By Victor M. Fic
Foreword by John O. Sutter
This volume describes the most serious threat to the pluralistic nature of the Indonesian society and its secular government posed by an attempt of the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI) to seize power on October 1, 1965 with the complicity of President Sukarno -- "father" of the republic turned dictator -- and collusion of the People's Republic of China. While the army under General Suharto thwarted the attempt, had the coup succeeded an intensive class warfare would likely have destroyed the political parties, religious organizations, and entire social classes committed to the preservation of the multifaceted pluralism in the country.
This book deals with the establishment of the Biro Chusus by PKI Chairman D.N. Aidit in 1964, and the methods used by its director Sjam and his staff to penetrate the armed forces and recruit Air Marshal Omar Dani, Generals Pranoto and Supardjo, Colonels Untung and Latief and a score of other officers for the promotion of the PKI's objectives. The study then discusses the collapse of Sukarno on 4 August 1965 because of kidney failure and his order to Untung to purge the Army's top command to preclude its political ascendancy should the attack leave him incapacitated. Meetings of PKI's Executive Committee in the middle of August are documented showing how the committee authorized Aidit and the Politbiro to use Untung and his associates to carry out the putsch -- the destruction of the top generals -- followed by the PKI's assumption of power.
Professor Fic’s well-documented opus, published 40 years after the event, is especially merited, for it overcomes a revisionist version based on limited information that had been broadly accepted until now.
$30 (including shipping and handling), 397 pages, soft cover. Published by Yayasan Obor Indonesia, Jakarta, 2005. (Also available in Indonesian translation.)
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