Tensions continue to rise in the Indo-Pacific, where China's economic growth and military modernization have drawn the attention and concern of politicians and defense officials in the region and around the world.
As China and the US compete for influence in the region, they are setting their sights on a country that has historically resisted getting involved in foreign affairs: Indonesia.
With over 270 million people, Indonesia is the fourth-largest country in the world and the third-largest in Asia. Made up of over 17,000 islands that straddle the Pacific and Indian oceans, it has a commanding position over the vital Strait of Malacca and the traditional maritime approaches to Australia.
"The geopolitical challenges of the future, Indonesia sits in an incredibly important strategic location," Michael Green, senior vice president for Asia and Japan chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Insider.
Indonesia's importance to China, the region, and the world is hard to overstate, and while it maintains neutrality on most matters, it is pursuing a massive military modernization effort.Indonesia has long avoided picking sides between superpowers. A former Dutch colony, it took an anti-imperialist stance upon independence in 1949 under President Sukarno.
Indonesia was a founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement during the Cold War, and even hosted the group's first meeting in 1955. By the 1960s, though, Sukarno was tilting Indonesia toward Beijing and the Communist bloc.
The military, with the support of the US and other Western governments, reversed that tilt with a violent purge of Indonesian Communist Party (KPI) members, suspected leftists, and other minority groups after a failed coup attempt in 1965 for which the KPI was blamed.The campaign is believed to have killed between 500,000 and 3 million people between 1965 and 1966. Communism was subsequently banned and remains so today, but Indonesia has never fully aligned with the West.
"Indonesia has a complicated history" with the US, Green said. "It's kind of been like a pendulum, back and forth."
Indonesia's relations with the West were strained during the latter half of the 20th century by its rivalry with Australia, criticism of Indonesia's human-rights record, and US and Australian support for East Timor's independence.
In the early 2000s, US military interventions in the Middle East were also viewed negatively in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim-majority country.
Relations have improved over the past 15 years, aided by increased security cooperation, especially on terrorism, and by US support after the 2004 earthquake and tsunami that killed over 130,000 Indonesians.
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