Embargo, lessons from history

Embargo, lessons from history

On Sept. 30, The Jakarta Post printed the article Embargo and
lessons from history by Riza Sihbudi, who attempted to analyze
the threat of a U.S. embargo, the reasons why the U.S. would want
to impose an embargo on Indonesia and whether we had to worry
about the threat.

I found several things in the article really annoying. The
writer started off by saying that embargoes rarely achieve their
purpose, and gave examples of embargoes against several
countries, such as South Africa and Taiwan -- both of which
survived.

The examples, however, were irrelevant because the writer
forgot the differences in the conditions of the two countries and
ours. In addition, the writer contradicted his main argument by
saying that we have to consider the U.S. threat because even
without an embargo we are already broke.

Further, the writer gave four possible reasons for a U.S.
embargo -- which actually were not very convincing because they
focused on religious differences between the U.S. and Indonesia,
and the personal feelings of some top government officials here
toward the U.S. and vice versa.

It is my conclusion that the writer penned the article for his
own personal satisfaction, merely expressing what he thought was
right. He focused on what he believed was true while overlooking
other facts.

The writer, who claimed to be a researcher at the Indonesian
Institute of Sciences, should have been able to come up with
better, more educated explanations than those he gave.

ANGGIET ARIEFIANTO

University of Indonesia