THE Bali bombing, the worst
slaughter of Australians since World War II, has left a strange legacy a decade
later -- a deep debt to Indonesia's counter-terrorism success, the elevation of
Bali as an Australian sacred site and a gulf still separating the peoples of
these two democracies.
The tragedy at Bali brought
Australia and Indonesia closer together in pursuit of a common foe, the
Islamist terrorist outfit Jemaah Islamiah, which killed 88 Australians and 38
Indonesians in a total death toll of 202. It was Indonesia's worst terrorist event.
The crisis provoked magnificent
co-operation between police authorities. Yet the broader Australian-Indonesian
partnership, so essential for both nations, remains far short of what is
necessary.
Bali touched the Australian soul. It
became a variation on our narrative from Gallipoli to Kokoda: young adventurers
going abroad and finding violence. This time they were holidaymakers, not
soldiers. Australian tourists never suspected that Bali could erupt in a new
conflict where the innocent were the targets.
The October 12, 2002, attack
adjacent to Paddy's Bar and the Sari Club ushered in a disturbing period where
Westerners were attacked by JI terrorists each year, including at the Marriott
Hotel in Jakarta, the Australian embassy (2004) and a second Bali bombing
(2005).
Australia's response to the Bali
attacks brought forth its better qualities. Critically, Australians did not
blame the Indonesian nation whose citizens were also victims. The Anzac spirit
was evident -- compassion in death, unity in tragedy, resolution in the face of
intimidation. It was one of John Howard's finest hours as prime minister.
Howard travelled to Bali, comforted
the grieving but legitimised their anger. "We'll get the bastards"
was his private pledge to weeping families. Later at the Parliament House
memorial service, conspicuously a religious service, Howard said Australians
were "as tough as tungsten" but also "a soft and loving people
who will wrap our arms around those who have lost so much".
It was an attack on Australians
(known to frequent the Sari Club) but not our homeland. This was not a repeat
of the 9/11 attack on the US the previous year. Howard, unlike George W. Bush,
did not demonise or divide. He knew what the national interest required --
reaching out to Indonesia in collaboration.
Explaining his response to this
writer, Howard said "reason controls anger" and that it would be a
mistake to "give the impression of having lost control of your
reason".
A decade later, however, the power
of reason remains limited in grasping the meaning and aftermath of the Bali
bombing.
It is a shocking truth that
Australians are largely ignorant of the fate of the Bali murderers. The 2012
Lowy Institute poll showed that 83 per cent of the public felt the Bali bombers
have either not been brought to justice "at all" (22 per cent) or
were only "partly" brought to justice (61 per cent). Only a tiny
portion, 11 per cent, said justice had been "fully" delivered.
Australian National University
Indonesia expert Greg Fealy says: "All of the main participants have
either been arrested and brought to trial or been killed. There is no excuse
for Australians not knowing what has happened."
Indeed. Yet Australians have been
deluded and confused about Indonesia for the past half century. Is it any
surprise we are deluded about whether justice has been delivered to the Bali
bombers?
"Indonesia's counter-terrorism
effort was remarkably successful," Fealy tells Inquirer. "JI as a
terrorist organisation has been largely destroyed. At the time of the bombing,
I don't think anybody would have predicted the level of success that has been
achieved. I think over the decade about 750 people have been apprehended.
"The depth of the relationship
between the Australian Federal Police and their Indonesian counterparts has
been unprecedented. This has been an important part of the story."
This was an outstanding example of a
mutual crisis bringing Australia and Indonesia closer together. Don't think it
was inevitable given the huge tensions over East Timor three years earlier.
Many things could have gone wrong. Howard says political ties at that time were
"quite cool".
But Howard immediately spoke to then
president Megawati Sukarnoputri and they agreed on a strategy of co-operation.
The pivotal factor, however, lay in
the close ties the AFP had built with Indonesia in the years before the bombing
and the personal relationship between AFP chief Mick Keelty and the Indonesian
officer, I Made Mangku Pastika, appointed to lead the inquiry into the attack.
From the start Keelty had AFP
specialists on the ground amid the chaos of burned and mutilated bodies. Howard
said it was the "extraordinary relationship" between the two police
forces "which resulted in the capture and later conviction" of the
planners and perpetrators.
The moral is that investment in
institutional and personal ties is crucial in the Australia-Indonesia
connection. This must be an enhanced national priority.
But Bali had another significance --
it brought then security affairs minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, a future
president, into play, where he was dealing with a range of Australians: Howard,
Keelty, foreign minister Alexander Downer and ASIO chief Dennis Richardson.
"This began our long involvement with Yudhoyono and it contributed to his
pro-Australian outlook," Howard tells Inquirer.
