Supardjo

Last updated February 25, 2019

Supardjo was a Brigadier General in the Indonesian Army. He was one of the leaders of the 30 September Movement, a group that killed six of the army's top generals and launched a failed coup attempt on 30 September 1965.

The Indonesian Army, the land component of the Indonesian National Armed Forces, has an estimated strength of 300,000 active personnel. The history of the Indonesian Army has its roots in 1945 when the Tentara Keamanan Rakyat (TKR) "Civil Security Forces" first emerged as a paramilitary and police corps.

The Thirtieth of September Movement was a self-proclaimed organization of Indonesian National Armed Forces members who, in the early hours of 1 October 1965, assassinated six Indonesian Army generals in an abortive coup d'état. Later that morning, the organisation declared that it was in control of media and communication outlets and had taken President Sukarno under its protection. By the end of the day, the coup attempt had failed in Jakarta at least. Meanwhile, in central Java there was an attempt to take control over an army division and several cities. By the time this rebellion was put down, two more senior officers were dead.

Supardjo was regimental commander of the Siliwangi Division which was stationed in West Java. As a result of his pro-Communist sympathies and actions, he was sent to Kalimantan, away from the centres of power on Java, and took part in the Indonesian actions against British and Malaysian troops in Borneo (see Konfrontasi ). Based at Menggaian in West Kalimantan, he led the Fourth Combat Command of KOSTRAD, the army's strategic reserve.

West Java is a province of Indonesia. It is located in the western part of the island of Java and its capital and largest urban center is Bandung, although much of its population in the northwest corner of the province live in areas suburban to the larger urban area of Jakarta, though that city itself lies outside the administrative province. With a population of 46.3 million West Java is the most populous of Indonesia's provinces.

Kalimantan is the Indonesian portion of the island of Borneo. It comprises 73% of the island's area. The non-Indonesian parts of Borneo are Brunei and East Malaysia. In Indonesia, "Kalimantan" refers to the whole island of Borneo.

Java is an island of Indonesia, bordered by the Indian Ocean on the south and the Java Sea on the north. With a population of over 141 million or 145 million, Java is the home to 56.7 percent of the Indonesian population and is the world's most populous island. The Indonesian capital city, Jakarta, is located on its northwestern coast. Much of Indonesian history took place on Java. It was the center of powerful Hindu-Buddhist empires, the Islamic sultanates, and the core of the colonial Dutch East Indies. Java was also the center of the Indonesian struggle for independence during the 1930s and 1940s. Java dominates Indonesia politically, economically and culturally. Four of Indonesia's eight UNESCO world heritage sites are located in Java: Ujung Kulon National Park, Borobudur Temple, Prambanan Temple, and Sangiran Early Man Site.

On 28 September 1965, he left his post without the knowledge of then KOSTRAD commander, Suharto (later President of Indonesia). He had received a telegram from his wife stating that his child was sick. At Supardjo's trial in 1967, an ex-Communist official testified that the cable was code between Supardjo and Communist participating in the coup, and that the real reason for his return to Java was to help command the coup.

Suharto was an Indonesian military leader and politician who served as the second President of Indonesia, holding the office for 31 years, from the ousting of Sukarno in 1967 until his resignation in 1998. He was widely regarded by foreign commentators as a dictator. However, his legacy is still debated at home and abroad.

The President of the Republic of Indonesia is the head of state and also head of government of the Republic of Indonesia. The president leads the executive branch of the Indonesian government and is the commander-in-chief of the Indonesian National Armed Forces.

Some Supardjo's military colleagues reported he was resentful over his slow pace of promotion and may have had a grudge against army commander, General Yani, who was one of the 30 September Movement's principal victims. According to General Sarwo Edhie Wibowo, commander of the fiercely anti-communist RPKAD para-commandos, Supardjo requested RPKAD reinforcements be sent to Kalimantan on 1 October. When Sarwo Edhie heard of the coup attempt, the sailing orders to Kalimantan were cancelled.

Sarwo Edhie Wibowo was an Indonesian military leader and the father of Kristiani Herrawati, the former first lady of Indonesia and the wife of president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and also the father of Chief of Staff Pramono Edhie Wibowo. As an army colonel he played a role in directing troops during the Indonesian killings of 1965–66, in which more than a million Indonesian civilians died. Later, he served as Chairman of the BP-7 center, as Indonesia's ambassador for South Korea and as governor of the Indonesian Military academy.

The Supardjo Document

Background

In the years following the failure of the 30 September Movement, General Supardjo wrote an analysis of the movement, titled Some Factors That Influenced the Defeat of ‘the September 30th Movement’ as Viewed from a Military Perspective. A copy of these personal notes, now known as the ‘Supardjo Document’, was intercepted by military officers and added to the records of the military court that tried Supardjo in 1967. In the document, Supardjo reflects on what may have caused the September 30th Movement to fail, based upon his military experience and what he witnessed throughout the event.

