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Early history
East Timor has long been involved in international trade. Before the Portuguese
arrived, the island's precious woods were traded with both the Chinese
and the Arabs who bought them by barter; exchanging axes, pottery,
lead and other goods for sandalwood.
The local population was culturally diverse and nearly thirty ethnic languages have been identified. The Portugese (see below) encouraged the use of Tetum as a common language. Society was hierarchical: at the top were the liurai (kings or chiefs), then there were the dato (lesser nobles), the ema-reino (freemen), the ato (slaves) and the lutum (nomadic shepherds.)
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Colonial era
Timor was "discovered" by Portuguese navigators in the sixteenth century.
Over the next two centuries, contact between the Timorese and the Portuguese
centred around Portuguese-sponsored missionary activities.
In the eighteenth century, the Portuguese stepped up the colonisation process and
established a seat of government in Timor. The Portuguese were not the only
colonial power in the area and found themselves in conflict with the Dutch over Timor.
Shortly after establishing government in Timor, the Portuguese abandoned
the western half of the island to the Dutch. The division of the island
was officially set down in a treaty between the Portuguese and the Dutch
in 1859. This treaty was not
formally ratified by the two governments until 1904.
The local people resisted the colonisation of their island. There were armed insurrections in 1719, 1895 and 1959. Some Dominican missionaries supported these revolts against the government.
Although under Portuguese influence for such a long time, the Portuguese had little direct effect on the culture. Until the nineteenth century, the liurai (traditional rulers) effectively avoided direct control, and as Portugal went into decline after the first world war, East Timor was largely neglected.
During World War II, Japan occupied East Timor. With considerable help from the Timorese, several hundred Australian soldiers carried out a guerrilla war on the island. The cost for helping the Australians was high, villages were burned, and food supplies were seized. The number of Timorese killed by Japanese and in the allied bombing that preceded recapture is estimated at 40,000.
Portugal was given East Timor back after the war and continued to neglect the island. But the economy began to improve and this, coupled with a general world-wide move towards decolonization, encouraged more and more Timorese to consider independence.
Although the 1959 insurrection failed, the internal pressure for independence increased and in the 1970's a national liberation front was formed. Events in Portugal precipitated the situation, the fall of the fascist regime there in April 1974 significantly strengthened the independence movement in East Timor. The new Portuguese government legalised pro-independence groups and in September 1974 FRETELIN, the Revolutionary Front for the Independence of East Timor was founded.
Despite its bright start, the decolonisation process was to go radically wrong. Within East Timor, the colonial administration was concerned that things were going too quickly. They helped to form UDT, the Timor Democratic Union, which campaigned for a more gradual move to independence and possible federation with Portugal. Between them, UDT and FRETELIN had the support of 90% of the Timorese population. A third force entered East Timorese politics, APODETI, the Timor Popular Democratic Association, which supported integration with Indonesia. This group had been set up by the Indonesian consulate and failed to gain significant support. Indonesia had been a Dutch colony, a large nation it was comprised of numerous islands colonised by the Dutch in the area, one of which was West Timor.
At some point in 1974 the Indonesian generals had set up a covert intelligence operation, Operasi Komodo, which aimed to bring about East Timor's integration with Indonesia by any means.
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The "excuse" for the Indonesian invasion was an armed conflict between UDT and FRETELIN, which was in fact largely engineered by the Indonesian army.
UDT attempted a coup in August 1975. A few days before this, the leaders of UDT, who had no knowledge of any ulterior Indonesian motives, were flown to Jakarta. There they were told, in confidence, by General Murtopo that FRETILIN was a communist group and that they were being trained by the North Vietnamese to take over East Timor. The UDT coup was designed to preempt this, completely fictitious, FRETILIN coup.
FRETILIN resisted the UDT takeover and there was a brief armed conflict between the two groups. But within three weeks of the UDT coup, the conflict was over and FRETILIN was in control of the territory. The Indonesian army though continued to claim that there was an ongoing problem and the Indonesian (government controlled) national press reported increasing chaos within East Timor. With very little international press interest these stories were accepted without question.
To give further credence to these stories, the Indonesians launched, on October 16, an attack from West Timor. They claimed that this was an attack by the UDT and that this showed the conflict was ongoing. In fact by this stage most of the leaders of the UDT were being held in a refugee camp in West Timor well out of the way. The Indonesian attack went wrong - five western journalists were killed and the Indonesians were successfully bogged down by FRETILIN resistance. There is evidence to suggest that, following the deaths of the western journalists, the Indonesian government temporarily halted the invasion, afraid of a negative reaction from western governments. There was none. The Indonesian government took this as a sign that their invasion would be tolerated. They began to make a series of small incursions to give support to their story that they were only going in to protect the East Timorese from an on-going civil war. In an attempt to get some international recognition, FRETILIN declared unilateral independence on November 28th 1975. The Indonesians responded with a full-scale and very public invasion on December 7th.
