Indonesia's 1965 Holocaust remembered<\/p>\n
Aboeprijadi Santoso, Amsterdam<\/p>\n
Conventional wisdom about what happened in Indonesia during the
\nsecond half of the 1960s generally held leading Army officers, in
\ncollaboration with some youth organizations, responsible for
\nIndonesia's greatest human disaster after its independence, which
\nincluded the killings, persecutions and imprisonment of hundreds
\nof thousands of alleged communists.<\/p>\n
Much less known, a seminar has recently revealed, is that
\nforeign and local academics were abused by the then most powerful
\nsecurity apparatus, the Kopkamtib (Security and Order Operational
\nCommand), in the repression during the 1970s.<\/p>\n
The 1965 Forgotten Holocaust of Indonesia\"seminar, held on
\nOct. 28 by the International Institute of Social History IISG in
\nAmsterdam to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the 1965
\ntragedy, presented a number of testimonies -- all pointing to the
\nprofound impact of the tragic events.<\/p>\n
One victim-witness, whose husband was tortured to death,
\nrelated the pain of the \"semantics of repression\" by the
\ninterrogators; another recalled with pain a dramatic, but polite
\nand peaceful confrontation with his father's killer.<\/p>\n
Many families lost members or faced tragic disintegration
\nwithout even understanding the reasons. Such complex experiences
\nwere left unresolved because the state and society were
\ndisinterested -- the incidents largely clouded with fear, silence
\nand ideological hatred.<\/p>\n
It is no doubt important for the nation to remember the
\ntragedy. But to refer to the killings and persecutions as a
\n\"holocaust\", the term describing the Nazis historic victimization
\nof the Jews in Europe, would only dramatize rather than
\ncontribute to a proper understanding of the Indonesian tragedy.<\/p>\n
With the truth suppressed, the price of history is a tragedy
\nconcealed, not resolved. Hence, the rights of the victims and
\ntheir families should be fully rehabilitated and those
\nresponsible for the tragedy, former President Soeharto in the
\nfirst place, must be brought to trial.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, a new academic trend has begun focusing on how
\nSoeharto's New Order was founded -- as distinct to the events of
\nthe 1965-1966 tragedy.<\/p>\n
Ben Anderson, an old hand in Indonesian studies, recently in
\nAmsterdam pointed out the importance of several political
\nnetworks as financial and intellectual resources supporting the
\nOpsus (special operations) campaign to neutralize and remove the
\nold elite.<\/p>\n
The transition to the New Order has also been described in a
\nnew book by Dutch historian Lambert J. Giebels, De Stille
\nGenocide (The Silent Genocide). Using hitherto unknown sources,
\nhe featured the central role of the Opsus chief Gen. Ali Moertopo
\nand the Dutch priest P. Beek, which has been a public secret for
\nsometime.<\/p>\n
Of this trend, quite independently, the latest is a study
\nIndonesian researchers in the Netherlands have embarked on
\nKopkamtib's collaboration with foreign and local scientists,
\nwhich started as early as 1971 as part of efforts to consolidate
\nthe new regime.<\/p>\n
Kopkamtib's project only came to the surface as its chief, the
\nsecurity tsar Admiral Soedomo seven years later proudly announced
\n\"now scientifically we can measure the state of political
\nprisoners' ideology with the help of Dutch psychologists.\" (The
\nNew York Times, Apr. 12, 1978). The admiral referred to the
\nquestionnaire designed \"to check them for the state of their
\ncommunist ideology\", which by 1976 had been used to examine
\n29,000 political prisoners of the \"B Category\" on the island of
\nBuru.<\/p>\n
Soedomo had earlier asked the CIA whether they had \"a computer
\nthat could be set to human head\" (Haagse Post Feb. 10 1979), but
\ngot a negative answer, so he turned to British and Dutch
\npsychologists for advise on the questionnaire method. Four
\nuniversities -- the University of Indonesia, Jakarta, University
\nof Pajajaran, Bandung, and those of Nijmegen and Groningen in the
\nNetherlands -- were involved from 1973 to 1976 in the set-up of a
\ndatabase and supervision of the research, which was also part of
\nthe Dutch-Indonesia Cultural Agreement.<\/p>\n
Soedomo had claimed the questionnaire was made by members of
\nthe Indonesian Committee on National Security.<\/p>\n
The issue had ignited student protests in the Netherlands, but
\nthe University of Nijmegen Council and Dutch Institute of
\nPsychologists NIP denied any ethical wrongdoing, rejecting the
\naccusation of being \"an instrument of Indonesia's security
\napparatuses\". There had been no public response, though, from the
\nIndonesian academics, and the new research team on Kopkamtib's
\nproject is now planning an inquiry.<\/p>\n
The political prisoners had been subjected to a test that
\nserved the aims of the Kopkamtib. Former Buru prisoners have
\nconfirmed they had sat questionnaire and had feared their answers
\nmight influence their predicament, Hilmar Farid, a member of the
\nresearch team, told Radio Netherlands.<\/p>\n
Some were indeed released later than others. Soedomo admitted
\nthe method had been used to select those who had to be
\nscrutinized after being released. Indonesian psychologists were
\neven active on the ground, reportedly traveling to Buru and
\nquestioning prisoners the admiral called \"criminal elements\". The
\npsychologists' role has thus critically shaped Kopkamtib's
\napproach to the political prisoners.<\/p>\n
The fact that the Kopkamtib decades ago sought and acquired
\nscience which it used for repression is a good lesson even today.<\/p>\n
It reminds the civil society the need to watch some state
\napparatuses even more critically as they now seek more power --
\njust as the active role of many intellectuals and Western
\ngovernments during Soeharto's transition to state power helps
\nexplain the sustainability of his three decades-long New Order
\nregime.<\/p>\n
The writer is journalist with Radio Netherlands.<\/p>", "url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/indonesias-1965-holocaust-remembered-1447893297", "image": "" }, "sponsor": "Okusi Associates", "sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com" }