ETLJB 09 October 2012 - In Volume 7 Issue 2 (September
2012), Jessica N Trisko, who is an Assistant Professor in Political Science at
the University of Western Ontario and a former Visiting Fellow with the Program
on Order, Conflict and Violence at Yale University (2010-2012) wrote a review
of lawyer Geoffrey Robison's book, "If You Leave Us Here We Will
Die": How Genocide Was Stopped in East Timor.
In her review, Trisko writes: "The December 1975
invasion of East Timor by Indonesia occurred in the context of a Timorese civil
war that pitted multiple political factions against one another, and which
generated tens of thousands of refugees."
It is not immediately clear whether this is a reference to
Mr Robinson's observations in his book or her own statement.
In any event, Mrs. Shirley Shackleton takes objection to
this statement as an inaccurate description of the actual historical fact.
Shackleton notes that "Geoffrey Robinson’s excellent
book ‘If You Leave us Here we Will Die,' provides a typical example of the
power wielded by General Suharto and his Western Public Relations advisor’s and
the complicity of Western governments regarding the so-called annexation of
East Timor, which should read: bloody,
ruthless land grab, for if you intend to seize the land and all that exists on
that land, you will gain 100% profit. And the record as a result of that
propaganda will be deeply flawed."
In response to the assertion that the Indonesian invasion
occurred in the context of Timorese civil war, Shackleton writes:
"In Portuguese Timor three political parties had
formed: União Democrática Timorense (Timorese Democratic Union or UDT), largely
made up of conservatives who had prospered under Portuguese rule; Associação
Popular Democrática Timorense (or Apodeti), originally called the Association
for the Integration of Timor into Indonesia, but because of adverse public
reaction, it was swiftly renamed the Timorese Popular Democratic Association;
and Frente Revolucionária de Timor-Leste Independente (Revolutionary Front of
Independent East Timor or Fretilin), the political party with the majority of
supporters.
The differences between the political parties were minor
until a covert Indonesian military organisation, Operasi Komodo (named after
the Komodo dragon), was established to destabilise Portuguese Timor.
Strategies employed by the organisation included
transmissions from a propaganda radio station into East and West Timor;
hit-and-run attacks against the shared border designed to convince the western
Timorese that their eastern brothers were a threat and vice versa; and
Indonesian spies infiltrating businesses in Dili who presented gifts with ‘no
strings attached’ to liurais and individual church leaders to convince them of
President Suharto’s goodwill.
Fretilin’s stated aims, meanwhile, were based on the
universal doctrines of socialism and democracy, including the right to
independence with a program of progressive autonomy to be overseen by the
Portuguese. Fretilin leaders told Australian officials on a fact-finding
mission that they ‘would need a lengthy timeframe of about eight to ten years
in order to establish an efficient political and economic infrastructure’.
Propaganda painted the Fretilin political party as a front
for communism. Even today certain apologists assert that the Timorese were
either communists or were about to become communists! Remarks by Indonesian Generals Ali Murtopo and
Yoga Sugama to US ambassador David Newsom would eventually be revealed as a
strategy of disinformation carefully designed to smooth the way for an
invasion. The Portuguese half of the island was rife with rumours; people lived
in dread, not knowing whom to trust. Some Timorese believed that the Indonesian
government intended to improve their lives, but the majority favoured home
rule.
The lead-up to the so-called a civil war remains as poorly
understood today as it was in 1975. Some ‘experts’ bet a bob each way by
referring to a civil war and the UDT Coup in the same breath. I intend to call
proceedings in Dili what they were – a coup that failed. The term ‘civil war’
was and is still being used to provide justification for the Indonesian
invasion and subsequent genocide.
On 11 August 1975, the UDT political party seized control of
the airport and the radio station in the capital, Dili, they arrested the
police chief and seized the water purification plant and the Marconi
Communications Centre, then arrested the leaders of the Fretilin political
party. Portuguese officials, believing BAKIN (Indonesian intelligence agency)
propaganda that Fretilin was planning to overthrow the Portuguese government,
began to quit the country. UDT officials were said to be plotting to arrest
their own leaders and senior members of UDT were believed to be in
Indonesian-controlled Western Timor, conspiring with Javanese generals. The
Portuguese governor called an emergency meeting and issued instructions to all
Portuguese officials and Portuguese military to stand aloof from both UDT, and
Fretilin. Some Portuguese military officers were suspected of secretly
supporting UDT and at one time a small contingent from the Portuguese garrison
marched from Baucau to take control of Dili.
