Out As Army Chief." The New York Times 15 October 1965
• Lashmar, Paul; Oliver, James (1999). Britain's Secret Propaganda War. Sutton Pub Ltd. ISBN 0-7509-1668-0.
• Latief, Col. A. (1999?) Pledoi Kol. A. Latief (The Defense [plea] of Col. A. Latief), Institut Studi Arus Informasi, ISBN 979-8933-27-3
• Ricklefs, Merle Calvin (1982). A History of Modern Indonesia. MacMillan. ISBN 0-333-24380-3.
• Ricklefs, Merle Calvin (1991). A History of Modern Indonesia since c.1300 (2nd ed.). MacMillan. ISBN 0-333-57689-6.
• Robinson, Geoffrey B. (2018). The Killing Season: A History of the Indonesian Massacres, 1965-66. Princeton University Press. ISBN 9781400888863.
• Roosa, John (2007) Pretext for Mass Murder: The 30 September Movement & Suharto's Coup D'État in Indonesia, University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 978-0-299-22034-1
• Schwarz, A. (1994). A Nation in Waiting: Indonesia in the 1990s. Westview Press. ISBN 1-86373-635-2.
• Sekretariat Negara Republik Indonesia (1975) 30 Tahun Indonesia Merdeka: Jilid 3 (1965–1973) (30 Years of Indonesian Independence: Volume 3 (1965–1973)
• Simanjuntak, P.H.H (2003) Kabinet-Kabinet Republik Indonesia: Dari Awal Kemerdekaan Sampai Reformasi (Cabinets of the Republic of Indonesia: From the Start of Independence to the Reform era, Penerbit Djambatan, Jakarta, ISBN 979-428-499-8
• Simpson, Bradley. Economists with Guns: Authoritarian Development and U.S.–Indonesian Relations, 1960–1968. Stanford University Press, 2010. ISBN 0804771820
• "Sukarno Removes His Defense Chief" The New York Times. 22 February 1966
• "Sukarno Seen Behind Coup" The New York Times. 6 October 1965
• "Tapol Troubles: When Will They End?". Inside Indonesia. April–June 1999. Archived from the original on 25 May 2000.
• Toer, Pramoedya Ananta (2000). The Mute's Soliloquy : A Memoir. Penguin. ISBN 0-14-028904-6.
• Vickers, Adrian (2005). A History of Modern Indonesia. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-54262-6.

Notes