Thoughts along Jl. Sudirman (2)
By Sabam Siagian
This is the second of two articles based on an introduction for the book on the late Gen. Soedirman, the Supreme Commander of the Indonesian National Army from December 1945 until he passed away in January, 1950. The book was written by Lt. Gen. (ret) Tjokropranolo, Gen. Soedirman's senior aide, and will be launched at the end of this month in Perth, Australia.
CANBERRA: How striking that on Dec. 19, 1948, three years after Gen. Soedirman was appointed Panglima Besar (Supreme Commander) of the National Indonesian Army, that he was faced with a decisive test of his leadership when the Netherlands military forces launched a lightning attack at Yogyakarta, the Republic's war capital, by dropping paratroops. The previous day the deputy chief of staff, Col. T.B. Simatupang, who was the senior representative of the Indonesian military forces at the negotiation table with the Netherlands delegation, saw Gen. Soedirman on his sickbed. He briefed Gen. Soedirman on the current state of negotiations and shared with him his intuition that the Netherlands side was up to something.
Gen. Soedirman on that day of infamy, still recovering from a lung operation, rose from his sickbed and went to the Presidential Palace. On that particular day he showed so impressively his fine qualities as a patriot and a military leader. The Indonesian government at that time was engaged in serious negotiations with the Netherlands on finding a peaceful solution to the Netherlands-Indonesia conflict, assisted by the United Nations Commission for Indonesia.
Vice president Mohammad Hatta, who was also prime minister and minister of defense, as leader of the Indonesian delegation was holding talks with members of the United Nations Committee in Kaliurang, a mountain resort north of Yogyakarta. He had breakfast with Thomas Critchley, the Australian member of the UN mediation committee when the Netherlands Air Force was strafing Yogyakarta to prepare the landing of the paratroops. Mohammad Hatta rushed to the Presidential Palace in Yogyakarta in order to chair an emergency cabinet meeting. It was decided that president Sukarno, vice president Mohammad Hatta and other government leaders would remain in Yogyakarta and let themselves be detained by the invading Netherlands military forces.
When a weakened Gen. Soedirman arrived at the palace and president Sukarno tried to persuade him to remain with him so that he could obtain medical treatment from the Netherlands military doctors, it was hard to describe Gen. Soedirman's bewilderment. It was already difficult for Gen. Soedirman to comprehend the logic of the political decision taken by the cabinet to remain in town instead of leaving Yogyakarta in order to wage a guerrilla war, as was stressed before in several inflammatory speeches. It was all the more unfathomable to hear the president of the Republic of Indonesia, who installed him as Supreme Commander, try to persuade him in what amounted to personal surrender. I heard this story from the late T.B. Simatupang who was present at the Presidential Palace on Dec. 19, 1948.
Quietly the military leaders, the seriously ill Gen. Soedirman and all the military personnel, with a few exceptions, left Yogyakarta to wage a guerrilla war as previously planned. They were also joined by the civil service, teachers, doctors, nurses and students, in short, citizens of all walks of life, which made the resistance against the invasion a true people's war.
The top leaders of the Republic, however, remained in town based on a political decision as a consequence of their calculations of international political reactions, which would be favorable to the Republic of Indonesia, responding to the blatant military aggression waged by the Netherlands about one week before Christmas.
The sorrow that had seized the officers, soldiers and civilians in leaving the Republic's capital, but at the same time their determination to overcome the immediate disaster, was aptly described by Col. T.B. Simatupang in his memoirs. He jotted down his thoughts and inner feelings as he walked towards the countryside:
"Yogyakarta has fallen. The President, the Vice President, and our other top leaders have been captured. But is this the end of our Republic? There's a writer (Machiavelli, if I'm not mistaken) who once said that the last fortress of a state existed in the heart of its soldiers. Whether or not our Republic will live or die now, mainly depends indeed on the question of whether or not it is still alive in the hearts of the officers, non-commissioned officers, and soldiers of the Indonesian National Army. The answer to this question will be given by developments in the days and weeks to come."
Lt. Gen. Tjokropranolo's story is mainly centered on what happened during the months after Gen. Soedirman left Yogyakarta on Dec. 19, 1948, until he entered the capital on July 10 the following year. It is a moving story of a military leader who led his army while carried around on a chair and took his oath of office very seriously ("determined to defend the sovereignty and independence of the Republic of Indonesia until the last drop of his blood"). It is not only heroism in the classical sense of the word that is so prominent throughout Tjokropranolo's book, but also that strong sense of unity among Indonesians, so important for a nation inhabiting the largest archipelagic state in the world, consisting of a great number of ethnic groupings. I am referring to the happenings in Yogyakarta during the second week of July 1949. The Netherlands military forces had vacated the Residency of Yogyakarta which covered the Yogyakarta Sultanate. The top leaders of the Republic (president Sukarno, vice president Mohammad Hatta and others) were released from the detention camp on the island of Bangka, off Sumatra, and were enthusiastically welcomed when they arrived in Yogyakarta on July 6, 1949.