Confusion was as widespread as it is in any country
undergoing bewildering threats and changes. Loss of confidence and suspicion
was skilfully manipulated to appear as if the country was on the edge of a
civil war and Fretilin was cast as the guilty party.
Eleven days after UDT tried to seize control, the fighting
arm of Fretilin, known by the acronym Falintil, rallied, put down the attempted
coup and restored the peace.
A coup that fails within eleven days with less than 1,500
deaths cannot be construed to be a civil war. If anyone wants to contest this
let them give an example that has occurred under the same conditions anywhere
in the world.
As to the claim that tens of thousands of Timorese fled
across the border in August 1975 (in respect of which Trisko cites the
Indonesian Department of Information reference "The Question of Portuguese
Timor" 1971), the figure is merely part of the Indonesian propaganda at
that time. Think about it. Imagine the terror no matter what an out-break of
hostility is called when people are killed. Very few UDT members had any idea
of what their leaders were attempting and when they heard reports from western
radio stations describing the coup as a civil war they believed them.
Two days after Fretilin declared East Timor an independent
nation on 29 November 1975, a bevy of Timorese led by João Tavares, the
self-styled Integration fighter, were flown to Bali. At the Bali Beach Hotel,
one day after Timor’s declaration of independence, four representatives from
UDT, Apodeti and two other minor political parties – KOTA and Partido
Trabalhista – signed a document declaring that the majority of Timorese desired
integration with Indonesia. (Quoted in Antonio Barbedo de Magalhaes’s East Timor, A People
Shattered By Lies and Silence.)
Any document prepared by a foreign power and signed by
Timorese without official status on foreign soil could not be said to represent
the will of the majority, yet judicial validity was claimed because the document
was grandly titled The Balibó Declaration. Appealing to the criminal minds of
the collaborators and those who were financially coerced to use this deception,
the perpetrators laughed and toasted each other as two letters were added to
transform Bali into Balibó.
However, two months after Falintil put down the coup and
four months before the invasion took place, ‘The liurai of Atsabe, Guilherme
Gonçalves’s sons did commit treason. José and Thomas led Indonesian battalions
and Team Susi into East Timor via Balibó in a pre-invasion raid designed to
terrify the Timorese into submitting to Indonesian rule without a fight.
It is correct to
report that ‘The majority of UN members refused to provide de jure recognition
of East Timor’s integration after an April 1976 UN Security Council resolution
failed to bring about Indonesia’s withdrawal. And that was a miracle which
lasted for the 24 years of the brutal occupation of East Timor by the colonial
power-mongers of Indonesia.
In another part of Trisko's review, she writes: ‘Robinson
does, however, provide substantial evidence that East Timor’s Tetum-speaking
Catholics were indelibly scarred by the Indonesian occupation.’
In this regard, Shackleton responds:
"Initially all Timorese, whatever their religion were
not just ‘scarred’ but were liable to be shot for not obeying an order spoken
in Indonesian which they could hardly be expected to understand. They were shot
for speaking their own languages by a military oligarchy that operated in a
climate of impunity guaranteeing that military perpetrators were beyond the
reach of the law.
In the pre-invasion society in order to climb the social
ladder Timorese had to speak fluent Portuguese and convert to Catholicism.
Despite this, animism persisted and still exists in Timorese society today.
After the invasion Timorese priests bravely stood their
ground by refusing to co-operate with Suharto’s attempt to conduct the Mass in
Indonesian. Though there was nothing in writing, Timorese were routinely shot
for speaking their own languages, the lingua franca, Tetum and their dialects.
The one place Timorese could hear their own language spoken was in the Catholic
Church. This and the fidelity of the Timorese priests led to huge increases in
attendance at church services and in time, led some foreign priests to take up
the cause of freedom."
In conclusion, Shackleton expresses her thanks "to all
who care enough to have educated themselves regarding the lies and who still
take the time to correct them."
Shirley Shackleton is the author of the Walkley Award
winning history, The Circle of Silence.......a personal testimony before,
during and after Balibó.
ETLJB would like to thank Mrs Shackleton for her permission
to publish her remarks here.
Warren L. Wright BA LLB
Solicitor & Barrister
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