There was fierce resistance in Dili to this invasion but this was quelled by massive Indonesian reinforcements. On 25th and 26th of December landings at Liquica and Maubara led to more mass killings. By the end of February 1976, the Indonesian appointed government of East Timor admitted that 60,000 East Timorese had died since the invasion. Many Timorese sought refuge behind FRETILIN lines, nearly half a million people may have been displaced in the first few months after the invasion.
By April 1976 there were 32,000 Indonesian troops in East Timor and 10,000 in West Timor. On the 31 May a people's assembly was convened by the army. On the 2nd of June, the delegates (all 28 of them, "supervised" by the army) asked the Indonesian government to annex East Timor. On the 17th of July President Suharto signed a bill that made East Timor Indonesia's 27th province. The UN has never accepted this assembly as legitimate and, under International law, the annexation of East Timor remains illegal.
Officially, the decolonisation process was never completed in East Timor and the UN recognises Portugal as the administrative power. Portugal was suffering from internal difficulties at the time of the invasion and effectively abandoned East Timor to the Indonesians. They have, however, never accepted the annexation and the Portuguese have campaigned strongly for the East Timorese, particularly over the last few years.
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Gaining control of their new 27th province proved difficult for the Indonesian regime. The East Timorese resisted strongly and the situation only moved significantly in the Indonesian's favour when they managed to acquire counter-insurgency aircraft from a number of western states (See Western Complicity below). These were used to bomb the mountainous areas, where most of the population was hiding. Casualties came not just from the bombing itself, but the attacks were so intense that it was impossible to farm and many people died from starvation.
Finally, in 1978 and 79 what was left of the population began to return to their homes, in an attempt to escape the famine and relentless attacks. In order to further depress the people, the Indonesian army split up many communities and forcibly resettled them.
By the end of 1979, the Indonesian generals believed that they had destroyed all resistance. FRETILIN, who had led the armed resistance, had suffered huge losses and their leader, Nicolau dos Rein Lobato, had been killed in combat in December 1978. The people had also suffered, an estimated 200,000 out of a total population of 700,000 had died. (Although they had initially been enemies, UDT also joined FRETILIN in their resistance to the Indonesians.)
But resistance continued. FRETILIN regrouped under their new leader, Xanana Gusmao, and the guerrilla war continued throughout the 1980's. (A ceasefire was negotiated between Gusmao and the head of the Indonesian forces in East Timor in 1983 but rejected by President Suharto).
In 1988 FRETILIN and UDT set up a coordinating body, CNRM - the National Council for Maubere resistance, through which they could work together for an independent East Timor. Xanana Gusmao, now a CNRM as well as Fretelin leader, was appointed head of the National Armed Forces for the Liberation of East Timor (FALINTIL). (In 1998, the CNRM became CNRT, the national council for Timorese resistance)
Since the invasion, the Indonesian regime has acted with brutality towards the local population. The traditional community structures were destroyed by resettlement. Movement was so restricted that famine often arose simply because people could not get to the land to farm. Numerous cases of rape, murder and political imprisonment have been documented.
What has been the role of the international community in all this ?
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(Western in a cultural sense, most of the countries named are in fact to the north-west, south and north-east of East Timor).
On the 22nd of December 1975, the UN Security Council condemned the invasion of East Timor. Since then numerous resolutions supporting the East Timorese have been passed. Portugal, in 1988, managed to secure both European Commission and Parliament support. In 1989 the UN Human Rights sub-commission also expressed concern. But despite this, East Timor was effectively off the International agenda. Why ?
Most of the major western states tacitly supported the invasion. US President Gerald Ford was in Jakarta just prior to the invasion. The Australian Government was one of the first to recognise the Indonesian takeover as legitimate and its failure to pursue the death of five journalists working for two Australian news agencies in October 1975 may have encouraged the Indonesian government to proceed.
Sales of weapons and aid to Indonesia have been significant. Without the large supplies, including counter-insurgency aircraft bought in 1977, the Indonesian victory would have been far from inevitable. America supplied large amounts of military equipment. Both Britain and France supplied aircraft. Indonesian military personnel were trained in the west.
It is unlikely that Indonesia would have succeeded in their takeover without this support.
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Last updated: 19/07/99
