September 30th: A day to remember in Indonesian history.
September 30th is a day Indonesians have had on the calendar of events for the last 40 years. On the day 40 years ago a group of young military officers kidnapped and killed six generals and accused them of trying to overthrow the government. Major General Suharto took command of the military and the country soon after.
He maintained this control for 30 years under a no-nonsense dictatorship (no-nonsense of course depending on your point of view). As part of the national indoctrination Indonesians were forced to watch a government film about the coup, which blamed Communists for everything and gave Suharto carte-blanche to accuse and kill anyone who opposed him. The film of course put another spin on events portraying Suharto as the Father of the Nation.
Times have changed, but the scars are still with members of the older generation. For some reason Suharto had an almost Nazi hatred of Chinese, even though he was part Chinese. A wave of killing started across the country in December 1965 and lasted until March 1966, the Chinese being targeted as well as other 'Communists'. Some estimates say 100,000 people were killed in Bali alone.
Here is Kuta I haven't heard anything about this day. It is interesting to note that many so called civilized countries have at some point in their history had massacres of civilians. Indonesians are just learning about their own recent history.
By Nick | Permalink
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There are suspicions of Suharto’s involvement or having prior knowledge of the plan to kill those generals.
1. A few days before the event, Suharto was at a hospital comforting his youngest son Tommy who was ill. Colonel Latif, one of the plot leaders, visited him at the hospital and the two had serious discussion. No one knows what they were discussing.
2. No one can explain satisfactorily why Suharto was not targeted by the assasins, eventhough he held a very powerful position as the commander of the elite KOSTRAD, the Army Strategic Reserve, based in Jakarta. He should have been a natural target.
3. He lied about getting the SUPERSEMAR mandate that formed the legal basis for the tranfer of power from president Sukarno to him. He has never shown the original document that has Sukarno’s signature. Thus, he commited coup d’tat against Sukarno.