For years virtually every Indonesian
operation against JI had an Australian police or intelligence role in the
equation. The leading bombers were executed by firing squad. Our intelligence
agencies, ASIS and ASIO, deepened their links with Jakarta.
"This co-operation put more
ballast into our ties when relations had been in a bad space after East
Timor," Peter Jennings, head of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute
tells Inquirer. "The legacy of the bombing drove this vital co-operation
when there were so many other points of difference: drug mules, asylum-seekers
and live-cattle exports."
The real legacy, however, is mixed.
On the negative side Indonesia had two great burdens -- in the 1990s it was
exposed by the East Asia financial crisis as an unreliable economy and in the
next decade it was exposed as having an Islamic terrorist problem. It was a
crippling double burden.
Australian business turned away from
Indonesia. Then Islam emerged as a new cultural dividing line. "After Bali
the travel warnings about Indonesia made it almost impossible for schools and
universities to send students," Fealy says. "The warnings were
retained for too long. The focus on Indonesian studies was damaged."
Indonesian language study entered a sharp decline in Australia. Relations
became too dependent on government-to-government ties though, fortunately, this
was a good news story.
In 2004 Yudhoyono became President.
In a gesture of respect, Howard invited himself to the inauguration. A few
months later more than 300,000 Indonesians were killed in the Boxing Day
tsunami and Australia offered a $1 billion aid package, the largest in its
history. In 2006 a new agreement on security, the Lombok Treaty, was concluded.
In 2009 Yudhoyono was re-elected and in 2010 he became the first Indonesian
President to address the Australian parliament.
Each of these events was a
milestone. Yudhoyono offered immense hope -- saying that Indonesia now saw
Australia in a different way -- yet the shadow remained. In a speech of
remarkable honesty Yudhoyono appealed to both nations to "expunge these
preposterous mental caricatures" of each other. He meant those Australians
who still saw Indonesia as "a military dictatorship or hotbed of Islamic
extremism" or nothing beyond "a beach playground with coconut
trees" and, on the other hand, those Indonesians who were
"Australiaphobic".
The Gillard government says the
Australia-Indonesian relationship has never been stronger. This is a half-truth.
There is goodwill, much dialogue and strong government-to-government contact.
"But there is a hollowness in
the relationship," Fealy says. "We don't have ministers who enjoy
close personal ties, who have a genuine interest in Indonesia, unlike 20 years
ago."
Among the public, suspicion of
Indonesia is still deep. Who is the Indonesian with the most recognisable face
in this country over the past decade? It is not Yudhoyono but that prophet of
violence and JI's spiritual leader, Abu Bakar Bashir, who has been periodically
arrested and is now imprisoned.
The 2012 Lowy Institute poll
measuring public warmth towards other nations had New Zealand top at 85 degrees
with Japan at 70, South Korea 61, China 59, India 58 and Indonesia lagging at
54 (up from 50 back in 2006). At least this year it was ahead of Burma on 50
degrees. So we are more warmly disposed to authoritarian China than democratic
Indonesia.
Yet Indonesia is the world's third
largest democracy. Its transition from autocracy to democracy is probably
unrivalled in any other Islamic nation. One suspects with the rise of China
that Indonesia has less profile in Australia. This is bad news. It recycles an
old Australian prejudice: you focus on Indonesia when things go wrong. It is
entrenched in Australia's media culture. In reality, Indonesia has been a good
news story for some time -- a revived economy, a growing democracy, a
pro-Australian President. And you can almost predict the next trap.
"It has been a number of years
since the last serious terrorist attack," Jennings says. "We need to
avoid thinking terrorism was last decade's problem. The risk is people will
believe the terrorism problem has been solved."
It is diminished but still exists.
The good news in terms of the global struggle against violent jihad is that the
most progress has been made in Southeast Asia, our own region. The bombing fed
directly into Howard as a national security prime minister. He orchestrated the
Bali response and it was superior to his 9/11 response that led to the Iraq
war.
Interviewed yesterday, Howard sees
three overarching legacies -- the imperative to be tougher on terrorism and
Islamic extremism; strong domestic national security laws that enjoy public
support; and much closer ties with Jakarta.
The legacies of 9/11 and Bali were
partly in contradiction. The former drove our roles in the Iraq and Afghanistan
wars. This investment, notably in Afghanistan, has diminished the resources and
energy devoted to the immediate region. Jennings says these wars have
"upset and disrupted" our priorities.
It is time to reinvest in the
region. That means, above all, seeking a true strategic partnership with
Indonesia.by: Paul Kelly, Editor-at-Large From: The Australian
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