It was the "diplomasi", as an Indonesian would say at the time, the diplomatic efforts waged at the United Nations in Paris, New York, New Delhi and Cairo that resulted in increasing international pressure on the Netherlands to cease their aggression and negotiate with the Indonesian Republic. But could diplomasi be effective if the people's war -- primarily waged in Java and Sumatra -- did not increasingly show effective results based on a strategy of attrition, since it was untenable for the Netherlands to maintain such a long and undefined front line.
The national leaders were back in Yogyakarta but Gen. Soedirman, the embodiment of the people's war, resting south of Yogyakarta, hesitated to enter the city. He was still suspicious of the opponent's motivation, that the Netherlands would launch another lightning attack and capture him inside Yogyakarta. But the Yogyakarta area commander, Lt. Col. Soeharto (now the President of the Republic of Indonesia) came to see Gen. Soedirman on July 9, and gave his Supreme Commander a full briefing on the current politico-military situation in Yogyakarta. The following day, Col. T.B. Simatupang, the deputy chief of staff, came to fetch Gen. Soedirman accompanied by another senior officer and together they rode in a car towards Yogyakarta. Col. Simatupang's overriding concern at that time was the estrangement, as if calling it a split was too serious, between the national political leadership and the guerrilla war leadership. He persuaded Gen. Soedirman to meet with president Sukarno and vice president Mohammad Hatta before he went to inspect the parade and accept the honors of his military units that had entered Yogyakarta after waging a successful guerrilla war. For Col. Simatupang, it was important that the outside world -- as represented by UN diplomats, military observers and foreign correspondents that were gathering in Yogyakarta for the historic events -- did not get the impression that a split existed within the ranks of the Republic. If and when Gen. Soedirman refused to see the Republic's top leadership "the Americans could well make Sukarno their Bao Dai if we don't manage to re-establish our overall unity at that crucial time", Simatupang told me.
Using some tactful phrasing, it was stressed that Gen. Soedirman's visit at the Presidential Palace on the afternoon of July 19, 1949 was not a case of a military commander reporting to the Republic's leadership, but it was a stop-over (an incomplete translation of the Javanese word mampir). Thus, a delicate situation was circumvented, that the highest military officer who, although severely ill, was determined to uphold his oath never to surrender to the enemy, had to report to the Republic's top leaders, who based on whatever complicated political calculations allowed themselves to be detained by the enemy. On entering the palace, Gen. Soedirman was unable to control his pent-up emotion that he felt almost seven months ago when the Netherlands paratroops were approaching Yogyakarta. He embraced president Sukarno and vice president Mohammad Hatta respectively and laid his head on their shoulders. The photographers present recorded this historic event. Thus, to international observers, the perception that the unity of the Republic's overall leadership was restored. Effective unity, however, and achieving a sense of common purpose required some time.
The unavoidable, intense and differing experiences that took place during the crucial seven months of war and diplomacy in 1949 were later reflected during the early 1950s in the political dynamics occurring in Jakarta which again became the capital in 1950. However, Gen. Soedirman was saved from the complexities caused by the increasing tension between president Sukarno and the leadership of the Indonesian military in the early 1950s, which eventually erupted in a confrontation that was popularly referred to as the "Seventeen October Affair (1952)". Gen. Soedirman passed away in Magelang on Jan. 29, 1950. Netherlands senior military officers were present during the simple but moving ceremony of his funeral.
My hope is that the book on Soedirman, written by someone so close to him and translated into English with deep sensitivity by a dedicated student of Indonesian politico-military history, Wing Commander Ian MacFarling, will help readers comprehend and appreciate the committed life of a true hero of the Indonesian revolution. And if readers thereby obtain a glimpse of the complexity of the Indonesian political culture which is still imbued by the Soedirman spirit, though perhaps not always obvious, then the book would have achieved its intended purpose.
The sight along Jl. Jenderal Sudirman these days is most probably a succinct snapshot of Indonesia's efforts to telescope the formation process of modern history. The impressive, gleaming office towers, the five-star hotels, the shopping centers and international airline offices indicate Indonesia's determination to be a significant part of global economy.
At the same time, however, the name Jl. Jenderal Sudirman reflects Indonesia's determination to achieve the status of a respected member of the international world, through self sacrifice, hard work, the refusal to accept defeat and an attitude of humility.
The rough balance between those two stances: on the one hand, the profit making motive by implementing the principle of cost efficiency and aggressive marketing inherent in the practices of modern corporations. When on the other hand, to remain faithful to the Soedirman spirit and encapsulate Indonesia's current social political situation.
Can we achieve such a rough balance which will make it possible for Indonesia to enter the 21st century as a strong, prosperous, democratic and just society? To rephrase the late T.B. Simatupang: "The answer to this question will be given by the developments in years to come."
Such were my thoughts when the traffic was moving again along Jl. Jenderal Sudirman.
Sabam Siagian was The Jakarta Post's first chief editor (1983- 1991) and appointed as ambassador to Australia from July 1991 to July 1995. He is currently a member of Post's Board of Directors.
Window: Gen. Soedirman was saved from the complexities caused by the increasing tension between president Sukarno and the leadership of the Indonesian military in the early 1950s.