INDONESIA: UN TRAGEDY
KIHSS, PETER
Indonesia: UN Tragedy By Peter Kihss AS we go to press, reports state that the Dutch and the Indonesian!, under UN auspices, have reached agreement ending the war and /permitting...
...FAILURE...
...12, it had doubted that "even the present unsatisfactory level of truce enforcement" could be maintained, and warned that "widespread hostilities" might occur on further Dutch moves for an interim government without Indonesian Republican cooperation...
...On Feb...
...27 and on Jan...
...Military action has not solved the Indonesian problem, nor will it...
...A U.N...
...So they have sacrificed moral strength, notably in Asia...
...24 the Council voted for a cease-fife and release of political prisoners...
...This dramatic confirmation of the correctness of the conclusions drawn by Peter Kihss below lends hie article—written long before the agreement was announced—an air of timely prophecy...
...It finds no legitimate basis on which a parly could here foresake the forum of negotiations for that of armed force...
...Indonesia: UN Tragedy By Peter Kihss AS we go to press, reports state that the Dutch and the Indonesian!, under UN auspices, have reached agreement ending the war and /permitting re-establishment of the Republican government...
...action they had benefited by evacuation of 29,224 Republican troops from behind their lines...
...champions, left Paris, and so did the Philippines, which had won the right to share in Council deliberations on Indonesia...
...In a supplementary report Dec...
...At dawn, on Sunday, Dec...
...heartache...
...17 they voted themselves a Christmas adjournment in Paris...
...But in the past, the Dutch had accepted U.N...
...A U.N...
...But Council delegates were weary, and on Dec...
...But negotiation needs an atmosphere of peace...
...solutions- Since December, for instance, the regional Organisation of American States has quelled a Costa-Rican-Nicaraguan incident, in which Oosta Rica complained oi 1.000 invaders...
...made up of Belgium, Australia and United States representatives, all from colonial powers, unanimously reported Dec...
...The same day, a Soviet resolution calling for Dutch withdrawal failed—the United States, among others, abstained...
...2. Infiltration—I1,000, 15,000 or 20,000 Republican troops, they variously said, had filtered behind their lines...
...On Jan...
...In part, it has been a propaganda joust...
...reliance on words' In part, the East-West split has prevented strong U.N...
...19, Dutch land, sea and air forces struck...
...2. The U.N...
...It never supplied a U.N...
...report of January 24 said it had meant that: "until now, in fact, serious disorders have been created...
...On Dec...
...More than two months after its start, a March 1 U.N...
...If a withdrawal proposal ever had merit, the merit didn't change with authorship...
...Prime Minister Amir Sjarifoeddin had resigned- and turned against the January, 1948, Renville agreement he had signed...
...3. Perhaps more hope may stem from regional organisation and leadership in Southeast Asia...
...26: "With truce violations as with political negotiations, the committee iinds that its facilities for adjustment and reconciliation have not been exhausted, much less effectively utilised...
...28, it called for a cease-fire and prisoner release, adding a time-table for an interim government by Match 15...
...Mere recently, triumphal Israel, disregarding Security Council cease-fires, drove on to finish up military occupation of the Southern Negeb...
...WHY THIS U.N...
...it has smoothed over a Haitian-Dominican furore, in which Haiti had charged "moral aggression," without even need of appeal to U.N...
...economic resolutions...
...who wish and merit a just role...
...That it was democratic Holland which took that course makes it no better...
...It ignored the deadlock dating from a June Dutch walkout over American-Australian proposals...
...Peter Kibes, the well-known New York Herald-Tribune reporter.' wae formerly that paper's UN correspondent...
...5. Responsibility to promote wishes of the Federal states, claimed to represent two-thirds of the 76,000,000 indies people...
...Elsewhere, when traffic cops' orders are flouted, men find themselves fined or in jail...
...road is a good road, but nations must make up their minds to travel it, and to fulfill the charted course, even if sometimes it requires sanctions...
...WHAT NEXT...
...On March 23, it had retreated to approving a resolution for a "preliminary" Dutch-Indonesian conference...
...action...
...The Indonesian case has led nineteen nations into New Delhi conferences which may yet evolve into a group keeping active, rather iban academic, watch over such developments and pressing for U.N...
...background against which the December 19th Dutch police action began...
...The Assembly can find that the Security Council ignored the rise of Dutch complaints and the warnings of the Republic and its own good offices committee...
...At 9:45 p. m. that night in Batavia, Ji...
...report said "active warfare, both guerrilla and on a more generally organized basis, is continuing to a variable extent in different areas...
...On Dec...
...no good to sit by and wring its hands, nor has it done good for anyone else...
