Communist putsch riddle

I am highly disturbed by the article from Prijono Tjiptoherijanto in The Jakarta Post on Jan. 28, titled Some things never change despite changes in regime.

The author presents a misleading view about the history of the Oct. 1, 1965, putsch and its tragic aftermath in which up to three million people were murdered and tens of thousands were imprisoned. Millions of Indonesian women and men are still suffering from the consequences of one of largest genocides after the World War II. They either lost their parents or spouses, were expelled from or never admitted to educational institutions. Thousands lost all their property without compensation or were denied their pensions.

Tjiptoherijanto suggests that the mystery surrounding this tragedy has been perpetuated by the kind refusal of General Soeharto to have former president Sukarno questioned. In fact, the greatest mystery surrounds not so much the murder of the generals on the Air Force training field at Lubang Buaya, which started the massacre and witch-hunt that led to the displacement of president Sukarno by General Soeharto.

Sukarno's role, which was minimal if he played a role in the original putsch at all, as well as the role of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), which was limited to the involvement of some leaders and members of Pemuda Rakyat (People's Youth), have been extensively discussed. Manai Sophiaan's book provides probably the most accurate assessment of Sukarno's role.

The major riddle is the role of Soeharto himself. It is clear that he knew in advance of plans for the putsch. He never reported this to his superiors at the time. Instead he quickly took command, overriding the orders of the legitimate president at the time to crush the very modest forces the putschists had been able to rally round their cause.

In an unprecedented slanderous media campaign that started a few days after the bodies of the murdered military men were found, the blame was laid on the Communist Party, and particularly on the socialist women's movement, Gerwani. Army sources spread the most horrendous lies that girls related to Gerwani would have seduced and castrated the generals. These lies were used to incite soldiers and members of mass organizations such as Ansor, to carry out a campaign of mass murder against anybody with a leftist reputation.

The precise number of victims is unknown, most of the mass graves have never been opened. None of the perpetrators of this genocide have ever been brought to justice.

In view of the mass character of this campaign, it is one of the modern world's largest mysteries as to who was behind it. In my thesis on the history of the Indonesian women's movement and Gerwani, I was not able to answer this question. In my later novel, Lubang Buaya (literally "crocodile's hole"), I could only speculate as to how this conspiracy to replace president Sukarno through a campaign of sexual slander and mass murder was conceived.

SASKIA WIERINGA The Hague, Holland