Importance

Supardjo wrote this document while on the run as he had already been stripped of his rank and dismissed from the military. This key fact is what gives the document its importance, and historian John Roosa notes that the document may be the most important primary source on the movement.^[1] The Supardjo Document is the only primary source which was written by a participant of the September 30th Movement before his arrest. The fact that the document was written before he was arrested means that there was no chance for the military to influence his testimony unlike those from other generals, which led to many unreliable narratives as most of their stories were either coerced through torture or fabricated by the media.

Before the movement, Supardjo was a highly decorated military officer. He was the highest ranking officer to participate in the movement as Commander of the Fourth Combat Command of the Mandala Vigilance Command. Many are quick to assume that Supardjo had a significant role in planning the movement due to the fact that he was the highest ranking officer; however, he confesses in the document that he only arrived in Jakarta three days before the event.

Supardjo’s role within the movement is a unique one as he can be viewed both as an outsider and insider. Being stationed along the border between Indonesia and Malaysia in the months leading up to the movement, he could not have been too heavily involved in the planning of the movement. The fact that he was not directly involved in the planning and was not too close with many of the other planning generals assigns him more of the role of the detached spectator. There were plenty of detached spectators of the time who could have given their opinions on the movement, but it is Supardjo’s additional role as an insider that makes his document reliable. Once the movement was initiated, Supardjo and the core organizers made plans for how they should proceed at their hideout at Halim Air Base. Furthermore, the fact that the core organizers also trusted Supardjo to talk to the president on their behalf proves that they believed him to be an essential asset to their plans.

The basis of the Supardjo document is an explanation of why Supardjo believed the movement was a failure, but it also provides reliable information on the leadership of the movement and answers many questions that historians have had for a long time. With regards to the leadership of the movement, Supardjo clears up the common misconception that he was the leader of the movement by stressing that he neither commanded any of the troops that were supplied by other organizers of the movement nor supplied any troops. Supardjo concluded that the movement was in fact led, “by the party” since he knew of Sjam’s role as a representative of the PKI. While there were questions for a long time over who truly led the movement stemming from a questionable claim of responsibility from Sjam at his trial, Supardjo states that there were three levels of leadership heading the movement. The first level was the head group which he believes consisted of the PKI Leadership, followed by the second level which was Sjam and his friends which made up the Special Bureau, and finally followed by Colonel Untung and the other military officers.

Since he was not involved in the planning meetings, Supardjo’s role as an outsider could cast doubt on the accuracy of the document. This lack of involvement could have led to unfamiliarity about the movement and the party itself, which does cause some discrepancies in his document, such as the number and purpose of sectors that Jakarta was divided into.^[2] Supardjo had said that there were 3 sectors, whose purpose were to provide food to the troops. Njono, the head of the PKI in Jakarta, however, recalled that there were 6 sectors, each of which were to be provided food by the troops.

However, Supardjo’s status as the highest ranking officer and direct contact with the core group of organizers makes this document reliable enough to draw accurate conclusions from.

Supardjo cites a number of reasons for the failure of the movement. Primarily, he notes that the movement had neither an overall leader nor a clear chain of command. There was a loose structure in the cooperation between the PKI and the military, and the two groups were constantly arguing over courses of strategic action, which led to moments of indecisiveness during critical points in the movement.

However, Supardjo later reveals in the document that the PKI was the true body behind the movement, and for that reason, he believes Kamaruzaman Sjam played the leading role. He viewed Sjam as an arrogant and stubborn individual who was both stiff to criticism and adamant that the movement would not fail. Sjam had falsely assumed that troops throughout Indonesia were ready to revolt. He wanted the movement to be “the fuse of a bomb rather than the bomb itself”,^[3] and hoped that the movement would incite large-scale rebellions nationwide. However, the leaders of the movement did not verify beforehand that the PKI masses were ready to respond to any military action.

Another failure that Supardjo mentions is that the organizers of the movement did not have a backup plan in case the movement did not succeed. Not only was there no backup plan, but the original plan itself was not fully complete. Furthermore, when Ahmad Yani, the supreme army commander, was assassinated during the movement, Sukarno chose Pranoto Reksosamudro to be his replacement, but Pranoto did not assert the power that Sukarno vested in him and failed to oppose Suharto for control of the army. Had Pranoto done so, Supardjo suggests that the movement could have been saved.

Notes

↑ Roosa 2006, p. 83.
↑ Roosa 2006, p. 102.
↑ Roosa 2006, p. 96.

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References

Hughes, John (2002). The End of Sukarno: A Coup that Misfired: A Purge that Ran Wild. Archipelago Press. ISBN 981-4068-65-9.
Roosa, John (2006). Pretext for Mass Murder. University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 029-9220-34-6.

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[FOOTNOTERoosa200683-1] Roosa 2006, p. 83.

[FOOTNOTERoosa2006102-2] Roosa 2006, p. 102.

[FOOTNOTERoosa200696-3] Roosa 2006, p. 96.