...22 reported it was "not aware of any circumstances connected with the concentration of Republican forces or the maneuvers of the Republican Army which should have given rise to apprehensions and alarm, leading to precipitate action on the part of the Netherlands...
...In the last analysis, Indonesians them* selves—Republicans and Federalists-* must work out their future, in co* operation preferably with the Dutch...
...It has done U.N...
...Committee of Good Offices, in a fourth interim report, had reminded the Council that Dutch-Indonesian negotiations under its auspices had been broken down since the end of May...
...Cochran, American member of the good offices committee, received a Dutch ultimatum for transmission to the Republic, with a 10 a. m., deadline for acceptance...
...Such a force has long been envisaged by Charter Article 43, and might have been set up on even the minimum Soviet proposals for an overall dozen divisions and 1,200 planes, or as a specific force for a specific mission...
...28, similar Ukrainian and Soviet proposals again failed—and the United States abstained...
...1, 1947...
...But the Republicans contended these were men rejoining their families, or local dissidents erupting against long delays in political settlement...
...And secondly, resolutions are no substitute for resoluteness, and too long has the United Nations remained unready to back up collective decisions with deeds...
...THE WORLD TOWN MEETING the General Assembly of the United Nations—has agreed to debate the case of Indonesia...
...And yet their own economic statements indicated that exports from Dutch-held areas nearly tripled in 1948, to $350,000,000...
...In fact, the good offices group Dec...
...27, it again voted for a prisoner release, this time with a report due in twenty-four hours...
...3. Fear of Jan...
...Western nations have been loath to invoke sanctions against the Dutch, preferring Western unity in the face of anticipated'military menace from Eastern Europe...
...It relied too much on words...
...decision, be ft a good judgment or bad...
...But the Republic was beset by serious economic troubles, in part due to Dutch trade restrictions, according to U.N...
...political action on anything of late...
...In Indonesia, the U.N...
...On Dec...
...Politically, it had at least just succeeded in stifling a revolt led by the Communist, Musso...
...THE DUTCH HAD ARGUMENTSi 1. Terrorism—But this, they said, was in Dutch-held areas, and now they proposed spreading their army even more thinly over more area...
...At 11:30 p. m. next night, he received Netherlands' notice that the truce agreement would be ended—one half hour later...
...On Dec...
...18 lines polled five votes, with seven needed—the Soviet Union abstained...
...It ignored non-compliance with U.N...
...5. But this might have been submitted for U.N...
...16, it relaxed the time-table...
...6. Domestic Dutch jurisdiction...
...Why this U.N...
...24, an American resolution calling on the "parties" to withdraw to Dec...
...1 uprising—based for instance, on Republican Army orders assertedly captured Nov...
...Whet was the U.N...
...Merle...
...On Dec...
...It might well ponder it as a tragedy, from which two' morals may be derived for the future of the whole world organisation: First, developing trouble is like a weed—it flourishes when ignored...
...Those who sit and wring their hands may find blood upon those hands...
...But Cabinets of East Indonesia and Borneo resigned upon outbreak of the police action...
...headache became a U.N...
...In Palestine, Arab nations had marched into the Holy Land, in the face of a U.N...
...But these other observations may ba drawn: 1. Military action as an instrument of national policy has once again led to tragedy and chaos, and only played into the propaganda hands of Communism...
...4. Republican irresponsibility and Communist influence — True, Prime Minister Soetan Sjahrir had had to resign soon after the March, 1947, Linggadjati agreement...
...good offices and promised respect for Council resolutions, and through U.N...
...The Soviet and Ukrainian delegations, amo'sg Indonesia's most vociferous U.N...
...Now there is an effort to find a way out, and the Netherlands itself has concluded the best solution would be to accelerate transfer of sovereignty to a Federal government shortly—a full year ahead of the Council's own time-table...
...Indie had invaded Hyderabad, and finished up the military job while the Security Council talked on...
...and moderate Prime Minister Mohammed Hatta had had difficulties with his government and Army...
...The tragedy of the Indonesian case, on<e so promising in the political phase of the U.N., and now so bitter a blow, whatever its outcome, is this: Warfare has once again been invoked as an instrument of national policy...
...14, the Republic had formally asked a Council session "on the basis of the utmost urgency and in view of the immediate threat to the peace...
...force which might have patrolled truce lines—for moral and symbolic value, even more than for military strength...
...THE GOOD OFFICES COMMITTEE...
...It never cleared up the question of legal jurisdiction, which might have been submitted to the International Court of Justice after the Council's very first cease-fire Aug...
Vol. 32 • May 1949 • No. 20
