Beyond the war on terror: Opportunity for Indonesia?

Daromir Rudnyckyj, Jakarta

Three years have elapsed since U.S. President George W. Bush, perhaps somewhat presumptively, proclaimed a "war on terror." At the time the hasty rush to war distressed many, both within Indonesia and outside. Indeeed it is becoming obvious that little strategic planning went into determining how such a war might actually be won.

Today it is becoming painfully apparent that Bush's "war on terror" is not getting closer to achieving its goals. Terrorist attacks against largely innocent civilians have increased in number and scale since 2001. In this year alone brazen attacks attributed to terrorists have struck Madrid, Istanbul, Casablanca, Beslan, and now Jakarta, to name but a few. Osama bin Laden remains at large.

Recently, before his political party's quadrennial convention President Bush, in a moment of rare candor, finally suggested that he did not expect that his "war on terror" would actually be won. Although the statement was altered in the inevitable cycle of spin that followed, a crack may have emerged for alternative resolutions to this pressing global conflagration.

It is as if in the escalating war between Bush and bin Laden from each act of horror perpetrated by one side, the other side draws its strength. Whether it be the ruins of a wedding party in Iraq or the shattered bodies and shattered glass in front of Jakarta's Marriott hotel, each act of grotesque violence served up on CNN or Al-Jazeera seems to serve as a rallying cry for the other side. Each draws its virulence from the brutality of the other. The losers are those caught in between, waiting for a bus, en route to a university lecture, or inspecting vehicles entering a diplomatic building.

Indonesia, the site of some of the most ghastly horrors in the war between Bush and bin Laden, occupies a unique and perhaps fortuitous position. The country simultaneously looks to Mecca and Hollywood and sings along with both MTV and popular Muslim vocalist Haddad Alwi.

In Indonesia's cities and towns, one is just as likely to encounter graduates of the great universities of the Middle East, like Cairo's Al-Azhar or the University of Baghdad, as one is to meet graduates of American or European institutions of higher learning.

Many Indonesians have no problem tuning in to television shows like American Idol after they have finished their Maghrib prayers or combining the latest American business management ideas with centuries-old passages from the Qur'an. Science and religion are held in a dynamic, creative, and potentially productive tension. In its ability to understand something of the society and politics of the Middle East and something of those of western countries, Indonesia may hold a key to reconciling the escalating cycle of violence associated with the "war on terror."

Most significantly, Indonesia can now lay claim to the title of the world's largest democracy with a Muslim majority population. This title offers prospective Indonesian leaders a unique opportunity in resolving the current conflict, as it is Islam that is either misunderstood on the one side or mistakenly invoked on the other.

Although such an initiative might at first appear somewhat farfetched given Indonesia's ongoing uneven economic and political transition, it would not be unprecedented. Indonesia's first President, Sukarno adroitly wove together a broad coalition of non-aligned nations at a historic conference in Bandung, just six short, shaky years after achieving full independence from colonial rule. The movement sought to offer a third alternative to the great global political struggle of Sukarno's era, the Cold War.

In the immediate aftermath of the Australian embassy bombing, Indonesia's highest public officials vowed to "hunt down and capture" its perpetrators. While such a response is predictable, if unimaginative, it would seem that amidst the ruins of Jl. Rasuna Said, the opportunity emerged for a perhaps more proactive response to the problem of terrorism.

Perhaps a reincarnation of something like the Non-aligned Movement might propose an alternative to the "war on terror" and its opposite. A movement of this nature might seek to get beyond the simple Manichean opposition of "you're either with us or against us" that appears to have only exacerbated retrenchment into one of two mutually suspicious and openly hostile camps.

A broad coalition of medium powers that continue to experience first hand the bloody effects terrorism, might be able to forge consensus and common ground around the open sore that continues to excite feelings of animosity and distrust: peace between Palestine and Israel.

Potential members of this coalition might include Spain, Morocco, Turkey, Russia and Indonesia, to name but a few. The details are left to the experts, but given the failure of U.S.- led efforts to forge peace in the Middle East it is high time for a new coalition of mediating parties to begin anew.

Whichever candidate is elected president on Monday, the newly anointed leader will have the first directly democratic mandate in Indonesia's history. This mandate can benefit not only citizens of Indonesia, but also citizens of the world, in taking bold steps to resolve the current conflagration. Six years after the end of authoritarian, one-party rule, Indonesia's leaders will stand on the brink of a tremendous opportunity to rechart the political response to terrorism.

Prof. Azyumardi Azra, rector of the State Islamic University in Jakarta, has referred to Indonesia as "a sleeping giant". Perhaps this most recent terrorist attack might awaken this giant to assume a leading role on the world stage, forging a new path in the escalating conflict. A path that is not dependent on one side of the current war violently annihilating the other, with too many innocent people caught in between.

The writer is Ph.D. candidate in anthropology at the University of California currently conducting research on Islam and Political Economy in Indonesia. He can be reached at daromir@alumni.uchicago.edu