Canberra's new bond with Jakarta buries old fears

Canberra's new bond with Jakarta buries old fears

Milton Osborne gives an Australian viewpoint on the new agreement.

Nothing gives greater point to the significance of the security agreement signed between Australia and Indonesia on Dec. 18 than the release, barely two weeks later, of previously secret Cabinet documents dealing with Australia's policies towards Indonesia in 1965.

With Sukarno still Indonesia's president then and his policy of "Confrontation" of Malaysia still in place, the then Menzies government gave its approval for Australian troops to go into action against Indonesian forces, including cross-border operations by an SAS squadron in Borneo.

With Sukarno's ouster later that same year and the accession to power of President Soeharto's "New Order" government, relations between the two countries improved rapidly, but a legacy of distrust remained on the Australian side. In part, this was a reflection of an ingrained xenophobia on both sides of Australian politics that fed on irrational fears of "Asian hordes" pouring south into Australia, as if by the force of gravity.

In part, too, negative views of Indonesia were promoted by those on the Left in Australian politics and in universities which refused to abandon their romantic image of Sukarno's Indonesia in spite of its demonstrable economic failures and foreign policy adventurism. For these people, a military- dominated government in Jakarta represented the worst of all possible worlds.

Yet, by the time Gough Whitlam's government came to power in 1972, there seemed hope that relations between the two countries could be maintained on an even keel, if not necessarily be marked by notable warmth. East Timor's integration with Indonesia in 1975 changed all that.

The integration, and its aftermath, became a political albatross around the neck of every Australian government in the next two decades. The reasons why this should be so are complex, even baffling, to many observers, including Australians.

That Indonesian actions and policies in Timor have often been ham-fisted and, particularly in the years immediately after the integration, unnecessarily brutal, is part of the explanation for the depth of feeling the issue has aroused in Australia. But, in themselves, they hardly explain the grip East Timor has had on public opinion.

The best, if incomplete, explanation seems to lie in the extent to which there is a remarkable coalition of groups opposing Indonesia's presence in East Timor and the degree to which these groups are prepared to place that opposition above concern for Australia's broader relationship with Indonesia.

While the Left of the Labor Party has been most prominent in criticizing Indonesian actions in Timor, they are part of a wider coalition that includes Timorese emigres resident in Australia, Catholic churchmen, non-governmental organizations and ex- servicemen who fought in Timor during World War II. When the 1991 "Dili Massacre" took place, there was no shortage of voices ready to fill the media with critical comment on Indonesian actions.

Against this background, Prime Minister Paul Keating's notable achievement has been to make clear his government's conviction that Australian policy towards Indonesia could not be dominated by the Timor issue. As he colorfully put it, relations with Indonesia could not be put in "hock" by concerns over Timor.

Having said some time ago that he believed good relations with Indonesia were the single most important aspect of Australian foreign policy, his success in concluding a security agreement gives tangible testimony to that conviction. In a fashion that invites comparison with President Nixon's opening to China, Keating has demonstrated that the leader of the Australian Labor Party, which still has strong left-wing elements, could embrace a policy that most conservative politicians would have hesitated to pursue, whatever their private wishes.

Criticism of the security agreement has been predictable and is likely to continue for some time. The so-called East Timor lobby was stunned by the announcement of the agreement but can be expected to return to the charge once Australia wakes from its summer torpor.

But the critics now face a fait accompli. And they will have to contend with the general support for the agreement that has been given both by the Labor Party's main political opponents and, with some reservations, by editorial writers in leading newspapers.

Some criticism has been leveled at Keating for the secrecy with which the security agreement was negotiated. Given the nature of political debate in Australia, few would disagree with the conclusion that to have done otherwise would almost certainly have put the whole aim of achieving an agreement in jeopardy.

Other critics have raised the improbable specter of Australia being caught up in Indonesia's efforts to suppress internal rebellion. Nothing in the agreement validates this view any more than the agreement can be portrayed as somehow anti-China in character.

While the terms of the security agreement certainly envisage some expansion of already existing defense cooperation, the fundamental importance of the document for Australia lies in its symbolism. At a stroke, signature of the document has made clear that, at the highest official levels, Australia has laid to rest any lingering perceptions that Indonesia is a potential, if publicly unidentified, enemy.

East Timor will continue to be an irritant in Australia's relations with Indonesia and differing perceptions on human rights issues will cause tensions from time to time. But, for the future, such irritants and tensions will occur in a different framework, one in which the primacy of maintaining good relations with Indonesia can no longer be an issue in Australia.

Dr. Milton Osborne, a former senior Australian intelligence analyst, is now a freelance writer and consultant on Asian issues based in Sydney.