Indonesia S Secret War

This book describes the historical development of the Irian Jaya guerrilla struggle for independence from Indonesia. The OPM, Organisasi Papua Merdeka, has been fighting Indonesian rule in West New Guinea since 1969; the military presence there was established in 1962. The author believes that the great majority of West Papuans support the OPM. The Indonesian Transmigration programme has forcible alienated clan land and sponsored settlers from Java. As a result of this policy 10,000 Papuans fled Irian Jaya in mid-1984 to seek safety in Papua New Guinea. The exodus was more than 1 per cent of the indigenous population. The OPM has almost no foreign allies. Both Papua New Guinea and Australia emphasize that Irian Jaya is part of Indonesia and thus an internal matter. The author predicts that greater autonomy for Irian Jaya would be more likely to result from political pressure on Jakarta than from a military victory by OPM.

An eye-opening, firsthand account of Indonesia’s campaign of terror in Aceh. This is the latest from acclaimed journalist John Martinkus, whose first book, A Dirty Little War, told the definitive story of East Timor's passage to independence. In this vivid, eye-witness account, Martinkus lifts the lid on the brutal, undeclared war in Aceh. Like East Timor, Aceh wants independence but it is paying a terrible price, and since September 11 things have got much worse. This book gets inside a conflict that is happening on Australia's doorstep – but no one seems to care.

The 'Confrontation' between Malaysia and Indonesia in Bornew (January 20, 2006), the war against Indonesian raids across a 900-mile border in some of the world's worst jungle terrain, eventually involved nearly 20,000 British and Commonwealth troops, with air and naval support; and yet, by mutual consent, it was astonishingly little reported at the time. This 'secret war' saw the perfection of SAS jungle tactics; a Parachute Regiment action described as 'a second Rorke's Drift'; and audacious secret missions deep inside enemy territory, including the award to a Gurkha soldier of the British Army's only 'living VC' for 40 years.

This book examines the role of the international community in the handover of the Dutch colony of West Papua/Irian Jaya to Indonesia in the 1960s and questions whether or not the West Papuan people ever genuinely exercised the right to self-determination guaranteed to them in the UN-brokered Dutch/Indonesian agreement of 1962. Indonesian, Dutch, US, Soviet, Australian and British involvement is discussed, but particular emphasis is given to the central part played by the United Nations in the implementation of this agreement. As guarantor, the UN temporarily took over the territory's administration from the Dutch before transferring control to Indonesia in 1963. After five years of Indonesian rule, a UN team returned to West Papua to monitor and endorse a controversial act of self-determination that resulted in a unanimous vote by 1022 Papuan 'representatives' to reject independence. Despite this, the issue is still very much alive today as a crisis-hit Indonesia faces continued armed rebellion and growing calls for freedom in West Papua.

From 1963 to 1966 Britain waged a secret war to keep the Federation of Malaysia free from domination by Soekarno's Indonesia and Chinese Communists. At the forefront of this campaign were the men of the Special Air Service. Working in four-man patrols, they befriended the former head-hunting border tribes and even trained some of them as an irregular military force. As the conflict continued, they went beyond the borders into Indonesia, where they tracked down enemy camps, destroyed supply routes and attacked the soldiers in the riverboats. By talking to those who were there, Peter Dickens reveals what it was really like to fight deep in the jungles of Borneo. He also captures the bravery and relentless pursuit of excellence that make the SAS the elite and prestigious regiment that it is.

The confrontation with Indonesia cut to the heart of Britain's desire to retain global power status in the 1960s and was central to decolonisation and British defence policy across South-East Asia. Factors such as the need to maintain a military base in Singapore drove strategy and this confrontation became a major commitment - close at times to escalating into full-scale regional war. However, 'the Confrontation' was not recorded as a conflict of this scale, and Britain was cast into a passive and defensive role. Here, David Easter reveals a radically different view, persuasively making the case that Britain waged a secret and aggressive war against President Sukarno's Indonesia. It was the covert nature of operations and the deliberate decision of British policy-makers to keep the full extent of this conflict away from public scrutiny that has allowed it to be overshadowed in the annals of history.

The 1998 Reform has paved ways for the reconfiguration and improvement of Indonesia's institutions to support economic growth. For the last 20 years, however, indonesia is facing the challenges of uncontainable urbanization and rising inequality. During the period 2008-2015, Indonesia's economy grew by more than 4 percent annually, the highest steady rate in Southeast Asia. Indonesia is now transitioning from a lower-middle income country to an upper-middle level one. Meanwhile, Indonesia faces a number of challengesto strengthen its democratic institutions. This book brings together 12 original chapters to discuss the achievements and challenges of Indonesia's transformation after 1998. it exa mines how state institutions and civil society manage the complexities of indonesia's transformations to develop common ground upon which to reach a national consensus.