Thoughts on Singapore-Indonesian tension: The naming of Indonesian vessel, the Harun Osman

Recently, the hot button foreign affair issue in the Singapore media has been about Singapore’s row with Indonesia over Indonesia’s naming of the navy ship Harun Osman. Harun Osman is taken after the names of two executed Indonesian commandos by the name of Harun Said, and Osman Hj Mohd Ali, who were responsible for setting off a time bomb at a place in Singapore known as the MacDonald House which killed 3 people and injured 33 others. The bombing was part of Indonesia’s armed opposition during the reign of Sukarno towards what was perceived as British attempts to withhold onto power in South East Asia after World War II.

The two commandos were arrested, put on trial, and sentenced to death. During the period of their detention, Sukarno was deposed by Suharto following the 30^th September Movement in 1965, who renounced the confrontational policy towards Malaysia; whilst the planned inclusion of Singapore into the Federation of Malaya went awry and Singapore became an independent state in 1965. Suharto petitions for a grant of clemency for the two commandos was turned down by the Singapore government, and the two commandos were executed shortly afterwards in 1968. Their bodies were returned to the Indonesian authorities which had them interred in a national heroes cemetery. Their hanging saw some 400 agitated students in Jakarta ransack the Singapore embassy, attack the consul’s residence and burn the Singapore flag, and bilateral ties remained tense for several years.  Supposedly, tensions were cooled after then Singapore Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew visited Indonesia, and sprinkled flowers over the graves of the two executed commandos. But it seems that any concealed deep-seethed misgivings towards Singapore for executing the two commandos are surfaced from the naming of the ship.

I have several thoughts and questions about the issue.

1.       The opinion of the Singapore government is that the two executed commandos were terrorists. The argument that they are goes that they targeted innocent civilians while not clothed in military uniforms. If they had been targeting military installations instead, they might have been deemd prisoner-of-wars rather than terrorists and been afforded certain protection that comes under the Geneva Convention on how Prisoner-of-Wars should be dealt with. However, I think the complication of this case as compared to the usual case of terrorism is that these soldiers could simply be carrying out the orders of the incumbent government to commit terrorist actions. How are they to be held accountable when that government is deposed and replaced by another government? I have read a blogger who argues that President Suharto was attempting to portray himself as distancing himself from the aggressive and expensive foreign interventionist policy in the region of his predecessor, so as to exculpate the two commandos for their actions.

2.       How much does domestic pressure plays in a government’s foreign policy? There are some examples in regional affairs where local domestic pressure in foreign regional countries causes their government to assume an antagnostic stance towards Singapore. In this case of the executed commandos, President Suharto could possibly have come under some form of domestic pressure to secure the release of the two commandos, which is possibly evidenced by the ransack of the Singapore embassy in Indonesia by the 400 agitated students. Another example where domestic pressure factored in was when the Philippines government threatened to cut off all diplomatic relations with Singapore during the Flor Contemplacion incident when a Filippino domestic worker was executed in Singapore for murder. But anyone claiming that the Singapore government had been ignorant of domestic pressure of the other countries in its foreign affairs dealing possibly misses out on taking into account the domestic pressure that is within Singapore as well. If there had been any domestic pressure that came upon the Singapore government in the executed commandos case, they most likely came from victims or relatives of those who were killed by the acts of the commandos. However, is it possible that sometimes, governments are the ones who incite domestic unrest towards foreign nations through their media as a way of building national solidarity and diverting attention from other important domestic issues?

3.       How should such gestures as the naming of the ship be interpreted by the Singapore government? Is it a bold affront by the authorties in Indonesia towards Singapore, a form of condescension by a big state towards a small state? Is it a way of testing the resolve of Singapore to assert itself? This seems to be the concern and sentiment of the Singapore government, who are probably concerned that any failure to speak up might be seen as weakness. Could it simply have been an oversight by the Indonesians to the sensitivities of neighboring nations. This seems to be the opinion of some Indonesian officials that the Singapore government is simply overreacting to what is a perfunctory tradition of naming ships after national heroes. Yet, there are other Indonesian officials who do make very aggressive statement towards Singapore, such as this comment “Let Singapore keep shrieking, like a chicken beaten by a stick” by Golkar MP Hajriyanto Thohari, deputy chairman of the People' Consultative Assembly. There are both hawks and doves in a country’s government, and I think if there is any concern by Singaporeans, it is whether these hawkish elements in neighboring governments are gaining more sway in their government.