There has been a great deal of change in Indonesia since 1998, when the long dictatorship of Suharto was overthrown. The transition to democracy has been fragile and slow. But it has allowed for a fairly strong and pragmatic leader to emerge in the person of Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, a man of experience.
Susilo on Sept. 20, 2004, was the first president to be directly elected by the people in the history of Indonesia. He defeated the incumbent President Megawati (Mega) Sukarnoputri, a housewife turned politician who had lost much of her popularity since early 2004 (see her background and that of her predecessors in Vol. 60, Gas Market Trends No. 12).
A retired four-star army general, Susilo had vowed to improve the country's socio-economic conditions, boost security and maintain the unity and long-term stability of Indonesia, and step up the fight against Islamic militancy.
With Indonesia having more Muslims than any other country, Susilo's political leadership has committed itself to upholding the country's secular political values and institutions. The leadership is relying on two segments of Indonesian society critical to its efforts to maintain a steady course: the military and the majority of moderate Muslims.
The military has a strong secular and nationalist tradition. It can be counted on to oppose any bid for power by Islamists. The political leadership is careful not to let public order deteriorate to an extent that might tempt the military to step back into political spheres which it vacated after Suharto's downfall.
The moderate Muslims are the strongest barrier to radical and anti-democratic tendencies, as well as the most effective potential allies of the US in the war on terrorism. How the US goes about establishing a democratic foundation in the Middle East will have a profound impact on public opinion in Indonesia and throughout the Muslim World. In this respect the US role in Iraq and the US-led war against global terrorism - now focusing on Osama bin Laden's Neo-Salafi/Wahhabi network al-Qaeda and its affiliates - are important where the Indonesian political leadership is concerned.
If the US can make a credible case that it is a reliable ally of Muslim democrats anywhere, it will have gone a long way towards putting ties with the Islamic World on a more enduring basis. This would strengthen the local as well as regional positions of Jakarta's political leadership - with emphasis on Indonesia's geo-strategic status as the biggest archipelago in the world and the most vital link between the Middle East and the Far East.
Indonesia's geo-strategic position is of particular importance to the US as well. The Strait of Malacca, between Indonesia's island of Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula, has been the scene of attacks on passing oil and gas tankers by political groups, notably including the Free Aceh Movement and Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). Both are Indonesian and dangerous, with JI affiliated to al-Qaeda, and the Aceh group consisting of separatists. If the latter manage to secede, the danger of Indonesian dismemberment will be come extremely serious in view of so many separatist movements in this archipelago. There is always the danger of a JI-Qaeda operation blocking energy traffic along the Strait of Malacca.
Indonesia faces territorial disputes, mainly a potentially major problem with China, including one with Malaysia over petroleum-rich offshore areas. The one with Malaysia is being negotiated peacefully in the hope the two states would have a diplomatic settlement.
In view of these and other dangers, the political leadership in Jakarta needs to modernise its armed forces as well as bolster its navy on a large scale. President Susilo is hoping a strategic alliance with the US could help boost Indonesia's military capabilities on the scale required.
Jakarta's revival of the strategic alliance between the US and Indonesia, with the Bush administration Bush eager to maintain military links largely to help combat terrorism, in 2005 featured US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's reinstatement of US military training assistance for Indonesia, an important step towards restoring full military ties.
