Nevertheless the parallels of East Timor and Kosovo represent an interesting challenge for leftists and I appreciate Michael Pollak linking the issues.
Massacres are occurring now in hundreds. Journalists fear to witness them, and the total figures are probably already in the thousands. The fascist militia are herding the population into confined areas, including, interestingly, onto the beaches.
Of course if East Timor had geographically been more like Kosovo it would have been easier to organise their expulsion with a measure of order (plus purely exemplary terror): they could have been herded over borders and their identity papers, together with their money systematically removed so they could not come back. That would be punishment enough for seeking self-determination.
Of course no two situations are identical. Yugoslavia was a sovereign state and it was a gross breach of international conventions for the NATO powers to attack it for an internal affair, however deplorably the dominant Serbs were abusing the Kosovans right to self-determination. East Timor was an independent country that was annexed by Indonesia.
But wait a moment. Yugoslavia (South Slavia) was an artificial country created at Versailles and placed under the represssive rule of Serbian King Alexander incorporating a territory long predominantly Albanian in character. Whereas the international legal framework that Indonesia overthrew in occupying East Timor was pure colonialism. Why should the boundaries set by colonial countries, Portugal and the Netherlands, half a world away, have any legal or moral authority? Why should the border between east and west Timor be any more sacred than the border between Iraq and Kuwait, the latter clearly also being a product of colonialism.
So my question to the fellow leftist subscribers to LBO talk is this: are you in favour of any sort of intervention in East Timor by the west?
The question can be dodged indefinitely. It can be ignored. Or it can be finessed with any number of articles in revolutionary or not so revolutionary papers putting the blame on imperialism.
Undoubtedly imperialism is much to blame. I have given one argument above. Another, undoubtedly true, is about western arms merchants arming the Indonesian military as zealously as the armed Sadam Hussein. Indeed Inonesia is one of the honoured guests on a forthcoming government sponsored arms exhibition in London this month.
Not many of these arms relatively speaking got to the East Timorese freedom fighters but those they did probably fell into the hands of some pretty suspect types, clearly courted by the CIA and guilty of atrocities in turn against other civilians. Besides the main movement in East Timor is represented by a prominent Catholic and we all know of the thoroughly dubious nature of the Roman Catholic church and its links with reaction and treacherous reformism throughout the world.
There is really no difficulty in churning out one of any number of permutions of articles that effectively, and in many ways correctly, put the blame on the ruling classes of the world. The necessarily contemplative stance of the articles can be compensated by the bitterness of the sarcasm.
Indeed the world can be analysed in many ways. But the point is to change it.
So the tough question I would like addressed is, are subscribers in favour of western intervention in East Timor. AND IF SO WHAT?
Because be in no doubt it has already happened. The west is on the slippery slope for which it must take full responsibility, of involvement, just as it got involved in Yugoslavia and in Bosnia.
Most immediately there is a single British warship in the area on patrol. While the Indonesian militias wage war against the civilian population of east Timor and herd them on the beach, is it not obvious that that ship should evacuate them? Well isn't it? And the next ten thousand, and the next ten thousand.
So should not threats be made to the Indonesian authorities? They undoubtedly already have been. Indeed that, some revolutionaries could claim, is part of the problem. The outbreak of violence against the population of East Timor was clearly precipitated by the election that the west kept pressing for and which has no backing in actual local power politics. It is clear that Timor has always been part of the south East Asian archipelago just as what is now called Kuwait was always part of the Mesopotamian economic and cultural area.
Admittedly the West is not bombing bridges in Jakarta yet, but its interference and promotion of elections in East Timor has clearly precipitated the massacre that is just about to happen. True or false?
The joint announcement of the results in Dili and in the UN was a deliberate form of coercion on Indonesia, which will have been backed by more confidential and subtle threats about cutting IMF payments. Signals are almost certainly going now to Habibi to order the military to disarm the fascist militia. But as in Kosovo the fascist militia were an integral part of government policy. And Habibi can say convincingly that the generals are out of his control.
This morning Portugal has gone public that a massacre is about to happen. Australia, although not part of the NATO coalition that attacked Yugoslavia, has publically verbally attacked Indonesia. What they have said in private we can only guess, but they are the only power in the region capable of attacking the Indonesian military.
So the options for the west, and for any progressive left winger who might hope to influence western governments rather than writing passive propagandist articles of withering cynicism, are
a) do nothing (always an option)
b) send in humanitarian aid (always an option, sounds good, and will undoubtedly happen)
c) evacuate the refugees, as many of the half a million population that the militias want to expel to make the remainder cower and give up their right to self-determination. Settle them in Australia. Queensland might be climatically most similar and their could be psycho-educational progams and laws to manage a racist backlash.
d) arm the independence fighters for what has to be a war of independence.
e) order the Indonesian military out on pain of attack, by Australian forces (to minimise the risk of a single member of the US armed forces being killed.
f) ride out any protests by China including the fact that it is reported it would veto a "peace force" in the UN security council
g) bomb bridges in Jakarta (trying this time to avoid the Chinese embassy).
h) reform the global capitalist system and the United Nations so there is an accepted system of world governance
i) do nothing, an option always present, and always worth repeating.
But if leftists think they avoid any responsibility however small, by deciding to steer clear of all the pitfalls of partial solutions whether reformist or less reformist, they should not assume that they are not involved.
Because they are, because the system of capitalism is global.
And "do nothing" is also involvement in the concrete situation.
Chris Burford
London